[Infowarrior] - Obama's quest for power and secrecy

[Richard Forno]

(Change we can believe in??? More like Same Stuff Different  
Administration ---rf)


An emerging progressive consensus on Obama's executive power and  
secrecy abuses

(updated below - Update II - Update III)

In the last week alone, the Obama DOJ (a) attempted to shield Bush's  
illegal spying programs from judicial review by (yet again) invoking  
the very "state secrets" argument that Democrats spent years  
condemning and by inventing a brand new "sovereign immunity" claim  
that not even the Bush administration espoused, and (b) argued that  
individuals abducted outside of Afghanistan by the U.S. and then  
"rendered" to and imprisoned in Bagram have no rights of any kind --  
not even to have a hearing to contest the accusations against them --  
even if they are not Afghans and were captured far away from any  
"battlefield."  These were merely the latest -- and among the most  
disturbing -- in a string of episodes in which the Obama  
administration has explicitly claimed to possess the very presidential  
powers that Bush critics spent years condemning as radical, lawless  
and authoritarian.

It is becoming increasingly difficult for honest Obama supporters to  
dismiss away or even minimize these criticisms and, especially, to  
malign the motives of critics.  After all, the Obama DOJ's embrace of  
many (though by no means all) of the most radical and extremist Bush/ 
Cheney positions -- and the contradictions between Obama's campaign  
claims and his actions as President -- are now so glaring and severe  
that the harshest denunciations of Obama's actions are coming from  
those who, during the Bush years, were held up by liberals and by  
Obama supporters as the most trustworthy and praiseworthy authorities  
on these matters.

< BIG SNIP >

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/04/13/obama/