Anthony Romero Faces the Nation
On Sunday, ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero was on Face the Nation debating Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) about President Obama's resurrection of the military commissions and decision to withhold the torture photos. You can watch video of the program here.
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May 18th, 2009 at 3:33pm
WANTED: THE VELVET-GLOVED FIST
The Kumbaya Strategy can take Barack Obama only so far without starting to look like a pretext for appeasement.
Constant conciliation risks being interpreted as vacillation and weakness, the willing surrender of principle to political expediency.
Civil libertarians and human rights activists have been dismayed and disappointed by this former constitutional law professor's refusal to demonstrate his conviction to core principles.
Especially disappointed are the many domestic victims of the extrajudicial targeting and punishment "matrix" spawned or vastly expanded under Bush-Cheney.
A grassroots citizen vigilante army continues to operate behind federally-funded community policing and related volunteer programs to stalk, harass and persecute unjustly "targeted" U.S. citizens.
The abuses of the so-called "terrorist watch list" are just the tip of the iceberg. There vigilantes, operating with the full knowledge of law enforcement, use secretly-implanted GPS beacons to stalk and terrorize their fellow citizens.
They also are believed to be equipped with silent, injury- and illness-inducing microwave radiation weapons identical to those being deployed under federal programs to law enforcement agencies nationwide.
Unfortunately, these Gestapo-like abuses continue under Team Obama. The conciliation strategy only enables tyrants who seek to impose their ideological will on America under the false flag of "keeping America safe."
Please, White House staff, read this. Your Bush holdovers already know all about it. What have they told YOU?
http://nowpublic.com/world/gestapo-usa-govt-funded-vigilan te-network-terrorizes-america
OR (if link is corrupted / disabled):
http://NowPublic.com/scrivener
May 19th, 2009 at 3:55am
Good job, Mr. Romero!
I marveled at how you were able to keep your cool in the face of the dishonest arguments ("I have no stake in this") put forward by Mr. King.
May 20th, 2009 at 1:03pm
Dear Mr. Romero,
My name is Max G. Etienne and I am an "ACLU" supporter and soon active member. I am originally from Haiti, and now an American citizen.
I have lost my father, friends, neighbours, classmates to the Duvaliers' and their henchmen. My father was "taken" with no explainations, and he disappeared (probably killed after being tortured)by the Haitian internationally famous "tontons macoutes".
Human rights abuses (whatever the motives that trigger them) have become a personal matter to me. I'd like to volunteer for your Institution and would like to sit down and talk to you personally.
Whether your efforts reach a positive outcome or not are not relevant. The issues your Institution stand for are like "Sisyph rocks" that any civilized community has to keep on rolling up... Freedom to petition grievances and human rights don't have a voice on their own.
Thank you for your stand and bravery and for taking the time to read this letter.
Regards,
max etienne
P.O. Box 7076
Langley Park, Md 20787
(240)-423-8646
May 20th, 2009 at 1:13pm
Dear Mr. Rpmero,
Thank you for your stand and bravery. I have personal reasons to hold tortures and human rights abuses (under any type of justifications) in contempt.
Whether you're successful in pursuing the issues you stand for is beyond the point. What is important, it is vital for the survival of human kind that Institution like yours exists.
For, tortures and abuses of authority are contagious, addictive have no limit, have "boomerang effects" and are double edged. Congratulations! Freedom to petition grievances and human rights don't have a voice on their own.
Thank you for taking the time to read this letter.
Regards,
max
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