Glenn Greenwald's Blog, page 66

MSNBC boldly moves to plug its one remaining hole | Glenn Greenwald

By hiring long-time Obama spokesmen Robert Gibbs and David Axelrod, the cable news network clarifies its function

Last month, MSNBC's Al Sharpton conducted a spirited debate about whether Obama belongs on Mount Rushmore or instead deserves a separate monument to his greatness (just weeks before replacing frequent Obama critic Cenk Uygur as MSNBC host, Sharpton publicly vowed never to criticize Barack Obama under any circumstances: a vow he has faithfully maintained). Earlier that day on the sa...

Pop quiz on US politics: guess the speaker | Glenn Greenwald

A prominent US politicians makes some familiar statements about secrecy, the War on Terror, and Muslim enemies: who is it?

A prominent US politician late last week was asked several questions by the Huffington Post about Obama's due-process-free assassinations of US citizens. Who was it who gave the following answers? Cheating via Google will be harshly punished.

First, when asked whether the US public should be told when the Obama administration has targeted a US citizen for due-process-free e...

The premises and purposes of American exceptionalism | Glenn Greenwald

That the US is objectively "the greatest country ever to exist" is as irrational as it is destructive, yet it maintains the status of orthodoxy

(updated below)

Last week, North Korea tested a nuclear weapon, and the US - the country with the world's largest stockpile of that weapon and the only one in history to use it - led the condemnation (US allies with large nuclear stockpiles, such as Britain and Israel, vocally joined in). Responding to unnamed commentators who apparently noted this cont...

Obama, the US and the Muslim world: the animosity deepens | Glenn Greenwald

Another new poll, this one of Pakistan, shows: a central promise of Obama for improving US security is an utter failure

In his first inaugural address, back in 2009, Barack Obama announced: "To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect." Improving how the US was perceived among the world's 1.6 billion Muslims was not about winning an international popularity contest but was deemed as vital to US national security. Even the Pentagon has long recogn...

Obama DOJ again refuses to tell a court whether CIA drone program even exists | Glenn Greenwald

As the nation spent the week debating the CIA assassination program, Obama lawyers exploit secrecy to shield it from all review

It is not news that the US government systematically abuses its secrecy powers to shield its actions from public scrutiny, democratic accountability, and judicial review. But sometimes that abuse is so extreme, so glaring, that it is worth taking note of, as it reveals its purported concern over national security to be a complete sham.

Such is the case with the Obama D...

The Iraqi government hires the Podesta Group to lobby for it in DC

The sleazy but legal process that drives Washington has a new happy couple as its latest symbol: Tony Podesta and Nouri al-Maliki

Whenever you think DC sleaze has reached its low point, it always manages to prove you wrong. Politico's Byron Taub and Anna Palmer this afternoon report that the authoritarian, human-rights-abusing government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Malki is about to hire The Podesta Group as its first lobbying firm.

That firm is run by Tony Podesta, who legally peddles hi...

Italy's ex-intelligence chief given 10-year sentence for role in CIA kidnapping | Glenn Greenwald

Such accountability for high-level government officials is inconceivable in the US, highlighting its culture of impunity

A US State Department official on Monday "expressed concern" about what he called "a 'climate of impunity' over abuses by police and security forces" - in Egypt. The official, Michael Posner, warned that failure to investigate Egyptian state agents responsible for "cruel treatment of those in their custody" - including torture - creates "a lack of meaningful accountability f...

Should an armed drone be dispatched to kill Christopher Dorner? | Glenn Greenwald

Why should the lives of law enforcement agents be risked to apprehend this suspected domestic terrorist?

(updated below)

A major manhunt has been underway in the Los Angeles area for Chris Dorner, the former LAPD officer, Navy reservist, and trained marksman who is the prime suspect in the murder of three people, including the daughter of an LAPD captain (who previously represented him in a disciplinary proceeding) and her fiance. A lengthy Facebook message attributed to Dorner vows that he wil...

DOJ kill list memo forces many Dems out of the closet as overtly unprincipled hacks | Glenn Greenwald

Last week's controversy over Obama's assassination program forced into light many ignored truths that were long obvious

(updated below)

This past week has been a strangely clarifying political moment. It was caused by two related events: the leak of the Justice Department's "white paper" justifying Obama's claimed power to execute Americans without charges, followed by John Brennan's alarming confirmation hearing (as Charles Pierce wrote: "the man whom the administration has put up to head the...

US Air Force veteran, finally allowed to fly into US, is now banned from flying back home | Glenn Greenwald

Secret, unaccountable no-fly lists are one of many weapons the US government uses to extra-judicially punish American Muslims

In early November, I wrote about the infuriating story of Saadiq Long, the 43-year-old African-American Muslim who - despite having never been charged with any crime - was secretly placed on a no-fly list and thus barred from flying to the US to visit his seriously ill mother. When I met with Long in early November in Doha, Qatar, where he has lived for several years wi...