Folks,
It is crucial that I share this with you people!!!
Let's think for a second about what's happened since President Obama took Office.
America businesses have added 4.5 million jobs in the last 29 months. The typical middle-class family has saved $3,600 in tax cuts over his first term. We passed historic health care reform. The war in Iraq has ended. It's now easier for women to fight for equal pay for equal work. Student Education Loan system and repayment has improved and relaxed opening more doors fair to all so that more students from middle and poor families to gain University education. Healthcare system has improved and will get better as time goes.
People, just imagine; if President Obama did not give everything in his intellect and power to put America on top of the world, the above would not have been possible. President Obama is above reproach that is why he played bi-partisan even when political tide is not politically favorable, but remained faithful to public mandate and promises he made during his first Presidential campaign. We all saw how he struggled against forces of obstructionists with tight blockages from the Special Interest strategy to block him every step of the way from the word go........
If Congress and Senate played bi-partism from both sides of political divide, the story would be different. Jobs and economic ratings would be favorably high reducing joblessness etc., and this is why voters must wake up this time round and get to know what Romney-Ryan ticket would mean to the majority; more specifically when galvanized by hate with racial discrimination on a non-idiological agenda ducking away from real policy issues. Voters must be concerned about what will become of the country when special interest of the millionaire rich continue to evade paying taxes.........and ask themselves, who then is dividing the Americans in this instances........ People, it will be:
a) "Politicians behaving badly"...... b) attacking Medicare, calling it Obamacare.......... c) inventing ID negative scheme to block voters galvanized by hate and discrimination......... d) the prescriptive procedural hurdles to block voters from voting rights .......... e) the manufactured Super-Pack Ads paid by super rich of special interest to smear President Obama negatively
These and many more of its kind will take away Peace and Unity the family of America is enjoying both locally and internationally and in the circumstances, interfere with business partnership including cultural diversity progressive development agenda the Nation cherishes.
You can see from the attachments and connect the dots and see why Peace and Unity is extremely important and why it is important to give President Obama a second chance........ It is because he will make things better for all………
Cheers everybody........ Judy Miriga Diaspora Spokesperson Executive Director Confederation Council Foundation for Africa Inc., USA http://socioeconomicforum50.blogspot.com Paul Ryan declares Devotion to AYN RAND in Videos, WOW!!! - Rachel Maddow Published on Aug 14, 2012 by Romney MrEtchASketch Rachel totally disproves Paul Ryan's "denials" about following Ayn Rand. Videos show he's a True Believer & devotee of Ayn and her philosophy of the privileged rich. Rachel also shows how Ryan's Plan would shift $4.6Trillion more to the rich in the next 10 years. "Ayn Rand argued for rational egoism (rational self-interest), as the guiding moral principle. She said the individual should "exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself". She referred to egoism as "the VIRTUE of SELFISHNESS" "She condemned ethical altruism as incompatible with the requirements of human life and happiness." Rand "considered laissez-faire capitalism the only moral social system." (free of government regulation) - Wikipedia Paul Ryan's Budget Plan calls for Medicare "Vouchers" to be given to Seniors over 67. But that effectively means that anyone with a serious illness or preexisting condition will be UNABLE to get any Heath Insurance, whatsoever??? 1 day ago 2 Paul Ryan's Budget Plan calls for Medicare "Vouchers" to be given to Seniors over 67. But that effectively means that anyone with a serious illness or preexisting condition will be UNABLE to get any Heath Insurance, whatsoever??? 1 day ago 2 I read in the book, "CAN MITT ROMNEY SERVE TWO MASTERS?" Romney and & Mormon Church's agenda is to bring the World under the Mormon Govt. of God. The Mormon White Horse Prophecy states that the government will hang by a thread & the Mormon Church will come forth to save it. Also that Mormons will rule the entire earth side by side with Jesus Christ from Jackson County Missouri-their Garden of Eden & Mormonism will be the-one-world-theocracy religion of which to perform the government through. Obama blasts 'dishonest' Romney-Ryan attacks over Medicare White House Correspondent The Ticket – 21 hrs ago
"They are just throwing everything at the wall to see if it sticks," Obama told a rowdy crowd of supporters in Dubuque on the third and final day of a bus tour through Iowa. The president said his approach had "strengthened Medicare" and added 10 years to the program's lifespan, even as it enacts "reforms that will not touch your Medicare benefits, not by a dime." "My plan's already extended Medicare by nearly a decade. Their plan ends Medicare as we know it," he charged. "My plan reduces the cost of Medicare by cracking down on fraud, and waste, and subsidies to insurance companies. Their plan makes seniors pay more so they can give another tax cut to millionaires and billionaires." "That's the difference between our plans on Medicare. That's an example of the choice in this election," the president said. Romney's camp has accused Obama of slashing Medicare by $716 billion, in part to pay for his landmark health care law, popularly known as Obamacare. Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus charged in an op-ed published Wednesday that Obama "is the only candidate in this race willing to let Medicare die." Obama's camp has countered that his cuts won't shrink benefits but, rather, target waste. (It notably cuts reimbursement rates for hospitals, drugmakers and insurers, while predicting that an influx of new patients will make up for losses.) And it has underlined that the House Republicans' budget, crafted by Ryan, not only embraces those reductions but envisions shifting the popular program to a voucherlike system that could see elderly patients paying more out-of-pocket costs. Both sides are grappling with Medicare's ballooning share of federal spending, fueled by an aging population and costly advances in health care. Republicans have pointed out that Obama previously denounced political grandstanding on the issue—only to turn to it in the aftermath of Romney's pick of Ryan as his running mate. The issue has particular political resonance among elderly voters, who are critical to the outcome in vital battleground states like Florida. First lady Michelle Obama, reunited with her husband for his last day in Iowa, introduced the president and told the crowd, "It all boils down to who you are and what you stand for. And we all know who my husband is, don't we?" "Your president knows what it means when a family struggles," she said, to cheers from the crowd. That echoed Obama campaign arguments that Romney's wealth has left him out of touch with average Americans. "I am just reminded how lucky I am, because she is a woman of strength, and integrity and honor," the president said of his wife. "She is the best mom in the world—and she's cute!" "I do think she is a perfect first lady," he said, noting that Michelle Obama planned to go pick up daughters Sasha and Malia "from sleep-away camp." The president also recalled how Iowans propelled his unlikely 2008 bid for the White House. "Every stop, I've got fond memories of the last campaign," he said. "This is where our movement for change happened." "I've come here to ask you to stand with me, just like you stood with me in 2008, to finish what we started," he said, to cheers from the crowd of about 3,000. "Iowa, I'm gonna need your help one more time here." Obama began his day with breakfast at Riley's Cafe and Catering in Cedar Rapids with three veterans, Amanda Irish, Jake Krapfl and Terry Philips. He also visited Cascade High School. Obama defends Biden on 'chains' remark White House Correspondent
The Ticket – 17 hrs ago  President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden campaign together in late 2010 (William Thomas Cain/Getty … President Barack Obama, breaking his public silence Wednesday on Vice President Joe Biden's claim that a Mitt Romney victory will "put y'all back in chains," dismissed the controversy over the comment and expressed full confidence in Biden.
In interviews with People magazine and "Entertainment Tonight," Obama sought to put Biden's remark, which drew angry denunciations from Republicans, in context and said voters aren't focused on the stir it created. "Most folks know that's just sort of a WWF wrestling part of politics," Obama told "Entertainment Tonight." "It doesn't mean anything, just fills up a lot of airtime." When asked by People magazine whether he would talk to Biden in the aftermath of that remark, the president offered the verbal equivalent of a shrug. "Joe Biden has been an outstanding vice president. He is passionate about what's happening in middle-class families," he said. "So I will be talking to him a whole lot about the campaign generally." Biden meant that "you, consumers, the American people, will be a lot worse off if we repeal these [Wall Street reform] laws as the other side is suggesting," Obama told People. "In no sense was he trying to connote something other than that." To "Entertainment Tonight," he characterized Biden's phrasing as a "distraction" from a substantive issue, adding that "we should focus on what Joe's comments meant and what they're intended to mean, and that is, we shouldn't roll back Wall Street reforms that are making consumers and the economy a lot more secure." Biden's comments came on Tuesday at a campaign stop in Danville, Va., where he told a group of supporters that Romney would "unchain Wall Street" by rolling back regulations. "He said in the first hundred days, he's going to let the big banks once again write their own rules, unchain Wall Street," Biden said during a speech at the Institute for Advanced Learning and Research. "They're going to put y'all back in chains." Obama jabs at Romney over dog-on-car-roof incident White House Correspondent The Ticket – Tue, Aug 14, 2012 For Seamus? President Barack Obama unleashed a sharp attack on Mitt Romney over his opposition to a wind-power tax credit popular in Iowa—and linked to it a long-ago incident in which the Republican candidate put his family dog, Seamus, in a carrier strapped to the roof of his car. "We're at a moment right now when homegrown energy, like wind energy, is creating new jobs all across Iowa and all across the country," Obama told an estimated 852 people in Oskaloosa, Iowa. The president underlined that Romney does not want to renew the tax credit when it expires at the end of the year, and painted the Republican candidate as an enemy of alternative energy. "He's said that new sources of energy like wind are 'imaginary.' His running mate calls them a 'fad.' During a speech a few months ago, Gov. Romney even explained his energy policy this way: 'You can't drive a car with a windmill on it,'" he said. "I don't know if he's actually tried that—I know he's had other things on his car. But if he really wants to learn something about wind, all he has to do is pay attention to what you've been doing here in Iowa," the president said. Other things on his car? The only well-known thing Romney has had atop his car was Seamus, the Irish setter. That June 1983 family trip has become the stuff of legend in the 2012 campaign (in the Republican primaries, Romney rivals Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum both used the tale as ammo against the former Massachusetts governor). More coverage from Yahoo! NewsMcCain says Obama Would Be 'Wise' to Replace Joe Biden with Hillary Clinton on the TicketBy Sunlen Miller | ABC OTUS News – 18 hrs ago
Although he predicted it would not happen, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said Wednesday it would be "wise" for President Obama to take Vice President Joe Biden off the Democratic presidential ticket and replace him with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. "I think it might be wise to do that but it's not going to happen obviously, for a whole variety of reasons," McCain said in an interview on Fox News, stopping just short of Sarah Palin's call last night for an all-out replacement of Biden on the ticket. "I'm not sure if I were Hillary Clinton I would want to be on that team," the senator added, "I think her ambitions frankly are for 2016 and I'm not sure that would enhance that likelihood." McCain had some harsh words ready for Biden, saying that the vice president "continues to say things that are unacceptable in American politics," and specifically referenced Biden's remarks Tuesday in Danville, Virginia. Yesterday Vice President Biden said to the crowd, "look at their budget, and what they are proposing. Romney wants to let - He said in the first hundred days, he's going to let the big banks once again write their own rules. Unchain Wall Street. They're going to put y'all back in chains." McCain said the Vice President "crossed the line" this time and should be held accountable for that sort of remark. "Yet he seems to get away with it because it's just sort of a joke," McCain said. The harsh words weren't reserved just for Vice President Biden but for the Obama administration's handling of the campaign overall, the tenor of which McCain says calls into question the Obama team's ability to govern should President Obama win a second term. "What do you get if you win with this kind of campaign?" he questioned of the Obama campaign, pointing to specific negative and what he defined as misleading ads the Obama campaign has run, "if you run this kind of slash and burn gutter campaign that they are running, what happens when you start governing again?" McCain said it would be "very difficult for anybody in the team that ran this kind of campaign to govern and bring people together come the following January." Aug 14, 2012 6:00am Paul Ryan Book Club: Shrugging Off Ayn Rand? Richard B. Levine/Newscom Wisconsin's First District has voted him into Congress seven times over the past 14 years, but popular as Paul Ryan is at home there may be another constituency that holds the Republican vice presidential candidate in even higher regard. Ryan, you see, is the country's most powerful Randian. At least, he used to be. More on that in a moment. First, a look at his adoring relationship with the work of Russian emigre novelist Ayn Rand, author of "Atlas Shrugged" and "The Fountainhead." It began, according to a 2005 speech Ryan gave to The Atlas Society, when he was still a student. And it guided his thinking on monetary policy for decades to come: "I grew up reading Ayn Rand and it taught me quite a bit about who I am and what my value systems are," he told the group. "It's inspired me so much that it's required reading in my office for all my interns and my staff." Ryan has since denied making his staff read the books. He continued: "But the reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand. And the fight we are in here, make no mistake about it, is a fight of individualism versus collectivism." Rand's literary inner circle was called, ironically perhaps, "The Collective." Individualism, or objectivism in some cases, provides the philosophical underpinnings for most of Rand's narratives. The novelist and literary critic Harriet Rubin wrote bluntly in the New York Times that "Atlas Shrugged" is a "glorification of the right of individuals to live entirely for their own interest." It also celebrates atheism, treating religion with a degree of scorn. "If devotion to truth is the hallmark of morality, then there is no greater, nobler, more heroic form of devotion than the act of a man who assumes the responsibility of thinking," one of Rand's characters says in the novel, the "alleged short-cut to knowledge, which is faith, is only a short-circuit destroying the mind." This is where politicians and business leaders tend to pull up. Ryan has, as noted above, taken a step back from his impassioned Rand-regard in the past few years. And in an interview with the National Review this April, he did a pretty firm about-face:
So after all that, Paul Ryan, it seems, has shrugged off Ayn Rand. August 11, 2012 Ayn Rand Joins the Ticket With the choice of Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney adds more to the Republican ticket than youth, vigor, and the possibility of carrying Wisconsin—he also adds the ghostly presence of the controversial Russian émigré philosopher and writer Ayn Rand. Although she died thirty years ago, Rand's influence appears on the rise on the right. As my colleague Ryan Lizza noted in his terrific biographical Profile of Ryan, Rand's works were an early and important influence on him, shaping his thinking as far back as high school. Later, as a Congressman, Ryan not only tried to get all of the interns in his congressional office to read Rand's writing, he also gave copies of her novel "Atlas Shrugged" to his staff as Christmas presents, as he told the Weekly Standard in 2003. Two years later, in 2005, Ryan paid fealty to Rand in a speech he gave to the Atlas Society, the Washington-based think tank devoted to keeping Rand's "objectivist" philosophy alive. He credited her with inspiring his interest in public service, saying, "[T]he reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand. And the fight we are in here, make no mistake about it, is a fight of individualism versus collectivism." (One of the trustees of the Atlas Society, Clifford Asness, the co-founder of AQR Capital Management, a twenty-billion-dollar hedge fund, is one of the many outspoken Wall Street financiers who has shifted political sides, denouncing Obama, whom he supported in 2008, for interfering with capitalism by bailing out Chrysler, and by imposing tighter financial regulations after the 2008 economic collapse). Three years ago, as Tim Mak reports today at Politico, Ryan described America's political challenge as coming straight out of Rand's work—saying, "what's unique about what's happening today in government, in the world, in America, is that it's as if we're living in an Ayn Rand novel right now. I think Ayn Rand did the best job of anybody to build a moral case of capitalism, and that morality of capitalism is under assault." More recently, however, Ryan distanced himself from Rand, whose atheism is something of a philosophical wedge issue on the right, dividing religious conservatives from free-market libertarians. This year, with his political profile rising, Ryan stressed not only that he had differences with Rand's atheism—a point he had made as far back as 2003—but went so far as to denounce her whole system of beliefs, describing his early attraction to her writing as little more than a youthful dalliance. He admitted that he had "enjoyed her novels," but, as Mak notes, he stressed that, "I reject her philosophy. It's an atheist philosophy. It reduces human interactions down to mere contracts and it is antithetical to my worldview. If somebody is going to try to paste a person's view on epistemology to me, then give me Thomas Aquinas." Ryan's sidestep from Rand was politically essential. As a Mormon, the last thing Romney needs is to alienate the Christian Right further by putting an acolyte of an atheist on the ticket. So it was not surprising that Romney made a point of stressing Ryan's Catholicism during his announcement of Ryan today, introducing him as, "A faithful Catholic" who "believes in the dignity and worth of every life." While Ryan may be distancing himself from Rand now, the Democrats will surely argue that her views on the virtues of selfishness have left a more lasting legacy in the policies that he and Romney embrace. In his début today, Ryan stressed that "We promise equal opportunity—not equal outcomes"—a philosophy that telegraphed a tough message to those who are worst off. Ryan also signalled a Rand-like celebration of the winners, and dismissed complaints from the losers, saying, "We look at one another's success with pride, not resentment." Rand's language was tougher still. She used words such as "refuse" and "parasites" to describe the poor, while celebrating millionaire businessmen as heroes. She abhorred government social programs, such as Social Security, at least until she reached the age of eligibility, and reportedly signed on for both its benefits and those of Medicare. Ryan won't be the first Rand fan to grace the Vice-Presidential ticket. Jack Kemp, who was Ryan's mentor in politics, also described himself as influenced by her writing. In some ways, the Romney-Ryan ticket resembles the Dole-Kemp one, in pairing a Presidential candidate short on charisma and conservative credentials with a younger, more ideologically fiery sidekick. Kemp, however, was famously optimistic in his outlook. Ryan has a sterner countenance. Either way, though, while the G.O.P. may be behind when it comes to attracting female voters, in picking Ryan, who like Kemp was deeply influenced by Rand, it has added at least the imprint of an extra woman to the ticket. For more on Romney, Ryan, and the rest of the campaign, bookmark The Political Scene, our hub for coverage of the 2012 election. Photograph by Brendan Hoffman/Getty Paul Ryan loved Ayn Rand, before he said he didn't Paul Ryan listens as Mitt Romney speaks during a campaign rally at Randolph… (Saul Loeb / AFP/Getty Images ) Back in 2005, an up-and-coming lawmaker named Paul Ryan credited the polemical novelist and libertarian Ayn Rand as a central inspiration for his entry into public life. Ryan toiled in those days in relative obscurity, a well-respected but low-profile member of the House of Representatives. By the spring of 2012, the boyish congressman had become a Republican star, widely named as a possible vice presidential pick. He also had become considerably less comfortable being linked to the controversial Rand, an atheist with a tartly Darwinian world view. As Ryan and the Republicans look to define the new vice presidential choice's brand, part of the commentary will be about just how Randian (read: unsympathetic to the weak) the candidate really is. Ayn (rhymes with "fine") Rand wrote the bestselling "Atlas Shrugged." She also encouraged the world's "makers" to pursue "rational self interest" as "the highest moral purpose of [one's] life," while giving little care to the nefarious "takers." Journalists who have recently written about Ryan suggested that his infatuation with the Russian émigré author, who died in 1982 at age 77, has hardly waned. The favorite son of Wisconsin has recently been insisting that his embrace of Rand amounted to a youthful infatuation. In an April interview with the National Review, Ryan said that the reports linking him to Rand were essentially "an urban legend." "I reject her philosophy," Ryan told Robert Costa of the National Review. "It's an atheist philosophy. It reduces human interactions down to mere contracts and it is antithetical to my worldview." He added that he had merely "enjoyed a couple of her novels," which also included another bestseller, "The Fountainhead." But Ryan made no bones about his philosophical influences just a few years ago. He told the Weekly Standard in 2003 that he gave his staffers copies of "Atlas Shrugged" as Christmas presents. Speaking to a group of Rand acolytes in 2005, Ryan said, "The reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand. And the fight we are in here, make no mistake about it, is a fight of individualism versus collectivism." Even three years ago, Tim Mak of Politico noted, Ryan channeled Rand. "What's unique about what's happening today in government, in the world, in America, is that it's as if we're living in an Ayn Rand novel right now," Ryan said. "I think Ayn Rand did the best job of anybody to build a moral case of capitalism, and that morality of capitalism is under assault." But by the time he introduced his austere budget plan this year — calling for an end to Medicare as a mandate and its replacement for many Americans with a system of vouchers — Ryan was being depicted as a harsh absolutist. He did not need to be tied too closely to Rand and her sink-or-swim imperatives. Jonathan Chait, writing in New York magazine, suggested Ryan cannot slough off his connections to Rand's thinking that easily. The journalist cited Ryan's 2009 remarks about the immorality of government attacking productive members of society. "It is not enough to say that President Obama's taxes are too big or the healthcare plan doesn't work for this or that policy reason," the lawmaker said. "It is the morality of what is occurring right now, and how it offends the morality of individuals working toward their own free will to produce, to achieve, to succeed, that is under attack, and it is that what I think Ayn Rand would be commenting on."  Chait said that Ryan has frequently invoked Rand's idea of "makers" subsidizing society's "takers." In the New York story, he summed up the writer's libertarian philosophy as "a defense of capitalism in general and, in particular, a conception of politics as a class war pitting virtuous producers against parasites who illegitimately use the power of the state to seize their wealth." While the congressman may not be a pure Randian "Objectivist," Chait opined, he hews to a particular vein the philosophy in support of supply-side economics and the imperative of cutting taxes and reducing role of government. Jack Kemp, an earlier Rand-follower and vice presidential nominee, took the same position. (He also was one of Ryan's first bosses when Ryan worked as a Capitol Hill staffer.) In his National Review interview contesting his ties to Rand, Rep. Ryan suggested another more important influence. "If somebody is going to try to paste a person's view on epistemology to me," he said, "then give me Thomas Aquinas." Aquinas was a saint, after all, who was said to disdain secular philosophy in favor of Christian revelation — a view unlikely to scare up criticism at a town hall meeting in Sheboygan or Rapid City. Ecuador grants Assange asylum; UK vows to 'carry out' extradition anyway Senior Media Reporter The Lookout – 4 hrs ago
Ecuador's foreign minister announced on Thursday that the country would grant asylum to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, defying threats by the British government to storm the Ecuadorean Embassy and extradite Assange to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning in cases of alleged rape and sexual molestation. "We have decided to grant political asylum to him," Ricardo Patino said at the end of a long televised statement from the Ecuadorean capital of Quito, where he criticized the U.S. and U.K. governments for failing to protect Assange from political persecution. "The countries that have a right to protect Assange have failed him," Patino said. "[Assange] is victim of political persecution. ... If Assange is extradited to U.S., he will not receive a fair trial." The foreign minister said that Ecuador asked Sweden to promise it would not extradite Assange to the United States, but Sweden refused. "Asylum is a fundamental human right," Patino said, adding that "international law" overrides local laws, and that Assange has "the right not to be extradited or expelled to any country." A crowd gathered outside the Ecuadorean Embassy in London, where Assange, a 41-year-old Australian native, has been holed up since June, to hear the announcement. At least one protester was arrested. [Slideshow: The scene outside the embassy] The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office called Ecuador's decision to grant Assange asylum "regrettable." "British authorities are under a binding obligation to extradite him to Sweden," a spokesman for the office said. "We shall carry out that obligation. The Ecuadorean government's decision this afternoon does not change that." According to The Associated Press, Sweden summoned Ecuador's ambassador to Stockholm, calling the decision to grant asylum to Assange "unacceptable." Moments before the announcement, Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa tweeted: "No one is going to terrorize us!" It's unclear what will happen to Assange now. U.K. authorities say his asylum is a violation of his probation--and there is reason to believe he would be arrested if he tried to leave the embassy. "Assange is going to Sweden," Louise Mensch, a conservative member of the British Parliament, tweeted. "We are going to extradite him there. That's it and that's all. #rape" Assange fears that if he were extradited to Sweden, he would immediately be extradited to the United States, which has condemned WikiLeaks' publication of classified documents. Assange and his supporters say the U.S. would charge him with espionage; the U.S. has not said whether or not it would pursue charges against him. On Thursday, the White House declined to comment on Assange. On Wednesday, Patino said he received a "clear and written" threat from British authorities who claimed "they could storm our embassy in London if Ecuador refuses to hand in Julian Assange." "We want to be very clear, we're not a British colony," Patino said. "Colonial times are over." British officials said they are obligated to turn Assange over to Stockholm. "The U.K. has a legal obligation to extradite Mr. Assange to Sweden to face questioning over allegations of sexual offenses and we remain determined to fulfill this obligation," a spokesman for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office said in response. "Under British law we can give them a week's notice before entering the premises and the embassy will no longer have diplomatic protection. But that decision has not yet been taken. We are not going to do this overnight. We want to stress that we want a diplomatically agreeable solution." Britain, the BBC noted, could lift the Ecuadorean embassy's diplomatic status to fulfill a "legal obligation" to extradite Assange using the "Diplomatic and Consular Premises Act 1987":
Such a move, though, would be unprecedented. In a statement early Thursday, WikiLeaks condemned the U.K.'s threat to raid the embassy:
In 2010, Swedish prosecutors in Stockholm issued warrants to question Assange about alleged sex crimes involving a pair of former WikiLeaks volunteers. Assange claims the charges are part of an international smear campaign stemming from WikiLeaks' publication of diplomatic cables. After a brief international manhunt, Assange turned himself in to London police in December 2010. He was granted bail and placed under house arrest. After Assange's appeals to fight his extradition to Sweden were denied, he fled to the Ecuadorean Embassy. Inside the embassy, Assange "sleeps on an air mattress in a small office that has been converted to a bedroom," according to the New York Times. "He has access to a computer and continues to oversee WikiLeaks, his lieutenants have said." According to Sky News, Assange watched the announcement from inside the building and welcomed it as a "significant victory," but added: "Things will get more stressful now." Filmmaker Michael Moore, one of several Assange supporters who contributed funds to guarantee his bail, applauded the decision, and urged Londoners to demonstrate outside the embassy. "As Americans we were lied [to] by our government about Iraq," Moore wrote on Twitter. "He exposed the truth." Ecuador, it's worth noting, has a horrible record on press freedom. And Correa, in particular, has had a "torrid relationship" with the press, Joel Simon, executive director of the Committee to Protect Journalists, wrote in a recent editorial. "His arsenal of repression includes such tactics as pre-empting private broadcasts to denounce the presenters, bankrupting papers through defamation suits, and publicly shouting down critics who dare question him." |
Email
Karibu Jukwaa la www.mwanabidii.com
Pata nafasi mpya za Kazi www.kazibongo.blogspot.com
Blogu ya Habari na Picha www.patahabari.blogspot.com
Kujiondoa Tuma Email kwenda
wanabidii+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com Utapata Email ya kudhibitisha ukishatuma
Disclaimer:
Everyone posting to this Forum bears the sole responsibility for any legal consequences of his or her postings, and hence statements and facts must be presented responsibly. Your continued membership signifies that you agree to this disclaimer and pledge to abide by our Rules and Guidelines.
0 comments:
Post a Comment