This Week With Barack Obama: Keith Olbermann's Special Comment: Obama must prosecute for torture (Video)

Monday, January 19, 2009

The Bush Administration is guilty of torture and must be held accountable for it.

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Rome Jette · 844 weeks ago

Keith Oberman

I am no longer entertained by our your sanctimonious, self-righteousness. Obama has not even been inaugurated yet and you just can’t wait to weight in with one of your ‘I am Keith Oberman and I am the center of the universe’ special comments!”

You are not a newsman your not on a news show. You Mr. Oberman, you are little more than an obnoxious entertainer who happily found a practical purpose in life that benefited us while Bush was in the White House. For that I thank you.

But now we have a real leader at the helm. And now you need to back off on your rhetoric - it is no longer entertainment and I am not interested in watching your fatuous self absorbed harangues when they are directed at Obama - especially before he has even had a chance to get started.

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2 replies · active 844 weeks ago

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icebergslim 48p · 844 weeks ago

Though Obama has not taken the office yet, the need to prosecute for illegal activities in torture is warranted. How can the USA be taken seriously if this violation is just turned away? In order to go forward, we must know what we did to get in this horrible situation, rectify it and make it known that this will NEVER happen again. Lastly, though we supported Obama, we need to hold him accountable while he is in office, like this country did not hold Bush accountable and looked what happened,

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Rome Jette · 844 weeks ago

First, it’s the tone of the editorial I object so strongly to - not the content. The tone is out of place for the time and place we are in. Without having taken office and without a state of limitations on war crimes, there is no justification for this style of editorial by Olbermann. I believe Bush and many of his media supporters were so disrespectful to America that they deserved the tone that Olbermann used in is “Special Comments”. I for one, cheered when I first heard someone finally wake us up and take Bush to task.

However, that style of political discourse is for extreme times. Obama has made huge progress toward ending the ‘eye for an eye’ style of political exchange that we have been caught up in – and now I want Olbermann to do the same.

Secondly, your point about being taken seriously is legitimate. But while it makes sense rhetorically, in practice I do not think it is a valid first-concern for Obama. I sell products all over the world; I am on the phone or traveling with people from Latin America to Saudi Arabia. My experience is that the support Obama has is overwhelming. To my astonishment, within weeks of the election, the American ‘brand’ was transformed. I honestly do not see real evidence that the world awaits investigations into Bush’s conduct before they will take Obama or America seriously. In this time of economic and political turmoil, the world is more concerned about what Obama plans for the future. And so far, they appear to be taking him very seriously.

Third, with regard to the practicality of a war crimes investigation. I would truly love to see both Bush and Cheney imprisoned. But do we remember Iran-Contra or the Impeachment of Clinton? Do we remember wishing we could turn on the TV and hear something else discussed? A war crimes trial would dwarf those events and consume our ‘political resources’ for years - bringing with it a huge retrenchment of the right. Force Obama to focus on war crimes investigations and we will find that rather than take us seriously, it is more likely that we and the rest of the world will watch in misery as the talents of Obama are wasted on years of divisive investigations – egged on by profits of polarization like Olbermann and O’Reilly who have both built their careers pandering to the their respective constituencies.

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Anonymous · 844 weeks ago

Its spelled Olbermann, moron.

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B.C. · 831 weeks ago

Mr Olbermann was well within his rights and mind to make the special comment that he did when addressing President Obama. Mr Olbermann is a sick and tired of this nation being trashed by its own corrupt gov because the justice dept won't do it's job to the fullest. I'm sick and tired of the same crap myself. The biggest reason why we continue to see officials repeat crimes and wrongdoings throughout history is because justice doesn't set examples for future officials by performing proper prosecutions. No justice begets more crimes and wrongdoings. Pardons allowed by US presidents are a complete joke as well. You do the war crime, you do the time. You cheat and lie, you're fired!

Mr Olbermann sent a well written 'special comment' message to our President. I fully support it's content. His comment represents our core values based on America's founding fathers. It defends our Constitution. Every bit of it simply defends reasons why justice served where best deserved. This is an area in which making special deals and giving breaks to the 'established' political snakes has no place. Justice is supposed to be better than that.

Thank you Mr Olbermann for trying to wake a nation up. You are a true American. True Americans already understands that.

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