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It’s insane how vulnerable we’ve made ourselves, like drunks failing to look around as they walk into traffic. Hackers could shut down the way we live, and if they hacked into drones or nuclear codes, determine the way we die. If you think it through, which most of us avoid, the prospect of Techmaggedon is terrifying. On Thursday, at John Brennan’s confirmation hearing to be C.I.A. director, some senators took a stab at thinking it through on the smart, sleek, robotic machine that dominates our political debate. (Drones, not Obama.) Maureen Dowd – New York Times
What a can of worms! Drone killings are one of those, “it seemed like such a good idea at the time”, deals that comes back to haunt the people that dream them up…. like getting the Saudis to finance the war against the USSR in Afghanistan, for example.
Parking all moral considerations and constitutional guarantees for a minute, another major downside is that the technology involved isn’t rocket science…. radio controlled airplanes and helicopters are even on sale in toy stores in developed countries.
Stop and think how easy it would be to use a toy helicopter, with an incendiary grenade attached to it, in as “target rich” an environment as the Isle of Manhattan. Then just think how disruptive it would be for normal life there if they had to jam all the junk-band radio frequencies used to operate RC models (and so many other devices) in order to prevent such an attack.
For a country as potentially vulnerable as the USA to use this technology as a primary weapon system is like telling children not to put beans up their noses: it is putting ideas in the heads of people without much technology or money to spend.
It is really time for a wide ranging discussion about how we got here and how to go in another direction, as difficult as that might be.
What bothers me a lot too, is that Obama is doing all this. With Bush, what you saw was what you got… But Obama is so opaque, so ambiguous, so mysterious… After four whole years I still don’t feel I know who he is… Better than Romney would have been for sure, but having said that… What a can of worms!
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Many of us thought it was time to start that discussion long ago.
Others were advocates for a more light-hearted approach:
David Seaton “Why vote for Obama” 5/2012
If you’re ready to participate in the discussion now, (including “moral considerations and constitutional guarantees“), maybe you should quit trying to sell “so opaque, so ambiguous, so mysterious.” What you see is what you’ve got.
It’s not intellectual rigor that drives our debauched bourgeois.
Actually this wouldn’t be worth a discussion if there weren’t many advantages in drone warfare that need to be addressed. We would like to reduce the American military footprint in the world, not get involved with boots on the ground as in Iraq and Afghanistan, see fewer young Americans come home in boxes or maimed. We would also like to lower military expenses and use the funds on health, education and infrastructure… Drones offer the possibility to do this… maybe.
Drones are like shale gas and fracking, another silver bullet to “solve” America’s problems. The trade offs are real, these things do have advantages… We would like to have cheap gas and a smaller army. The question… will we pay the price?
Empire, slaughtering innocents on multiple continents, and fossil fuel extraction are always all about the medical care! and the cheap gas! and the jobs! I can hardly wait. This time it will work for sure.
/s
This is all very messy, that’s why it has to be examined with care and honesty. The USA is schlepping a huge amount of Karma… and we have an obscene life style… are we willing to change it? Are we willing to live more simply in order not to have to “rule” the world? Make a list yourself Marym.
Yes, but at least MoDo’s mojo got him thinking.
But see, you’re accepting that the US had *any* business in Afghanistan and Iraq, both of which misadventures were based on lies and danger neocon thinking in the aid of American empire. Add in Africom, NATO itself, and hell, Libya…you start to see the bigger picture: we back the bad guys!!!. The War Machine is also about making enemies to extend War Everlasting. Yeah, fewer Americans gripe when we don’t have ‘boots on the ground’, but who cares about their moral vacuity?
Fracking good for whom, Dave? Big Oil, whose subsidies never end, and whose products are not only dangerous, but keep us from developing sincere alternatives. At least you admit the wars are for resources, but they’re for other controls as well.
“We would like to reduce the American military footprint in the world, not get involved with boots on the ground as in Iraq and Afghanistan, see fewer young Americans come home in boxes or maimed. We would also like to lower military expenses and use the funds on health, education and infrastructure…”
Who’s “We,” Sr. Seaton? You and I, perhaps, but never His Obamic Majesty, in whom you placed your own, qualified endorsement time after time after time last year. NOW you have reservations about drone warfare? What happened? Some Spanish kid flying a remote-controlled airplane toy with a cellphone camera around your favorite sidewalk cantina?
I’m not trying to speak for Marym, but I’ve been living more simply than most for decades. No credit, cash and carry, baby. Ditched the cable/satellite TV for free over the air TV with an antenna slung from the back fence. I don’t know what an I-Phone is, and texting may as well be some alien plot.
We get nearly all our groceries from farmers’ markets, which I know we are lucky to have, and local grocery chains who buy most of their stuff in the Midwest. I drive a plastic-bodied car to get better gas mileage; hell, the thing has a standard transmission. And it’s a 1998 that I keep going.
I wouldn’t know how to use GPS, we use MAPS. We cook the vast majority of meals at home; the big treat is eating out maybe once a month at some local restaurant. My beer of choice is imported from far off Pottsville, Pennsylvania. Yes, it’s the largest remaining American-owned brewery, but hey! You can’t beat $17 per case for amber beer. We drink filtered tap water from Lake Erie, and milk from no farther away than Illinois. The occasional hard liquor is imported all the way from Kentucky.
We simply CAN’T live much more simply in this system, and I really, REALLY want to keep electricity and indoor plumbing, thank you very much. In order to do so, I’m willing to withdraw all of our troops from everywhere overseas and try that crazy Texas billionaire’s plan to run all 18-wheelers on natural gas until we can convert everything over to hydrogen power or some such new-fangled clean thing. Besides, if our troops came home, maybe we’d quit pissing so many people off at us.
For all I know, you might be willing to do the same, Blessed Be if true. But His Obamic Majesty isn’t, and you can take that to whatever Spanish bank is still solvent. He is a creature of Wall Street capitalism, and THAT requires intervention in foreign affairs and vast military spending.
Como dice? Es la verdad, yo creo.
… X 2 … thank you… needed to be said
… X 2 … succinctly stated … thank you wd
Any RC aircraft..or anything for that matter – can be easily hacked to what ever frequency the hacker desires and use whatever code they choose. Even make up their own.
Even use a frequency hopping technique.
Better than Romney would have been for sure,
So not true, Obama is worse because he is going to do what Romney would have done and he wont get any resistance from the left for doing it. If this were a republican president the left wld be in a blaze, but because its the left who elected this president they are silenced. The enemy within is always more effective and dangerous than the enemy on the outside.
Not knowing by now who or what Obama is or represents is sophistry.
And apparently you aren’t bothered enough to take a clear stand against the criminal insanity of your guy perpetuating and expanding the absurd and ghastly “war on terror” you seem so eager to accept as “facts on the ground.”
You write of the “advantages of drone warfare” but evade defining or even confronting the bloodlust of pax americana.
And then you tell us it’s our fault because we don’t want to give up an “obscene lifestyle.”
Well, I’ll remind you that fewer and fewer citizens are “enjoying” the “obscene lifestyle” which you imagine we all share and the collective guilt you attempt to throw on us is in lock-step with Obama’s “shared sacrifice” bullshit.
You voted for our murderer-in-chief. I didn’t. You broke it, you own it and it’s way too late for the “discussion” you now wish to have. You should be talking about impeachment, at the very least, but that’s a concept that eludes those of you who, having checked your conscience at the door, think being well-adjusted enough to the bloodletting so as to allow for “discussion” is the same as being well-adjusted. In fact, it’s the anti-thesis of mental health. The noisy rattling in your brain is called cognitive dissonance and you’re the only one who can stop it.
“What bothers me a lot, too, is that Obama is doing all this.”
Excuse me, but this president’s wholehearted embrace of drones comes as a shock to you after the assassination of Anwar Awlaki and his teenage son? Really?
He is not “my guy”, about the only thing I like about him is the color of his skin; I think it is important that a person that looks like Obama be in the White House. Historically, in that sense, he is a “before and after”.
The situation:
The United States was created by ethnic cleansing, enslaving Africans and debauching the land’s natural resources… all of this dressed up in the language of human rights and progress. The Cold War and the entertainment industry have spread this contradiction to the farthest corners of the planet. Americans believe they have the right to “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” also cheap gasoline.
Anyone with eyes can see that this is a very funky dialectic.
You have the gift of understatement. It’s the kind of country that racketeers, con-men, robber barons and pirates would come up with.
… That produced, Abraham Lincoln, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Jane Addams, Herman Melville, FDR and Ray Charles to name just a few.
This is a dialectic, remember.
I was surprised long before that, but I shouldn’t have been. American presidents kill people all the time, have for years.
I don’t think the president kills people for fun… the situation is poisonous, we are prisoners of our past actions and escaping them will require a major effort in thinking through all the tradeoffs, who we are, what we want and the true price tag on everything, economic, political, ecological and moral.
…legitimate point made robbep
POTUS Obama ( DLC )( Wall St.D ) ( MICC D ) has been able to use non stop misdirection and deceptive turns of direction to render the D zealots defused while POTUS Obama does BushCheney GWOT/AHIPPROFITCARE / War On SS/MC in ways Bush and Cheney would have been roundly berated by same D zealots for doing.
Had David Seaton presented this FDL diary six months ago,nine months ago or one year ago it would have been a political credit on David Seaton’s part to have done so.
Doing so now? Seems contrived and only being done now to recast the framing(s) of what David Seaton can now write some more diaries around.
Barack Obama is not opaque,ambiguous or mysterious. To still suggest here in February 2013 after the last four years of what Obama has done and how Obama does/is doing it is thinly veneered D zealot sophistry.
Barack Obama has been re-elected which David Seaton made/makes clear was what David Seaton was in favor of. This was not a cloaked secret was it? Too late David. Barack Obama now in WH until early 2017. How convenient to only now be coming around with this on second thought act.
The Rs may be political lunatics / maniacs but O/D zealots since Jan.20,2009 have been betraying what they were willing to berate/mock Bush and Cheney over for eight years evidently largely due to Barack Obama being elected as some kind of D POTUS. Those of us who were/are radically opposed to what Bush and Cheney were doing/did now have a large body of reason(s) to believe Barack Obama is doing much of what Bush/Cheney wanted to do and did. Obama doing Bush/Cheney better with IOKIYAAD shielding in place to manipulate and defuse O/D zealots while Obama moves/does Bush/Cheney agenda(s).
At this point New Day Left radicals need to conclude that the O/D zealots were just showing up to play R vs. D junk politics 2000-2008 and now with a so called “D” in the WH are now more interested in D Party “win at any cost” Team D politics.
Evidently O/D zealots were not genuinely interested in principles of being against what Bush/Cheney were doing or wanted to do but it was all about R vs. D junk politics for the D zealots. With Barack Obama (DLC)(DINO) in WH doing Bush/Cheney more effectively the O/D zealots spent much of 2012 WH election span defending Obama and browbeating those who refused to overlook what Obama is and is not.
At some point the R vs. D junk will need to be pushed aside and banished as it is not moving the ball anywhere other than nowhere.
Had the CIA / John Brennan white wash job we were treated to last week by Senator Diane Feinstein (D)(MICC) and President Obama (DLC)(MICC) (WarCriminal)(Killer of Innocents) been a Bush/Cheney WH production the D zealots would have launched into ballistic ballets of mockery and heated condemnation. But seeing how it was a D Party Capitol Hill conjuring of pro defensive MICC / Obama WH Killer CIA-Drone strikes O/D zealots were largely quiet. D zealots seem to think this sort of political conduct earns them seats at New Day Left Table. It does not.
Sooner New Day Left jettisons these poser sell out D zealots who only care about R vs. D junk and not principles of deep change in WashingtonDC the better.
I recommend that people make a brief visit to diydrones.com to get a picture of how inexpensive and ubiquitous this technology already is.
John Brennan is Obama’s “counterterrorism czar,” and counterterrorism is terrorism, just as a counterattack is an attack.
Priceless! I don’t know how you guys can keep commenting on Mr. Seaton’s continual stream of unconsciousness, it’s like trying to explain to my dog why she can’t run around outside on the city streets.
“Sweetheart, you’ll run out in front of a car, and it’ll be all over.”
“But the oders! The glorious oders! hehe hehe hehe hehe…”
Most of guys usually don’t, hotdog. But this one just offered too many delicious targets (pun intended).
Eep; should have been ‘us guys’, lol.
Indeed. Manichaeism is a simple and easy cop-out.
By the way, did you see this takedown of the WaPo’s apologia for drones? http://my.firedoglake.com/efbeall/2013/02/10/drones-and-the-myth-of-wapos-5-myths/
He’s actually one of the more cogent and informed posters at MyFDL, IMO.
Makes one wonder how far off these are…..
No. The simple and easy cop-out is doing the wrong thing because you’ve convinced yourself (or allowed yourself to be duped) it is the ONLY thing you CAN do.
I’m sure Dave will appreciate your usual endorsement, PW. ;o)
I admit that I feel rather misunderstood. I am not endorsing the drones or targeted assassinations of American citizens or the citizens of any other nation. What I do is understand why they happen and it is not because Barack Obama in himself is especially sinister, but rather that the position of the USA has become more and more a prisoner of its grotesque and obscenely wasteful “Way of Life” and the accumulated karma of the Cold War, with its paranoia and its military-industrial complex.
Two points:
Point one: The USA is broke and cannot spend the kind of money it has spent in Iraq and Afghanistan on any more wars to “remake the world in our image”. The money is needed for other things like pensions for people who have worked all their lives and are entitled to them.
Point two: Thanks to inserting Saudi money and Wahhabi Islam in Afghanistan-Pakistan to fight the Soviet Union and then stationing American soldiers in Saudi Arabia during the first Gulf War, the USA has made real enemies in the Muslim world, people who really do wish to kill as many Americans as they can. We have brought this hostility on ourselves with our ham handed stupidity, but it exists, nevertheless.
The sum of these two points have led to drone warfare, which I believe will lead to horrendous future blow-back.
This is a tragic dialectic.
I think any serious discussion should begin by seeing these points and the conflict/contradiction they produce with our sense of morality/ethics/constitutionalism, and not simply falling back on moral outrage posturing.
Yep…what goes around comes around.
You also have a certain flare for understatement.
The US isn’t broke. It’s continually transferring wealth and income upward to people and corporations who don’t pay taxes, create jobs, or build anything useful to society. We borrowed money to pay for wars and a prescription drug program, and the war profiteers and drug companies got richer instead of being required to pay back the debt that enriched them. The debt/and deficit are just being used as an excuse to continue this wealth transfer, by further cutting benefits and programs. Most people who participate at FDL, whether continuing to support the Dems or not, understand this.
Supporting fighters in Afghanistan 30 years ago created a relatively small number of terrorists. Instead of dealing with that problem, the US is simply continues creating more enemies in more countries on more continents. Wars creating enemies creating wars.
You may choose to think Obama isn’t particularly sinister for killing innocent people, creating more enemies, and transferring more wealth, but that doesn’t mean it’s karma – real people, Obama, the Congress, and the courts are responsible for what they’re doing, who benefits, and who pays the price. Pointing out their agency isn’t moral posturing.
Posturing? OMFG
YOU have no posture at all dude. You’ve prostrated yourself. And now you keep writing this apologistic diarrhia with some kind of plea for “serious discussion.”
You work to put a guy in power who’s only attribute is “the color of his skin?” who nominates monsters like John Brennan, and promotes the totally illegal and unconstitutional usurpation of executive limits to ASSASSINATE people according to secret committees, not to mention all the other unconscionable betrayals he’s responsible for, then you absolve him of guilt and cry about shades of gray and want to have a “serious discussion?”
OMFG
Seaton’s a projectionist. His first point is false as well as a moralism. They’ve stolen money to perpetuate wars as needed; war is their priority not Seaton’s entitlements.
His lectures are contradictory, disinformative, and patronizing. His class interests are clear.
Bravo, well said ! Obama is guilty. I believe the time for discussion is past. “They” aren’t listening. Massive resistance is called for. Non-violent,of course. It’s our only hope. See you all on the streets of Washington D.C. soon. If all goes well, i’ll be there this spring. PEACE
Now, why doesn’t THAT surprise me? I’ve recommended some of his posts. Sr. Seaton is intelligent and, sometimes, thoughtful and perceptive.
But when it comes to His Obamic Majesty, he is, to paraphrase his own words, blinded by the color of Obama’s skin.
Obama’s not a black president. He only plays one on TV. Please open your eyes. You’re not stupid, either.
Nobody who endorsed Obama has any moral or ideological standing to offer an opinion on drone murdering–at least not one that matters.
The best reason for supporting Obama in the last election was to keep the Tea Party from packing the Supreme Court in the next four years… There are others, but that is the best.
… would and will concur wigwam with this point of view… John Brennan is The Hand Of Obama and to suggest what John Brennan and CIA does would be tolerated by Obama WH and Langley were it falling on them day to day and week to week in similar arbitrary measure and scope exposes how rotted Obama WH /CIA Killer Drone protocols are.
@ David Seaton … not persuaded very much or very often by the pro Obama / D Party politics you seem to support and political tints / tinting you use in service of pro Obama/D Party slant(s).
While I will and do respect your opinion(s) in the spirit of site fair play I repeatedly am unable to agree with your pro Obama / D Party tilt(s).
Thank you for being a gracious FDL diaries host David…that is seen and appreciated and does keep me coming back to your comments threads. :-)… best wishes always