Why Liberals Love Obama

by Justin Raimondo, May 22, 2009

Even as he betrays them on civil liberties and foreign policy

If I were a liberal Democrat – and, as my regular readers know, this is very far from being the case – I’d be mad as heck over the way President Barack Obama has reversed himself on key foreign policy and civil liberties issues. I’d be positively furious about his “reconsideration” of preventive detention, the revival of military commissions, rendition, JSOC-style assassinations, denial of habeas corpus, etc., etc., ad nauseam. Not to mention the general direction of his foreign policy, which rationalizes escalating the fighting in Afghanistan – and its extension into Pakistan – under the general exculpatory rubric of fighting the “war on terrorism.”

As Glenn Greenwald trenchantly makes the point, what appears to have happened is that:

“Obama’s political skills, combined with his status as a Democrat, is strengthening Bush/Cheney terrorism policies and solidifying them further. For the last eight years, roughly half the country – Republicans, Bush followers – was trained to cheer for indefinite detention, presidential secrecy, military commissions, warrantless eavesdropping, denial of due process, a blind acceptance of any presidential assertion that these policies are necessary to Keep Us Safe, and the claim that only fringe Far Leftist Purists – civil liberties extremists – could possibly object to any of that.

“Now, much of the other half of the country, the one that once opposed those policies – Democrats, Obama supporters – are now reciting the same lines, adopting the same mentality, because doing so is necessary to justify what Obama is doing. It’s hard to dispute the Right’s claim that Bush’s terrorism approach is being vindicated by Obama’s embrace of its ‘essential elements.’”
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