For a lawyer, and one-time law lecturer, Obama seems to either ignorant of what is going on or turning a blind-eye to the appalling and disgraceful treatment being meted out to Private Bradley Manning. It's a subject taken up by Daniel Ellsberg in a piece in The Guardian.
"President Obama tells us that he's asked the Pentagon whether the conditions of confinement of Bradley Manning, the soldier charged with leaking state secrets, "are appropriate and are meeting our basic standards. They assure me that they are."
If Obama believes that, he'll believe anything. I would hope he would know better than to ask the perpetrators whether they've been behaving appropriately. I can just hear President Nixon saying to a press conference the same thing: "I was assured by the the White House Plumbers that their burglary of the office of Daniel Ellsberg's doctor in Los Angeles was appropriate and met basic standards."
When that criminal behaviour ordered from the Oval Office came out, Nixon faced impeachment and had to resign. Well, times have changed. But if President Obama really doesn't yet know the actual conditions of Manning's detention – if he really believes, as he's said, that "some of this [nudity, isolation, harassment, sleep-deprivation] has to do with Private Manning's wellbeing", despite the contrary judgments of the prison psychologist – then he's being lied to, and he needs to get a grip on his administration.
If he does know, and agrees that it's appropriate or even legal, that doesn't speak well for his memory of the courses he taught on constitutional law."
The Guardian also has a piece worth reading "Stripped naked every night, Bradley Manning tells of prison ordeal" - Bradley himself writing about his treatment.
Politico reports :
"The BBC reporter Philippa Thomas, now a Nieman Journalism Fellow at Harvard University, reports on her personal blog on a conversation with State Department Spokesman PJ Crowley that doesn't seem to have been meant for public consumption, exactly, but which reflects deep divisions on Manning's treatment".
"President Obama tells us that he's asked the Pentagon whether the conditions of confinement of Bradley Manning, the soldier charged with leaking state secrets, "are appropriate and are meeting our basic standards. They assure me that they are."
If Obama believes that, he'll believe anything. I would hope he would know better than to ask the perpetrators whether they've been behaving appropriately. I can just hear President Nixon saying to a press conference the same thing: "I was assured by the the White House Plumbers that their burglary of the office of Daniel Ellsberg's doctor in Los Angeles was appropriate and met basic standards."
When that criminal behaviour ordered from the Oval Office came out, Nixon faced impeachment and had to resign. Well, times have changed. But if President Obama really doesn't yet know the actual conditions of Manning's detention – if he really believes, as he's said, that "some of this [nudity, isolation, harassment, sleep-deprivation] has to do with Private Manning's wellbeing", despite the contrary judgments of the prison psychologist – then he's being lied to, and he needs to get a grip on his administration.
If he does know, and agrees that it's appropriate or even legal, that doesn't speak well for his memory of the courses he taught on constitutional law."
The Guardian also has a piece worth reading "Stripped naked every night, Bradley Manning tells of prison ordeal" - Bradley himself writing about his treatment.
Politico reports :
"The BBC reporter Philippa Thomas, now a Nieman Journalism Fellow at Harvard University, reports on her personal blog on a conversation with State Department Spokesman PJ Crowley that doesn't seem to have been meant for public consumption, exactly, but which reflects deep divisions on Manning's treatment".
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