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In reply to the discussion: Emails Show TPP 'Collusion' Between Big Banks & Obama Administration [View all]Octafish
(55,745 posts)91. Is This Barack Obama's 2nd Term? Is it Bill Clinton's 3rd? Or Is It Ronald Reagan's 9th?
They say that elections do matter, and that there are real differences between Republican and Democratic presidents. But backing up the view to 30 years, that difference looks a lot more like continuity, both at home and in America's global empire.
By Bruce A. Dixon
Black Agenda Report managing editor
The answer is yes to all three. Ronald Reagan hasn't darkened the White House door in decades. But his policy objectives have been what every president, Democrat and Republican have pursued relentlessly ever since. Barack Obama is only the latest and most successful of Reagan's disciples.
SNIP...
In Barack Obama's case all he had to say was that he wasn't necessarily against wars, just against what he called stupid wars. Corporate media and liberal shills morphed that lone statement into a false narrative that Barack Obama opposed the war in Iraq, making him an instantly viable presidential candidate at a time when the American people overwhelmingly opposed that war. Once in office, Barack Obama strove mightily to abrogate the Status of Forces Agreement with Iraq which would have allowed US forces to remain there indefinitely. But when the Iraqi puppet government, faced with a near revolt on the part of what remained of Iraqi civil society, dared not do his bidding, insisting that uniformed US troops (but not the American and multinational mercenaries we pay to remain there) stick to the withdrawal timetable agreed upon under Bush, liberal shills and corporate media hailed the withdrawal from Iraq as Obama's victory.
Barack Obama doubled down on the invasion and occupation of large areas of Afghanistan, and increased the size of the army and marines, which in fact he pledged to do during his presidential campaign. Presidential candidate Obama promised to end secret imprisonment and torture. The best one can say about President Obama on this score is that he seems to prefer murderous and indiscriminate drone attacks, in many cases, over the Bush policy of international kidnapping secret imprisonment and torture. The Obama administration's reliance on drones combined with US penetration of the African continent, means that a Democratic, ostensibly antiwar president has been able to openly deploy US troops to every part of that continent in support of its drive to control the oil, water, and other resources there.
The objectives President Obama's Africa policies fulfill today were put down on paper by the Bush administration, pursued by Bill Clinton before that, and still earlier pursued by Ronald Reagan, when it funded murderous contra armies of UNITA in Angola and RENAMO in Mozambque. It was UNITA and RENAMO's campaigns, assisted by the apartheid regimes of Israel and South Africa that pioneered the genocidal use of child soldiers. Today, cruise missile liberals hail the Obama administration's use of pit bull puppet regimes like Uganda, Burundi and Rwanda, all of which shot their way into power with child soldiers, to invade Somalia and Congo, sometimes ostensibly to go after other bad actors on the grounds that they are using child soldiers.
CONTINUED...
http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/barack-obamas-2nd-term-it-bill-clintons-3rd-or-it-ronald-reagans-9th
Wealthiest times in human history and We the People must settle for Austerity and STFU @ the Wars Without End.
By Bruce A. Dixon
Black Agenda Report managing editor
The answer is yes to all three. Ronald Reagan hasn't darkened the White House door in decades. But his policy objectives have been what every president, Democrat and Republican have pursued relentlessly ever since. Barack Obama is only the latest and most successful of Reagan's disciples.
SNIP...
In Barack Obama's case all he had to say was that he wasn't necessarily against wars, just against what he called stupid wars. Corporate media and liberal shills morphed that lone statement into a false narrative that Barack Obama opposed the war in Iraq, making him an instantly viable presidential candidate at a time when the American people overwhelmingly opposed that war. Once in office, Barack Obama strove mightily to abrogate the Status of Forces Agreement with Iraq which would have allowed US forces to remain there indefinitely. But when the Iraqi puppet government, faced with a near revolt on the part of what remained of Iraqi civil society, dared not do his bidding, insisting that uniformed US troops (but not the American and multinational mercenaries we pay to remain there) stick to the withdrawal timetable agreed upon under Bush, liberal shills and corporate media hailed the withdrawal from Iraq as Obama's victory.
Barack Obama doubled down on the invasion and occupation of large areas of Afghanistan, and increased the size of the army and marines, which in fact he pledged to do during his presidential campaign. Presidential candidate Obama promised to end secret imprisonment and torture. The best one can say about President Obama on this score is that he seems to prefer murderous and indiscriminate drone attacks, in many cases, over the Bush policy of international kidnapping secret imprisonment and torture. The Obama administration's reliance on drones combined with US penetration of the African continent, means that a Democratic, ostensibly antiwar president has been able to openly deploy US troops to every part of that continent in support of its drive to control the oil, water, and other resources there.
The objectives President Obama's Africa policies fulfill today were put down on paper by the Bush administration, pursued by Bill Clinton before that, and still earlier pursued by Ronald Reagan, when it funded murderous contra armies of UNITA in Angola and RENAMO in Mozambque. It was UNITA and RENAMO's campaigns, assisted by the apartheid regimes of Israel and South Africa that pioneered the genocidal use of child soldiers. Today, cruise missile liberals hail the Obama administration's use of pit bull puppet regimes like Uganda, Burundi and Rwanda, all of which shot their way into power with child soldiers, to invade Somalia and Congo, sometimes ostensibly to go after other bad actors on the grounds that they are using child soldiers.
CONTINUED...
http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/barack-obamas-2nd-term-it-bill-clintons-3rd-or-it-ronald-reagans-9th
Wealthiest times in human history and We the People must settle for Austerity and STFU @ the Wars Without End.
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Emails Show TPP 'Collusion' Between Big Banks & Obama Administration [View all]
Octafish
May 2016
OP
Obama's "behind the scenes" work on the TPP has been reported on for a very, very long time.
bjo59
May 2016
#1
I'll tell you what I do know: People who trash DUers can't find something wrong with what they post.
Octafish
May 2016
#70
Wealthiest times in human history, and they're prescribing austerity for commoners,
LongTomH
May 2016
#10
"CIA moonlights in corporate world". The real reason for warrantless wire taps and email snooping.
GoneFishin
May 2016
#33
K and R!!! You bet! And the kitty youtubes is most awfully kewt! (Don't look at the man
Akamai
May 2016
#30
'Goldman Sachs urging him to push for "robust commitments" on Investor-State Dispute Settlement'
think
May 2016
#8
Is This Barack Obama's 2nd Term? Is it Bill Clinton's 3rd? Or Is It Ronald Reagan's 9th?
Octafish
May 2016
#91
There's a "Thank you, Sir" thread currently worshipping him as the best President ever.
MadDAsHell
May 2016
#34
I much prefer those posts of pictures of Obama with his family where all the responses all
Gene Debs
May 2016
#49
Similarly, environmental groups, unions, etc., sent letters to Obama and Congress on TPP.
Hoyt
May 2016
#54
Actually,you are quite wrong. While you were whining about TPP, he slipped Paris Accord
Hoyt
May 2016
#81
Thank goodness for laws requiring gov e-mail servers and the FOIA. Except for Hillary of course
Teamster Jeff
May 2016
#57
Those that conspire will try to cover themselves by trying to denigrating anyone that
rhett o rick
May 2016
#75