Obama Supports Bush and Rove Torture Policies

Obama and the Democrats campaigned on changing the Bush policies on torture. Now that Obama and Democrats are firmly in power and can set policy, they are reversing their campaign pledges.


Under Obama, same stance on rendition suit
Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/02/09/MNGS15QB5B.DTL

President Obama's Justice Department signaled in a San Francisco courtroom Monday that the change in administrations has not changed the government's position on secrecy and the rights of foreign prisoners - and that lawsuits by alleged victims of CIA kidnappings and torture must be dismissed on national security grounds.




Obama's campaign website specifically criticizes the Bush use of secrecy and state secrets.

http://www.barackobama.com/issues/ethics/
Secrecy Dominates Government Actions: The Bush administration has ignored public disclosure rules and has invoked a legal tool known as the "state secrets" privilege more than any other previous administration to get cases thrown out of civil court.


Commentary from Glenn Greenwald at http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/02/10/obama/index.html

Apparently, the operative word in that highlighted paragraph -- unbeknownst to most people at the time -- was "the Bush administration," since the Obama administration is now doing exactly that which, during the campaign, it defined as "The Problem," the only difference being that it is now Obama, and not Bush, doing it. For journalists who haven't bothered to learn the first thing about this issue even as they hold themselves out as experts on it, and for Obama followers eager to find an excuse to justify what was done, a brief review of the State Secrets privilege controversy is in order.