Robert Scheer: Hillary Clinton Flaunts Her Surveillance State Baggage

[marmar]

from truthdig:


Hillary Clinton Flaunts Her Surveillance State Baggage

Posted on Jul 7, 2014
By Robert Scheer


Who is the true patriot, Hillary Clinton or Edward Snowden? The question comes up because Clinton has gone all out in attacking Snowden as a means of burnishing her hawkish credentials, eliciting Glenn Greenwald’s comment that she is “like a neocon, practically.”

On Friday in England, Clinton boasted that two years ago she had favored a proposal by a top British General to train 100,000 “moderate” rebels to overthrow the Assad regime in Syria, but Obama had turned her down. The American Thatcher? In that same interview with the Guardian she also managed to get in yet another shot against Snowden for taking refuge in Russia “apparently under Putin’s protection,” unless, she taunted, “he wishes to return knowing he would be held accountable.”

Accountable for telling the truth that Clinton concealed during her tenure as secretary of state in the Obama Administration? Did she approve of the systematic spying on the American people as well as of others around the world, including the leaders of Germany and Brazil, or did she first learn of all this from the Snowden revelations?

On Saturday, a carefully vetted four-month investigation by the Washington Post based on material made available by Snowden revealed that while Clinton was in the government, the NSA had collected a vast trove of often intimate Internet correspondence and photos of innocent Americans, including many users of Facebook, Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and other leading Internet companies. The Post reported many files “described as useless by the [NSA] analysts but nonetheless retained ... have a voyeuristic quality. They tell stories of love and heartbreak, illicit sexual liaisons, mental-health crises, political and religious conversions, financial anxieties and disappointed hopes.” .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/hillary_clinton_flaunts_her_surveillance_state_baggage_20140707

[LuvNewcastle]

1. Looks like she's going to run from the center-right.

No surprises there. God help us if she gets elected.

[pipoman]

3. She is center right....not just running center right....

[LuvNewcastle]

4. I don't think she's really anything at all.

She could be a lefty if she chose to be. She could also be a RW Republican. The Clintons don't have any core beliefs. Sure, they have a natural tendency to be RWers, but that's just a habit. The Clintons are nothing. They have no real convictions. They do what benefits them the most.

When Hillary runs, she's going to pander to the left on some issues, and she's going to pander to the right as well. She'll be all over the place. The important thing to her is winning, and she'll do or say anything to get elected.

That's how our system has evolved and that's the kind of person who best fits our system. We'll either choose to keep that system in place or we can go another direction, if we have a candidate who will do that. And then we have to worry about whether that candidate will survive.

[2banon]

11. Well said LuvNewcastle..

That's how our system has evolved and that's the kind of person who best fits our system. We'll either choose to keep that system in place or we can go another direction, if we have a candidate who will do that. And then we have to worry about whether that candidate will survive.

[zeemike]

12. "They do what benefits them the most. "

Well that too is a conviction...one held by many and personified by the Ayn Rand philosophy of The Virtues of Selfishness.

And you are totally right, that is the kind of person that rises to power in this system...it's the system stupid...

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

15. We need another authentic progressive to carry on Obama's legacy.

[FiveGoodMen]

20. First we'd need an authentic progressive to ESTABLISH such a legacy

[ballyhoo]

9. The disasters that the Clintons past and present

have been and are now are palpable. NFTA killed a good portion of the world, and we are in the process of killing the rest of it in the name of PNAC. With Obama having put boots on the ground in Iraq2 we are in deep deep trouble. And then there's the new Katrina--border variety.

[littlemissmartypants]

14. When BBA passed many health care professionals

Suffered. I never thought of them in a positive way after that.

[ballyhoo]

17. Yes. It destroyed Health Care and the American

Economy. Without the revenues because of BBA, Bush raided Social Security and Medicare to get dollars for war. These two buddies knew exactly what they were doing every step of the way. And we are no wiser right now...

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

13. Uggghhhhh, Hillary again showing her true colors. When is enough enough?

[pipoman]

2. I really wish the Democratic party would get behind an actual liberal democrat this time. .

[antigop]

5. oh, no, NOW you've done it...you are now on the Clinton frenemy list. nt

[xchrom]

6. du rec.

[WillyT]

7. Wow !!! - K & R !!!

[antigop]

8. "Hillary Clinton is either a fool or a liar. "

Well, I guess Robert Scheer is on the Clinton frenemy list.

[Enthusiast]

10. Just say, "NO" to a Hillary candidacy!

K&R!

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

16. ok, NO!

[Divernan]

18. It's demeaning to Thatcher to refer to HRC as "The American Thatcher".

Powerful article. When I first read the reference to HRC as an American Thatcher, I thought - right! she's so conservative. But upon reflection, I decided it was a disservice to Maggie Thatcher to identify her with HRC. I have never agreed with Thatcher's political positions/philosophy, but she did have the courage of her convictions, had a long and loving marriage, and succeeded in breaking through the glass ceiling on her own efforts. Here's some history.

1. Margaret Thatcher was a lifelong conservative. What you saw was what you got. She didn't flip-flop from Barry Goldwater Girl/president of Young College Republicans over to supporting McGovern and end up as a 3rd Way/corporatist/pro-war/Big Bank enabler. Y'all remember George McGovern's objections to Vietnam? One assumes HRC was familiar with them when she campaigned for him:

"It doesn't require any particular bravery to stand on the floor of the Senate and urge our boys in Vietnam to fight harder. And if this war mushrooms into a major conflict and a hundred thousand young Americans are killed, it won't be U.S. Senators who die. It will be American soldiers who are too young to qualify for the Senate." And also, "I'm fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to die in."
http://www.buzzfeed.com/summeranne/five-idealistic-quotes-from-george-mcgovern

I remember him saying that because I had the privilege to hear him speak when I campaigned for him. I'm still anti-war. HRC? not so much.

"On Friday in England, Clinton boasted that two years ago she had favored a proposal by a top British General to train 100,000 “moderate” rebels to overthrow the Assad regime in Syria, but Obama had turned her down. The American Thatcher?" http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/hillary_clinton_flaunts_her_surveillance_state_baggage_20140707

2. Thatcher had a solid, 50+ year marriage, with not a whiff of scandal, betrayal or adultery. "Sir Denis Thatcher died of heart failure on 26 June 2003 and was cremated on 3 July. She had paid tribute to him in The Downing Street Years, writing "Being Prime Minister is a lonely job. In a sense, it ought to be: you cannot lead from the crowd. But with Denis there I was never alone. What a man. What a husband. What a friend."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Thatcher

3. Thatcher made it politically on her own - not on her husband's influence, connections or coat tails, and she started at the bottom and hung in through several initial defeats. She ran for Member of Parliament as a Conservative for a safe Labour seat. That's called flying the flag for your party, when there's no chance of victory, but you get your party's point of view out there. It's called paying your dues and working your way up. She was defeated in 1950, 51 and 54. She was finally elected an MP in 1959. From 1970 to 1974 she served as Secretary of State for Education & Science. From 1975 to 1979, she served as Conservative party leader, i.e., Leader of the Opposition. Finally, after 29 years directly serving her party - on her own, not as first spouse - she ran for and was elected Prime Minister, where she served from 1979 to 1990.

[Metric System]

19. What the hell does their marriage have to do with ANYTHING?!? Jesus, I've officially seen it all on

DU. Hillary Clinton compared negatively to Margaret Fucking Thatcher on a Democratic message board.