Like Madoff telling a bum to get a job: After Running from his Antiwar Past, Kerry Tells Snowden 'Ma

[unhappycamper]

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Like-Madoff-telling-a-bum-by-Dave-Lindorff-Anti-war_Edward-Snowden_Justice_Kerry-John-140530-610.html



Which guy needs to 'man up' and take a principled stand?

Like Madoff telling a bum to get a job: After Running from his Antiwar Past, Kerry Tells Snowden 'Man Up' and Face Trial
By Dave Lindorff
OpEdNews Op Eds 5/30/2014 at 19:09:18

Our prissy Secretary of State John Kerry, hair carefully coiffed for his interview, told NBC's Brian Williams last week that fugitive National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden should "man up" and return to the US to "stand in our system of justice and make his case."

The supposedly "manly" Kerry (whose claim to "courage" is having employed the high-calibre machine gun mounted on his Mekong River gunboat to blow away unarmed fishermen and lightly armed Viet Cong freedom fighters, or having called in air strikes on them) has been hiding his later youthful history of standing up against the Vietnam War, and of condemning American war crimes there. He surely knows from his carefully buried past as a critic of the Vietnam War plenty of fellow American veterans, as well as Vietnam-era deserters and also draft resisters, who did just that -- they "made their case" in "our system of justice." And Kerry also surely knows what happened to them: most ended up getting shuffled off to jail by an American "justice" system that, particularly when it comes to national security and opposition to the state, operates on the Lewis Carroll principle of "verdict first, trial afterwards."

Yet Kerry, in that same NBC interview with Williams, forged right on and, as the fourth man in line under the US Constitution to assume the Presidency if something were to happen to the president, vice president and speaker of the House, declared that Snowden is guilty as charged, saying, "This is a man who has betrayed his country."

Um"What trial decided that, Mr. Secretary? The one you want him to come submit to?

--

Kerry at the Winter Soldier hearings in 1971:

[Lint Head]

1. Man up and end the unconstitutional practices of the NSA.

[JDPriestly]

11. The president's men interpreted legal decisions and the Constiution to permit this dragnet

spying on us. Snowden's e-mail released yesterday by Feinstein tells us that the programs that spy on us were approved or deemed to be legal by a legal counsel to the NSA (as the article is worded but could be for the President), not by Congress itself. Snowden's e-mail tells us that the legal counsel to the NSA decided based on his/her own office's research and personal legal opinion that a statute passed by Congress could be interpreted to permit the NSA's far-reaching program.

That means that the questionable program (or programs) is (are) based not on the precise wording of a law passed specifically and publicly by Congress to permit this program or programsn that Snowden thought were overreaching and in violation of our Constitution. That means that it does not take an act of Congress to end the program or programs. The President ordered the NSA's actions via executive order and can order that it be ended or reduced in size and scope. If he hasn't already he should now.

Snowden referred specifically to an intelligence directive requiring that NSA activities be "conducted in a manner that safeguards the constitutional rights of U.S. persons." Agency training for following the directive, Snowden said, appeared to give equal weight to federal law and executive orders.

"I'm not entirely certain, but this does not seem correct, as it seems to imply executive orders have the same precedence as law," Snowden wrote. "Between (the orders) and laws, which have precedence?"

The general counsel's office reply began, "Hello Ed," and continued, "Executive orders have the 'force and effect of law.' That said, you are correct that (they) cannot override a statute."

The e-mail ended, "Please give me a call if you would like to discuss further."

http://www.sfgate.com/nation/article/Feinstein-Snowden-never-voiced-NSA-concerns-5514604.php

It's a bit subtle and not all DUers may be able to understand what that exchange means, but the general counsel for the NSA (the article says "agency" so probably the NSA but could be the President?)

Also, what I am saying does not entirely do away with programs that Congress approved to protect our national security. It merely does away with those that Congress has not specifically approved and that were instituted under executive order.

I would assume that Congress is now demanding the right to exercise better oversight over the NSA's programs. I hope so. In the future, once the NSA's programs have been changed so as to meet constitutional requirements, excesses by the NSA should be dealt with by a vigilant Congress.

The system as it is now working makes Congress subservient to the intelligence agencies that can spy on the normal workings of members of Congress and psychologically if not physically have the potential to interfere in or influence the ability of members of Congress to freely communicate with the world.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

2. Do we really need more Kerry/Snowden postings?

Especially ones that challenge the prior sexist statements by tossing the same sexist insults back in the other direction? Or attack anyone's war record? 'Lightly armed' people killed a lot of 'heavily armed' people in war as well. We never call upon our military to 'gear down' to fight 'lightly armed' people while 'lightly armed' themselves, so why would this even be any sort of attack on Kerry, as opposed to the military as a whole?

[zeemike]

4. Yes we do.

Because the US has a short memory and if not kept reminded will go on to the next manufactured outrage and forget about the real problems of the increasing loss of our liberty and the criminal activity by the NSA and others.

[lostincalifornia]

3. Kerry went to Nam, and came back and protested the war. He did not run away from anything

Sounds like the swift boaters are at work here, and it is bs

[JDPriestly]

12. I, too, like Kerry.

But the criticism of Kerry's statement which is so utterly supportive of a law that deprives Americans of due process is justified.

Criticizing one statement by a very great American doesn't mean you are criticizing the man.

We humans all make mistakes.

Kerry is human. He is mistaken on this issue in my opinion.

[lostincalifornia]

15. Then why does the op criticize his war record, and not the point you are making?

[JDPriestly]

18. I don't know. I didn't write it. As I pointed out, we all make mistakes. We are all human.

I don't let it bother me because I have raised children and I know that everyone gets angry sometimes and regrets it later. I think that attacking Kerry's war record is unfair. But then who is fair all the time. Not even Obama or Kerry although I like them both.

The fact is we all make mistakes. That is why we should not attack the person but rather the actions of the person.

I must quote once again from Elizabeth Warren's book A Fighting Chance, page 106.

"Late in the evening, Larry (Summer) leaned back in his chair and offered me some advice. By now, I'd lost count of Larry's Diet cokes, and our table was strewn with bits of food and spilled sauces. Larry's tone was in the friendly-advice category. He teed it up this way. I had a choice. I (Elizabeth Warren) could be an insider or I could be an outsider. Outsiders can say whatever they want. But people on the inside don't listen to them. Insiders, however, get lots of access and a chance to push their ideas. People -- powerful people -- listen to what they have to say. But insiders also understand one unbreakable rule: They don't criticize other insiders.

Kerry is now an insider. It's not his job to criticize any more. Criticism? That's our job.

[A Simple Game]

5. I really like and want to keep liking Kerry,

I hope he doesn't turn himself into another Colin Powell.

[KG]

7. way too late for that...

[A Simple Game]

9. Yeah, I think I knew that before I posted.

I really think he used to mean well. So the system ruins another one.

Kerry and others like him are good example of why we should limit a persons length of time in our political system. The odds are that sooner or later you will be corrupted. The sad thing is Kerry is not likely to be going any farther in politics and doesn't need the money, so why compromise his principles and our Country's reputation?

[JDPriestly]

13. But just limiting the time in politics would not end the corruption and stop the system from

ruining good people.

We have term limits in California. All too frequently, once the term limit is over, the politician gets a higher paying job as a lobbyist or something similar.

Politics like so many other jobs has become a profession. A walk of life.

I don't think we can change that unless we use the ballot box to send good public servants back into office and to vote the corrupt ones out.

To that end, I am supporting Elizabeth Warren for president in 2016. I hope you will read her book A Fighting Chance and decide whether you, too, would like to support her. I think she will appeal to both Republicans and Democrats.

[KG]

6. rec.

[Botany]

8. You might disagree w/Sec. Kerry but to lump him in w/Madoff sucks.

John has earned the the right to say what he thinks. And he has earned it many times over too.

[lostincalifornia]

16. It is garbage, and to criticize his war record also.

[Botany]

20. 3 purple hearts, a bronze star, a silver star, and he lost not one man doing some of ....

... the hazardous duty in the war. And Kerry is doing a great job as Sec. of State too.

[lostincalifornia]

21. We are on the same page

[Botany]

22. In 2004 I met some of the men who served w/John on the Swift Boat.

Anybody who makes fun of or talks down his record in combat are low life
pieces of pig crap.

[billh58]

10. Typical Lindorff

garbage...

[OilemFirchen]

14. "Prissy"?

Fuck this specific noise.

[lostincalifornia]

17. 1000000+

[niyad]

19. "man up" is such an offensive phrase-as though the default setting for integrity, honour, courage,

decency, is male. kerry ought to know better.