Up Bear Creek / 31jan26013i1 / Jill Stein, Pres. Obama & Drones

Green Presidential Candidate Jill Stein

 I told my friends I wouldn’t start criticizing Barack Obama until (and if) he won a second term. I voted for him a second time, even though the Green Party had a wonderful, competent and visionary candidate in Dr. Jill Stein of Massachusetts. But it feels like we’re still semi-trapped in the social and economic collapse of the Bush/Reagan dynasty, and it was important to move this nation off center right, and back to center left. I think the swing won’t be complete until the Dems regain control of Congress.

Then will be the time to mount a hard push to the left to enact a New Green Deal like Stein was advocating – putting America back to work with a Full Employment Program to be co-developed locally and nationally; moving towards green energy and sustainable small businesses; regaining public control of our domestic monetary policy; abolishing corporate personhood; instituting regulatory safeguards for voting rights; championing local control over federal pre-emption, defending civil liberties; and financing new programs by cutting military spending in half; closing our 700+ American military bases around the world; and starting a new round of nuclear disarmament initiatives.

But with the president formally inaugurated into a second term, I have to raise my voice in public opposition to his use of drones -- officially UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) – a program begun under the previous administration and continuing now into Obama’s second term.

Extra-judicial state murders of suspected terrorists, with its collateral damage of civilian casualties, is illegal, unethical, and just plain wrong. It violates the U.N. Charter, and constitutes a thumbing of Uncle Sam’s nose at international law – just like the previous administration used to do. If George W. Bush should have been charged on the world stage for war crimes, and Ronald Reagan likewise for his Contra War in Nicaragua, funded by covert illegal drug smuggling, what should we do with Barack Obama’s drone strikes?

According to the website Global Research, an estimated 800 or more innocents have been killed by UAVs in Pakistan, including up to 168 children, and only 22 Al Qaeda commanders. And according to the Council of Foreign Relations website, by 2010 there had been 79 drone accidents, costing $1 million each

 Maybe we ought to stop trying to limit Americans’ citizen access to guns, and stop slaughtering innocents in drone attacks world-wide. Just because we don’t see it, don’t read about it in the corporate media, and it doesn’t happen to us or our neighbors doesn’t mean a terrible thing isn’t happening -- paid for by our tax dollars

Former President Jimmy Carter has come out publicly and voiced opposition to Obama’s drone assassination policy. So must we.