Barack Obama: No Friend of Civil Liberties

The peace group Code Pink recently delivered a “report card” to the White House where they gave President Obama a 'D' for his administration's treatment of Americans' civil liberties, noting that his Justice Department has raided the homes and offices of antiwar activists whose only offense was exercising their right to dissent.

But in an interview with Change.org, co-founder Medea Benjamin suggests that the president was perhaps a bit more deserving of an 'F,' pointing out that Obama has declared it his unilateral right to assassinate American citizens without charge or trial – a right even former President George W. Bush dared not assert. And his administration's treatment of the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks, which Vice President Biden says is headed by a “high-tech terrorist,” and accused leaker Bradley Manning indicates he's no friend of civil liberties – or government accountability.

Founded in 2002 and named for the government's much-mocked, color-coded terror threat levels, Code Pink, like the antiwar movement writ large, has fallen on something of hard times – and not because of a lack of wars to protest. Since taking office, Obama has more than doubled the troops in Afghanistan, dropped more bombs in Pakistan than the previous administration did in eight years, and launched deadly missile strikes in both Yemen and Somalia. At the same time, his administration has supported repressive regimes from Israel to Egypt.

But be that as it may, “the movement just fizzled after Barack Obama got elected,” Benjamin says. “It's been very difficult as an organizer. I mean, we feel very inadequate ourselves that we haven't found a way in these new times under Obama to bring people out. Many people in the movement thought he was going to change things."

He hasn't.

Whether it's due to partisan allegiance to a Democrat or disillusionment with protests, or a combination of the two, Benjamin says it's been hard to get those opposed to war – and polls show a majority of Americans want out of Afghanistan – back out in the street.

However, the tide may be turning. After the Justice Department last September raided the homes and offices of prominent antiwar activists in Minneapolis and Chicago, issuing subpoenas to two dozen people to testify before a grand jury about their supposed “material support” for terrorism – these are peaceniks and pacifists we're talking about, mind you – any illusions about this administration disappeared overnight. No longer could anyone pretend the president was a friend of the peace movement. And no longer could anyone maintain his lofty rhetoric was more important than his actions.

And since the raids, there have been rallies across the country to express solidarity with those targeted by the Justice Department and the FBI in particular, giving the moribund antiwar movement a spark, with protests in the Midwest drawing hundreds of supporters. Like Benjamin, those taking to the streets have reached the conclusion that the responsibility for the raids goes all the way to the top – and not just to Attorney General Eric Holder, but to Barack Obama himself.

“It's his Justice Department and it's his attorney general,” says Benjamin. “I think he bears a lot of responsibility – and that if he thought this was wrong then he could turn this around.”

But again, he hasn't. Just as Obama has done nothing to help 23-year-old Bradley Manning, the Army intelligence officer who allegedly leaked evidence of war crimes to the whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks; that is, the man who is accused of singlehandedly doing more to promote government transparency and accountability – values Obama supposedly cherishes – than anyone else in the U.S. government.

Since being charged with disclosing classified information last July, Manning has been held in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day, denied a pillow, bedsheets and the ability to exercise while in his cell. And just this week, military officials denied him access to one of his lone remaining visitors, detaining activist David House for several hours without charge, only releasing him after visiting hours were conveniently over.

And as an American citizen is tortured – mentally destroyed – for a crime he hasn't even been convicted of, Obama has been conspicuously, the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize winner presumably too busy sucking up to the Chinese dictator who has placed the 2010 winner under house arrest.

“The president's the commander in chief,” notes Benjamin. “He could lift one little finger and Bradley Manning would not be in isolation and not have his visitors harassed. He's either condoning it or ignoring, but he certainly has the power to change it.”

But he hasn't.

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Photo Credit: Charles Davis