Excerpt of speech at the Socialism 2009 Conference (that's the real thing they discussed there!)
Pilger was very Harsh on Obama, deservedly so in my view. Here's quite a quote:
Pilger: During his brief period in the senate, Obama voted to continue the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He voted for the PATRIOT Act. He refused to support a bill for single-payer health care. He supported the death penalty. As a presidential candidate, he received more corporate backing than John McCain. He promised to close Guantanamo as a priority, but instead he's excused torture, reinstated military commissions, kept the Bush gulag intact, and opposed habeas corpus.Change we can believe in? No wonder the towel is so close to being thrown in on the markedly inferior "public option" health plan, hanging now by the delicate thread of House progressives who have shown themselves again and again to be spineless and useless. Of course I'd hope it's not going to be the same old shit this time around ....
Daniel Ellsberg, the great whistle blower, was right, I believe, when he said that under Bush, a military coups had taken place in the United States giving the Pentagon unprecedented powers. These powers have been reinforced by the presence of Robert Gates, a Bush family crony ... and by all the Bush officials who have kept their jobs ...
I've been following Bruce's incredible trip to Japan and Korea at Organizing Notes.
Posted by The Owl at 16:50. Filed under: Power and accountability
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