With the Olympics underway and the non-stop Chris Christie coverage, you’re probably not going to get much mention of this historic development in the American media. I worked and lived in Taipei for a short time in the late 1980’s and although I wasn’t interested in politics at the time, I remember very well when my taxicab driver proudly explained to me how Taiwan had many big guns pointed on their north shore towards mainland China in the event of an invasion.
Last night’s State of the Union proved Speaker Boehner really does need an intervention for his tanning bed use, VP Biden has now officially turned into your crazy old uncle, and the GOP has jumped the shark in choosing patriotic backdrops (notice the apples; pie anyone?) for their SOTU responses. But what continues to stick in my mind is the moment when President Obama introduces Army Sergeant 1st class Cory Remsburg. No, not because of the two minute standing ovation he received and the understandable emotional reaction people (and myself) had- but to this line in Obama’s introduction:
“A few months later, on his tenth deployment, Cory was nearly killed by a massive roadside bomb in Afghanistan.”
His 10th deployment. Think about that for a minute.
Plenty of news orgs are characterizing this as the SOTU high point, but I haven’t read any stories or heard any of the talkingheads this morning pointing out the outrageousness of a soldier on his 10th deployment and how it illustrates the constant state of war this country is in. Our politicians are great at waving flags and giving standing ovations for injured soldiers while ignoring what this does to a country and its people’s souls.
Yes, Edward Snowden is a whistleblower. Not a traitor, not a spy, and not someone who “…ought to swing from a tall oak tree”. Since the NSA ruling by Judge Richard Leon, I’ve been hearing more of the MSM use the term to describe, or at least pose the question that Snowden is a whistleblower.
Quite a different attitude than when we first learned of Edward Snowden:
A DC district judge ruled yesterday that the NSA’s collection of Americans’ phone records is most likely unconstitutional. This comes right after the outrageous 60 Minutes promotion/propaganda piece for the NSA last Sunday where the viewer was treated to little tidbits about Edward Snowden’s behavior so he comes across as a bit of a weirdo.
Yesterday 14 new countries were named to the UN Human Rights Council- among them were China, Russia, Cuba, and Saudi Arabia. I’ll just post this 2001 cartoon from the archives:
