ACLU Does NOT Run the CIA

The ACLU has responded to Michelle Bachmann's claim during the Repubublican Presidential Debate that they are running the CIA.

From ACLU Email:

The presidential debates this year have been filled with — how should I put it? — interesting moments. One of them came Saturday night when Michele Bachmann commented that:

"Today, under Barack Obama, he is allowing the ACLU to run the CIA."

Huh?

Yesterday, on Meet the Press, she clarified that she meant to say the CIA is being run in accord with the "philosophy" of the ACLU. Perhaps she needs some clarification on what the CIA is doing and what the ACLU stands for.

Either way, let's help her out by bringing her up to speed.

Add your name to our "Five Clues that the ACLU doesn't run the CIA" message.

CLUE #1: If the ACLU ran the CIA, we wouldn't have undermined our security and values by using waterboarding and other forms of torture.

CLUE #2: If the ACLU ran the CIA, we would have helped restore our nation's standing in the world with a full and complete accounting of any past involvement in torture.

CLUE #3: If the ACLU ran the CIA, the senior officials who authorized U.S. involvement in torture would have been brought to justice in a court of law.

CLUE #4: If the ACLU ran the CIA, there wouldn't have been any secret CIA prisons operating around the world.

CLUE #5: If the ACLU ran the CIA, the American people would never have seen extraordinary rendition, indefinite detention, targeted killing of people far from any battlefield, and other human rights abuses carried out in our name.

Let's help clarify things for Michele Bachmann. Add your name to our "Five Clues That the ACLU Doesn't Run the CIA" message.

Thanks, Anthony D. Romero Executive Director, ACLU

Fake Bombshell: Obama Played Golf 20 minutes before Bin Laden Raid

Remember the fake controversy over Obama not issuing an Easter proclamation? Despite the fact that no president since 1980 has issued and Easter proclamation, that didn't stop the right wing making up a controversy. I was actually surprised no president since then had issued one. But it wasn't until the Faux outrage that I learned that. The attack on Obama was almost too ridiculous to believe. Now there's a fake bombshell that Townhall, National Review Online, Newsmax, Fox Nation and other right-wing websites are in a frenzy about regarding a book saying Obama was playing golf 20 minutes before Bin Laden Raid.


What's the bombshell? That he was playing golf?


The book, “SEAL Target Geronimo: The Inside Story of the Mission to Kill Osama bin Laden” by former SEAL Chuck Pfarrer. Obama was on the golf course until 20 minutes before the operation began in earnest, a move alleged to provide cover for the president if the raid had gone bad, according to book excerpts in London’s Daily Mail. It's not a secret kept for months that he was playing golf, in fact it was already being talked about after the raid. Yet the headlines are making the bombshell that he was playing golf.


The Washington Times already tried to turn it into an outrage after the raid. The rest of the right wing didn't keep up with what outrage to manufacture. They came a couple months to late.


It doesn't take more than one reader of the Drudge Report for screwing in a light bulb nor for doing a Google search to check whether a "scandal" is real or not for yourself. It's amazing what you find.

From USA Today

After playing nine holes of morning golf, President Obama joined his senior aides in the White House Situation Room at 1 p.m. ET on Sunday to go over final preparations for that day's top-secret raid on a complex 35 miles outside Islamabad that those in the room believed was built to hide Osama bin Laden [USA Today 5/3/11]

From the Christian Science Monitor

Come Sunday, Obama headed for the Andrews Air Force Base golf course, as he does on many weekends when the weather is nice. But he only played nine holes, instead of his customary 18, leaving after about three hours. The reporters who accompany him on public outings didn't think anything was amiss and thought the chilly, rainy weather played into the president's decision to leave several hours earlier than usual. What they didn't know was that Obama was heading back for that final meeting on the bin Laden operation. [Christian Science Monitor 5/4/11]

From MSNBC.com 5/3/11:

Obama's golf shoes a clue to bin Laden raid?... President kept his poker face for 72 hours as he held a momentous secret

Who is Chuck Pfarrer? Special thanks to the No More Mister Nice Blog for pointing this out:


Chuck says: "I've been a Seal for 30 years and I never heard the words 'kill mission'. It's a fantasy word. If it was a kill mission you don’t need Seal Team 6; you need a box of hand grenades."

First of all, Chuck, you haven't "been" a SEAL for 30 years. You were a SEAL for 8 years, and haven't been one for about 20. How do I know that? You say so yourself on your own Web site. After that you became a Hollywood screenwriter (dude! you're a co-writer of Pam Anderson's Barb Wire!), and you've written several books.

And if "kill mission" is "a fantasy word," someone needs to tell the Murdoch media, which also uses the expression. [No More Mister Nice Blog 11/7/11]

He also in the book has been pushing discredited claims about WMDs in Iraq and the threat posed. So it just diminishes his credibility even more.