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Politics : Liberalism: Do You Agree We've Had Enough of It? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (172419)	9/10/2014 2:04:59 PM
From: Bill	4 Recommendations Recommended By jlallen locogringo Sedohr Nod TideGlider Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 224759

And still, we were in better shape than we are today. That's why you should care.

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (172419)	9/10/2014 4:49:54 PM
From: lorne	5 Recommendations Recommended By FJB locogringo Sedohr Nod Thehammer TideGlider Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 224759

Comrade philips..."I recall that Cheney was the architect of the foreign policy disaster that resulted in 4,489 Americans being killed, more than 32,000 wounded,".... 72% of US Casualties in Afghanistan Happened Under Obama January 12, 2013 by Daniel Greenfield frontpagemag.com Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is a New York writer focusing on radical Islam. He is completing a book on the international challenges America faces in the 21st century. Like Nixon, Obama came into office with a plan for winning the war. Unlike Nixon, the media never held Obama accountable for escalating the war with no real plan for winning it. Under Obama 1. Casualties drastically increased due to a surge in troop numbers combined with… 2. A policy that tied the hands of those troops to win a Hearts and Minds conflict. And to make matters that much worse, both of these approaches were combined with 3. A total lack of commitment to the war, as evidenced by a withdrawal timeline, wavering commitment, musical commander chairs and mixed messages. If anyone in the future wants a blueprint for how to lose a war, they can just look at everything that Obama did and didn’t do in the last 4 years. If they want to know how not to get blamed for it, they just have to find the Rohypnol that Obama poured into the cocktail drinks of the poodle press. Obama said U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan will adopt a “support role” starting in the spring of 2013, to allow Afghan police and soldiers to take full responsibility of the country’s security, a nation where 2,053 American soldiers have died since the war started on Oct. 7, 2001. Seventy-two percent of those casualties occurred during Obama’s first term. Just as in Iraq, we are totally withdrawing… not. Obama said Friday at the White House, alongside Afghan President Hamid Karzai. “Our troops will continue to fight alongside Afghans when needed but let me say it as plainly as I can: Starting this spring, our troops will have a different mission. Training, advising, assisting Afghan forces,” he said. When Obama says, “Let me say t as plainly as I can”, it means pay close attention to my lie. And no John Kerry, we aren’t talking about the one in Vietnam. Obama’s first withdrawal was followed by the claim that the US would just be there as Advise and Assist Brigades. This is more of the same. It’s the Afghanization of the War. And considering the rising number of Insider Attacks, it doesn’t even matter any more what combat role they’ll be playing, since they’ll be under fire whenever they’re around Afghans,

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (172419)	9/10/2014 4:56:20 PM
From: lorne	2 Recommendations Recommended By FJB locogringo Respond to of 224759

Comrade philips..."and the deaths of more than 100,000 Iraqi civilians. So who care what Cheney has to say?"... So is it ok with you if hussein wipes out..murders..whatever it is called a few civilians course he would be on the golf course so maybe not his fault? The Toll Of 5 Years Of Drone Strikes: 2,400 Dead The Huffington Post By Matt Sledge Posted: 01/23/2014 huffingtonpost.com The U.S. drone program under President Barack Obama reached its fifth anniversary on Thursday having tallied up an estimated death toll of at least 2,400 people. As the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, a U.K.-based non-profit, details on its website, five years ago the CIA conducted the first drone strikes of the Obama presidency. Although there were reports of suspected "militants" killed, at least 14 civilians also died that day. After those initial mistakes, TBIJ notes, Obama rapidly ramped up the drone program in Pakistan and increased its use in Yemen and Somalia, two countries where al Qaeda affiliates expanded their presence during Obama's presidency. Obama recently told The New Yorker that he "wrestle[s]" with civilian casualties. But, he said, he has "a solemn duty and responsibility to keep the American people safe. That’s my most important obligation as President and Commander-in-Chief. And there are individuals and groups out there that are intent on killing Americans -- killing American civilians, killing American children, blowing up American planes." Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International issued a pair of reports in October fiercely criticizing the secrecy that shrouds the administration's drone program, and calling for investigations into the deaths of drone victims with no apparent connection to terrorism. In Pakistan alone, TBIJ estimates, between 416 and 951 civilians, including 168 to 200 children, have been killed. Critics of the drone program generally acknowledge that most of the people killed in Pakistan were likely members of terrorist groups. But that has not pleased Pakistanis: Hakimullah Mehsud, a Pakistani Taliban leader, was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of civilians, but his death by drone in November prompted a wave of popular outrage over the incursion on national sovereignty. The administration cut the number of drone strikes in Pakistan considerably after a May 2012 speech in which Obama promised tighter rules and greater transparency for the program. But America's drones keep flying. A December strike in Yemen -- reportedly conducted by the Pentagon's Joint Special Operations Command, not the CIA -- killed 12 civilians. The drone war is under increasing scrutiny in the U.S. and abroad. A September U.N. report warned that drone warfare has the potential to greatly undermine global stability. And in October, for the first time, Congress heard firsthand accounts from the victims of an apparently botched drone strike. But lawmakers do not seem to be listening: Earlier this month, an omnibus bill blocked Obama's plans to transfer control for the drone program from the CIA to the Pentagon, which would have been a modest step toward changing the program.