NN08 – Part III – Good Germans

( – promoted by buhdydharma )

If you haven’t seen them you might want to check out Parts I and II.  NN08 – Part I – Old Friends/New Friends has lots of pictures of kossacks and Netroots Nation, but I particularly recommend NN08 – Part II – Where’s our goddam impeachment Nancy?

In Part II, I equated our sucking up to Nancy Pelosi at Netroots Nation in Austin to the behavior of the ‘good Germans’.  Jeffrey Feldman, the very man who adamantly refused to allow me the use of the microphone to confront Pelosi on impeachment there, oddly enough objects.

oh, brother… (0 / 0)

When I turn on my television, I see Bill O’Reilly calling kossacks Nazis.  At the very least, I expect not to be treated to the same kind of accusation when I show up in my own community:

More crap is all we got from Nancy, and we sat there politely and quietly and took it like good Germans.  What are we?  Republicans?

C’mon, now.  I’ve heard of Godwin’s law, but this is just so far over the top.

I really can’t believe it has reached the point where I am posting a comment explaining that our citizen-organized convention was not a moment where kossacks acted like Nazi enablers.

Didn’t see value in the Pelosi event–fine. It wasn’t for everyone. Weren’t happy with the questions?  Point taken.  Felt ‘personally’ snubbed in the Q&A?  Noted. Despite the way they were delivered, those messages have been heard loud and clear.  But there has simply got to be a better way to offer your critique of NN than to accuse everyone of being an enabler of the Nazis.

Yeesh…

by Jeffrey Feldman

Apparently Jeffrey hasn’t heard, Godwin’s Law ain’t what it used to be.

Mike Godwin on Godwin’s law:

The Law turned out to be more successful at propagating itself than I could ever have predicted. Far more people have heard about “Godwin’s Law” than have heard about me, although Wikipedia handily links us together nowadays (another link that predates my arrival at Wikipedia as a hobbyist editor and later as an employee). That’s fine by me.

Still, I sometimes have some ambivalence about the Law, which is far beyond my control these days. Like most parents, I’m frequently startled by the unexpected turn my 18-year-old offspring takes. (I’m happy to say that my 15-year-old offspring-my daughter, Ariel Godwin-surprises me at least as often, although invariably in happier ways.) When I saw the photographs from Abu Ghraib, for example, I understood instantly the connection between the humiliations inflicted there and the ones the Nazis imposed upon death camp inmates-but I am the one person in the world least able to draw attention to that valid comparison.

Source

Jeffrey, your argument implies that the comparison is invalid because the Bush administration is better than the Nazis.  Okay, I’ll give you that.  The Bush administration is better than the Nazis…but by how much?  

NOT VERY FUCKING MUCH.

But if that makes you feel better about being an enabler so be it.

To suggest that there is no parallel between what is happening in this country and what happened in Germany circa 1939 is either ignorant or disingenuous, in Jeffrey’s case, I’m guessing the latter.  Either way is to deny the reality of our very dire circumstances.

Secret Bush Administration Torture Memo Released Today In Response To ACLU Lawsuit (4/1/2008)

Memo Contends That President Can Authorize Torture

NEW YORK – A secret memo authored by the Department of Justice (DOJ) asserting that President Bush has unlimited power to order brutal interrogations to extract information from detainees was declassified today as a result of an American Civil Liberties Union Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. The memo, written by John Yoo, then a deputy at the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), was sent to the Defense Department in March 2003.

“Senior officials at the Justice Department gave the Pentagon the green light to torture prisoners,” said Amrit Singh, an ACLU staff attorney. “It is outrageous that none of these high-level officials have been brought to task yet for their role in authorizing prisoner abuse.”

ACLU

I could go on and on with solid evidence of the heinous crimes that have been perpetrated against us and much of the rest of the world – but you’ve already seen it a million times.  It’s bad, it’s never been worse and it’s not going to get better easily.  Especially since we’ve been robbed of the opportunity to take the first step toward healing by Nancy Pelosi.

I know that there are a lot of people who want to pretend that things are proceeding normally and that all we have to do is be blindly loyal to Obama, get out that vote and elect more and better Democrats (not that there’s anything wrong with that) and everything will be fine.

Well, everything will not be fine and may never be again precisely because we have lacked the courage to stand up to the bullies who have taken over our country, ripped it off and ruined it.  Those we counted on to oppose the criminals in the White House have betrayed us instead.

The freedoms that have been taken from us are not coming back.  Our so-called government is not going to stop spying on peaceniks, invading countries whenever it takes a notion or torturing people all over the world.  We are not going to ever have universal healthcare.  We are not going to find a graceful way out of the energy crisis.  We will never again be a free nation – and our economy is collapsing as we speak.  We are all going to suffer horribly because of what the Bush administration has done – and they have done it with the painfully obvious collusion of the leadership of the Democratic Party.

Pelosi and Dem Leaders Complicit in Bush’s Torture Policy?

Have Congressional Dems known of Bush’s waterboarding and rendition policies since 2002?

What did Congressional Democrats know, and when did they know it?

Is it possible that many Democratic leaders have been informed by the Bush administration over the years about its doubtfully legal activities?

If so, are they therefore complicit in the Bush administration’s lawlessness?

It’s just been disclosed that Representative Jane Harmon and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi were briefed by the Bush administration on the use of waterboarding. Harmon objected but Pelosi did not — and when she became speaker of the house, she rejected Harmon for chair of the House Intelligence Committee.

Alternet

But you’re right Jeffrey, it’s not as bad as the Nazis…so I guess it’s okay that we enabled it all.

I still say that sucking up to Nancy Pelosi in light of how much damage she personally has done to this country and to the cause of justice was a complete and utter disgrace.

However, I must point out that it is no more of a disgrace than how we have failed to stand up to our betrayal at the hands of the Democratic leadership time after time, year after year.  We gave them a majority in November 06 and all they have done since is fuck us over, just as they did before while blaming it on the Republican majority.  They continue to fund that evil clusterfuck in Iraq and have no real intention of ending it…EVER.  If that weren’t true they wouldn’t still be funding it.

Even Obama, bless his heart, says we will leave a ‘residual force’ there to ‘combat terrorism’.  Come on Barrack.  WTF?

So anyway, Obama should win this thing, that is if we don’t lay down, roll over and let the Republicans steal it again (of which there is at least a 50/50 chance in my book).  They will definitely try to steal it, it’s how they play the game, it’s what they’re good at and lord knows we haven’t grown any balls since the last two times we let them steal it.  Furthermore, we have not done our due diligence in assuring the integrity of our electoral system and the mechanisms the Republicans used to steal 2000 and 2004 remain firmly in place in most parts of the country.

So if Barack Obama becomes our next president, and he should, does anyone expect to see corporations reigned in?  Blackwater disbanded?  Our jobs brought back?  Our economy revived?  Our military madness reduced?  Our priorities reordered?  Our environmental laws strengthened to the point that global warming is reversed?  Color me pessimistic – and yes, I agree completely that Obama is better than McCain.  

That’s not really saying very much though is it?

Even if my pessimistic view is not borne out, and I really hope it won’t be, the point here is that we have plenty to be pissed off about.  PLENTY!

It really is pitiful when you think about it.  We have no trouble at all standing up to Bill O’Reilly or Rush Limbaugh and their ilk.  We’re hell on blowhards and idiots.  And we’re hell on anyone in our ranks who would dare criticize Democrats no matter how much they deserve it – but we can’t be bothered to stand up to those who have truly betrayed us and our country – those like Nancy Pelosi or Harry Reid.  No, all we can do with them is kiss their asses and pretend like they aren’t still stabbing us in the back.

George Bush, Dick Cheney, Condoleeza Rice, Alberto Gonzalez, Donald Rumsfeld and all the other criminals you let off the hook thank you Nancy.  But I do not.  And WE should not.

If we had any integrity at all or the courage of our convictions we would have (metaphorically) grabbed Nancy Pelosi by the throat and shook her while screaming in her traitorous face, “WTF? WTF? WTF?  Where’s our goddam impeachment Nancy?”

But no.  We sat there and refused anyone of us the right to confront her, and bitched about Code Pink, the only ones with the courage to protest…like the good Germans we are.

Cheers Jeffrey.