Can't see the forest for the trees, a tale of two threads.

[thundley4]

Two separate threads, but the DUmmies are blind to reality.

Bravo Zulu   (1000+ posts)           Mon Sep-27-10 01:21 AM
Original message
What happens if a radical takes over a White House that has grown dangerously powerful?
   
Yale professor BRUCE ACKERMAN sounds a warning

After America's century-long rise to world hegemony, the presidency is a vastly different institution than it was in the days of Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. The next few decades will be equally transformative, but in ways that will cause great difficulty for the formulation of U.S. foreign policy.

A series of political, bureaucratic and military developments threaten to make the presidency into a platform for charismatic extremism and abrupt swings in foreign policy. Barack Obama's centrism and constitutionalism may disguise their significance in the short term. But this should not lead him to ignore the long-term dangers. He should use his time in office to support reforms that will ameliorate, if not cure, underlying pathologies -- lest a Sarah Palin, or her mirror image on the left, someday come to power and use the presidency as an engine of destructive radicalism.

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10269/1090077-109.stm?cm...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9207419

MNBrewer (1000+ posts)           Sun Sep-26-10 12:54 PM
Original message
Obama administration has just reached an all-new low in its abysmal civil liberties record
   
From: <http://www.salon.com/news/politics/barack_obama/index.h... >

"At this point, I didn't believe it was possible, but the Obama administration has just reached an all-new low in its abysmal civil liberties record. In response to the lawsuit filed by Anwar Awlaki's father asking a court to enjoin the President from assassinating his son, a U.S. citizen, without any due process, the administration last late night, according to The Washington Post, filed a brief asking the court to dismiss the lawsuit without hearing the merits of the claims. "
...
"But what's most notable here is that one of the arguments the Obama DOJ raises to demand dismissal of this lawsuit is "state secrets": in other words, not only does the President have the right to sentence Americans to death with no due process or charges of any kind, but his decisions as to who will be killed and why he wants them dead are "state secrets," and thus no court may adjudicate its legality."
...
"The same Post article quotes a DOJ spokesman as saying that Awlaki "should surrender to American authorities and return to the United States, where he will be held accountable for his actions." But he's not been charged with any crimes, let alone indicted for any. The President has been trying to kill him for the entire year without any of that due process. And now the President refuses even to account to an American court for those efforts to kill this American citizen on the ground that the President's unilateral imposition of the death penalty is a "state secret."

...

Can the Republic survive such exercise of power in the name of "state secrets"?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9204263

The DUmmies are too stooooopid to realize that there is a radical extremist already in the White House.  This is why I didn't support some of the actions of President Bush. I was worried what would happen when a less principled person took the office of president.

[true_blood]

The DUmmies are too stooooopid to realize that there is a radical extremist already in the White House. 

That they are. If they don't see that, then we are doomed, unless the Tea Party and independent voters can rally up the votes to throw the dumbo, that is just occupying the White House, on his ass.