Another day, another round of embarrassing authoritarian nonsense from would-be Republican presidential candidates. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), the honey-throated apocalyptic who Ed Krayewski writes about below, made the following “joke” on
Source: Graham: I’ll Drone You for Your Thoughts. Christie: Beware ‘civil liberties extremists’
Known NSA-defender Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is now calling for “heads to roll” over the recent accusation that the CIA was spying on Senate computers.
“Heads should roll, people should go to jail if it’s true,” Graham said. “If it is, the legislative branch should declare war on the CIA.”
His statement is nothing short of hypocrisy considering his ardent defense of the National Security Agency’s surveillance program that spies on Americans citizens, without having a search warrant.
“This is Richard Nixon stuff. This is dangerous to the democracy,” he added about the revelation.
Tuesday morning, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, also a defender of the NSA, took to the Senate floor to accuse the CIA of unconstitutionally spying on Senate computers.
“I have grave concerns that the CIA’s search may well have violated the separation of powers principles embodied in the United States Constitution,” she said. “I have asked for an apology and a recognition that this CIA search of computers used by its oversight committee was inappropriate. I have received neither.”
Sen. John McCain slammed the CIA as well.
Security leaker Edward Snowden, however, noted the hypocrisy of Feinstein Tuesday, calling it the “Merkel effect.”
“It’s clear the CIA was trying to play ‘keep away’ with documents relevant to an investigation by their overseers in Congress, and that’s a serious constitutional concern,” he said in a statement to NBC.
“But it’s equally if not more concerning that we’re seeing another ‘Merkel effect,’ where an elected official does not care at all that the rights of millions of ordinary citizens are violated by our spies, but suddenly it’s a scandal when a politician finds out the same thing happens to them.”
http://rare.us/story … snt-like-spying-now/
War Hawks are getting so desperate that they are using fear tactics in order to motivate constituents to support the war in Syria. Syria and Iran maybe allies, but Sen. Lindsay Graham’s analysis of their connection is simplistic and misguided. According to the senator, if the US does not intervene in Syria, Iran will not take the US seriously and will have a nuclear weapon by the end of 2014. If Iran gets nuclear weapons, such weapons will end up in the hands of terrorists. He ended his analysis by describing the fear-inducing-if-unrealistic situation of a nuclear bomb dropping on Charleston Harbor.
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At an invitation-only breakfast at Mount Pleasant this week, Graham offered his assessment of the Syria situation, saying that it will destabilize the entire Middle East, and that “if we get Syria wrong, within six months – and you can quote me on this – there will be a war between Iran and Israel over their nuclear program.”
He also said that any terrorist nuclear device “won’t come to America on top of a missile, it’ll come in the belly of a ship in the Charleston or New York harbor.” The prospect of Iran acquiring a nuclear device is a legitimate threat, not a fear-mongering talking point to justify hasty foreign policy decisions.
Iran and Saudi Arabia are the two main powers in what could be seen as a regional Cold War (and indeed Russia and the US come down on opposite sides of the conflict). Both countries’ regimes are brutal, oppressive and fundamentalist, and both wish to become the dominant regional power. Syria is merely the current battleground. Iran supports Assad, while Saudi Arabia supports the rebel forces, which include Al Qaida and Chechen extremists.
As for Graham’s statement that Syria will destabilize the Middle East, that happened two years ago with the Arab Spring, which again was US-backed. Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Yemen, Algeria, and even Pakistan, which had admittedly been ruled by brutal governments in the past, were plunged into revolution followed by extremist Islamic governments, though the majority of the populations haven’t supported them.
Full article: http://benswann.com/ … n-syria-or-be-nuked/
