Richard_A_GA’s Comments

• Jul 27th, 2013 @ 5:48pm

  Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

  on Obama Promise To 'Protect Whistleblowers' Just Disappeared From Change.gov
  @anton - You're right: I accepted without question the credential often presented by President Obama, his staff, and his campaign team that he was a "Constitutional law professor". Based on additional research done after reading your rebuttal, as far as I can see, the actual situation is somewhere in between your position and his preferred biographical positioning. I could not find info on his academic training at Harvard, but his teaching at the University of Chicago on some aspects of Constitutional law was more that just "...a 2-hour class now and then...". It was 12 years of teaching on 3 topics: due process and equal protection areas of constitutional law (a topic directly relevant to his anti-constitutional positions on indefinite detention without charge or trial and extrajudicial executions); voting rights and the evolution of election law; and racism and the law. At least the first two could be considered to be specific to Constitutional rights and the third could have aspects related to equal protection provisions. So, whether or not he was technically a "Constitutional law professor" as he claims and as I described, his courses were enough that he should be fully aware of the Constitutional rights that are being abridged or compromised by the positions that he has taken on FISA, NDAA, and several other wide reaching laws he has pushed. His positions have had severely affected due process and expanded the massive surveillance of the very large majority of US citizens and citizens of other countries not suspected of being engaged in illegal activities.
  
  Whether Constitutional law professor or not, it appears from the rest of your comment that we have basically the same view of the outcome of his actions related to Constitutional rights. I focused more on the outcomes of his actions without considering his character and you focused more on your view of his character that drove the outcomes.
• Jul 27th, 2013 @ 8:27am

  Re:

  on Irony Alert: Obama Opposes Amash Amendment Because It's A 'Blunt Approach' And Not A Product Of 'Open' Process
  @shutslar - Very well put. This is a statement every citizen should ascribe to.
• Jul 27th, 2013 @ 8:22am

  Re: Re: Re:

  on Obama Promise To 'Protect Whistleblowers' Just Disappeared From Change.gov
  @Mekongcola - Let's not forget that in both Presidential campaigns Obama promised to do away with the kinds of surveillance, detention programs, and extrajudicial abductions/renditions/interrogation practices of the Bush administration. Instead, he insisted that increasingly abusive executive extrajudicial power over both US citizens and foreigners be included in the NDAAs that have been passed since 2009; plus increasing the reach of NSA surveillance; plus increasing the use of detention; plus taking deliberate focused action against all whistle-blowers who have revealed improper or illegal actions by his administration. He couldn't have done more if Dick Cheney had been retained as his personal adviser for secrecy and retribution. He doesn't get a free pass just because Bush started it. Bush may have started it, but Obama could have ended it and did not, instead knowingly choosing to make it worse.
  
  BTW - I'm not a Republican or Tea Party troll. I am a regretful 2 time voter for Obama; feeling frustrated and abandoned seeing the number of Constitutional rights that have been compromised under the Obama administration. As a trained Constitutional lawyer, one can only conclude that he has known exactly what he and his administration have done and has decided the Constitution isn't relevant if it conflicts with what he wants to do. His administration has no hold on the moral high ground in criticizing SCOTUS for any of its actions comprising citizens' rights under the Constitution.