There are actions and then there are inaction’s. There is biting the hands that feed you now and in the future, and then there are the decisions one makes to not bite the hands that feed you, now and in the future.
First there was the illegal torture program of President George W. Bush. Bush is the only former US president who couldn’t visit Switzerland and numerous other nations after his terms in office. Bush would be arrested and charged with war crimes should he or several other members of his administration, including Vice President Dick Cheney, ever step foot into those nations. Obama called the torturers “patriots” and those who demanded justice “sanctimonious.”
When a judge in Spain began to pursue war crimes charges against Bush, Obama successfully began a diplomatic initiative to quash the charges.
Obama went out of his way to ensure that nobody of political and financial significance suffered the consequences of their actions.
Not one single person was charged with war crimes, torture or murder. Forget US laws, forget the US Constitution, and forget international laws the US had signed on to.
Perhaps Obama decided not to pursue charges, or quash prospective charges, because much of the torture was done by publicly traded corporate contractors. In other words, torture was to a large degree about profits; the more torture victims, the more profits.
Virginia-based CACI Premier Technology corporation is a military contractor that was a major US torturer at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. The company made millions upon millions of dollars torturing people on behalf of President George W. Bush.
CACI’s share price hovered around $13 a share when Bush became president. Thanks to the torture contracts the company received from the US government, the share price increased more than five fold to $65+ by the summer of 2005. Under Obama, CACI’s share price rose to $122.25 the day before he left office, in part because of government contracts.
Why is it that a person can commit torture to somebody else and not be convicted of a crime? If anybody else not under contract to the US government kidnapped and tortured somebody they would be charged with crimes, but if the US government pays you for breaking national and international laws, then you will face no charges. That does not make a whole lot of sense.
No doubt Wall Street liked the torture program a lot because it fed into the pockets of the billionaires and millionaire investors of Wall Street, as well as Wall Streets large investment corporations, and Obama had to protect his financial benefactors, so justice could never be served, otherwise the financial spigot watering, seeding and fertilizing the corruption of government at all levels would have been turned off, and Obama could never have tolerated that.
John Hively's Blog: News and Analysis of the War Against the Middle Class 