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Something to consider, when evaluating cases like this: Politicians like Obama often make promises like this with the same open-source information about these
by vonmoltke 6y ago
Something to consider, when evaluating cases like this:
Politicians like Obama often make promises like this with the same open-source information about these programs that you or I have. What if the failure to follow through was driven by a change of heart caused by having full access the the details of such programs?
I'm not saying these details do justify continuation, just that we need to consider that there are things Obama did not know about these programs when he made these statements that he found out when he was elected thus changing his views of these programs or his decisions on where to spend political capital).
- Clubber 6y agoI agree that's a possibility and a probability. He was surely convinced otherwise by his advisors, whomever they were. We do live in a democracy and as citizens who elect representatives, we must have that information to be able to elect properly. That's is the concerning disconnect. We need to understand the justifications of Guantanamo and the wars and USA PATRIOT Act and decide for ourselves. But we aren't "allowed" to, which is in itself circumventing democracy. An analogy I would use is buying a car. On the outside it looks great. I have normal concerns, but the salesman won't allow me to either inspect it, or have an independent mechanic inspect it, but he'll allow his mechanic to inspect it and he'll report the results to me. That's what I feel our democracy is like on these issues.