I type the title of this diary carefully. With significant thought. With hesitation.
I very much want to support Barack Obama. As I have in the past. Because the alternative Republican universe is just so much worse.
I recall supporting Ted Kennedy in 1980 against an incumbent President. A President who would soon lose to a man who wrought tremendous destruction to America. I still feel that I personally let a damn good Jimmy Carter down, even if he got my vote in the end, to no avail, too late, and pointless.
Hence my current trepidation.
But I wonder how much longer I can tolerate a Democrat who supports the "enemy combatant" policies of George W. Bush.
I am thinking, please give me change Barack Hussein Obama.
The very concept of "enemy combatants" undermines the entire Constitution of the United States of America as well as many long-ratified treaties:
"The hope we all had in President Obama to lead us on a different path has not turned out as we'd hoped," said Tina Monshipour Foster, a human rights attorney representing a detainee at the Bagram Airfield. "We all expected better."
Will the President, really, continue on the path of fascism, as did our beloved George W. Bush?
"They've now embraced the Bush policy that you can create prisons outside the law," said Jonathan Hafetz, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union who has represented several detainees.
I wonder whether I belong to the Democratic Party anymore? Am I really a person who has moved to the extreme, not yet defined? Not Republican, clearly, but also not a part of what I thought was my home -- the Democratic Party?
Is there truly no grounding for justice in America?
Am I alone in my anger? Is the Democratic Party just another cog in the wheel of fascism? Is it time to fall to my knees and lick the boots of my corporate masters? Where is Al Gore when we need him?
I do not know what others may think, but as for me, I cannot condone Barack Obama's administration trampling on settled international law.
For those of like mind, please let your thoughts be known here and in all other diaries addressing the subject.
Remember always: Sic semper tyrannis! And let it not be Barack Obama. That is our prayer!