So much Change your head will spin…. w…
So much Change your head will spin….
well, I’m sure someone will spin it as Change in any case.
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Lawrence of Arabia
So much Change your head will spin….
well, I’m sure someone will spin it as Change in any case.
shams, 
thabet, 
shams 11:51 am on September 11, 2010 Permalink
[no more of that], it isnt for national security reasons its for AMERICAN SOLDIER LIFE REASONS.
Let me ax you the same question i ax Aziz.
should Assange release the Garani massacre video?
it would hasten the end of drones, i guaran-damn-tee, and speed our exit from Iraq and Af-Pak.
is it worth those lives, and the countably infinite supply of terror-recruits al-Q will farm from it?
thabet 1:33 pm on September 11, 2010 Permalink
I see LoA also touched a very raw nerve too.
shams 2:17 pm on September 11, 2010 Permalink
amswer the question.
should Assange release the video?
that is a microcosm of what Obama deals with every day.
thabet 2:28 pm on September 11, 2010 Permalink
The questions in this thread are: ‘Should Obama allow those tortured by the US to receive justice? Or should he continue to use Bush-era arguments in opposing their claims for justice?’
We see he is using Bush-era arguments. Ergo, he is no different to Bush at least on this particular topic.
shams 2:41 pm on September 11, 2010 Permalink
why won’t you answer my question, brother thabet?
you can say yes or no.
coward.
We see he is using Bush-era arguments.
hardly– Obama outlawed waterboarding and called it torture.
Bush’s argument was all about pretending we weren’t RELLY torturing, like you and Aziz pretend America wasn’t RELLY proselytizing judeoxian culture.
Shams al-Nahar 3:22 pm on September 11, 2010 Permalink
those questions are non-separable from my question about the Garani massacre video.
and you know it.
Abu Noor 4:21 pm on September 11, 2010 Permalink
I actually don’t see the relationship between the sets of questions.
But I do think Assange should release the video, to answer your oft repeated question.
thabet 5:19 am on September 12, 2010 Permalink
Yes, I would like to see the victims, or their families, of the Garani massacre (or indeed any other similar killing), whether done by US or any other troops, receive justice and recompense.
shams 6:13 am on September 12, 2010 Permalink
i would prefer to see it released after the drawdown starts next July.
but it is not my decision….i don’t know what will happen, or what Assange has brokered with the US gov. He may just be waiting until after the Iraq documants hit the media….”in several weeks”.
First the collateral murder video was released April 5, then then the Afghan document dump on July 26. Assange has said he spaces his revelations to prevent burnout. The next instantiation might come 12 weeks after July 26…..late October….right before elections.
The methdology is the same– several media outlets have had the data for months independently preparing stories extracted from the massive data– supposedly 3x the amount of Afghan theater data.
And they will release it on the same day.
I imagine the choice of outlets is multinational, like the choice of der Speigel, the Guardian, and the NYT for the afghan docs. i think Assange has changed strategy because the raw data was not largely read by citizens, allowing detractors to frame the data as burning afghan collaborators. People are lazy and don’t read for themselves. that won’t happen this time.
shams 6:16 am on September 12, 2010 Permalink
i have read what is available open source about the video– it will be the most amazing terrorist recruitment tool ever.
it will run 24/7 on youtube.
shams 6:21 am on September 12, 2010 Permalink
youtube will try to pull it, but it will go viral instantly. a deadly terrorism meme-virus loose in social media.
a meme-plague of terror.
shams 6:27 am on September 12, 2010 Permalink
and the reason for that is biology….visual memes are far more powerful than spoken or written memes because of homo sapians sapians is wired for visuals. We are especially visually permeable to the big three– blood, death and sex.
Our monkey genes.
Shams al-Nahar 8:56 am on September 12, 2010 Permalink
has teamed up with media organizations—including major television networks and one or more American media outlets—in an unspecified number of countries to produce a set of documentaries and stories based on the cache of Iraq War documents in the possession of WikiLeaks.
Assange learned……this time the document dump will be ON TEEVEE.
the revolution will be televised.
NWBCW!
Shams al-Nahar 10:29 am on September 12, 2010 Permalink
and please note, thabet is still ducking the question.
thabet 12:49 pm on September 12, 2010 Permalink
I’ll answer your silly question, just as soon as you write to Binyam Mohamed and Maher Arar telling them why Obama is right to deny them justice.
aziz 3:02 pm on September 12, 2010 Permalink
what question is he supposed to be answering? im honestly lost.
UPDATE – oh about Assange releasing the video. No, I dont think he should, i thinkhe should release a transcript. And then thrreaten to release 30 sec of video every time an innocent group of people are (verifiably) reported killed by a drone.
shams 4:30 pm on September 12, 2010 Permalink
whether Assange should release the Garani massacre video.
this is sort of what Assange is doing….only it isn’t 30 sec of Garani….its the next bunch of classified docs in his posession.
and that is not the same thing, brother thabet.
Obama is not denying them justice– America is.
Should Assange release the Garani massacre video? it is not a sillie question. it would cause a lot of death, a lot of terrorism enlistment, and likely speed our withdrawal from an unjust, immoral and unwinnable war.
what is the trade off? do you only care about 2 muslim brothers that have been horrifically treated? I care about all my brothers…expecially the young ones so vulnerable to American injustice.
thabet 12:52 am on September 13, 2010 Permalink
As you said yourself in another thread, “Obama is the American president”.
Unlike you I don’t believe all Muslims are all stupid barbarians who will kick off the moment a genuine fair trial and investigation into American torture begins. Terrorists who want to recruit will do so anyway, torture trials or not. They have a multitude of reasons available to them.
I think a real investigation, and genuine attempts at justice and recompense for those wronged will go a long way to aid Obama and the US in the Middle East and around the world.
shams 6:11 am on September 13, 2010 Permalink
you are confused. that wasn’t me that said that.
Obama is the CinC– shouldn’t he care about the lives of our soldiers? I care. Most of them are there trying to execute pop-centric COIN (armed social work) and protect the population while the theater command is making more terrorists to kill them with dronestrikes and funding the ISI/Taliban strategic alliance to kill them.
sheesh…there are Qur’an burning protests in Pakistan right now, and no quranic bonfires have occurred yet.
Like Imam Rauf said– there are “an endless supply of angry young Muslim rebels prepared to die for their cause and there [is] no sign of the attacks ending unless there [is] a fundamental change in the world”.
The shadow of American unjustice is deep and wide. you pick two cases…wallah. there are hundreds of thousands of just lawsuits that could be brought against America. One out of every 200 Iraqis died in the last seven years. Their infrastructure was destroyed, their social fabric shredded. If the Garani massacre video aired could the village bring suit against America for warcrimes? Obama is trying to extricate us from that horrorshow….. and all you say is he is just like Bush.
thabet 11:44 am on September 13, 2010 Permalink
You need to get out and about and meet people on the end of US foreign policy to realise why I say this. Here’s a view from the Middle East.
I look forward to your open letter explaining to the people of NW Pakistan why Obama needs to be given more time to blow up their children.
Shams al-Nahar 11:53 am on September 13, 2010 Permalink
thabet you don’t get me at all.
if the kepler trigo matrix says i have to choose between apologizing for Bush and protecting our soldiers from dying, im on the side of the soldiers.
there is no altruism in nature.
im confident Obama is doing the best he can to extricate us from Bush’s horrorshow.
you aren’t.
thabet 11:57 am on September 13, 2010 Permalink
Fair enough. I am glad you recognise why I harp on about this. I am not convinced Obama’s vision is altogether different from Bush’s, though his methods and rhetoric may be nicer.
I will stop our disagreement across multiple threads as its not nice for others on here, and we can just agree to disagree.
Shams al-Nahar 12:21 pm on September 13, 2010 Permalink
well….you see Obama as one dimensional.
i see the whole….umm….the quantum Obama.
i love him like i love Lincoln and Jefferson, because the system is WAI while he is in office.