obama..takes care of our vets

[Danzig]

http://www.salon.com/2012/08/06/is_drone_war_moral/

Protocol I of the Geneva Convention clearly states that there is a legal requirement to accept the surrender of an individual who expresses the intent to surrender himself. Such a person is literally considered “outside of combat” and thus even if he is a combatant at the point where he surrenders he is as illegitimate a target as any other civilian. Drone warfare, of course, offers no inherent facility to deal with such individuals, save for killing them or conversely allowing them safe passage — the latter being an extremely unlikely outcome in most cases. The oft-horrific result of such a circumstance has been noted by the people most intimately familiar with the program itself. As former vice-chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff James Cartwright put it, “To me, the weakness in the drone activity is that if there’s no one on the ground, and the person puts his hands out, he can’t surrender … What makes it worse with a Predator is you’re actually watching it. You know when he puts his hands up.”


Roughly speaking, there are two types of drone strikes that can be carried out: ones where the identity of the target is known and ones where it is not. The latter are known as “signature strikes” – drone strikes that are carried out against targets whose names, ages, occupations and political sympathies are completely unknown but who are still killed based on the opinions of those observing from abroad as to whether they are connected to militant activity. Behavior that may arouse such suspicion includes a group of males meeting together in an area considered hostile, a car driving in an area where militants are believed to be operating and other highly speculative and unverifiable rationales. In the revelations about the Obama administration’s secret “kill lists,” it also came out what exactly the official definition of a “militant” is from the White House’s perspective: “All military-age males in a strike zone.” In other words: Every man killed by a drone is by official definition a militant according to the U.S. government and correspondingly the news organizations who release reports regularly citing “militant” deaths.



As many have noted, this policy of “kill first, ask questions later” is tantamount to extra-judicial murder and the supposed moral benefit of firing accurate missiles is greatly reduced when you don’t even know who is on the other end of them.

[Danzig]

the same people saying bush should be 'on trial for war crimes' say nothing about obama and his use of 'signature' strikes. bush was bad because he ordered captured militants to gitmo and other bases.
but obama-he just kills them and others with drone strikes, so it's all okey-dokey.

[Riot]

Originally Posted by Danzig

the same people saying bush should be 'on trial for war crimes' say nothing about obama and his use of 'signature' strikes.

Nonsense. You could read the lefty world more. There are plenty of lefties that are refusing to vote for Obama, and far more lefties that would put Obama up on charges at the Hague immediately than neocon right wingers who forgive because they secretly get off on the aggression, while bemoaning the lack of defense contracts compared to Iraq.

The right has forgiven Bush, even if he can't travel to Europe without be arrested as a war criminal.

[Rudeboyelvis]

Originally Posted by Danzig

the same people saying bush should be 'on trial for war crimes' say nothing about obama and his use of 'signature' strikes. bush was bad because he ordered captured militants to gitmo and other bases.
but obama-he just kills them and others with drone strikes, so it's all okey-dokey.

The daughter of the assistant Police Chief of St. Petersburg was killed last week in Afghanistan along with three other by a suicide bomber dressed as an Afghani Intelligence Officer.

Here's a link to the story in the local paper - though it doesn't go into much detail surrounding the circumstances:

http://www.tampabay.com/news/militar...nistan/1256424

What is very interesting to note, is that the suicide bomber previously had no ties whatsoever to Al Queda or the Taliban - he was a simple tribesman caring for his family.
That was until a drone wiped out some of his family - or specifically, an uncle who had held a fairly high stature within the tribe, and by tribal law, his unprovoked attack and subsequent death was required to be avenged.

So there you have it. It isn't bad enough to unilaterally occupy a sovereign nation and go to war against an undefined enemy, with no exit strategy or even so much as an end game, but now we are giving the non-Al Queda afghani's an excuse to be recruited to kill our kids. But BigDumb loves it -

[Danzig]

yeah, that was mentioned in an article i read about the drone strikes. that people who weren't involved are becoming so because their relatives are killed and were in no way involved as terrorists.
a bad war is a bad war, regardless of who, or how it's being waged. a 'war' on terror has as much of a chance of ultimate success as a war on drugs.

the terror 'war' can't be waged conventionally, because it's not a country. that explains why we're still in afganistan after all these years, with no winning end in sight. terrorists are individuals in various countries. they're criminals and must be handled the same as any other criminal. they should have never been elevated to combatant status. they aren't combatants. they're members of gangs essentially.

[dellinger63]

Originally Posted by bigrun

True statement

Not suprisingly you and the village idiot are again wrong. If you want to support the troops support their candidate!

The Obama campaign had been hoping that veterans and their families — especially among the post-Sept. 11 generation that served in Iraq and Afghanistan — would be part of their path to victory: They’re a high turn-out demographic and concentrated in battleground states, with nearly 1 million each in North Carolina, Ohio and Virginia, and 1.6 million in Florida.

But recent polls make clear that the president’s campaign is losing the battle. Even as Obama leads in Colorado, Florida, Ohio and Virginia, Mitt Romney is up by double digits among veterans in those states. Nationwide, he’s got a commanding 20-percentage-point lead over Obama and has even overtaken the president with younger veterans.

Instead, even as Obama has been gaining in the overall polls, several NBC/Wall Street Journal/Marist polls conducted from Sept. 9-11 had Romney well ahead of Obama among veterans in Florida, Ohio and Virginia. And in Colorado, a poll released Sept. 16 by SurveyUSA and the Denver Post found both veterans and military families supporting Romney over Obama 53 percent to 39 percent in a survey that included third-party candidates.

Back in May, Obama had the lead among Afghanistan and Iraq veterans. But a Reuters/Ipsos poll from September says that’s evaporated, with Romney now up 48 percent to 34 percent.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories...#ixzz2AEhkUY5n

[Danzig]

figured this was as good a place as any regarding talk on defense. i read that romney said during the debate that the us navy is smaller than at any time since 1916, the air force since 1947. so, i did some looking.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-me...7-air-force-s/


shocking that romney wasn't quite correct. note in the article that the navy actually is slightly larger ship number wise than during bushes terms. also, does anyone, anyone think that our navy is less than what it should be? that it's 'weaker' than what we had pre-ww1? or that our air force is not as good as post ww2?? that anyone is at all a threat to not exceed, but even match our firepower? does romney, or anyone, pay any attention at all to what our military actually has? what it can do?
there's a reason no country has attempted to attack us since japan got suddenly completely stupid in 1941. no one, no one, can match us militarily. not enough get to half of what we've got. and good christ, the amount of weaponry we could quickly produce because of our industrial capability-it's insane.

which is why i have said all along that romney is incorrect regarding defense spending.
when are people going to sit down and actually look at where most of our federal dollars are going? when will our political 'leaders' do something about this?

probably never.

[jms62]

Originally Posted by Danzig

figured this was as good a place as any regarding talk on defense. i read that romney said during the debate that the us navy is smaller than at any time since 1916, the air force since 1947. so, i did some looking.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-me...7-air-force-s/


shocking that romney wasn't quite correct. note in the article that the navy actually is slightly larger ship number wise than during bushes terms. also, does anyone, anyone think that our navy is less than what it should be? that it's 'weaker' than what we had pre-ww1? or that our air force is not as good as post ww2?? that anyone is at all a threat to not exceed, but even match our firepower? does romney, or anyone, pay any attention at all to what our military actually has? what it can do?
there's a reason no country has attempted to attack us since japan got suddenly completely stupid in 1941. no one, no one, can match us militarily. not enough get to half of what we've got. and good christ, the amount of weaponry we could quickly produce because of our industrial capability-it's insane.

which is why i have said all along that romney is incorrect regarding defense spending.
when are people going to sit down and actually look at where most of our federal dollars are going? when will our political 'leaders' do something about this?

probably never.

Some folks cant see the hypocrisy of wanting a bigger defense budget and no defecit. I'll redboard. If we don't have these 2 unfunded wars, we don't have a defecit. Our enemies know the only way to defeat this country is to destroy its economy and it will crumble from the inside as we all turn against each other. They tried to do that on 9-11 and our leaders (Bush and Obama because we are still there) have helped them since. Now Romney wants to speed things up by increasing Military spending and go after Iran. I wont even get into him raising taxes of all of us to pay for his and his 1% ers tax cuts. And many of us who rile against the defecit are chomping at the bit to vote for him. Are we a reality challanged nation ?

[Danzig]

yeah, the math just doesn't work. he's going to cut taxes, increase defense spending, still fund medicare and ss as they are right now-how? if we can't pay our bills with the current tax rate, how will we with less revenue? magic?

[jms62]

Originally Posted by Danzig

yeah, the math just doesn't work. he's going to cut taxes, increase defense spending, still fund medicare and ss as they are right now-how? if we can't pay our bills with the current tax rate, how will we with less revenue? magic?

Magic underwear

[bigrun]

Stewart on vets retraining and a bit on Trump and Palin...and his guest is Dakota Meyer, MOH recepient...



http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-epi...2-dakota-meyer

[bigrun]

A CIA veteran transforms U.S. counterterrorism policy

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...c=nl_headlines

[Danzig]

http://news.yahoo.com/drone-of-silen...-10251296.html

an article i just read on yahoo about the drones, and the 16 year old us citizen killed by a drone strike.

some excerpts:

Yet Gibbs was one of Obama’s closest advisers during the early days of the administration when the president began personally picking the suspected terrorists who would be targeted by drone attacks. So Gibbs is familiar with the presidential rationale for these targeted killings and the collateral damage that sometimes accompanies them.


The mindset surrounding the drone attacks is analogous to Richard Nixon’s declaration, “When the president does it, that means that it’s not illegal.” In this case, Gibbs was saying, in effect, “When the president kills you with a drone strike, that means you are a terrorist.” And if you are an American citizen like the 16-year-old Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, then you too are fair game.

Except that this teenager was not with his father when he died in 2011. As Tom Junod reported in Esquire, Abdulrahman al-Awlaki had not seen his father in two years and was searching for him -- haunted as many boys are by the missing imprint of a male parent. Given the blanket of executive secrecy surrounding the president’s kill list, we do not know why the group of relatives and friends that he was eating dinner with by the side of the road was targeted by a drone.




http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...a4b_story.html


that's the link to the 'disposition matrix' (which is a euphamism for kill lists) article that is mentioned by yahoo....



an excerpt:

Meanwhile, a significant milestone looms: The number of militants and civilians killed in the drone campaign over the past 10 years will soon exceed 3,000 by certain estimates, surpassing the number of people al-Qaeda killed in the Sept. 11 attacks.

The Obama administration has touted its successes against the terrorist network, including the death of Osama bin Laden, as signature achievements that argue for President Obama’s reelection. The administration has taken tentative steps toward greater transparency, formally acknowledging for the first time the United States’ use of armed drones.

Less visible is the extent to which Obama has institutionalized the highly classified practice of targeted killing, transforming ad-hoc elements into a counterterrorism infrastructure capable of sustaining a seemingly permanent war. Spokesmen for the White House, the National Counterterrorism Center, the CIA and other agencies declined to comment on the matrix or other counterterrorism programs.

Privately, officials acknowledge that the development of the matrix is part of a series of moves, in Washington and overseas, to embed counterterrorism tools into U.S. policy for the long haul.

[bigrun]

Iraq Body Count project

105,052–114,731 civilian deaths as a result of the conflict. Over 162,000 civilian and combatant deaths.

March 2003 to January 2012

[dellinger63]

Did those two retired Seals qualify as Vets?

If they were did Obama take care of them by denying backup? Even when it was requested three different times?

Is 'leave no man behind' a thing of the past?

Now they're just bumps in the road?

[Riot]

Originally Posted by dellinger63

Did those two retired Seals qualify as Vets?

If they were did Obama take care of them by denying backup? Even when it was requested three different times?

Is 'leave no man behind' a thing of the past?

Now they're just bumps in the road?

CIA information disproves your allegation. Seriously - try to watch more than Faux News (a station not permitted broadcast license in Canada, because "news" programs have to tell the truth in Canada by law)

I'm in favor of using target drones rather than troops on the ground where we can, but yes, there are serious civilian safety concerns and creeping war declaration issues (and no, I'm not making light of it, it's serious)

However, I'm sick watching those attack Obama, who supported Bush killing thousands of civilians and our troops in the invasion of a wrong country, after he already invaded Afghanistan, for no reason, and not own up to their error of supporting the man. Americans are dead because Bush lied to the United States. Period.

[bigrun]

Originally Posted by Riot

CIA information disproves your allegation. Seriously - try to watch more than Faux News (a station not permitted broadcast license in Canada, because "news" programs have to tell the truth in Canada by law)

I'm in favor of using target drones rather than troops on the ground where we can, but yes, there are serious civilian safety concerns and creeping war declaration issues (and no, I'm not making light of it, it's serious)

However, I'm sick watching those attack Obama, who supported Bush killing thousands of civilians and our troops in the invasion of a wrong country, after he already invaded Afghanistan, for no reason, and not own up to their error of supporting the man. Americans are dead because Bush lied to the United States. Period.

I've been preaching that for months, doesn't fly here..they can't handle the truth...somewhere in this thread or another i listed the civilian deaths in Iraq..where was the right blasting Bush for those deaths...not to mention our precious troop losses...they don't like the drone attacks where we have zero losses they prefer invasions...

[geeker2]

uh oh...guess who got it wrong again.

http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/foxcanada.asp

[Riot]

Originally Posted by geeker2

uh oh...guess who got it wrong again.

http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/foxcanada.asp

Did you read the last two paragraphs? I'm guessing not Is Fox News as televised in the US permitted in Canada? No. Due to rules regarding truth.

[geeker2]

Originally Posted by Riot

Did you read the last two paragraphs? I'm guessing not Is Fox News as televised in the US permitted in Canada? No. Due to rules regarding truth.

You are wrong it does say that - but very nice