Obama Abandons USS Cole and 911 Families

Posted on by ( 9 comments already! )
        

Loading

This is worth reading. Unless something else comes along, I believe that Obama’s attempt to distract from his lack of accomplishments via the release of interrogation memos, the fate of Gitmo detainees past and present will haunt him long and hard.

By DEBRA BURLINGAME
In February I was among a group of USS Cole and 9/11 victims’ families who met with the president at the White House to discuss his policies regarding Guantanamo detainees. Although many of us strongly opposed Barack Obama’s decision to close the detention center and suspend all military commissions, the families of the 17 sailors killed in the 2000 attack in Yemen were particularly outraged.

Over the years, the Cole families have seen justice abandoned by the Clinton administration and overshadowed by the need of the Bush administration to gather intelligence after 9/11. They have watched in frustration as the president of Yemen refused extradition for the Cole bombers.

Now, after more than eight years of waiting, Mr. Obama was stopping the trial of Abu Rahim al-Nashiri, the only individual to be held accountable for the bombing in a U.S. court.

Ms. Burlingame, a former attorney and a director of the National September 11 Memorial Foundation, is the sister of Charles F. “Chic” Burlingame III, the pilot of American Airlines flight 77, which was crashed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001.

More here.

0 0 votes
Article Rating
Subscribe
Notify of
9 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

Excerpt:

“This isn’t goodbye,” said the president, signing autographs and posing for pictures before leaving for his next appointment, “this is hello.” His national security staff would have an open-door policy.

Believe . . . feel . . . hope.

We’d been had.

Binyam Mohamed — the al Qaeda operative selected by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) for a catastrophic post-9/11 attack with co-conspirator Jose Padilla — was released 17 days later.
…
Given all the developments since our meeting with the president, it is now evident that his words to us bore no relation to his intended actions on national security policy and detainee issues. But the narrative about Mr. Obama’s successful meeting with 9/11 and Cole families has been written, and the press has moved on.

The Obama team has established a pattern that should be plain for all to see. When controversy erupts or legitimate policy differences are presented by well-meaning people, send out the celebrity president to flatter and charm.

Burlingame nailed it! Obama’s all about P.R. and the photo op to cover up and mute criticism of what is really going on. And it works. He gets away with doing things that are totally opposite the assurances he offered the 9/11- USS Cole families. They were used like pawns in his game.

0
Reply

HE IS SYSTEMATICALLY DISMANTLING OUR MILITARY’S OVERWHELMING EFECTIVENESS VERSUS ANY OTHER NATION AND THE EFFECTIVE ENFORCEMENT OF BORDER/ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION LAW AND AT THE SAME TIME, TRYING TO CRIPPLE US ECONOMICALLY. HE MUST REALLY HATE THIS COUNTRY.

0
Reply

Rest assured, sadly, that since this nation is at war…sometime in the next 3 and half years…he’s gonna need that military, NEED that CIA, and NEED us to support his belligerent actions. Every President does.

0
Reply

Yeah,

…..and it will be Bush’s fault when we get hit again, because “Bush made people hate America!” So it goes. BO is all about BO and no one else. He is taking America down a road that will make the entire world more dangerous, less secure and far darker than any of us imagine.

He will enslave generations of Americans to economic servitude.

0
Reply

>>HE IS SYSTEMATICALLY DISMANTLING OUR MILITARY’S OVERWHELMING EFECTIVENESS VERSUS ANY OTHER NATION<<

I would like to consider this and possibly respond, but I have no idea to what you are referring. Can you elaborate, please?

To my understanding, the defense budget isn’t being cut, it’s actually increasing. What is happening is spending more money on some areas of defense (e.g. against the sorts of threats which were responsible for the bombing of the USS Cole, e.g. more money for special ops forces and sea, land, and air transport of special ops forces) and less money for other areas of defense (e.g. dogfights with the Russians over the airspace of the Czech Republic). But this is no different than the actions of the Bush administration, who redirected financing of other unnecessary weapons systems (e.g. Crusader mobile artillery) to more relevant military operations.

– Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA

0
Reply

I REMEMBER HOW BUSH MADE SURE TO LOOK INTO THE COLE BOMBINGS AS SOON AS HE TOOK OFFICE AND HE CAUGHT THOSE GUYS AND THINGS WERE SAFER

0
Reply

Burlingame and the 9/11 families should never have gone to meet with Obama in the first place. It was only with gross negligence that they could not have known that they were mere pawns, covers for Obama’s reckless national security proposals and that he would not listen to their just concerns.
So having willingly been used as pawns, and for table dressing, she and the others are ‘upset’ at being used? Well, I don’t give them any sympathy, especially those who voted for Mr. Obama and against McCain. You deserve what you got and now you have to live with the consequences, as will our country for the next two or more years.

0
Reply