A chilling commentary on Obama’s secret ‘kill list’

President Obama with National Security Adviser Donilon, (L) and top counterterrorism adviser Brennan. Pete Souza,  White House.

This thoughtful, objective NY Times article describes President Obama’s ruthless, take no prisoners approach to fighting terrorism; whereas, Hillary Clinton emerges several times as the voice of reason. Authors Jo Becker and Scott Shane write:

WASHINGTON — This was the enemy, served up in the latest chart from the intelligence agencies: 15 Qaeda suspects in Yemen with Western ties. The mug shots and brief biographies resembled a high school yearbook layout. Several were Americans. Two were teenagers, including a girl who looked even younger than her 17 years.  

President Obama, overseeing the regular Tuesday counterterrorism meeting of two dozen security officials in the White House Situation Room, took a moment to study the faces. It was Jan. 19, 2010, the end of a first year in office punctuated by terrorist plots and culminating in a brush with catastrophe over Detroit on Christmas Day, a reminder that a successful attack could derail his presidency. Yet he faced adversaries without uniforms, often indistinguishable from the civilians around them.

Becker and Shane continue:

They describe a paradoxical leader who shunned the legislative deal-making required to close the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba, but approves lethal action without hand-wringing. While he was adamant about narrowing the fight and improving relations with the Muslim world, he has followed the metastasizing enemy into new and dangerous lands. When he applies his lawyering skills to counterterrorism, it is usually to enable, not constrain, his ferocious campaign against Al Qaeda — even when it comes to killing an American cleric in Yemen, a decision that Mr. Obama told colleagues was “an easy one.”

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Modern day versions of crucifixion and state-sponsored revenge

 Thoughts of torture and capital punishment have been inescapable in recent years as first the Bush Administration and now the Obama Administration have sanctioned what Steve Thorngate, blogging at the Christian Century, refers to as “state-sponsored revenge.” That would include, I’m guessing, the murder on foreign soil of suspected terrorists, including American citizens, without trial.

Yes, torture, assassination of American citizens, and drone attacks that take the lives of many civilians in other nations are indeed sanctioned under the administration of Nobel Peace Prize winner, Barack Obama.

Sadly, Thorngate’s post titled “Crucifixion and the News" is appropriate reading for Good Friday 2012:

Among other things, Holy Week always brings to mind the tension between thinking doctrinally about Christ and thinking historically about Jesus. The latter is particularly poignant given the news this week: Bush State Department employee Philip Zelikow apparently wrote a memo in 2006 that advised against the use of torture. What's not news, of course, is that Zelikow's wise words were not heeded.

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America terrorizes others in its take no prisoners strategy in the war on terror

This photo released on Dec. 8, 2012 by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, claims to show the US RQ-170 Sentinel drone captured by Iran.

Katalusis readers already know how I feel about America’s current weapon of choice, the deadly unmanned Predator drone. This morning the CS Monitor reports the Obama Administration’s resumption of drone attacks in Pakistan after a brief hiatus following the NATO air strike in November that mistakenly killed 24 Pakistani soldiers. Ariel Zirulnick, Staff writer, reports:

A US drone strike killed a senior militant in northwestern Pakistan today, one of two drone attacks on suspected militants this week.

Pakistani intelligence officials and Pakistani Taliban members told Reuters that the strike in the town of Miran Shah killed Bador Mansoor, a leader of a faction of the Pakistani Taliban with close ties to Al Qaeda. At least three others were killed in the strike, which came on the heels of a strike yesterday that killed 10 people.

Mr. Mansoor led a group of more than 200 Pakistani Taliban fighters in North Waziristan (see map here), a key sanctuary for militants, an insurgent told the Associated Press. Intelligence officials said they could not confirm for the AP that Mansoor was among those killed in the strike on Miran Shah’s bazaar.

So we continue to kill off our enemies with these antiseptic air strikes that remove us from the messiness of human death and the complications that arise from taking prisoners and bringing them to trial.

And even though Iran recently captured one of our drones and may now be able to repair and replicate it for its own use, the Obama Administration continues to pursue this immoral use of force. 

Has it never occurred to President Obama or our military leaders that one day Americans may be targeted by a “made in the USA Predator drone?”

A way out of our nation’s violent mindset

With our government’s emphasis since 9/11 on “killing” those we define as our enemies, as opposed to capturing them and bringing them to trial, I continue to post on the worrisome upsurge of violence in our culture.

In the meantime, I practice mindfulness meditation and host a bi-weekly mindfulness meditation group. When we met yesterday afternoon, we read and discussed Dom Roberti’s article, Thich Nhat Hanh: Engaged Buddhism, which offers a way out of the violent mindset plaguing our nation these days. The article concludes:

There are more elaborate forms of Metta (loving kindness), but this simple one is powerful enough. If enough people on earth could reach the state which the loving kindness meditation envisions, there would no longer be any need for war. Put simply, that is what Thich Nhat Hanh's work is all about.

Following the discussion, I presented the following guided meditation on loving kindness, which I found at http://www.buddhamind.info/leftside/lifestyl/medi/medi.htm

STOP FOR A FEW MOMENTS. Sit quietly, with a straight back and gently close your eyes. Feeling the rhythm of the breath as it enters and leaves the body, allow yourself to let go of past and future, and come into the present moment; being with exactly what is – now. 

Bring your attention to the feeling of the body, accepting it just the way it is – with kindness. Allow yourself to accept all the sensations and feelings of the body completely.

Breathe in deeply, with a sense of trust and well-being: breathe out, letting go of tension, allowing any tightness to dissolve. 

Then, focus on the normal breathing; just the feeling of breathing in, breathing out.

Imagine yourself surrounded by light – perhaps a golden-coloured light if you like gold. Being with the sensation of the body breathing in, breathing out, draw the light into the body as you breathe – maybe through the nostrils, the heart or the head. Imagine light saturating the body, through every pore. 

Think to yourself: ‘May this being be well,’ and turn the calming effect of the meditation towards this being: ‘May this being be calm.’ Suffuse your whole body with this calm and kindly attention.

Then, let your awareness explore the body: moving around the head and face, gradually down the neck, the back and the chest, spreading right down the finger-tips; then down the legs, to each toe; drawing on the good energy of the breath, expanding and embracing the heart. 

Focusing more on the out-breath, let go of the memories, the grudges, the grievances; let it all go. Begin again with each breath.

Picture yourself in your mind’s eye as you are now. Make peace with this view of yourself, through forgiveness, compassion, gentleness. ‘May this being be well.’ Suffuse this picture with gentle, warm light from the heart, then let it go. 

Next, picture your parents, let them into your mind. Make peace with their image: ‘May you be well,’ bathing them with soft light, with gratitude.

Observe thoughts arising. Memories of yourself as a child, perhaps something painful or something you have never made peace with. Let it be in the mind, in the light.

Then bring up an image of your daily situation, at home or wherever, with the people it involves. People you like or dislike, feel conflict with, love, fear or worry for. ‘May these beings be well.’ Put aside aversion, fear, worry, guilt; at this moment, allow yourself to be kind.

Think of someone you know who is having a difficult time; send these feelings of kindness towards them. Breathe in light, breathe out wishing them well. 

Gradually open up more and more, from the people you see every day to nobody special; and even those for whom you have hardly a memory. Recognise them as human beings with ambitions, hopes, problems, anxieties, joy – just like you! Give them some life in your perceptions. 

And, even more remote, acknowledge all the people you can conceive of in this world. This may be a faint feeling, but open up the heart to allow them into consciousness, to be felt. See what the mind does, how it reacts indignantly about some people – such as political figures. Let go of that indignation for this moment. Allow a sense of peace to envelop all beings: the liked, the disliked, familiar and unfamiliar. 

And then imagine the planet Earth as seen from space. Extend this sense of peace to the planet we live on, embracing it with your heart, surrounding it with light. 

Turning your attention to that sense of peace and light allow it to expand outwards, without limit, letting the sense of ‘me’ and ‘the world’ dissolve in the stillness of the present. Then turn your attention back in towards itself; upon the feeling of knowing ‘the screen of the mind’, the place where images arise. Let it be quite empty or full, choiceless, being illuminated by the soft light from the heart, light from the breath; warm, gentle; beginning, letting go, patient kindness. 

Gently come back to the rhythm of the breath, and when you are ready, slowly open your eyes.