In the same way that Obama said today that he wakes up everyday thinking about how to keep the American people safe, Bush said he wakes up every day thinking about how best to protect America in 2004.
Nowhere does it explicitly state in the Constitution that the President’s “most important responsibility” is “to keep the American people safe.” As Commander-in-Chiefe of all branches of the military, it can be argued that this means security is of the utmost importance, but really, isn’t a President’s “single most important responsibility” to uphold and defend the Constitution?
This phrase about keeping the American people safe is a loaded phrase left over from the Bush Administration. It is something that was regarded as the highest priority when policies and legislation were being debated, and it is something that was meant to reassure those who were responding to the fear and paranoia created by the Bush Administration’s “war on terror.” (Like Jon Stewart said last night, “I love it when he does the Bush covers.)
Obama isn’t just parroting Bush in some cases; he’s seeking to develop ways that would allow this he and future presidents to continue policies used by the Bush Administration.
In his speech yesterday, Obama said, “After 9/11, we knew that we had entered a new era—that enemies who did not abide by any law of war would present new challenges to our application of the law to our application of the law; that our government would need new tools to protect the American people, and that these tools would have to allow us to prevent attacks instead of simply prosecuting those who try to carry them out.”
Would these “new tools” include military tribunals almost guaranteed from the start to find a detainee guilty? Would these “new tools” involve preventive detention?
Were waterboarding and other techniques “new tools” and how did they work?
Weren’t policies of abuse and torture designed to get around the rule of law and is that the Obama Administration envisions ---“new tools” to justify unlawful and callous actions which may or may not prevent another 9/11?
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