US Politics: we are all liberals, we are all conservatives

[MerenthaClone]

Now if American soldiers get captured, they'll be kept alive instead of beheaded or strung up on bridges publicly on TV. This is what happens when you negotiate with terrorists*! Thanks, Obama.

(* terrorists are treated as if they were fighting members of a sovereign nation that the US has semi-declared war on, but for now we'll ignore that we just classify Taliban fighters as whatever is most politically convenient at the time )

[OnionAhaiReborn]

What I've read on this thread, from reputable news sources, are first hand accounts that not only did the guy desert but that he was a willing guest of the enemy. If true the guy deserves his day in court.

Bullshit. There are no first hand accounts of him being 'a willing guest of the enemy.' There are rumors.

This reality denial is fucking amazing. There is video of this guy in captivity begging to be brought home, and we know the Taliban has been making demands for his release for years, but no, this guy isn't a hostage because rumors.

[TrackerNeil]

In summary, days after the VA scandal comes to a head, we coincidentally release five Taliban commanders (without consulting congress) in exchange for a shitbird that deserted his post and got his fellow soldiers killed.

Wow...if ever I doubted Obama Derangement Syndrome (ODS), I doubt no longer. Ten years ago board conservatives would have gone ballistic if anyone had dared refer to a US soldier as a "shitbird." We really have gone through the looking-glass.

[DanteGabriel]

Wow...if ever I doubted Obama Derangement Syndrome (ODS), I doubt no longer. Ten years ago board conservatives would have gone ballistic if anyone had dared refer to a US soldier as a "shitbird." We really have gone through the looking-glass.

Not that long ago, the audience at a Republican Presidential primary debate booed an active-duty soldier because he said he was gay. So... yeah. Turns out that being willing to send soldiers halfway around the world on bullshit intelligence and refusing to reinforce and fund them properly does not actually mean you're "for the troops."

[Altherion]

3. The President lacks the authority to make an arrangement like this without Congress.

I have no idea if this is true. Is there a citation on this?

It depends on how much you believe in the legality of signing statements. The issue is not he lacks the authority, but that he has to let Congress know a month in advance and explain why and he didn't do it:

House Armed Services Committee Chairman Howard “Buck” McKeon (R-Calif.) and Senate Armed Services Committee ranking member James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.) accused President Barack Obama in a statement Saturday of breaking the law by failing to give Congress proper notice of the transfers. The law requires the White House to tell lawmakers about Guantanamo transfers 30 days in advance. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, however, told Congress about the five Bergdahl transfers Saturday morning, just hours before the prisoners were on a plane and headed to Qatar.

...

Obama himself signed the 30 days rule into law last year. He also wrote a controversial signing statement along with that law in which he said he believes the President is allowed to “act swiftly in conducting negotiations with foreign countries regarding the circumstances of detainee transfers.” The Bergdahl deal is the first in which he’s put this belief into practice. (It’s also worth noting Obama campaigned in 2008 against the use of signing statements to enhance the executive branch’s power).

Signing statements are a bit bizarre: there is absolutely nothing in the Constitution that gives the President the authority to modify laws like this. They started out as clarifications (i.e. the President saying how he intends to interpret the law) and rhetorical statements, but more recent Presidents have used them to declare parts of laws unconstitutional and it's basically gotten to the point where the President can say "I'm signing this law, but I reserve the right to ignore it." To be fair to Obama, he didn't start this trend -- everything he has done with signing statements G.W. Bush did more of.

[awesome possum]

It depends on how much you believe in the legality of signing statements. The issue is not he lacks the authority, but that he has to let Congress know a month in advance and explain why and he didn't do it:

No, he didn't give Congress a month advance notice. He gave them FOUR YEARS advanced notice, per my link above, and they derailed it. Fuck any Republican who whines about advance notice.

[Altherion]

No, he didn't give Congress a month advance notice. He gave them FOUR YEARS advanced notice, per my link above, and they derailed it. Fuck any Republican who whines about advance notice.

He asked them in 2012 (which is when your article is from) and they said no so this time around he didn't bother asking. I'm pretty sure that doesn't count as advanced notice.

[awesome possum]

He asked them in 2012 (which is when your article is from) and they said no so this time around he didn't bother asking. I'm pretty sure that doesn't count as advanced notice.

The article is from 2012, is about events from 2010 and is only 530 words, not that tough of a read. I'll quote it, again:

The process, launched with Obama administration support in Qatar in 2010 under German mediation, was to begin with a prisoner exchange as a trial test for further talks. The American soldier, Sgt. Bowe Bigdahl, who was captured on June 30, 2009, was to be released in a swap for five Taliban detainees held in Guantanamo. The Taliban believed the exchange had US approval. But US Republican opposition made Congressional approval impossible, and the talks have floundered ever since.

So yeah, four years of advanced notice that the administration wanted to do this.

[TrackerNeil]

Not that long ago, the audience at a Republican Presidential primary debate booed an active-duty soldier because he said he was gay. So... yeah. Turns out that being willing to send soldiers halfway around the world on bullshit intelligence and refusing to reinforce and fund them properly does not actually mean you're "for the troops."

Gosh...how could I have forgotten about this?

I think The Great Unwashed is wise to be skeptical. Whenever you hear statements like "there are rumors" or "one could speculate", you should go on full alert. There are rumors to fit any occasion, and one can speculate -- well, anything, really. If Bergdhal was a deserter the truth will come out in due course, and until then we should proceed with what we know, and not what could be imagined.

[Seli]

It is possible we have a bunch of soldiers who failed miserably at their task, and try to put blame elsewhere? And even if he was a deserter, at least now you have him back in custody and not used a missile to kill a US citizen.

The nasty bit of these negotiations is releasing people into the hands of a group that I'd guess is very unlikely to trust them, since they cannot know what happened to them in these years of captivity. That can't be a healthy environment.

[Inigima]

And can we please dispense with the notion that just because CNN is reporting rumors, that means it's "credible"? CNN aired a segment with a psychic in relation to the missing Flight 370 story.

CNN is credible -- they are reporting on hearsay from other troops. They identify it as hearsay. There's a fuzzy line here -- Fox routinely crosses it by using this tactic to imply things they know to be false -- to which editorial discretion ought to be applied, but it's not like they're representing it as fact.

[The onion wight]

It is possible we have a bunch of soldiers who failed miserably at their task, and try to put blame elsewhere? And even if he was a deserter, at least now you have him back in custody and not used a missile to kill a US citizen.

The nasty bit of these negotiations is releasing people into the hands of a group that I'd guess is very unlikely to trust them, since they cannot know what happened to them in these years of captivity. That can't be a healthy environment.

Wow! So there's some hidden agenda whereby active military personnel for some reason decide to defame a perfectly innocent POW. Maybe they're psychic and figured that Obama would at some point look for some good PR from his release?

[awesome possum]

It's amazing that somehow conservatives are arguing that we should have let an American citizen remain a Prisoner of War for any reason whatsoever. If he deserted his post, let him face justice... here, in the United States.

[lokisnow]

it blows my mind this concerted smear campaign. Bergdahl could be a 9/11 first responder and have done 10 tours and they'd still be trying to smear and attack him.

Proof that Conservatives do not support the troops. Treacherous of them, conservatives are betraying their country by engaging in these tactics.

[The onion wight]

it blows my mind this concerted smear campaign. Bergdahl could be a 9/11 first responder and have done 10 tours and they'd still be trying to smear and attack him.Proof that Conservatives do not support the troops. Treacherous of them, conservatives are betraying their country by engaging in these tactics.

What concerted campaign? I've read articles from respected sources quoting active military personnel. I very much doubt that it's common for soldiers to publicly state such opinions about a POW unless they were 100% sure it was true. So let's see what happens next.

[NoneofYourBiz]

The comments here are laughable. Deserters are not considered to have honorably served. It's not unpatriotic or not being supportive of the troops to not call this guy a hero.

The fact that some of you think other troops, troops who served with him, would lie about what they witnessed is ridiculous. To what end? Do you have any freaking idea of the lengths troops will go to save even the body of a fellow fallen soldier? Do you have any idea of the scope of operations that were launched to retrieve this douche from his own stupidity and how many guys were injured and killed in these ops? These guys are coming out to discuss this in the media, at least the ones who can, because they know what happened and this guy is no hero and no POW. This is a well known story in the Army and in theatre. It may be news to this forum, but the "rumors" about this have been known in the military community for years.

Completely understand the reasonable skepticism until all the facts come out, but the way some of you are reacting in your predictable "this is all about Obama" fashion is utterly ludicrous. Wipe the stars from your eyes and try to look at this situation without the political chips on your shoulders.

[DanteGabriel]

Completely understand the reasonable skepticism until all the facts come out, but the way some of you are reacting in your predictable "this is all about Obama" fashion is utterly ludicrous. Wipe the stars from your eyes and try to look at this situation without the political chips on your shoulders.

I'm reserving judgment on this brouhaha until I know more -- but maybe the preceding six years of "Obama is the worst thing ever and this thing he just did is the worst, most MuslimSocialistTerroristy thing ever" have done the right wing a disservice, eh? The unreasoned, knee-jerk bleating has been so deafening and so consistent for so long, hard to pick out when we should start paying attention to the GOP's fainting chorus. You folks have cried "anti-American!" too often.

[MerenthaClone]

The comments here are laughable. Deserters are not considered to have honorably served. It's not unpatriotic or not being supportive of the troops to not call this guy a hero.

The fact that some of you think other troops, troops who served with him, would lie about what they witnessed is ridiculous. To what end? Do you have any freaking idea of the lengths troops will go to save even the body of a fellow fallen soldier? Do you have any idea of the scope of operations that were launched to retrieve this douche from his own stupidity and how many guys were injured and killed in these ops? These guys are coming out to discuss this in the media, at least the ones who can, because they know what happened and this guy is no hero and no POW. This is a well known story in the Army and in theatre. It may be news to this forum, but the "rumors" about this have been known in the military community for years.

Completely understand the reasonable skepticism until all the facts come out, but the way some of you are reacting in your predictable "this is all about Obama" fashion is utterly ludicrous. Wipe the stars from your eyes and try to look at this situation without the political chips on your shoulders.

Yeah, when the DoJ gets around to giving (and convicting) this guy a trial for desertion, I'll start thinking of him as a deserter. But until then, I'm going with the whole "innocent until proven guilty" concept that's supposedly one of the cornerstones of our justice system, soldier or no. You should try it sometime.

[TrackerNeil]

Completely understand the reasonable skepticism until all the facts come out, but the way some of you are reacting in your predictable "this is all about Obama" fashion is utterly ludicrous. Wipe the stars from your eyes and try to look at this situation without the political chips on your shoulders.

Don't mix your metaphors, dear.

As to "chips on your shoulders", given the amount of nonsense this president has been subjected to (has the birth certificate of any previous US president been questioned?), I think we are well justified in expecting a witch hunt when we see the stakes being hammered into place.

[The onion wight]

Yeah, when the DoJ gets around to giving (and convicting) this guy a trial for desertion, I'll start thinking of him as a deserter. But until then, I'm going with the whole "innocent until proven guilty" concept that's supposedly one of the cornerstones of our justice system, soldier or no. You should try it sometime.

I think that's a fair comment. The only doubt I have is whether or not the DoJ will be motivated to investigate and try this guy after they've spent so much effort getting him released? I put a lot of store in what soldiers in the field have been saying about this, to brush that off as partisan attacks on the POTUS is silly.