Obama’s Fateful Line in the Sand
by ANDREW LEVINE
To die by cobra is not to die by bad pork
Gregory Corso, Bomb
Who would have imagined that, five years into Barack Obamas tenancy of the White House, American whistleblowers would seek refuge in Russia (or China or in formerly subservient but now robustly independent South American countries) or that investigative journalists and documentary film makers would find Germany or Brazil safer havens in which to practice their trade than the United States?
The answer is no one: not even those of us who have always been skeptical not just of Obamas leadership skills but also of his intentions.
At the same time, some things havent changed: the American government, like all governments, still wallows in hypocrisy.
But even with a President more disappointing than anyone would have imagined, and a government that demonizes its enemies depredations and cloaks its own in the mantle of humanitarian righteousness, the line in the sand that the Syrian government may or may not have crossed is still over the top.
Remarkably, though, hardly anyone in the political or media mainstream sees it that way.
President Obama declared long ago and more than once that should Syrias President Hafez Al-Assad use chemical weapons against rebels trying to overthrow his government, he would risk bringing the United States and whatever coalition of the willing partners he could cobble together into the war on the rebel side.
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http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/08/27/obamas-fateful-line-in-the-sand/