Dave Lindorff: President Obama his key advisors plus Biden, Clinton and Panetta are all currently war criminals for threatening Iran with attack

so, is this why obama doesn't want to hold the war criminals from the bush administration accountable...?

President Obama and His Key Advisors are a Gang of War Criminals

Under the Nuremberg Principles, later incorporated into the United Nations Charter, to which the United States is a signatory, the planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression, which is defined as a war started against another nation that does not pose an imminent threat of attack on the aggressor nation or nations, is the highest of war crimes, for which the perpetrators are liable for the death penalty. Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of any of those above acts is an equally serious capital crime.

How then to explain the casual way that civilian and military leaders of the US and Israel are talking openly about plans and threats to attack Iran?

[...]

One would think that the magnitude of the unknown and dangerous potential consequences of a criminal attack on Iran by the US and its client state Israel would lead at least some news organizations to look into the very legality of such an attack.

But no. Apparently calling the leaders of this nation criminals is beyond the imagining of the so-called chattering class and its paymasters.

I’ll do it here though:

President Obama and his key advisors, as well as Vice President Biden, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Defense Secretary Panetta, are all currently war criminals for threatening Iran with attack. And if the US does attack Iran, either on its own or in support of an Israeli attack, they will be even worse war criminals, and will be deserving of the same fate met by Japan’s Imperial Army General and Prime Minister Hideki Tojo, and by Nazi Germany’s Foreign Minister Joachim Von Ribbentrop and Field Marshall Wilhelm Keitel.

another perspective missing from our traditional news media...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Marcy says what needs to be said about the Very Scarey Iran Plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador

amazingly, there has not yet been a case submitted to a grand jury...

marcy - emptywheel - wheeler...

Our government has had eleven business days now to subject its amended case to the scrutiny of a grand jury, it had two and a half months to subject its original case to the scrutiny of a grand jury, and it hasn’t yet bothered to do so. We’re sharing our case with the rest of the world before we’re subjecting it to the most basic level of oversight enshrined in our Constitution. Instead of using the legal process laid out in our founding document, we’ve gotten the signature of a Magistrate Judge and run off with it to the rest of the world. And while I have no doubt of the competence of Magistrate Judge Michael Dolinger, the judge who signed the complaint in this case, that’s simply not the way our judicial system is supposed to work. Average citizens are supposed to review the work of the government when it makes legal cases, not just Magistrates.

All of which ought to raise real questions why our government has decided to share these details with the rest of the world, but bypassed the step where they’re supposed to share them with its own citizens.

how interesting that it takes a lone blogger to make the kind of substantial point that should have been a glaring omission to even the least perceptive of our so-called professional news media... if the case was worth the paper it's printed on, a grand jury indictment should have been a slam dunk and certainly something our fear-mongering leaders would have wanted to have had in hand before trying to put that horribly scarey country, iran, back on the front burner...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Glenn doesn't claim that Biden was told to change his tune but I'm going to

before...

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

after...

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

glenn...

In one day, Biden went from giddily declaring that "I don't think there's any damage" to gravely warning that "it has done damage." I have no idea whether Biden was told that his Thursday no-damage admission would severely harm the Government's efforts to prosecute Assange, but what is clear is that he was perfectly willing to march into Meet the Press the following day and say things that he knew were false in order to depict the WikiLeaks diplomatic cable disclosures as harming U.S. national security.

and why in the world would biden so quickly change his tune...? maybe he got out there in front of the press before he'd been briefed on the correct talking points...? just sayin'...

more glenn...

It's really not an overstatement to say that WikiLeaks and Julian Assange are the new Iraqi WMDs because the government and establishment media are jointly manufacturing and disseminating an endless stream of fear-mongering falsehoods designed to depict them as scary villains threatening the security of The American People and who must therefore be stopped at any cost.

i'm still grappling with the fact that, with all the fuss generated by the hackers who went after companies that dropped wikileaks, there's been virtually nothing whatsoever in the media about going after those who perpetrated the ddos attacks on wikileaks... oh, well... i guess it doesn't make any sense to "grapple" with what i already know to be the flat-out hypocrisy of our handlers...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Netanyahu visits Obama while flipping off the U.S. yet again

you can't tell me israel's timing isn't carefully calculated...

Israel Approves Controversial New Building Plan As Netanyahu Visits Obama

The Jerusalem municipality has approved 20 new apartments for Jews in east Jerusalem, the city said Wednesday. The move could stir a new diplomatic crisis with the United States just as Israel's leader is in Washington on a fence-mending visit.

The Obama administration views Israeli building in east Jerusalem, the part of the city claimed by Palestinians as their future capital, as disruptive to Mideast peacemaking efforts. Israel, which captured east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war, insists the city cannot be divided and says it has the right to build anywhere.

The differences over east Jerusalem erupted into a crisis earlier this month when Israel announced during a visit by Vice President Joe Biden that it plans to build 1,600 new apartments for Jews in east Jerusalem.

Israel has apologized for the poor timing of the announcement but rejected calls to cancel the project. In Washington this week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a pro-Israel audience that Israel was determined to keep building in all of Jerusalem -- a statement quickly rejected by the White House.

Netanyahu met twice with President Barack Obama on Tuesday in an attempt to defuse what has become the countries' worst spat in decades. But Wednesday's announcement by Jerusalem city officials threatened to derail any progress.

The new project -- funded by Jewish American millionaire Irving Moskowitz, a longtime patron of Jewish settler groups -- calls for tearing down part of an old hotel, the Shepherd, and building 20 apartments and a three-level underground parking lot instead.

Word of the approval was leaked to an Israeli Web site minutes before Netanyahu met with Obama at the White House on Tuesday.

a bit more on the settlements...

The building and populating of Jewish settlements within Palestinian inhabited areas of East Jerusalem, as well as the construction of the Separation Wall that divides Palestinians residing in Jerusalem from those living outside the city, in the West Bank, are integral elements of Israel's attempt to fragment the Palestinian population in Jerusalem.

Israeli non-profit associations, such as Elad and the Ateret Cohanim, have been responsible for the settlement construction on lands confiscated by the Israeli government, with the substantial financial support of foreign tycoons, including, most notably, American millionaire Irving Moskowitz.

a little bit more on irving moskowitz...

Dr. Irving I. Moskowitz (born 1928, New York City) is a Florida-based businessman and philanthropist, who built a fortune running hospitals and legal gambling in California. He is the founder of the eponymous "Moskowitz Foundation" which claims to help victims of natural disasters. The foundation raises funds for contentious Israeli settlements in the Arab neighborhoods of East Jerusalem projects through its "charity" bingo hall in Hawaiian Gardens, California.

[...]

Among notable Zionist activities, is the foundation help to Shinlung immigration to Israel. The family also established the Moskowitz Prize for Zionism in 2008.

meanwhile, all the movers and shakers as well as the mover and shaker wannabes in the middle east both in and out of the region should really stop and consider how fortunes in that part of the world have shifted over the centuries...

here's a youtube clip, courtesy of juan cole, that shows the amazing number of empires that have come and gone in the middle east over the past 5,000 years...



let's hope that the pair obama seems to have grown over the health care debate carries over to netanyahu and israel...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Israel's call for calm in crisis with the U.S. followed by Netanyahu's "BIG BUT"

oh, yes, by all means, let's not get carried away... just because we stuck a finger in joe biden's eye, gave the dirty digit to obama AND took a crap all over the peace process is no reason to go and get your knickers in a twist... relax... chill...

Netanyahu has been trying to dispel the impression that relations with the U.S. have degenerated into a crisis. His attempt Sunday to ease concerns were his first public comments since the feud erupted.

"We opened the newspapers this morning and read all kinds of commentary and assumptions regarding the crisis with the U.S. I recommend not to get carried away and to calm down," Netanyahu told his Cabinet.

Netanyahu, however, gave no indication that he would cancel the east Jerusalem construction plan, despite warnings from Washington that it could undermine the negotiating climate as indirect peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians are about to begin under U.S. mediation.

and, just so's ya know, i have a really BIG BUT - don't think for one goddam minute we're going to even CONSIDER reconsidering our settlements decision... in your dreams, my good friends... in your dreams...

seriously, the most appropriate response to israel's recent actions as well as netanyahu's supremely condescending apology and call for calm is outrage, and it's an outrage that should have been given full expression a long, long time ago...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Israel claims national heritage status for 2 West Bank sites, announces new settlements, kills off the peace talks, and then...?

and then seals off the west bank for fear of unrest...? WTF...???

Israel has sealed off the West Bank for 48 hours, preventing Palestinians from entering Israel because of fears of unrest.

first the announcement of the national heritage sites on 3 march... then the approval of new settlements in east jerusalem... then the phony apology to joe biden for taking a crap on his visit to promote the peace process... then, no big surprise, palestine pulls out of the peace talks... and now that israel has once again shown its true colors, it seals off the west bank because the palestinians might be upset... might be...? MIGHT BE...??? lordy lord...

and almost as bad is watching the vice president of my psychopathic country, after a momentary lapse into sanity, re-join and appallingly celebrate the psychopathology of israel

'US has no better friend than Israel'

US Vice President Joe Biden tried to put the furor over announcement of plans to build 1,600 units in Ramat Shlomo behind him, saying during a speech Thursday at Tel Aviv University that he condemned the move because as a friend he was compelled to "deliver the hardest truth," but adding that he appreciated the clarifications he received on the matter from Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.

He opened the speech by stressing the importance of US-Israel friendship and Washington's commitment to the security of the Jewish state, saying that "US President Barack Obama and myself know that the US has no better friend in the community of nations than Israel."

i'd sure like to know what israel has on our u.s. leaders that they can so slavishly serve the genocidal interests of another country...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Israel is committed to eradicating Palestine and Palestinians from the face of the earth [UPDATE: Israel apologizes for bad timing]

[UPDATE]

aw geez... it's just bad timing, eh...? nothing wrong with the decision itself, eh...? how is it that the very people who have suffered the most hatred and persecution over the centuries can turn around and be such monsters...? oh, wait... the victim becomes the victimizer... silly me... i forgot...

Israel apologized Wednesday for disrupting the visit of Vice President Joe Biden with its announcement of 1,600 new homes in disputed east Jerusalem, but made clear it had no intention of reversing the order that has cast a shadow over the latest U.S. push for Mideast peace.

As Biden held talks with top Palestinian leaders in the West Bank, Israeli Interior Minister Eli Yishai, whose office announced the new construction on lands Palestinians claim for a future state, said the problem was about timing, not substance [emphasis added].

"We had no intention, no desire, to offend or taunt an important man like the vice president during his visit," Yishai told Israel Radio. "I am very sorry for the embarrassment. We need to remember that approvals are done according to law even if the timing was wrong. ... Next time we need to take timing into account."

the world community of nations should stop pussyfooting around, step up and put a halt to israel's slow, incremental, deliberate genocide... it's gone on for much too long...

Israel approved the construction of 1,600 new homes for Jews in disputed east Jerusalem on Tuesday — a move that immediately clouded a visit by Vice President Joe Biden aimed at repairing strained ties and kickstarting Mideast peace talks.

The Interior Ministry announced the construction plans just as Biden was wrapping up a series of warm meetings with Israeli leaders. There was no immediate reaction from the vice president.

Relations between Israel and the Obama administration have been chilly precisely because of the settlement issue.

The U.S., like the Palestinians and the rest of the international community, believes that Israeli settlements built on lands claimed by the Palestinians, including east Jerusalem, undermine peace prospects. President Obama has been more outspoken on the issue than his predecessors.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rebuffed calls from the White House to halt all settlement activity, agreeing only to a limited freeze that does not include east Jerusalem.

israel has set itself above all rule of law, any accountability and has completely forfeited any good will and credibility it might have had by pursuing a sincere course for peace...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Promoting fear of (choose one: biological, nuclear, terrorist, conventional weapons) attack - it's good for business

a friend sent me this article with the following question...

the question...

What's your read on this having spent time near the country mentioned?

the article...

The United States can expect a terrorist attack using nuclear or more likely biological weapons before 2013, reports a bipartisan commission in a study being briefed Tuesday to Vice President-elect Joe Biden. It suggests the Obama administration bolster efforts to counter and prepare for germ warfare by terrorists.

[...]

Al-Qaida remains the only terrorist group judged to be actively intent on conducting a nuclear attack against the United States, the report notes. It is not yet capable of building such a weapon and has yet to obtain one. But that could change if a nuclear weapons engineer or scientist were recruited to al-Qaida's cause, the report warns.

The report says the potential nexus of terrorism, nuclear and biological weapons is especially acute in Pakistan.

"Were one to map terrorism and weapons of mass destruction today, all roads would intersect in Pakistan," the report states.

my response...

i think 90+ percent of these stories are designed as fear-mongering, pure and simple... a population living in fear is, by definition, easier to control...

however, if sophisticated biological attacks become part of the arsenal of ANY group, it will because the technology and skill required for their development became available in some manner, intended or otherwise, through the incessant research on same being done by countries like the u.s., in precisely the same way that nuclear weapons technology became available to pakistan and, now, india...

don't think for a moment that a new weapons race such as that announced today by russia in response to the u.s. plans to position missiles in poland and the czech republic isn't planned as a means to increase defense research and weapons systems spending... likewise, nuclear and biological weapons systems proliferation is equally good for business... as always, follow the money...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

In Amman, Jordan

woo-hoo... all flights were on time, i got some sleep on the long haul from chicago to amman, and my bags made it with me... who says we don't have a lot to be grateful for...? now, i'm going to find out what happened with the biden-palin nonsense last night, that i only got the briefest glimpse of in the gateroom in chicago, while i'm waiting for my colleague to arrive from london...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Don't Pinch Me...........

.........I don't wanna be woke up.

I'm having sweet dreams, courtesy of NewsMax, no less.


Obama May Bring Criminal Charges Against Bush

Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden said he and presidential hopeful Barack Obama could bring criminal charges against the Bush administration if they are elected in November.

“If there has been a basis upon which you can pursue someone for a criminal violation, they will be pursued,” Biden said during a campaign stop in Florida on Monday, ABC News reported.

“Not out of vengeance, not out of retribution. Out of the need to preserve the notion that no one, no attorney general, no president — no one is above the law.”

Biden promised that an Obama-Biden government would go through Bush administration data with "a fine-toothed comb" and pursue criminal charges if necessary.

Now, if they will only dig into the back of their closets, and find the backbones they misplaced so long ago, and keep their word this time.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know..............but cut me some slack. I said I was dreamin'.

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Digby on Mukasey: "The ends justify the means"

it depends on what your definition of "is" is...



digby...

I'd like to once again thank all those who voted to confirm Michael Mukasey and those who didn't bother to vote. It was an excellent demonstration of leadership. (My recollection is that many of the Democrats felt they had already "won" by forcing out Alberto Gonzales.) But maybe next time, we could just have a a little baseline that the Attorney General of the United States can't believe that torture can legally be used if it might save lives. I think that might be considered a basic qualification going forward.

bastard... (i'm speaking of mukasey, of course...)

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

A sad farewell to Dodd, good riddance to Biden, tough noogies Hil, and hello Huck

and do ya s'pose we're maybe even seeing the end of the bush-clinton dynasty...?

the nyt on biden and dodd...

Two Democrats dropped out Thursday night: Senator Christopher Dodd of Connecticut and Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware.

i was hoping for a better showing for chris dodd last night than he got, but i'm also not surprised... not only does defending the constitution, the rule of law, and calling for accountability barely register on the national media and political radar screen, damn few voters have really tuned in to what's happening to our country... and, sadly, other than dodd's recent heroic battle against telecom immunity, i don't think he made nearly the big stink that is so desperately called for... would that have been different if, for instance, a story like the recent re-categorization of the u.s. as an "endemic surveillance society" had been a national lead story that consumed as much media energy as the killing of a san francisco zoo patron by a tiger...? idle speculation, i admit, but minimally adequate media treatment of our dire straits could have made at least a small difference... maybe the media and our citizens will wake up... maybe bill gates will give me a ten million dollar, no-strings attached grant...

but, as robert parry points out, perhaps the best news to come out of iowa is this...

[T]he Iowa caucuses on Jan. 3 dealt a stunning blow to the Bush-Clinton duopoly, with Sen. Barack Obama thrashing Sen. Clinton on the Democratic side and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee trouncing former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who had the backing of some elements of the Bush Family.

Though the presidential selection process has a long way to go, the inevitability of another election between representatives of the Democratic/Republican establishments was thrown into severe doubt by the victories of Obama and Huckabee.

i'm pleased that edwards did as well as he did and i'm completely noncommittal on barack... huck is a different story, however... he is one scary guy...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Biden on Bush and the Iran NIE

i'm no biden fan, but this is the kind of statement that every member of congress ought to be making, out loud, in public, from every platform available...

For many reasons, war with Iran is not just a bad option, it would be a disaster. So I want to be crystal clear on this: if the President takes us to war with Iran without Congressional approval, I will call for his impeachment.

i know this isn't the first time he's said this, but i don't think it can be repeated too often... i just wish he'd take action to impeach the s.o.b. anyway...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Honor Dodd's hold

Dear [Name redacted],

The ball is in Majority Leader Harry Reid's court.

All he has to do is respect Senate tradition by honoring the "hold" Chris Dodd has placed on any bill that includes "retroactive immunity."

With one public pronouncement, we can rest peacefully in the knowledge the rule of law has been preserved ... this time.

We've written a letter to Senator Reid cosigned by MoveOn.org, the ACLU, and a number of other prominent organizations and bloggers asking the Majority Leader to honor Senator Dodd's hold.

Add your signature to ours before we deliver the letter prior to next week's Judiciary Committee hearings on the issue.

http://www.noretroactiveimmunity.com

AT&T's alleged actions here violate the constitutional rights clearly established [by the U.S. Supreme Court]. . . . AT&T cannot seriously contend that a reasonable entity in its position could have believed that the alleged domestic dragnet was legal.

That was the emphatic rebuttal of the telecom's case by U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker -- a President Bush (the elder) appointee.

Providing amnesty to lawbreaking corporations is a complete assault on the rule of law and on the basic fairness of our political system. When ordinary American citizens are accused of breaking the law, they are forced to go to court and, if the accusations are proven, they suffer the consequences.

If the telecoms really did nothing wrong, they should prove that in court, like all Americans must do.

And if Senator Reid honors the "hold," they'll have their day in court.

It's that simple.

Read the letter to Senator Reid and add your name.

http://www.noretroactiveimmunity.com

Senator Dodd also pledged to filibuster any bill containing retroactive immunity should his hold be ignored.

He has been joined by Senators Obama and Biden.

After a record number of threatened Republican filibusters, it shouldn't be a handful of Democrats actually forced to maintain one.

Hopefully, we can make sure it won't actually come to that.

Sincerely,

Glenn Greenwald, Jane Hamsher and Matt Stoller

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Sunnis and Shiites unite on one thing - don't Balkanize us

notably absent from the joint statement are the kurds...

Iraq's political leadership, in a rare show of unity, skewered a nonbinding U.S. Senate resolution passed last week that endorses the decentralization of Iraq through the establishment of semiautonomous regions.

The measure, which calls for a relatively weak central government and strong regional authorities in Sunni Arab, Shiite and Kurdish areas, has touched a nerve here, raising fears that the United States is planning to partition Iraq.

"The Congress adopted this proposal based on an incorrect reading and unrealistic estimations of the history, present and future of Iraq," said Izzat Shahbandar, a member of former interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi's secular parliamentary bloc.

He was reading from a statement also signed by preeminent Shiite Muslim religious parties and the main Sunni Arab bloc.

He was reading from a statement also signed by preeminent Shiite Muslim religious parties and the main Sunni Arab bloc.

"It represents a dangerous precedent to establishing the nature of the relationship between Iraq and the U.S.A.," the statement said, "and shows the Congress as if it were planning for a long-term occupation by their country's troops."

The nonbinding measure was approved in Washington on Wednesday, and resentment appears to be building daily in Iraq. Passed by senators, 75 to 23, it supports a "federal system" that would create regions dominated by sect and ethnicity.

The measure was sponsored by Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware, a Democratic candidate for president. Biden, along with Council of Foreign Relations president emeritus Leslie Gelb, has advocated that the country be divided up along ethnic, sectarian and regional lines.

Northern Iraq already has a semiautonomous region ruled by Kurds, but its leaders want to annex adjacent areas with dominant Kurdish populations.

the friend i visited in texas last week announced that she liked biden... not one to keep my counsel, i said i thought biden was a nitwit... sponsoring the measure does nothing to dispel that notion...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

McCain's candidacy: "Things are sinking fast..."

john, rudy, mitt, sam, maybe chuck... nobody looks very good over there right now...

[A] guru to the conservative movement, says [that] ... "One of the top aides to the Republican leadership told me that McCain has lost so much support, he's simply beside himself. He's wringing his hands. Things are sinking fast—in two or three weeks, we'll know if there is any recovery."

and with hillary, barack, john, joe, and maybe wes, things on this side ain't lookin' that much better...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments