….Rush Limbaugh described Obama as channeling someone else, with Obama putting to the forefront “in no uncertain terms that he is a socialist, if not a Marxist.”
In fact, one of Obama’s peers from Occidental College, John Drew, described Obama as an “ardent” “Marxist-Leninist” who “was in 100 percent, total agreement with [his] Marxist professors.” Furthermore, Obama called those who didn’t agree that a communist revolution in the West was possible “reactionar[ies].”
[….]
This prompted one commentator to point out that (NB continues):
…[S]omething else about conversions is that they often breed a person who hates what he has rejected as much as he once loved it. This is why ex-smokers can be the most ardent anti-smoking activists or why Christian converts can be the staunchest critics of secularism. But from Obama we see no visceral contempt for communism. What we do see, however, is a man who just a few years ago had an alliance with former Weatherman terrorist Bill Ayers, who called himself a “small c communist” and was caught on tape saying that 25 million capitalists may have to be killed to advance the Marxist program. Even more damnably, Obama appointed communists to office upon taking power. One of these was Van Jones, another man who called himself a communist; and former communications director Anita Dunn, who said that Mao Tse-tung — who murdered 60 to 70 million people — was one of her two favorite philosophers.
(Best investigation done on this incident linked via above graphic)
The below video supposedly showing U.S. military Apache helicopter pilots killing innocent persons in 2007 (Iraq) elicited comments from me a while ago. It has come up again in discussion and this time I will post it here at RPT in order to reference it in the future.
….However, the Web site does not slow down the video to show that at least one man in that group was carrying a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, a clearly visible weapon that runs nearly two-thirds the length of his body.
WikiLeaks also does not point out that at least one man was carrying an AK-47 assault rifle. He is seen swinging the weapon below his waist while standing next to the man holding the RPG.
“It gives you a limited perspective,” said Capt. Jack Hanzlik, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command. “The video only tells you a portion of the activity that was happening that day. Just from watching that video, people cannot understand the complex battles that occurred. You are seeing only a very narrow picture of the events.”
Hanzlik said images gathered during a military investigation of the incident show multiple weapons around the dead bodies in the courtyard, including at least three RPGs.
“Our forces were engaged in combat all that day with individuals that fit the description of the men in that video. Their age, their weapons, and the fact that they were within the distance of the forces that had been engaged made it apparent these guys were potentially a threat,” Hanzlik said.
Military officials have also pointed out that the men in the video are the only people visible on those streets. That indicated something was going on and that these individuals still felt they could walk freely, one official told Fox News.
Julian Assange, a WikiLeaks editor, [the guy who leaked the video] acknowledged to Fox News in an interview Tuesday evening that “it’s likely some of the individuals seen in the video were carrying weapons.”….
This frame grab image, taken from a video posted at Wikileaks.org, shows a group of men in the streets of the New Baghdad with weapons just prior to being fired upon by a U.S. Army Apache helicopter July 12, 2007. (FNC)
Of course, you will hear the critics of this military action say the military is at fault, and not the guys carrying the RPGs and AK-47s, but you didn’t hear them complain that between March and September 1991, the Iraqi Army and security services killed as many as 300,000 Shiites. One mass grave near the city of Hillah is said to hold 30,000 bodies alone. These Iraqi military officials that carried this out received medals, mansions, and $$ for their service. In cases when the military purposefully targets innocent lives (which is almost never), court-marshals abound! But, the most important thing to know is that children were not killed. Some adults were killed in the situation were, innocents and terrorists, but the children survived!
“The watching helicopter crews requested permission to engage, stating “…looks like [the men] possibly uh picking up bodies and weapons” from the scene,[31] and upon receiving permission opened fire on the van and its occupants.[18][24][30] Two children sitting in the front seat were wounded but survived.[18][24][30] Chmagh was killed[18][24][30] along with the father of the children.[32]“ (Wiki)
Some good audio of Julian Assange can be found at Science and Technology’s post titled, The Internet Springs a Leak:
…That may be, but some critics say Wikileak’s posting of some documents in and of itself may be in error.
“To my way of thinking, their approach is quite wrong,” says Steven Aftergood, director of the Federation of American Scientists’ Project on Government Secrecy and publisher of the Secrecy News blog. “Not every act of editorial judgment is censorship, and not every act of withholding information is censorship.”
[….]
Aftergood has plenty of experience receiving, vetting, and publishing secrets. He has praise for Wikileak’s posting of the Baghdad video. “It’s useful for all of us to be reminded from time to time that war is genuinely, unspeakably horrible. And I think this video did the service of reminding all of us of that.”
But Aftergood says, “There are also problems with the video and the way it was released.” He says the video appears to show the presence of weapons such as a rocket propelled grenade (RPG), something not noted in the Wikileaks on-screen graphics. Assange says the video was classified, a claim Aftergood cannot verify. And the titling of the video itself – Wikileaks calls it “Collateral Murder” – is something Aftergood calls “a heavy-handed, propagandistic exercise.”
This is a pet peeve of mine. That is, people talk from positions of knowledge all the time, but they neglect to actually test their positions to see if they stand up to, not opinion, but facts/common sense, or the arguments own parameters. One can see this “peeve” in action with my conversation with actor Michael Berryman. You see, one of the only ways to test your opinion on a matter to see if it is truly founded in a knowledgeable position is to see if it withstands the test of the real world. That is, learn to converse well and throw your ideas out in conversation to see how they return. Typically, this means talking to others not of the same mind (which would be a sound room/echo chamber) but to those who would politely differ. (One should take note that charged or emotional responses/defenses are not ad hoc impolite.) I will post my example of this phenomenon below and it is a question I typically ask to judge whether I am speaking with someone who is concerned about the truth of the matter or just getting their own opinions validated:
I often bump into people that have watched some or most of the following “documentaries” I likewise own and have watched all on the following list (one should take note that some of these are shown in public school classrooms):
• Bowling for Columbine • Roger and Me • Fahrenheit 9/11 • Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price • Sicko • An Inconvenient Truth • Loose Change • Zeitgeist • Religulouse • The God Who Wasn’t There • Super-Size Me
But rarely do I meet someone of the opposite persuasion from me that have watched any of the following (I own and have watched):
• Celsius41.11: The Temperature at Which the Brain Dies • FahrenHYPE 9/11 • Michael & Me • Michael Moore Hates America • Bullshit! Fifth Season… Read More (where they tear apart the Wal-Mart documentary) • Indoctrinate U • Mine Your Own Business • Screw Loose Change • 3-part response to Zeitgeist • Fat-Head • Privileged Planet • Unlocking the Mystery of Life
