When Donald Trump becomes commander in chief in January, he will take on presidential powers that have never been more expansive and unchecked.
He’ll control an unaccountable drone program, and the prison at Guantanamo Bay. His FBI, including a network of 15,000 paid informants, already has a record of spying on mosques and activists, and his NSA’s surveillance empire is ubiquitous and governed by arcane rules, most of which remain secret. He will inherit bombing campaigns in seven Muslim countries, the de facto ability to declare war unilaterally, and a massive nuclear arsenal — much of which is on hair-trigger alert.
Caught off guard by Hillary Clinton’s election defeat, Democrats who defended these powers under President Obama may suddenly be having second thoughts as the White House gets handed over to a man they described — with good reason — as “unhinged,” and “dangerously unfit.”
In the years after the 9/11 terror attacks, Vice President Dick Cheney and his legal adviser David Addington dramatically expanded the powers of the presidency, asserting the unilateral right in wartime to ignore legal limits on things like torture and government eavesdropping. Congressional Democrats generally caved, but made a few efforts to push back.
The Democrats went silent on executive overreach when Obama was elected, however.
When the New York Times revealed Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program in 2005, 60 percent of registered Democrats thought the program was “unacceptable.” But after NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden revealed a dramatically larger surveillance apparatus in 2013, a 61 percent of Democrats said the opposite — presumably because they trusted the man in charge.
The Obama administration has counted on that trust repeatedly. When defending the drone program in 2012, instead of referencing its legal standards, administration officials reassured the New York Times that Obama is “a student of the writings on war by Augustine and Thomas Aquinas,” and that CIA director John Brennan is like “a priest with extremely strong moral values who was suddenly charged with leading a war.”
After eight years of trusting the President with expanding military power, liberals must now reckon with the fact that Obama will pass the same capabilities to a man who has proposed killing terrorists’ innocent family members, who has said he would do “a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding,” and who has suggested dipping bullets in pigs’ blood is sound counterterrorism strategy.
And most of the paltry few legal limitations that regulate the security state could easily be repealed by a President Trump.
In 2015, for instance, in response to protests in Ferguson, Mo., Obama signed an order banning the transfers of certain surplus military weapons to police, including armored vehicles, grenade launchers, bayonets, and high-caliber ammunition. Trump, who has called police the “most mistreated people in America,” and has refused to criticize police for brutality or killings, could easily revoke that ban.
Trump has said he would create “a deportation force” – apparently ignorant of the fact that he’ll inherit one. Obama has increased the budget for immigration enforcement to an all-time high and accelerated the rate of deportations. Obama has deported more than 2.5 million people – already more than any other President – and has made the Department of Homeland Security the largest law enforcement agency in the country.
Obama also already incarcerates hundreds of thousands of immigrants in detention centers, and forces young children to appear before immigration judges without a lawyer.
Trump will also take over the FBI, which has 35,000 employees and a network of 15,000 paid informants. Trump, who has said Muslim Americans should be forced to register on a government list, could easily rewrite its investigative guidelines.
As for the NSA, Congress passed a law in 2015 ending the bulk collection of Americans’ phone records and replaced it with a modified program. But according to a former State Department official, the phone records program is minuscule compared to the government’s “universe of collection” under Executive Order 12333, which Trump is free to reinterpret or modify.
To make matters worse, the Obama administration has convinced courts that citizens cannot challenge the legality of NSA programs until they can prove they are under surveillance. Because government secrecy makes that generally impossible, courts have started to reject anti-surveillance lawsuits on procedural grounds.
Trump may also get his wish to “fill up” Guantanamo Bay. Despite Obama’s efforts this year to rapidly depopulate the prison camp, 60 prisoners remain, along with the architecture to imprison hundreds more.
With an additional stroke of his pen, Trump could reopen the global network of CIA “black sites” and imprison people there without any due process. After the Supreme Court ruled under Bush that Guantanamo detainees have rights under habeas corpus, the Obama administration in 2009 fought to avoid having the same rule applied to military prisons around the world.
Trump could also make good on his promise to resurrect the CIA’s torture program with a “hell of a lot worse than waterboarding,” despite the fact that it would be clearly illegal under a law passed by Congress in 2015. Trump said he would “expand the laws,” but he could probably get away with it regardless, because by refusing to prosecute any CIA officials involved in Bush-era torture, Obama made clear that presidents can get away with illegal torture.
During Trump’s campaign, former CIA director Michael Hayden and current CIA director John Brennan both insisted that CIA officials would disobey any order to commit “torture.” But both have defended the CIA practices, and while Brennan has said he would refuse to engage in “some of these tactics,” he has defended others as useful. Under Brennan, the CIA has also fought to undermine oversight efforts, and has publicly contested the results of an exhaustive Senate investigation into their abuses.
Trump, who has said he would “bomb the shit” out of terror groups and has proposed killing terrorists’ innocent families, will also inherit a global, unaccountable program of drone assassination. Obama started a vast escalation of Bush’s drone program in 2009, and Democrats have trusted him to assassinate people he deems an “imminent threat,” even when they are far away from war zones, and when he doesn’t even know who he is killing.
Obama made it look like he was reining in the program in May 2013, signing guidelines that required “near certainty that a terrorist target is present,” and “near certainty that non-combatants will not be injured or killed.” But a number of disastrous strikes in the following years – including one on a wedding party in Yemen – have led many to believe the administration is not following its own guidelines. And to whatever extent they actually apply, those guidelines could easily be revoked when President Trump gets to decide what is an “imminent threat,” living out his desire to “bomb the shit” out of terror groups.
The Obama administration has also convinced courts that they have no role to play in reviewing the legality of drone strikes – even when it involves killing a U.S. citizen. Lawsuits on behalf of drone victims, filed both before and after strikes took place have all been dismissed, setting the stage for Trump’s targeting decisions never to see their day in court.
When it comes to sustained bombing campaigns, Trump may not have to justify his actions much at all. Obama dramatically reduced the number of ground soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, but he has continued to bomb seven countries, with virtually no Congressional acknowledgement or debate.
Obama has continued the Presidential tradition of going to war without Congress, sometimes in almost absurd ways. In 2011, for example, the White House needed to argue that it could continue bombing Muammar Gaddafi’s forces in Libya without Congressional authorization. So the top lawyer in the State Department sent a memo to Congress arguing that a bombing campaign did not amount to wartime “hostilities,” mainly because the enemy could not fire back.
Even when the Obama administration sought Congressional authorization in 2013 to strike Syrian President Bashar Hafez al-Assad’s forces in retaliation for using chemical weapons, he insisted that he didn’t really need to. And he has not sought out a separate authorization to extend the war on terror to fight ISIS in Syria, ISIS in Libya, Al Shabaab in Somalia, or Boko Haram in Nigeria.
With such expansive war powers, and armed with the broad, Bush-era 2001 Congressional resolution authorizing war “in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism,” the next President could conduct military operations on a whim.
And perhaps most alarming is that Trump will inherit a Justice Department that has waged an unprecedented war on press freedom. Rather than shut down the Bush-era office that prosecuted leaks to the press, Obama made it his own, and has prosecuted more than twice as many people under the Espionage Act for leaking information to the press than all of his predecessors combined. His actions met with no resistance from Democrats.
In 2013, Obama’s Justice Department seized the phone records from three Associated Press bureaus to uncover the source for a story. Obama also waged a seven-year legal campaign against New York Times Reporter James Risen, threatening him with prison if he did not reveal his source for a story about a botched CIA operation. The prosecutors dropped the request at the last minute.
The legacy of that system is now passing into the hands of someone who has made a show of his contempt for the media. During his campaign, Trump repeatedly incited crowds against reporters, threatened publications with defamation lawsuits, and expressed his desire to “open up those libel laws.”
President Obama has spent much of his time as commander in chief expanding his own military power, while convincing courts not to limit his detention, surveillance, and assassination capabilities. Most of the new constraints on the security state during the Obama years were self-imposed, and could easily be revoked.
It is too early to tell what Trump will actually do. But if his campaign promises are anything to go on, he will flex all the powers Obama accrued and more, while cutting through Obama’s self-imposed restraints like tissue paper. And the silence of Democrats during the Obama years will play a major role in facilitating his abuses.
Correction, Nov. 11:
An earlier version of this story incorrectly characterized the extent to which Obama has increased the budget for immigration enforcement
President-elect Donald Trump talks after a meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama in the Oval Office.
Obama, GOP lite war pig shill loser shallow speech maker. Yay your legacy is to leave is with shill GOP arse kissing by you Holder and Lynch and you leave nothing but a orange Nazi to erase your barley left wing two terms
System sure looks like it’s burning to me…….yay democracy …..
Protest Trump
Impeach Trump
Impeach Guiliani
Fire Sessions
Impeach Pence
They’ll deny it all they want. But 8 years ago, before Obama was sworn in, a secret group of neocons met in the back of a DC restaurant and made a plan to block EVERYTHING Obama tried to do. Why? Because he’s bi-racial. And these racist white guys really didn’t like that. They still don’t like it.
Now, we have a racist President elect. No surprise then that when they met in the Oval Office for the first time, the cable news networks actually had psychologists, body language experts and others micro analyzing every single frame of this video. What does this mean? Just how much does Trump hate bi-racial Muslim Obama?
Trump’s pick to be AG? Racist Jeff Sessions? Keep in mind Trump will have press conferences where blatant racism is considered perfectly normal. Yeah? What’s your question, you f*****g ______?
Remember Trump supporters, he REALLY REALLY hates all dark skinned people who aren’t Christians and have names like Mohammad.
Soon, Trump will have to power to have anyone killed who he says is a “terrorist”. They can be killed anywhere in the world. Now Obama never had anyone killed in the US. Would Trump have somebody killed by a drone strike on US soil? Or, would he have a hit team (JSOC, CIA, etc.) sneak in and do it? Millions of people could scream about it. The press could scream about it. Trump would then reply, ____ you. It’s all legal. Thank Congress for passing the NDAA. Especially SEC. 1021.
Thank you Bush and Cheney. Obama knows a hell if a lot more than we do. We have to protect ourselves from the dangers in the world, including Wikileaks and Edward Snowden who screwed his own countrt. Traitor. He had other means if shared his information without than to go to other countries.
Trump met with President Obama in the White house after the election to have chat in front of the press.
After, he said, “I don’t think he’s ideological… and he has a good sense of direction.”
Others said; “We owe him an open mind and a chance to lead.” -Hillary Clinton; “Give Donald Trump a chance” -Geraldo Rivera; “The American people should give Donald Trump a chance, because if he succeeds, we succeed.” Don Lemon (CNN); “Give President-elect Trump a chance” -Nicholas Kristof (NYT).
I wholeheartedly disagree.
I think all of us should listen more to someone who takes the opposite view like Ted Cruz (before the election) “I’m going to tell you what I really think of Donald Trump. This man is a pathological liar. He doesn’t know the difference between truth and lies.” Or like Bob Gates (former defense secretary) “he is unqualified and unfit to be commander in chief.” Or like John Oliver. Sunday night on ‘Last Week Tonight’, he said “This is NOT normal…Because a Klan backed, misogynist, internet troll is going to be delivering the next ‘State of the Union’ address. And that is not normal. It is fucked up!”
Thank you President Obama, for strengthening the powers of the secret police state you inherited from George W. Bush. ‘Thank you’ all you democrats (& republicans) who were silent (or even ridiculously vocally aghast) when Edward Snowden enlightened us about the unconstitutional domestic spying of our country by the NSA. You have not only dropped the ball with regard to protecting our constitution (and privacy), but handed the ball over to the enemy and said “we surrender”. ‘Pathetic’ does not even begin to describe your actions or lack thereof. More like it, ‘apathetic’, or ‘traitorous’ would be a more fitting description of you and your ilk.
And BTW, one of Trump’s candidates to run Dept of Homeland Security, (Milwaukee County Sheriff) David Clarke commented on (after election) anti-trump protesters, saying “they must be quelled.”
The devil has begun his rise from hell. The old guard is giving him his due.
LMAO, really? You’re trying to blame Obama for this? Obama never once did anything he wasn’t allowed to do – all of those “powers” are things every president we’ve ever had had the power to do.
Really? How many drone strikes did Thomas Jefferson order? Who was on Millard Filmore’s kill list?
Granted, some of this expansion of presidential power started under Bush (as the article acknowledges, and as you’ll discover if you read past the headline), but constitutional scholar and Nobel Peace laureate Obama not only didn’t roll back these powers but expanded them. I don’t think Dubya would have dared to assassinate a US citizen, but Obama could get away with it because he’s perceived as a nice guy. After all he reads Thomas Aquinas!
In one sense, you’re correct: Obama did only what he was “allowed” to do. The point of the article is that we shouldn’t have “allowed” Obama to do anything that we wouldn’t want Trump to be able to do.
It is disingenous to say the least, warning about Trump’s supposed warmongering tendencies (without any evidence) when we all know that Hillary has long proclaimed her intention to use brute military force to put Putin [aka the new Hitler] in his place: the logical outcome of a policy of American exceptionalism, hegemony and regime change.
Besides the terrifying fact that the Constitution has been thrown in the shitter, the President is NOT the Commander in Chief unless and until the Congress has declared war. The Congress has not declared war in any recent conflict. The president is nothing but a putz like all the rest of us, any opinion of the SCOTUS to the contrary not withstanding.
As the article pointed out, Obama is already doing what Trump proposes; The Donald, like most Repos, is more honest about his fascist tendencies. Dummos like Obama commit the same crimes and lie about it.
Better to have an honest tyrant than a lying liberal.
I voted for Trump. He will be as bad as you think. I hope. I wanted America to see what we have become. I want everyone to see what the system looks like from the outside. We needed this. We needed to see how far we’ve gotten from where we were supposed to be going. We believd we were something we are no longer. Once this nation truly was the last, best hope for mankind. Something to believe in, worth the sacrifice of our treasures and even our lives. We pledged to each other our sacred honor and prized that bond over selfish rewards and comforts.
That America slipped away while we weren’t looking. Our lack of vigilance let thieves steal into our marble halls of state and seduce a generation of our finest sons and daughters from our finest ivy league universities. Now we see the rot, we see how deep it goes. We passed the tipping point, the spell is broken for most of us. The ivy league alumni may be hopelessly lost for a generation but we never really needed them, we just needed to see what we had become. This America is not worth our sacrifices. These Americans don’t stand united, but maybe Trump gives us a reason to unite, to defend each other and to remember why we are here in the first place. If America isn’t worth living and dying for for All the People then there is no America. Divided, we will fall.
In Alcoholics Anonymous they say you have to hit rock bottom to have that ‘moment of clarity’ before you can really accept the need to recover. I hope this catastrophe, this collective hangover, when we look over and see just who we’ve been to bed with, is low enough to jolt us into seeing that moment of clarity and how ugly we’ve become and resolve to walk the long road to recovery.
I voted for Trump because I love America, and Tough Love is all we deserve right now.
This is a pretty funny comment.
“Once this nation truly was the last, best hope for mankind.”
What do you think America is? What about Canada and many European countries?
It seems the protesters are protesting to get a leader that is a lot nicer with their words when yielding unconstitutional executive power. It’s ok to bomb innocent civilians, militarize police, spy on the general public, jail political prisoners, take huge donations from human rights violating countries and bail out wall st IF you talk a good politically correct game like Obama? Have this many people really been brainwashed? Have this many people failed to recognize the threats of globalism, blowback from endless wars or the rise if the police state? This mass illusion is stronger than I realized. Not saying Trump is the solution but to believe HRC is some savior worth disrupting our cities or rejecting an election shows me we have a large portion of people who truly do not understand what the greatest dangers are. HRC is establishment and would sell any of us out to the highest bidder.
Tough – you built it – now reap the whirlwind.
“kill innocent families of terrorists”
Um, Obama been there done that, and he was an American Citizen to boot.
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2015/04/abdulrahman-al-awlaki-obama-drone
“They sow the wind and reap the whirlwind.” Hosea 8:7
He won. He has a pen. And a phone. If Congress won’t act, he will. Enjoy the ride, Democrats.
There has been inexorable ratcheting of federal power across many presidents. What is ruining us, IMO, is the globalist imperialist consensus among the advanced Western powers vis a vis the less developed world. We Americans and our rights are of minimal concern to those playing the new “Great Game”.
I am modestly hopeful that Trump will eschew this game and instinctively return us to a more classic nationalist version of the USA.
I submit (this is long, but the first segment is best):
https://reason.com/blog/2016/11/11/the-case-for-optimism-about-trumps-presi
This is exactly why I advocated for Trump. Seems people need a lesson in consolidation of violent power.
This, precisely.
It’s not Obama your headline should be thanking — it’s the millions of low information “I jus’ voted for him because he black” voters who elected him, and the MSM bootlickers who defended him, all of whom applauded every extraconstitutional violation Obama committed.
Now, a “mainstream” Republican, having won, would make the canonical “Stupid Party” mistake of not retaliating in kind — not just letting the Democrats off scot-free, but practically allowing them to steer his administration.
But Trump’s not typical, and I’m hoping he decides it’s well past time to redirect some serious grief onto the original griefers.
They like presidents who aren’t “afraid” to ignore those dead white guys’ Constitution? Let’s give them one.
exactly. Congress, a bunch of war whores for profiteers and power, could not do their job and declare war. So what happened? President Obama decided to break the law and do what congress didn’t do. And what congress did not do was to declare a war. Using the military as a police action constitutes treason.
The hysteria on the left proves they are mental cases and great monsters of the highest order. I call them pussies. They area threat to the US Constitution.
Trump will have terrible powers as did Obama before him and they came from Bush before him and this will continue because there is a wholesale refusal to Prosecute Presidents for their Crimes! If Bush was Prosecuted for His War Crimes the unlawful invasion of Iraq, the Unlawful imprisonment and torture of Prisoners and note this is not MY take on the matter one of the SCOTUS Justices made comment about it in his opinion in Hamdin V Rumsfeld (Minority opinion)! Until Presidents are brought to task for their on their non voted for legislative whims then we are doomed to allow them to make more!
What seems to be lost in all this is that these powers were not evoked unilaterally, or handed down chiselled in stone, but rather handed over to the various presidents – going all the way back to Lyndon Johnson – by a Congress that has increasingly refused to fulfill its Constitutional obligations. What’s more, the democrats and republicans do not fundamentally differ in their views of presidential power, they only object to its being wielded by a member of the other branch of the Party.
Last Tuesday’s election was a charade, in which the electorate played a willing part. Not only did they not recognize the possibility for true change offered by third party candidates, they returned an overwhelming majority of the corrupt, incompetent Congress to Washington. Having thus elected these clowns yet again, we will reap our just rewards.
BINGO!
Alex you need to question your parents. Or be doomed to live in the unfinished portion of your grandparents basement.
But then again you are posting such things at such a young age. You will be my master. With no understanding of things except golden parachutes.
Er so?… I hope Trump delivers what he promised, and isn’t just yet another unscrupulous rich selfish c***…
“I’m going to tell you what I really think of Donald Trump. This man is a pathological liar. He doesn’t know the difference between truth and lies.” -Ted Cruz
“Obama’s self-imposed restraints ”
LOL – WHAT.
I have nothing against drugs, but people taking drugs and then writing articles should put a disclaimer or something.
Yes.
lol
I agree, but suggest that perhaps it was a euphemism. For incompetence. Or for corruption. Or both. Yes, that’s it: Obama’s incompetence and corruption.
Informative article. I would suggest a more honest title that captures the current reality:
“Commander-In-Chief Barak Obama Has Terrifying Powers. Thanks, Obama.”
Oh yes, and for the Intercept to rant about empowering Klansman and other hate groups is very disingenuous. The owner of the Intercept financially empowers Nazi Battalions in the Ukraine. This is material empowerment not guilt by non-association – a tactic liberals love to use to paint Trump as a fascist. Much hypocrisy.
Yes.
It’s obvious that people in the West, especially the U.S. don’t appreciate the threat to our freedoms that the religion of Islam presents. Trump understands this and appears to be the only one willing to publicly do something about it. For that reason and that reason alone, we are lucky he got voted in. I believe in religious freedom & the right to worship & proselytize to your heats content. But Islam is far more than just a religion—it’s a political-religious ideology hell-bent on changing current Western laws to further promote the religion of Islam ….. just look at how their women are kept under control! Do you really want an 8th century mentality imposed on our 21st century ways of thinking? The moment Muslims shut up & accept OUR ways is the moment I’ll accept theirs.
Obama currently enjoys an 88 % approval rating from “black” Americans.
In 2000, Al Gore received 90% of the “black ” vote
In 2004, Kerry received 88% of the “black” vote
in 2008, Obama received 95% of the “black” vote
in 2012, Obama received 93% of the “black” vote
in 2016, Hillary received 88% of the “black” vote
Hillary entered the election with a virtual guarantee that she would receive roughly 90% of the black vote.
As there were roughly 25,000,000 eligible black voters in 2016, Hillary had a potential lead of roughly 22,500,000 votes
44 % of eligible voters self-identified as republicans
48 % of eligible voters self-identified as democrats
27 % of eligible Hispanic voters self-identified as republicans
63% of eligible Hispanic voters self-identified as democrats
54 % of eligible white voters self-identified as republicans
39 % of eligible white voters self-identified as democrats
38 % of eligible female voters self-identified as republicans
54 % of eligible female voters self-identified as democrats
42% of the female vote went to Trump
54 % of the female vote went to Clinton
Trump’s favorability rating among eligible voters was 35% on Nov 7
Clinton’s favorability rating among eligible voters was 40% on Nov 7
Hillary Clinton outspent Trump by a factor of 2 (roughly 900,000,000)
The single biggest difference between Obama’s victories in 2008 and 2012 and Hillary’s loss in 2016 was her failure to get out the democratic vote.
In 2008 , Obama received roughly 69,500,000 votes
In 2012 , Obama received roughly 66,000,000 votes
In 2016, Hillary received roughly 60,000,000 votes
Karl, you are wrong when you say :
“The single biggest difference between Obama’s victories in 2008 and 2012 and Hillary’s loss in 2016 was her failure to get out the democratic vote.”
the truth is:
The single biggest difference between Obama’s victories in 2008 and 2012 and Hillary’s loss in 2016 was that in 2008 and 2012 Obama ran for POTU$, and in 2016 HRC ran for POTU$.
… your statistical analysis is that of the MSM, the DNC and the RNC – and bears NO resemblance to what happened in voterland.
… “the democrats” that you claim HRC didnt get out to vote mostly stayed at home in protest to the bullshit goings-on within the DNC and the obviously completely corrupted and compromised HRC (and some did go out to vote – and voted for Trump in an even more obvious protest).
hopefully Karl, you live in one of the states where the weed laws changed … because you are going to need a lot of hashish to get through the next 4 years.
>> cheers brother.
Logic isn’t your strong suit, is it Owen? You just provided proof for the very argument you intended to refute. The fact that there were some crossover votes between parties does prove your point as that happens in every national election. In many states with semi-open primaries, election officials or poll workers from their respective parties record each voter’s choice of party and provide access to this information. Thus, an independent can choose to vote in a democratic primary and yet vote republican in the general election.
Yes, Doublecroosing and Dishonesty are not something to vote for.
Trump has the power to command and demand – but does he have the power to actually make people follow through on any of it, especially if enough of them say no. He will be powerful but the agencies he will have to deal with are also very powerful – some have already said they would not do as commanded and specifically as regards torture, whether that was bravado and a bit of chest puffing remains to be seen.
Ultimately, it will all depend on how much ugliness and suffering people are willing to accept for the ‘other’ in exchange for a relatively ‘peaceful’ albeit much more limited life for themselves. Obviously a great many people are willing to accept a great deal of ugly and suffering for others, usually for people in countries far away so one can just turn the TV off when it gets uncomfortable or starts to prick the conscience, or with the disenfranchised ‘other’ here, but they are slowly making their voices heard. But, when those screams are much louder, in the same room and cannot be ignored and quieted so easily it is a very different matter. There’s a far more telling reason than security that Gitmo is not on US soil, that the black sites known about are in foreign lands. I think the important thing is not to stay quiet, not to give into fear, make it harder for people to become habituated to others (and their own) suffering.
Who would have thought pre-9/11, that torture would be thrown around with such abandon, that kidnapping, assassinations, imprisonment without due process, in fact all that was used to castigate and boycott other countries to say “we walk the high road” would become business as usual here and to such an extent that a Presidential candidate can use it as cement for his platform. Fear made that a reality. Habituation and ignorance and silence backed it up.
Trump might be able to ‘sign’ away respect, peace, autonomy, privacy, the right to a dignified life, but how many, when push comes to shove, will agree to go along with it, sell themselves for it? That is and always has been the deciding factor on whether the worst happens or better is had. I am sure many who voted for Trump do not hold with his racist, misogynist, xenophobic, prejudiced values but they were/are prepared to accept his ugly and others suffering in exchange for what they want. When they don’t get what has been promised, who knows what might happen. Who knows if when they see the price that has to be paid for it if they will be willing to fork over their freedom and the American dream. At that point we might well see a unified US willing to work and pay towards a more humane path.
But, we are not there yet. There is still some time, before the worst is in the offing, to switch paths and forge ahead under the banner of freedom, dignity, justice and equality for all. I live in hope.
I agree but you will see a difference sooner than that. A year from now. When the dimwits who voted for him realize he took them the same way he took students at his “university”.
Trump needs to be watched and his feet held to the fire on his promises.
His “unknown qualities” were a safer bet than Hellary’s ” known qualities”.
Yes.
In other words, it’s actually business as usual. Everything Trump promised to do is merely a slight expansion of that which was already happening. And once again, a glorified popularity contest-winner has his twitchy finger on the nuclear trigger – the same situation that prevailed ever since the system ws created. So maybe Trump will be good for the US after all – since it’s a distinct possibility that more USians will wake up to the murderous farce that the “land of the free” has always been. So yes, thanks, libtards. For once, I don’t mean that sarcastically.
I hope Trump will run the country like a business, if he does in four years he might get us started in the right direction. Maybe people who care more about their party than the country will wake up and become American citizens instead of Democrats or Republicans. I have more confidence in Trump than I do you team organizers.
If he runs the country like Trump University, no other country will trust the U.S. If he runs the country like Trump Vodka, Trump Steaks, or Trump Taj Mahal, the country will be bankrupt in no time.
If he puts people to work, hopefully he will pay them, unlike the contractors that are suing him (750+ at last count) that built his resorts.
Be careful what you wish for grasshopper.
“inheriting a nuclear arsenal, much of which is on hair-trigger alert,…” That is already a dicey proposition given that the military brass managing it has a history of drunkenness and accompanying psychotic behaviors. I expect a hangover launch any Saturday or Sunday during a general’s dry heaves.
Most every cloud has a silver lining from some angle, some are just not immediately visible.
The backlash to any President Trump evil should be far greater and swifter, domestically and globally, than it ever would’ve been if Hillary was just continuing empire’s status quo plans. I expect a percentage of the main stream media that backed Hillary to inadvertently begin being journalists again instead of stenographers, at least while Trump’s volunteering as target.
Is this perhaps what all that establishment and power, that lined up behind Hillary, really feared? Is any too-public interruption in the decades long plan of dictating law, hypocrisy and economics to the rest of the world – one that might end it all? Plausible.
Enough journalists no longer dazzled by their access – might actually bring down an empire.
In other words a media who distrusts our POTUS and will watch him like a hawk ready to pounce on any miss step is MUCH better than a darling of the media who would enjoy the backing of media explaining away all her criminal activity.
In a more charming vernacular, I suppose, yes.
Yes.
Good article, thank you.
Maybe congress will reign in some of these powers under Trump that they would expanded even more under Clinton.
In a back door way Trump may cause some really good things to happen.
Lets first hold him to those Term Limits for congress….
Dear Alex Emmons,
Trump is no more unfit to wield that power than any other man or woman on this planet. That you invest so much power in one person is itself insane. The USA has been amassing this insane arsenal and expanding its reach to all corners of the globe since becoming the main superpower in 1945. It took another giant leap with the fall of the Soviet Union and it grabbed its “opportunities” with both hands post-911.
You are an invasive, murderous people that left your homelands and “settled” in North America; now your globalisation sees you expanding ever further into our worlds with disgraceful trade agreements and terrorism and spying and manipulation and murder.
All of this goes on unchecked by the electorate of the USA. It is also funded with your taxes. It is not Trump who worries the world, it is YOU, the people of America. YOU are the disgrace.
You are the pretend-paranoid idiots who spend $1trillion EVERY YEAR on weapons and spying, seeing enemies everywhere and using it as an excuse to force yourselves into all aspects of peoples lives, the military arm of your imperialism.
You are the consumers that enrich your greedy corporations, empowering them to kill off all competition, usurp your national democratic processes and develop “trade agreements” that allow them to usurp our democratic processes. You are the CEOs and managers and employees and lawyers of these companies and so you do nothing.
You are the electorate that vote. You are the people that man your juries and judicial system that pass its judgements and laws.
Out of 300million people NOT ONE MAN OR WOMAN could stand up and challenge either Trump or Clinton. NOT ONE FUCKING PERSON.
And so now you will in true Yankee fashion whine like cunts whilst doing diddly squat.
If Hillary had won, then the USA would comfortably slip back into denying its guilt around the world; now instead you want to dump all your demons on Donald Trump – who you just democratically elected.
Between them Bush and Obama are responsible for untold deaths running into the hundreds of thousands. They both signed off on illegal detentions, torture, drone murders, the use of terror and when they were not directly involved they willingly backed any number of proxies to act on their behalf.
Trump is no saint, but you the citizenry of the USA are definitely sinners. And this little babyish cry-fest at The Intercept won’t change a fucking thing. Get off your arses and revolt, or shut your fucking whining up. Fucking full of shit moron hypocrites.
This is perhaps the best comment I have read this year at The Intercept, and that includes Benito Mussolini’s gems. Bravo sir or ma’am. Good article too, by the way.
I’d have to agree that the above commenter pretty much hits the nail squarely on the head. Until the American people are willing to take a long hard look in the mirror, much of the globe is going to continue to pay for “our way of life” with their lives and futures.
That’s not right, that’s not moral, that’s not humanitarian or humanist, and our failure to see that truth is going to be the cause of our nation’s downfall, and the continued destruction of all the people in the world that we see as “objects” of our “national interest”.
Many of us have been saying this for years. That’s why I’m not whining about someone like Trump coming to power, because he is the consequence of precisely the failures the American people that “Is this the new article-repeat-ad-nauseam” is pointing out.
The problem isn’t Donald Trump. The problem is the American people.
“In a free society, some are guilty, but all are responsible.” — Abraham Joshua Heschel.
Americans have a *lot* to answer for.
Well said.
Well said. The liberals or the democrats as they call themselves are if anything even more hypocritical than the Republicans. The Republicans at least don’t lie to themselves and to others that US dealings with the rest of the world are not motivated only by greed and self-interest.
That is why US liberal journalists which includes many at the The Intercept paint Obama or Hillary as lesser threats than Trump. The fact is that Obama and Hillary were worse than anything they project Trump as capable of, except in two areas of only domestic concern – abortion and gay rights. And though a US President is relevant to US legal regimes on abortion or gay rights, I don’t think the deep state that was supporting Hillary cares much about either of these two issues. So I don’t think the election in 2016 turned on either of these issues.
Thanks, we needed that.
Now if Alex, The Intercept_, and the rest of us could see these truths we might, at the very least, understand the reality we live in. And who knows perhaps through something like free will do something about it.
It was doubtful that representative government would work from the beginning and, what do you know, has made mindless consumers out of all of us.
Off towards democracy we go then. Come on you ‘fucking full of shit moron hypocrites’ let’s go.
It’s become pointless to speak of what your against. Decide what your for, speak of it, and be willing to fight for it. Starting with a planet that we can live on (if that means anything to you).
Yes, Trump is the soul of US. See yourself there.
While reading this article you might never guess that
while in any position of power
Hillary Clinton has been one of the most devoted supporters
of expanding these “Terrifying Powers” (Terror-ifying)
beyond what the criminal Obama or the criminal Cheney have done.
That is probably why her criminal candidacy was supported
by her fellow NeoCons like Paul Wolfowitz and Robert Kagan.
As awful as Trump is, Clinton was proudly determined to
make these matters worse.
What a great country – NOT!
The American people are excellent at denying their own culpability in all of this – they vote, they consume, they work in the organisations, they sit on the juries. They ignore the crimes of Obama, and they blame Trump before he is even doing the job.
They are too comfortable to care, too stubborn to change, too complicit to confess, too cowardly to act.
G. Dubya Bush did what he’s told. He’s totally convinced, by the Israelis, that’s what Jesus wants.
Bush on steroid, aka Obama, gets things done by staying mum. His ‘transparency’ initiatives consist of sticking to the script from the teleprompter.
The president-elect believes that true leaders don’t need to worry about trivial things such as explication or justification. To do otherwise would be a sign of weakness.
They all do what needs to done. They all quite content knowing: the path to make-America-great-always is strewn with countless crimes.
“Whatever happens next in this saga it will be ground-shaking. The worst that can happen to Trump’s enemies is that he wins despite the all-fronts attack. They define his underlying meaning, just as the Enemy they construct abroad defines them. If he loses, there will be a carnival of the money-war-media party pretending a healing of the great division that has come to view. But this is not a Republican-Democrat division. It is as deep as all the lost jobs and lives since 2001, and it is ultimately grounded in the tens of millions of dispossessed people which the life-blind global market system and its wars have imposed on America too.” (GlobalResearch)
CNN is actually bemoaning that Trump will undo Obama’s promise to shut down Guantanamo. Unintended satire.
So Mr. Obama has been conducting an assassination program, engaging in illegal wars, conducting mass deportations and waging an unprecedented war on press freedom. But these policies were universally supported because he was such a nice guy.
I believe the concern that Mr. Trump will not receive universal support for continuing these programs is unfortunately valid. No one has ever accused Mr. Trump of being a nice guy. So opposition to these various policies will probably arise, but fortunately, Mr. Trump as President, will have the requisite power to deal with it.
Here is another power, POTUS can find handy:
Social media giant Facebook suddenly says a bunch of its users are dead.
https://techcrunch.com/2016/11/11/facebook-suddenly-thinks-a-bunch-of-people-are-dead-dont-panic/
https://techcrunch.com/2016/11/11/facebook-suddenly-thinks-a-bunch-of-people-are-dead-dont-panic/
We Conservatives were against the Executive Orders when Obama used them and will be against them when/if Trump uses them. Recinding Obama’s EO’s via more EO’s sticks in my craw somewhat – it smacks of justifying their constitutionality somehow, but I cannot think of another way to do it without taking years through the courts.
Should Trump fulfill his promise to only appoint originalist judges then future extra legal EO’s become a lot less likely. Frankly I don’t trust Trump, but feel a LOT better since he appointed Pence to run the transition team. Pence has a strong Constitutional background.
Definition of ‘Irony': Leftists suddenly concerned with limited government. Lol
Libertarian Ron Paul yesterday on Donald Trump, with a focus on foreign policy.
RT’s Peter Lavelle interviews Dr. Ron Paul (22 mins)
Obama had terrifying powers, he seized terrifying powers which he use terrifyingly. Thanks Obama.
You seem to forget this all started with George Bush. Obama benefited from NDAA and draconian executive orders created by neocon traitors. We are in for a bumpy ride. We let Obama get away with highway robbery in his 4th month in office. He approved the oppressive FISA bill.
Yes, all both parties sedition is handed to Trump, a good for these same folks to relearn the value and need for the Constitution.
This kind of thing really must stop:
“. I agree that pre-judging Trump is inappropriate, however.”
As a Muslim-American wrote on Twitter:
Get a fucking clue, folks: Donald Trump is a hardcore Zionist. Worse possibly than Hillary:
The time to begin opposition, to commence standing in solidarity with people of color, religious and sexual minorities, and to rush to the civil libertarian barricades, was 1 second after Donald Trump was announced the winner.
“An Israeli Cabinet minister has called for a renewed wave of settlement construction now that President-elect Donald Trump is signaling an end to longstanding White House opposition to the settlements.”
because Donald is a hardcore zionist?
i respectfully disagree. What i see is a panicked israel saying “we had better get to building now because Obama is a wimp and Donald hasnt been inaugurated yet.”
At the same time they will get Donald to become accustomed to the idea of being bowled over before he has a chance to oppose them.
IMO
YOU are utterly wrong. Can you not read? “Earlier, Jason Greenblatt, one of Trump’s advisers on Israel, told Army Radio that Trump doesn’t believe settlement activity should be condemned and doesn’t view the settlements as an obstacle to peace with the Palestinians.” That does not happen without Trump’s approval — Trump knowingly chose Greenblatt months ago, and the man is a wild-eyed pro-Israel fanatic.
Donald Trump personally made sure the GOP platform emerged this year as the most pro-Israel in it’s history — a real feat. Trump literally bragged about how pro-Israel he’s made the GOP.
And here’s BLM activist and journalist, Shaun King: No, we should not wait and see what a Trump administration does. We should organize our resistance right now. , my emphasis:
And they should be panicked.
i would need to hear verbatim from DT’s mouth. Meanwhile i would suspect that Jason Greenblatt would be running a con on Donald to see what he can get away with. If Donald is getting snookered, then he is simply a pushover and betraying the conscience of goodness and America – hard to believe.
(my age sex and so are tmi) thanks for response. will keep up on the subject.
That is utterly preposterous. Truly absurd; complete denial of reality. tnis is Times if Israel but it was widely reported all over and I myself saw the tweets:
Did you vote for Donald Trump?
no. jill stein.
i was also ANYONE BUT HELLARY.. and defended Trump quite vigorously.
thinking……
1. build build build move move move?
2. he wants 49% ownership of jerusalem & related developments (hotel & casino)?
3. something to do with a trade in manhattan?
4. he’s going to compete against adelman?
5. money for construction loans and US jobs for supplying materials?
it only makes sense if he is going to give Palestinians the same deal.
i think that’s what he will do, good for the goose and gander.
Did you vote for shllary?
I largely agree with your assessment. When Obama first came to power, he attempted to force Israel to freeze settlement activity:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/28/AR2009052803771.html
By September of 2009 however, President Obama abandoned the demand for an Israeli settlement freeze by framing it in a broader context of seeking an Israel/Palestinian resolution. In short, Israel made a naive and fledgling Obama realize how little power he actually possessed to influence the policies of Israel. Truth be told, Israeli construction in the West Bank and east Jerusalem thrived during Obama’s two terms in office. In spite of that fact, Israel is receiving record levels of foreign aid from the US. In fact, Defense News reports that the Obama intends to allow US military aid to jump to more than $40 billion over the 10-year period beginning in 2018, from the $30 billion in the program that began in 2008.
Please learn to speak Mexican and smoke pot. This will help you lead a normal life on the other side of the wall once we have attended to the minor task of building it.
It was I who said “I agree that pre-judging Trump is inappropriate, however,” and I stand by it.
I don’t see the point in complaining overzealously about things he hasn’t actually done yet.
On the plus side, I think with Trump’s presidency – as alarming as it may well become – we may well have avoided war with Russia, and also we may well have avoided the TPP:
Obama Administration Backs Off Pacific Trade Deal Vote Effort
These are considerable positives, seen in isolation, and if Trump can be positive in some regards (just as Obama was) it’s worth noting as well as being sensibly wary (but not freaking out) about the future.
Mostly I think Trump will be guided by the duopolistic establishment into being a typical Republican, which is bad enough but not especially apocalyptic. I’m hopeful that as a figurehead he’s going to have to tone down his xenophobic idiocy and behave with more presidential gravity. The major concern for me is the environment, but Democrats weren’t listening to reality about that any more than the GOP.
But you must follow your heart – this is just to expand on my opinion.
Maisie, are you a white heterosexual?
Did you cry when shillary lost?
“are you a white heterosexual?”
Talk about a races/sexist question, what the hell does that have to do with any of this? Did ALL white heterosexuals vote the same way? Do all white heterosexuals ascribe to the same ideology?
Trying to fits someone’s opinion in to a race/gender box of your preconceived notions is just small minded.
Do you need my age, race, sexual preference, religion and zip code so you can figure where I fit and then use that to dismiss anything I say you don’t agree with.
You really are a true Democrat. Oh wait did I just put you in a box? My bad…
And with regard to Palestine, Obama has done FUCK ALL to halt the increased land-grabbing. What the hell would the difference be, except now maybe Democrats will actually speak up for the first time in years, drawing needed attention if and when worsening invasions are actually proposed?
And? Trump is actually WORSE than Obama on Israel-Palestine, and possibly even worse than Hillary. He’s just goddam awful across the board. He’s considering appointing the ARCHITECT of Bush’s torture regime to head the CIA, and plans to bring back waterboarding and worse torture.
WTF? Wait and see? For fucking what exactly? How could you have posted and promoted that excellent Jimmy Dory segment in which he drills a new asshole for all the “wait and see” idiots and then come over to this thread and take that very position?
To quote Dory quoting someone else: “I don’t fight fascists because I think I’ll win, I fight them because they’re fascists.” And I sure as hell don’t mutter polite “wait and see” while the coming victims are in a justified panic. I stand in utter solidarity with them.
I enjoyed the Jimmy Dore clip very much, and shared it because I thought it was insightful and cathartic, but not everything I link to means I agree with 100% of the content. I’m not sure I’d link to anything if that was a criterion.
Perhaps you hope to persuade me or other readers that my position is incorrect, because – like Oprah Winfrey – I’m white and heterosexual, but I don’t feel like getting into it with you.
Oprah Winfrey is one of the wealthiest people in the world. She is not vulnerable. At all. She is more privileged than most very privileged but not extremely wealthy heterosexual white people.
You *should have enjoyed the Jimmy Dore clip– he’s spot on.
Well, I’m Caucasian and bisexual, and ridiculously in student debt, for what it’s worth.
Hopefully your student debt is for a useful degree and not something like worthless like women’s studies or basket weaving.
On the last point you might check out:
http://studentloanjustice.org/
in particular the “Victims” heading at the top. there are state by state testimonials to lives being obliterated by the loan parasites championed by Bush/Obama/Clinton/Duncan etc. etc.
Dory seems not to have much depth. — It’s amazing to me to see people who poured out all their vitriol onto Hillary before the election, now expressing their horror that donnie drumpf (dd) won, and how he is going to be so terrible. DD is an evil human being with an evil(er) VP, and Hillary has her flaws and made mistakes. — But, for those people who twisted themselves up in a phony web of moral equivalency about which candidate was worse — and are now crying in anguish about the DD win — FU.
The time to begin opposition and to unite together to rush the civil libertarian barricades was when Bush came out with the Patriot act. Fascism has gripped the US and the West for many years now with corporatised, militarised governments, oppressing the masses. It is the power of corporations and Wall Street that needs to be smashed with new political systems and political parties created so that democracy can be restored. Globalisation and the fascists attempts to break down nations boundaries for the hegemony of US capitalism has been a humanitarian, and economic disaster. The wars need to stop now,along with the trade pacts, and the misuse of pervasive technology. The US needs to stop invading and interfering with other countries, and to concentrate on its own economic problems, rebuilding its infrastructure, and ensuring jobs and opportunities increase within the US. The World is in total turmoil currently and peace and unity needs to be the first goal along the path to resolve this huge mess that the greedy, selfish, sociopath elites have caused.
So let me get this correct. We should have chose shillary, who would have expanded ALL of these Obama programs and continued the rapid transformation of the NSA/DHS/FBI/CIA in to the Stasi just because she had a better “public” opinion on the Palestinians?
First off you believed her?????
Second, this ENTIRE news agency was born out of the fight against Bush/Obama expanded NSA/DHS/FBI/CIA powers and the freedoms they are using as toilet paper. You think we should have elected the person who would have continued to greatly expand and accelerate the very programs we all are here to stop. AND SHE COULD HAVE GOTTEN CONGRESS TO GO ALONG WITH HER!!!!!
The big difference with Trump is he will try the same thing but congress will fight against him more.
There is no metric where shillary is better than Trump, and Trump is bottom of the swamp.
Mona denies the existence of a US Stasi and collaborates with it. She is always eager to show off her patriotic contribution at something calling itself “rationalwiki”, where she disses Stasi Zersetzung targets. (Take a look at her co-authors’ bios if she replies to this post with the link to it. ). She claims targets, like the apparatchiks she collaborates with, “do not exist”. She also defends Snowden and Greenwald’s lucrative protection of the identities of NSA employees and contractors, who she admits are targeting “thousands, possibly millions” of US citizens. And by the way, have you ever asked yourself why E.S. and G.G. never lifted a finger to help more than five pampered human targets (one of them a member of G.W. Bush’s admin), preferring to limit redacted NSA doc publications to technology related issues? Think about that if you have not already. I speculate a deal has been negotiated, but I do not know the answer to that interesting question. I do know zerstezung targets have been betrayed. I am one of them.
Anyhow, Mona’s spam is pure BS. She, like Obama and HRC, does not give a flying fuck about the threats to minorities posed by Trump. She is not telling you what she “believes”. Her full time vocation is JTRIG style forum manipulation, but she gets caught lying so often even non-targets are noticing an odd smell.
There is no point in attempting to extract honesty and consistency from a collaborator.
Totally OT! We really donot care. Why are people so obsessive with Israel– is it a mental inferiority complex
One of the saddest tendencies of our citizens is to check their brains, their consciences and their moral compasses at the door when they enter a political party.
Half the nation are borderline psychopaths. The other half don’t vote.
Now enshrined in marble over the door to the Oval office.
A presumably rightwing ignoramus posted this below:
This guy has not the slightest clue where he is commenting. One of the three co-founders of The Intercept wrote this today in the Washington Post: Glenn Greenwald: Trump will have vast powers. He can thank Democrats for them.
Conventional, establishment Democrats have been hating Greenwald for virtually all of Obama’s term — just as Bushbots hated him as soon as he began political writing in ’05. As he writes:
Yes, with Trump it could certainly get worse, but it was only getting worse and worse with Obama.
You reap what you sow and for what we did to the rest of the world we have reaped a very sad future for our children, and it was done long before Trump.
The Bushes and Clintons directed by their corporate masters planted bad seed all over the planet. So as the sham of an election is over please save us the almost Hillary “Correct The Record” type trolling, which just serves to distract us from the fact that both Hillary and Trump are different sides of the same tarnished corporate coin.
Grant it Trump is terrifying, but who knows what the Hillary “no fly zone” may have led to…goodbye world.
Trump has made it so many are not currently proud of being Americans. However Trump could not have come into being if we as a people did not keep of our heads buried in the sand for so long, which has resulted in the bringing of the “Shock Doctrine” and its oppressive horrors to our shores.
Reading your comment made me relieved there are others out there who aren’t fooled by the theater of representative democracy. I liked your, very appropriate, nod to Naomi Klein as well.
Let’s hope we all survive the next year(s) to further unify a citizens political uprising.
President-elect Donald J. Trump could not have come into “being” if the Democrat Party establishment, the DNC and the “Super Delegates” had not made a dirty deal with Her Royal Highness who was under a criminal investigation by the FBI. The leaked DNC emails and the leaked Wikileaks emails connect all these dots quite well.
We all witnessed the underhanded skullduggery of the DNC in regard to the Sanders campaign. The fix was in for Hillary Clinton probably YEARS prior to Sanders even announcing he was running.
Leading up to the convention Sanders and Clinton had roughly the same amount of pledged delegates. Even with Clinton’s slight lead the Super Delegates could have decided it would be better for the COUNTRY to put Sanders over the top as their nominee. The DNC’s mission statement/by-laws even call for the Super Delegates to put the candidate over the top who has the best chance of beating the Republican in the general election.
ALL polling showed Sanders had a double digit lead over Trump and Clinton had a 2-3 point lead.
The Democrat Super Delegates willingly rolled the dice for Clinton KNOWING she had a good chance of losing the election.
We are all sitting here right now with President-elect Trump due to the corruption of the Democrat party for a candidate who herself is a pathological liar and is corrupt to her core.
Best to lick our progressive wounds, look to the 2018 mid-terms and run candidates who will stand up to any future transgressions the Trump administration has planned. And plenty are on the horizon.
Like privatizing all the “infrastructure projects” for a profit rather than using public funds.
Apparently Mr. Trump would like to privatize all our infrastructure, including our health care, for “profit” and use our public funds for “re-building the military”.
Just think. We could be sitting here with President-elect Sanders and FINALLY a “Medicare for All” health care system.
Instead the Democrat Party screwed the People by trying to break some stupid glass ceiling with a totally corrupt woman.
All the “protesters” should be throwing rotten eggs at the DNC in Washington, D.C. if they want to get to the core of why we are in this situation right now.
Trump won the election fair and square.
Now everyone who disagrees with his pro-capitalist/for-profit policies will have to deal with this and we must lay the blame squarely where it lies.
To: Charlene Avis Richards
Yours was a very well written summary…However that is just exactly how the controlling elite want us to think…Blame it on the Democrats or blame it on the Republicans, and worry that…the Huns are coming …the Russians are coming…the Muslims are coming.
That is exactly what they want: us to be distracted, fearful and so frustrated we place our heads in the sand.
Your ending was “…we must lay the blame squarely where it lies.”…And I agree so let’s blame it on those that have bought and purchased our political system, and turned it into a one party Democratic sham.
Yes- now that a Republican is in journalists can show what integrity they have by taking an adversarial role. It has nothing to do with Trump being a Republican. Funny, I was looking for articles on how Obama expanded the power of the executive branch in a frightening way- couldn’t find any. I’m going to enjoy this. Something has to be done about our gangster journalists. It’s like Chicago in the 20s. Maybe the South American solution to left wing journalists.
Why the President looks overjoyed. Kinda like when the Senate went to the Republicans–he has that same big, genuine smile, and though you can’t see his feet, his people probably had to nail them to the floor to keep the President from floating away in bliss. Trump looks like a boy who just made a funny joke, or farted, and is trying to contain his laughter. The Party faithful seen this picture yet?
they were no doubt talking pussy grabs…
Taking an adversarial position to the power that Donald Trump represents is good journalism.
What journalists forgot for long is that very adversarial role. The shameless support to Barak Obama and Hillary Clinton was very reprehensible.
Brilliant. Obama has been acting like tyrant, he took GWB’s repertoire and doubled down on it, while the so called “Progressives” cheered him on. Where were the left and the MSM then? Kissing the ass of their favorite pants suit.
Their “principles” amount to pure ideological expediency.
i called DT the winner of the republican primary when he announced to run. That was a no brainer. I called Bernie the winner of the general should he get the dem primary and hillary a loser if she got it – another no brainer. When hillary robbed Bernie and trashed him out, a further no brainer. Florida, Pa, Tx, Mich, Ohio, Wis, & dakotas i called for DT, georgia & carolinas a tossup.
Now i make another call.
a 3rd Party for 3rd World USA in 2020
– in the running, in the debates, and ahead in aggregate poll numbers to the end. A real problem for the electoral college split 3 ways, eh?
Indeed. I wonder how many hundreds of thousands of young women were permanently put off Clinton when two of her establishment hacks, Albright and Steinem, insulted their intelligence and, in Steinem’s case, made sexist remarks. There are dozens of examples of these moments of imbecility, cluelessness, and arrogance littering the trail to the Democrat’s doom.
I’m insulted. Albright does not have the vantage point from which to insult the intelligence of a flatworm.
No doubt the CIA is busily recruiting young eager women, for the lavish mysterious world of international espionage, top secrecy, and repression of dissidents, and undermining of democracy, just like they did Steinem. Nothing says feminist cred like a diploma from the agency.
We were warning of this for over a decade, only to be ignored, especially by those on this very site. Now all will know the powers which have existed under a fake Democratic party, which will now secretly be turned against you all. You were warned.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLKuPPe1IhY&t=6s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvgZWDwWqEo&t=7s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0U-Y9wKmHs&t=4s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kg1-vao5Ta8&t=3s
This is the best article I’ve seen from Alex, but he stops short of the story’s main point. All of the powers mentioned are actually not surprising.
What is government? It is a geographical monopoly of jurisprudence. This means it mediates all disputes (and enforces decisions) between itself and any other within its geographical region. It also means there is a persistent tendency to favor itself in all decisions. Over the years governments size and scope has increased due to creep on that margin.
What is government for? Governments are attractive for their ability to award financial and normative privilege. Myriad such privileges are conceivable, but only a fraction possible. Competition for that fraction constitutes the entirety of political history. Even the so-called 19th century laissez faire-ists competed, if only for the power to suspend in disuse some of that capability.
These two notions fully explain the situation we see today. Those on the Right Left and Center tussel in the mud for their personal agendas, and fail to see the forest for the trees.
“What you mean WE, kimo sabe?”
YEAH
Ask Barack. I’m not qualified for admission to their schools.
i was ;)
Well, “We tortured some folks”, you know.
“Whattsamatta, You not on board with team White Phosphorous, or sumtin’….?”
Ah, yes, the Conciliator in chief confounds his admirers again.
JV
so RIGHT!
left gitmo open
amped up the drone murder game
gave israeli genocidal maniacs $38 billion
remained in afganistan
increased the spy-on-US program
preserved the NDAA to kidnap torture and murder americans secretly and without recourse and without due process just like stalin, hitler, polpot, and who’s that jackass in the honduras the hellary supported?
i supported obama and yet he needs to be charged with treason.
what a fool i was.
He had no choice on Gitmo. Congress has passed numerous statutory laws that prohibit a unilateral closing of the prison. Way too many of the prisoners he has released should never have been released alive, and have returned immediately to the battlefield and operations to attack western targets. I suspect the security situation is actually very tenuous and there are numerous attacks in various stages being thwarted that we’re not hearing about because they don’t want us frightened. It’s the only thing that explains his about face on NDAA.
Pulling out of Afghanistan would have let the Taliban right back where they were and, at best, been a repeat of ISIS in Iraq from pulling out prematurely.
Islam is, if anything, patient. They remember it took 88 years to destroy the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. The state of Israel isn’t there yet…
Barry is guilty of treason all right, but not for any of the things you mentioned.
Funny , you libtards didn’t complain a bit about this during Faily McWorsethancarter’s
administration.
While it’s true that most “libtards” avoided criticizing Obama (or Clinton), this outlet (the Intercept) for all its occasional establishmentarianism, overall timidity and dubious hires is one of the few places where the Democrats have indeed been subjected to scorn for warmongering and violating civil liberties. If you think the establishment’s theater of left and right is legitimate, and that the “right” is now victorious over the “left” (rather than a continuation with a new face of the corporatist militarism and corruption that plague the deep state and its puppets), then you are as fucking retarded as the libtards you condemn.
Absolutely right! This is only a continuation. Neither side represents the 99%. The only difference now is that a Drumpf presidency means the emboldenment of racist animal thugs.
Surely you mean the BLACK racist animal thugs? The ones we see countless videos of online (attacking white peoplefor being white) but who never appear in the MSM. And never seem to be criticized by the left. Enjoy your cognitive dissonance.
I have absolutely no faith in the false left/right paradigm. Most did not vote ‘for’ Trump as against the Status Quo elites. When they realize they are not getting the change they voted for it will go from “down with the establishment ” to “gonna get you sucka”. And they are well armed and equipped to do so. The “special snowflakes” protesting the election after castigating Trump for not saying that he would accept the election results is a special kind of hypocrisy. Soros has his useful idiots out in force. Excuse me while I get some more popcorn.
What goes around comes around!
Yes, all those non-constitutional powers given to a president could be wielded negatively. Depends on who is president, doesn’t it?
Ron Paul wanted to cancel all the executive orders.
Trump made great promises. I hope TI and the rest of the media hold his feet to the fire.
somehow i have the idea that obama is a control freak
i used to believe that he treated his wife as an equal, now i’m not so sure.
Great piece. Good minds must think alike because Glenn made about the same arguments in is WaPo Op-Ed piece today.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/11/11/glenn-greenwald-trump-will-have-vast-powers-he-can-thank-democrats-for-them/?postshare=2971478896617739&tid=ss_tw
You are damn right. In fact this is a very good thing. We need to throw a lot of irritating folk over the wall. There are a lot of folks around hereabouts that qualify for the heave.
I am really happy for the prospect of freedom that Assange now sees.
Which of these nightmarish powers were introduced following informed public debates?
Which ones the public voted for?
I think Mr. Mackey needs to take notes on how to be a journalist from you and Glenn Greenwald. Thanks for the excellent post-election article. Neither ruling party is innocent of wrongdoing.
I transcribed it incorrectly, damn it. Here’s the exact quote (from 18.53 in the video):
Edward Snowden, yesterday.
(If anyone can be bothered to delete my post at 3.04, please do so.)
Edward Snowden, yesterday.
From a perhaps somewhat unexpected source:
“If Trump is the price we have to pay to defeat Clintonian neoliberalism – so be it.
— Mumia Abu-Jamal”
taken from the header of this fine article:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/11/10/the-big-split/
I just read the entire Guardian piece that you linked to the Senate/Feinstein/CIA/Brennan/Daniel Jones.
What a depressing story. Saw both Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy (The Presidents Club) on two different shows. The things they discussed were light, not the darker portion where job one of POTUS is to preserve his increased powers. In spite of knowing who the next occupant will be, it’s hard to imagine Mr Obama rolling anything back. Maybe he can assign more federal lands to prettier things than oil/coal/gas rigs/mines/pipes.
Brennan not punished, check. CIA not punished, check. FBI, check. NSA, check. Petraeus, check. Ms Clinton, check. GWBush for an illegal war, check. Each and every banker, check. Seems to me that we are in for a long effing ride, another awful four years of lawlessness by the people/corporations capable of doing the most damage to our country, our world, our planet, and most of all, people here and everywhere.
Dammit – I want to see #NoDAPL, whistleblower protections etched on the finest marble tablet, and I want to see all the punished whistleblowers restored w/benefits.
Great story, Alex Emmons.
I feel better now.
yeah, thanks bush.
bush made the presidency so powerful that obama couldn’t do anything about it
“bush made the presidency so powerful that obama couldn’t do anything about it”
except go out and obliterate a wedding or twelve, and a grandmother or twenty, sell a $100+ billion in arms and targeting to the Saudis, so they could annihilate piss-poor Yemenis, until the feeling went away…
[try to discern obvious irony elwood, it’s a basic reading skill]
I only hope all Trump’s male voters born after 1960 are registered with Selective Service and are current.
And in the event that they are not, I hope they haven’t accidentally falsified applications for student loans, business loans, home loans, or drivers licenses by stating that they are registered. That could be a problem.
Democrats being delusional about Obama gave us Republican control of Congress, the Tea party, the rise and fall of Hillary, the rise of Trump, and an increasingly authoritarian state already full of corruption and abuse but primed for more excesses.
I’m not sure if poking the Dem establishment in the eye and rubbing salt on their wounds will encourage them to reevaluate and reform their policies, but that’s all they’re going to get from me.
Apparently, when he leaves office, Obama will be working with Holder on “fixing” gerrymandering… if there are any real liberals or progressives left in the Democratic party, they need to say “thanks, but no thanks”. Obama’s record does not suggest a positive result is likely.
Obama deserves the blame for so much, but if opinion polls are to be believed, most Democrats are still delusional about that reality.
They are fully delusional For some of them they’ve transitioned from Denial and are now entering into the Anger phase (although to be fair there are a huge number still complaining about the Stein Johnson voters and ignoring the 30 million Democrats that didn’t vote, funny that).
It should be about six months before they finally get to Acceptance. Sooner for the biggest grifters amongst them.
Hillary is no doubt auditioning right now for her old position as Sec’y of State…
The left sat silent while these abuses went unabated. And now, it is grimly fitting that a truly maniacal republican leader will inherit the instrument of these abuses. This is why unprincipled progressives that quieted their criticism of Obama are profoundly hypocritical.
The Bush administration expanded the powers, the Dems kept it and Trump will keep it. Even if the Dems hadn’t maintained the Republican Status quo, Trump would have expanded his powers anyway.
So your scared about Trumps policy…….no kidding. BUT are you unable to take a look at your favorite candidate Hillary and her policies..
Libya Iraqi Ukraine and I could keep going for a long long time. You forget, if you ever knew, that Obama during his 8 years, has been at war somewhere up to the number 7. Where was your terror then? Just where in the hell did TI get these writers? Is this an example of our great college system. Where do you people go for safe spots, and the rest of that P.C. crap? Do us all a favor go to a library if you could find one and get a book and read it, get the hell off of Twitter and Face Book and find out was this world is all about. Start with Plato and find out the very simple way to go about it called “critical thinking”. It easy just ask questions and don”t stop until you thinking improves, you will find out it become easy and we don’t have to look at anymore of these types of columns.
Why presume Alex Emmons is a Hillary supporter? He’s pointing out here that the Democrats have been plenty evil and have set the stage for Obama’s successor to be as unaccountable for violations as possible.
For whatever reason certain articles here get the attention of shit fer brains Right-versus-Lefters who know of no other way to examine their world and all who live in “their world” other than the simplistic R Vs L talking point world. They think that The Intercept is a spin off wannabe of Fox News or of CNN or some other faux R vs L media outlet. So consequently they don’t actually read whatever article they are commenting on. They might skim it, but it’s hard to tell what they might have gathered from their skim.
Here’s an example of this slow Hal person’s shit fer brains comment: “You forget, if you ever knew, that Obama during his 8 years, has been at war somewhere up to the number 7. Where was your terror then?” But if slow Hal had actually read the article, he might have noticed the following sentence within it:
One good thing about Trump’s victory is I don’t have to give a shit *what* happens to the Clintons any more, except in terms of idle curiosity about what country they move to. (You never know when you might need to go there yourself) Even the Democrats can’t be stupid enough to lead with them in any future election … can they?
Now if only we could send Rahm Emanuel and Dianne Feinstein the same place, we’d be making some serious progress. No goddamned draft, no goddamned censorship! I want some hippies stationed outside the front door of the DNC giving incoming personnel the sniff test like the dogs in Terminator. Because a lot of them have only a thin external layer of living human tissue…
The Clinton dynasty isn’t going anywhere.
Bill and Hillary bought the house next to their compound in Chappaqua for $1.6 million so when Rep. Nita Lowey, who is 79, decides to retire, Chelsea and her husband and kids can move into their new house and Chelsea will (they think) be coronated into that House seat. After that when Schumer retires he will hand his Senate seat to Chelsea (who needs an election? Barbara Boxer handed her seat to Kamala Harris)..
After a year or two in the Senate she will run for President.
Of course if some illegal activities HAVE been going on at The Clinton Foundation (apparently the FBI is in the midst of that investigation), Bill and Hillary and Chelsea could all be indicted and convicted and that would end the Clinton’s ambitions once and for all.
Heck, I think if it was proven that Chelsea DID actually take $3 million from The Clinton Foundation for her stupid “wedding” at the same time depriving starving babies from food and AIDS patients from their medication, that wouldn’t look so hot on her resume.
The stint she did for NBC where they paid her $600k to sit there and be a Clinton didn’t pan out so well either.
Reminds me of that scene from “What About Bob?” when the kids are worried that Bob had left and Richard Dreyfus opens the door and Bill Murray is standing there. Dreyfus shouts, “See!! He’ll never go away!!!”
I’ll give 3 to 1 odds that you’re wrong and the Clinton “brand” and “dynasty” (not sure how one Clinton POTUS and 2nd short term Senator and failed POTUS candidate constitutes a “dynasty” in the first instance–but whatevs) is effectively dead in this nation. As it should be.
Bill Clinton single-handedly set back progressivism in this country by 23 years. And progressivism will suffer another 25 because of their DLC third way triangulating neoliberal globalist bullshit.
Now I’m not positive so I’m only laying off action up to $50 per bet by any individual or entity, but still confident enough to give 3 to 1.
I admire your concern regarding Chelsea’s possible difficulties in finding a $600k sinecure for doing less than nothing, and possibility inability to cash in on her family’s political longevity, within the next 6 months or so, but assure you your worries regarding her financial and political future are ill-founded…
The Clinton Crime Family are cranking up a new campaign to run Chelsea. God knows she’s automatically entitled to any office she runs for, eh?
“automatically entitled to any office she runs for, eh?”
She sure is. My suggestion is they run a Chelsea-Ivanka campaign , for the first fem-fem ticket in the cosmos. Imagine the universal acclaim.
“…idle curiosity about what country they move to…”
Saudi Arabia or Qatar perhaps, so they can stay glued to the tit…
I’m 100% certain you’ve never read Plato. And you certainly never passed an English course.
Please go away, Hal.
You obviously have no idea what it has been like here.
You might also try reading the story and the links.
It probably wouldn’t be much better under Clinton unfortunately. If Trump want to leave a legacy of “make America great again” he would have to come to his senses. If he wants to use the US war tools for destruction, he will have ample opportunities to do that with little accountability.
But since the MSM have provided the American people with circus journalism during primaries and general election we won’t really know what his motives and plans are before he is ready to act. This is a repeat of what happened in the 1933-election in Germany, but Hopefully Trump has sane motives (as opposed to what Hitler had) and his toxic language was more campaign rhetoric than anything else, but time will tell.
Clinton would have been met with little resistance from any coherent quarters, and would have gotten away with what Obama has and worse. At least with Trump there will be articulate pushback.
What Trump hasn’t done is worse than what his predecessors have done.
I like the logic displayed here.
Trump has postured as an authoritarian, and Obama’s entrenching of abusive powers is a frightening array of possibilities and actualities of extreme violation. I agree that pre-judging Trump is inappropriate, however.
Yeah, well Obama is part of the same corrupt establishment, and people have to stop believing there are two opposing sides in the duopoly. Disrespect the entire establishment today and every day, and stop wishing the good cop or the bad cop represent anything but the corrupt system.
Obama set to green-light disputed Dakota Access pipeline
Alex, that is why I was planning to vote for Bernie.
But between Hillary, which I believe is a war-mongering psycho, and Trump… what a choice, heh?
Yes.
We’re going to end up with concentration camps.
An excellent game show.Trump for host?
Now, who was the stooge again?
RCL