Referring to Monday's New York Times article on the death squad that Barack Obama is personally directing from the White House, Floyd writes:
It is not so much a newspaper story as a love letter -- a love letter to death, to the awe-inspiring and fear-inducing power of death, as personified by Barack Obama in his temporary role as the manager of a ruthless, lawless imperial state. In the cringing obsequiousness of the multitude of insiders and sycophants who march in goose-step through the story, we can see the awe and fear -- indeed, the worship -- of death-dealing power. This enthrallment permeates the story, both in the words of the cringers and in the giddy thrill the writers display in gaining such delicious access to the inner sanctum.See also this piece entitled "Barack Obama: an out of control psychopath with a God complex from Ceasefire (UK).
Although Floyd's article frames this story by hinting at a deeper security state, both unfortunately place too much emphasis on Obama. Obama is essentially only a smooth talking salesman for the inner security establishment that serve as political operatives for the key decision-makers of the One Percent. As Floyd stated at one point in his article, Obama is only a "temporary manager". Obama was raised with the values of the One Percent by his white banker grandmother who enrolled him in an elite school in Hawaii, and from there he went on to further indoctrination in ruling class values at Harvard. Because of this indoctrination, his natural gifts as a public relations officer, and all the rewards he has received by serving the ruling class, he very willingly serves the needs of the Empire.
Obviously, because the real decision-makers function mostly in secret, it is always hard to determine who the key actors really are. Names that are mentioned in the NY Times article are Leon E. Panetta (CIA Director), John O. Brennan (chief counterterrorism advisor), David Axelrod (personal advisor to Obama), and Hillary Clinton (Secretary of State). What must be emphasized is that these people frequently are appointed by key political operatives. For example, in the video interview below from The Real News, former CIA officer Ray McGovern reports that George Tenet first appointed John Brennan. Tenet is very likely a key political operative. The latter, it turn, answers to key decision-makers who are well connected to Wall Street and the Federal Reserve bankers. (For example, Jamie Dimon head of the New York branch of the Federal Reserve is likely a key decision-maker.) What is most important to keep in mind is that the real key actor is a system--capitalism.
In this video McGovern gives us a much deeper analysis of what is going on behind the scenes of this NY Times report:
What both of these articles and many others like those written by David DeGraw miss is the systemic nature of the regime that controls our government. I am certainly not trying to excuse the people listed in the NY Times report, but only to accurately focus in on the problem so that real corrective action can be devised: the replacement of a system designed to allow the private accumulation of socially produced wealth--capitalism--with one that is socially and environmentally sustainable. If many activists continue to think in such narrow terms as various liberal authors do, we will never solve our problems.
