person:obama

Politics, Power, and Preventive Action » Does U.S. Foreign Policy Spur National Security Threats?
▻http://blogs.cfr.org/zenko/2015/06/01/does-u-s-foreign-policy-spur-national-security-threats

Yesterday on “Face the Nation,” CIA Director John Brennan made an unnoticed but significant acknowledgement about the conduct and consequences of U.S. foreign policy and the ongoing war on terrorism. Asked whether President Obama “seems to be just trying to buy time here, that he’s not ready to make a full commitment here in this war on terrorism and basically is just trying to keep things together well enough that he can leave it to the next president to resolve it. Do you see that?” Brennan responded:

“I don’t see anything like that. I’ve been involved in this administration in different capacities for the last six and a half years and there has been a full court effort to try to keep this country safe. Dealing with some of these problems in the Middle East, whether you’re talking about Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Libya, others, these are some of the most complex and complicated issues that I’ve seen in my thirty-five years, working on national security issues. So there are no easy solutions.

I think the president has tried to make sure that we’re able to push the envelope when we can to protect this country. But we have to recognize that sometimes our engagement and direct involvement will stimulate and spur additional threats to our national security interests.”

What makes this concluding sentence so extraordinary is that it is—to my knowledge—an unprecedented recognition by a senior official about how U.S. counterterrorism activities can increase direct threats to the United States and its “national security interests.”

Give Up on Netanyahu, Go to the United Nations - NYTimes.com

▻http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/20/opinion/give-up-on-netanyahu-go-to-the-united-nations-israel-palestine.html?_r=1&ca

The greetings President Obama extended last week to Israel’s new government may have sounded conciliatory, but Mr. Obama no longer entertains any illusions about Israel’s leaders.

In the wake of last month’s election, the longtime peace activists and diplomats who have devoted much of their professional lives to achieving a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are more depressed and demoralized than ever before.

#israël #nations_unies

5月19日のツイート
▻http://twilog.org/ChikuwaQ/date-150519

Papier is out ! paper.li/ChikuwaQ/13277… posted at 09:15:14

Top story : President Obama on Twitter : "Hello, Twitter ! It’s Barack. Really ! Si… twitter.com/POTUS/status/6…, see more tweetedtimes.com/ChikuwaQ ?s=tnp posted at 05:42:20

Top story : @gchampeau : ’Ceci est une allégorie qui pourrait plaire à @Calimaq. … pic.twitter.com/6zsVXdk10u, see more tweetedtimes.com/ChikuwaQ ?s=tnp

posted at 01:01:48

The New Enemy Within - The Atlantic
@PETER BEINART MAY 2015 ISSUE
▻http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/05/the-new-enemy-within/389573

If George W. Bush were seeking the Republican presidential nomination today, he’d face at least one big problem: his defense of Muslims and Islam. In a 2000 debate with Al Gore, Bush condemned the fact that “Arab Americans are racially profiled” using “what is called secret evidence.” After 9/11, he called Islam “a faith based upon love, not hate,” and made a highly publicized visit to a mosque. One Muslim Republican even called Bush America’s “first Muslim president.”

A decade and a half later, the climate on the American right has radically changed. In January, the Republican presidential hopeful Bobby Jindal argued that “it is completely reasonable for [Western] nations to discriminate” against some Muslims in their immigration policies, on the grounds that radical Islamists “want to destroy their culture.” In February, another GOP contender, Mike Huckabee, declared, “Everything [President Obama] does is against what Christians stand for, and he’s against the Jews in Israel. The one group of people that can know they have his undying, unfailing support would be the Muslim community.” In March, after New York City announced that public schools would close for two Muslim holidays, Todd Starnes, a Fox News contributor, lamented, “The Islamic faith is being given accommodation and the Christian faith and other religious faiths are being marginalized.”

This is strange. Why are conservatives more hostile to Muslims and Islam today than they were in the terrifying aftermath of 9/11? And why have American Muslims, who in 2000 mostly voted Republican, apparently replaced gays and feminists as the right’s chief culture-war foe?

For half a century, cultural conservatives have vowed to protect America against threats from domestic insurgencies: black militancy, feminism, the gay-rights movement. But those insurgencies involved large and restive groups. Muslims, by contrast, make up only 1 percent of the U.S. population. And they are not restive. Yes, a tiny share sympathizes with Salafi groups like the Islamic State, or ISIS. But unlike the civil-rights, abortion-rights, and gay-rights activists of eras past, American Muslims are not seeking to transform American culture and law. They are not marching in the streets. For the most part, they constitute a small, well-educated, culturally conservative minority that wants little more from the government than to be left alone.

Fini les «#ingérences» en #Amérique_latine, dit Obama
▻http://www.lapresse.ca/international/amerique-latine/201504/10/01-4860009-fini-les-ingerences-en-amerique-latine-dit-obama.php

Soucieux de reprendre pied sur le continent latino-américain après avoir déminé la question cubaine M. Obama devra faire face à de nombreux pays latino-américains outrés par sa récente décision de signer un décret qualifiant le Venezuela, principal partenaire économique de Cuba, de « menace » pour la sécurité intérieure des États-Unis.

Letterman to Cornel West: Am I ‘Ignorant’ to Think Race Relations Are Getting Better?
▻http://www.filmsforaction.org/watch/letterman-to-cornel-west-am-i-ignorant-to-think-race-relations-are-g

The author of “Black Prophetic Fire” talks about the civil rights movement, President Obama and more.

Germany Concerned about Aggressive NATO Stance on #Ukraine - SPIEGEL ONLINE
▻http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/germany-concerned-about-aggressive-nato-stance-on-ukraine-a-1022193.html

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US President Obama supports Chancellor Merkel’s efforts at finding a diplomatic solution to the Ukraine crisis. But hawks in Washington seem determined to torpedo Berlin’s approach. And NATO’s top commander in Europe hasn’t been helping either.

#OTAN #belliciste #Russie

EU Chief Speaks Out Against Arms Supplies for Kiev - NYTimes.com
▻http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2015/03/06/world/europe/ap-eu-europe-ukraine-russia-.html

The European Union’s foreign policy chief on Friday came out against a bipartisan call in the United States to provide lethal, defensive weapons to Ukraine in its fight against Russian-backed separatists.

House Speaker John Boehner and a group of top Democrats and Republicans wrote to President Obama calling for deliveries but so far have found few backers in the 28-nation EU.

Federica Mogherini said Friday that “the European Union is doing enough” and insisted that the implementation of the peace deal brokered in Minsk last month “is the way to go forward.”

La Haute Représentante de l’Union pour les affaires étrangères et la politique de sécurité Federica Mogherini est réputée être compréhensive avec V. V. Poutine. Contrairement au Président du Conseil européen, Donald Tusk.

Americans May See Appeal of #Medical Tourism in #Cuba - NYTimes.com
▻http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/18/world/americas/americans-may-see-appeal-of-medical-tourism-in-cuba.html?ref=todayspaper&_r

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Anuja Agrawal jumped on the phone. President Obama had just announced that he would restore diplomatic relations with Cuba — and Ms. Agrawal, who runs a medical tourism company in Orlando, Fla., did not want to miss her opening.

She reached a health care administrator in Cuba, agreeing to move ahead with a deal that they had been discussing for months in the hope that American patients could soon start traveling to the island for medical treatment.

“There was a lot of excitement about it,” said Ms. Agrawal, the chief executive of Health Flights Solutions, adding that if Americans start traveling to Cuba for affordable medical treatments, it could mean a big economic boost for the country’s health system. “For them, they’re looking at it literally like winning the lottery.”

#Etats-Unis #médecine #prix

Isis has provoked an Arab alliance to bomb the West’s enemies - Middle East - World - The Independent
▻http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/isis-has-provoked-an-arab-alliance-to-bomb-the-wests-enemies-10050206

So President Obama and the Pentagon can, it seems, take satisfaction in seeing their “moderate” friends in the Middle East flying alongside them in their latest version of the “war on terror”. So far, so good. No “boots on the ground”, as the now-hackneyed expression goes. No Western lives in danger – save for the pitiful handful of hostages still held in Raqaa. Of course, any Iraqi who opposes the “Islamic State”, any Iraqi Shia, and any Christian – Libyan or otherwise – who falls foul of Isis’s sectarian hatred, will suffer accordingly. But that will be Arab killing Arab. Americans are safe. So are the Israelis.

#isis #coalition_arabe

Still Fighting Ebola: A View from Liberia’s Front Line | WIRED

▻http://www.wired.com/2015/02/ebola-liberia/?mbid=social_twitter

http://www.wired.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/UNMEER-Liberia.jpg

We’ve pretty much signed off on Ebola in the United States — last week, President Obama withdrew the US troops sent to fight the disease — but in Africa, the news on the epidemic has seemed pretty good. The overall number of known cases stands at 22,894, with 9,177 deaths, far below the dire predictions made last fall that the epidemic could sicken millions.

Progress at beating the disease is stalling, though. According to the World Health Organization, the number of new cases has gone back up for two weeks in a row. Sierra Leone, now the outbreak’s epicenter, still has what the WHO calls “widespread transmission,” and on Saturday its government quarantined part of the capital. Guinea has had a spike in cases, and in several areas, mobs have attacked clinics.

#ebola toujours

Obama, le président-zombie
▻http://www.dedefensa.org/article-obama_le_pr_sident-zombie_11_02_2015.html

• Vu par Robert Parry et selon des détails inédits, Obama se confirme comme le président US le plus catastrophique possible. • Est-ce le président de la phase finale de la crise ?

Meet the Unusual Plaintiffs Behind the Supreme Court Case That Could Destroy Obamacare
▻http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/02/king-burwell-supreme-court-obamacare

These two plaintiffs seemed driven by their political opposition to President Obama; one has called him the “anti-Christ” and said he won election by getting “his Muslim people to vote for him.” Yet most curious of all, one of the plaintiffs did not recall exactly how she’d been recruited for the case and seemed unaware of the possible consequences if she wins. Told that millions could lose their health coverage if the Supreme Court rules in her favor, she said that didn’t want this to happen

Compare and Contrast: Obama’s Reaction to the Deaths of King Abdullah and Hugo Chávez
▻http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/28224-compare-and-contrast-obamas-reaction-to-the-deaths-of-kin

http://readersupportednews.org/images/stories/article_imgs15/015045-abdullahchavez-012415.jpg

Hugo Chávez was #elected President of Venezuela four times from 1998 through 2012 and was #admired and supported by a large majority of that country’s citizens, largely due to his policies that helped the #poor. King Abdullah was the #dictator and tyrant who ran one of the most repressive regimes on the planet.

The effusive praise being heaped on the brutal Saudi despot by western media and political figures has been nothing short of nauseating; the UK Government, which arouses itself on a daily basis by issuing self-consciously eloquent lectures to the world about #democracy, actually ordered flags flown all day at half-mast to honor this repulsive monarch. My Intercept colleague Murtaza Hussain has an excellent article about this whole spectacle, along with a real obituary, here.

I just want to focus on one aspect: a comparison of the statements President Obama issued about the 2013 death of President Chávez and the one he issued today about the Saudi ruler. Here’s the entire Obama statement about Chávez (h/t Sami Khan):

http://readersupportednews.org/images/stories/article_imgs15/015053-statement-1-012415.jpg http://readersupportednews.org/images/stories/article_imgs15/015054-statement-2-012415.jpg

#propagande

Parents Challenge President to Dig Deeper on Ed Tech - NYTimes.com
▻http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/01/12/parents-challenge-president-to-dig-deeper-on-ed-tech

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2015/01/12/technology/12bits-obama/12bits-obama-videoSixteenByNine600.jpg

Education technology companies that have pledged not to exploit student data they collect for marketing purposes welcomed President Obama’s endorsement on Monday of the industry’s effort to limit its use of classroom data.

But the president’s comments did nothing to alleviate the unease of some parents concerned about potential civil rights issues raised by the increasing use of ed tech in schools, including the possibility that some programs and products might automatically channel or categorize students in ways that could ultimately be discriminatory or detrimental to their education.

“We’re very excited that President Obama is endorsing the pledge and calling for other companies to sign it,” said Jules Polonetsky, the executive director of the Future of Privacy Forum, an industry-financed research group in Washington that helped draft the industry pledge. Mr. Polonetsky’s group has received financing from dozens of companies including Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft.

But some parents, educators, technologists and education privacy law scholars say there is little evidence to back up the marketing hype over personalized learning technology. While welcoming efforts to curb the use of educational data for advertising purposes, they contend that neither the industry pledge nor the California law that President Obama invoked as a model for federal student digital privacy legislation places any meaningful requirements on companies regarding the accuracy, efficacy or fairness of their novel digital learning products.

#education #libertes_civiles #edutech

Redacted Pages Of Official 9/11 Report Could Be Declassified
08/01/2015
▻http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2015/01/08/redacted-pages-of-911-report-could-be-declassified_n_6437032.html

NEW YORK — President Obama is under pressure from a bi-partisan group in Congress that is demanding the infamous 28 pages of redactions in the official 9/11 report be declassified.

Former Senator Bob Graham, who penned the report into the attacks in 2001, has joined a growing chorus of voices demanding the redacted pages, which detail links between the terrorists and the Saudi Arabian government, be made public.

Entitled the Joint Inquiry Into Intelligence Activities Before and After the Terrorist Attacks of September 2001, the original report was published in December 2002, however President Bush demanded that 28 pages of the 828-page dossier were blacked out in an effort to protect America’s relationship with the Saudis.

North Korea/Sony Story Shows How Eagerly U.S. Media Still Regurgitate Government Claims
▻http://www.filmsforaction.org/articles/north-koreasony-story-shows-how-eagerly-us-media-still-regurgitate-g

The identity of the Sony hackers is still unknown. President Obama, in a December 19 press conference, announced: “We can confirm that North Korea engaged in this attack.” He then vowed: “We will...

The Tragedy of the American Military - The Atlantic

▻http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/12/the-tragedy-of-the-american-military/383516

Signalé par Daniel Letouzey (Clioweb)

Et j’apprends au passage un truc intéressant. La toute petite entreprise (Kitron) qui se trouvait à Kilsund (près d’Arendal) jusqu’à l’année dernière, c’est à dire à 2 km de chez moi au fin fond de mon petit fjord fournissait des pièces pour le F-35...

On est petit.



https://dl.dropbox.com/s/n792k9zgkw7cfrn/Capture%20d%E2%80%99%C3%A9cran%202015-01-03%20%C3%A0%2022.50.21.png?dl=0

In mid-September, while President Obama was fending off complaints that he should have done more, done less, or done something different about the overlapping crises in Iraq and Syria, he traveled to Central Command headquarters, at MacDill Air Force Base in Florida. There he addressed some of the men and women who would implement whatever the U.S. military strategy turned out to be.

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The part of the speech intended to get coverage was Obama’s rationale for reengaging the United States in Iraq, more than a decade after it first invaded and following the long and painful effort to extricate itself. This was big enough news that many cable channels covered the speech live. I watched it on an overhead TV while I sat waiting for a flight at Chicago’s O’Hare airport. When Obama got to the section of his speech announcing whether he planned to commit U.S. troops in Iraq (at the time, he didn’t), I noticed that many people in the terminal shifted their attention briefly to the TV. As soon as that was over, they went back to their smartphones and their laptops and their Cinnabons as the president droned on.

#armement #armée #états-unis

Taking the Initiative Back For the Movement After the Brinsley Killings
▻http://www.filmsforaction.org/articles/taking-the-initiative-back-for-the-movement-after-the-brinsley-killi

For brutal wannabe fascists like police union thugs, for liberal authoritarian politicians like President Obama, the Congressional Black Caucus and most big city mayors, for media talking head...

Conférence de presse de Brennan, le parrain de la #CIA : incroyablement les #journalistes présents continuent à utiliser l’expression « Enhanced Interrogation Techniques »

#torture #mascarade

In an effort to restore the public’s faith in law enforcement, President Obama made an impassioned appeal this week, calling for the installation of turret-mounted video cameras on all police tanks.
▻http://www.theonion.com/articles/obama-calls-for-turretmounted-video-cameras-on-all,37586

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Why Immigration Reform Is Useless Without Ending the Drug War
▻http://www.filmsforaction.org/watch/why-immigration-reform-is-useless-without-ending-the-drug-war-interv

Abby Martin speaks with Eugene Puryear, organizer with the ANSWER coalition about President Obama’s executive action on immigration reform and how this will impact the millions of undocumented...

Archive avril 2013: Current Top Pentagon Official Urged Bombing North Korea… When He Was on the Sidelines
▻http://nation.time.com/2013/04/03/current-top-pentagon-official-urged-bombing-north-koreawhen-he-was-on-t

In one of those strange twists of fate TV writers love, Ashton Carter, the current deputy secretary of defense, advocated bombing North Korea seven years ago when he was safely in his bunker at Harvard University.

Along with Clinton-era defense secretary William Perry, Carter urged in Time in 2006 that the Republican George W. Bush Administration conduct a “surgical strike” on a North Korean missile as it was readied for launch

Ce matin: Obama Is Said to Pick Ashton Carter, Physicist and Ex-Deputy, as Defense Secretary
▻http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/03/us/politics/ashton-carter-may-replace-chuck-hagel-at-defense-department-official-says.h

President Obama has selected Ashton B. Carter to be the next defense secretary, senior administration officials said on Tuesday, elevating a physicist and the Pentagon’s former chief weapons buyer to succeed Chuck Hagel, who was ousted last week.

Remarks by President Obama at G20 Press Conference | November 16, 2014
▻http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2014/11/16/remarks-president-obama-g20-press-conference-november-16-2014

Q But just to put a fine point on it — are you actively discussing ways to remove him [President Bashar al-Assad] as a part of that political transition?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: No.

Iago, l’impromptu de Brisbane
▻http://www.dedefensa.org/article-iago_l_impromptu_de_brisbane_18_11_2014.html

• Parmi les nombreux commentaires suivant le G20 de Brisbane, la conférence qui s’est transformée en exercice de dissolution du monde, nous nous attachons à ceux qui cernent une personnalité. • Il s’agit d’un homme, Obama, dont un commentateur mesuré a écrit qu’il a représenté, à Brisbane, le “Mal incarné” au travers de la référence au Iago de Shakespeare. • La réunion de Brisbane a exprimé le vide complet de la politique nihiliste qui écrase le monde. • Elle a donc introduit un élément de métahistoire avec cet invité inattendu qui a dominé l’ensemble : le “Mal incarné” (“pure evil”).