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In one of his last moves in office, President Obama has commuted the 35-year prison sentence of Chelsea Manning, the Army private who leaked a massive trove of military secrets to WikiLeaks.
The former intelligence analyst's prison sentence has been shortened to expire on May 17, 2017, according to a statement from the White House.
Her lawyers at the ACLU expressed relief after the decision, saying that Manning has already served more time behind bars than any other whistleblower in U.S. history, and under difficult conditions.
Also at the BBC and the New York Times.
Previously: Chelsea Manning Reportedly on Obama's Short List for Commutation; Assange Offers Himself in Trade
Original Submission #1 Original Submission #2 Original Submission #3
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Justin Case on Wednesday January 18 2017, @11:18AM
Although I haven't followed every step of his 8 years in office, this is the first time I can recall where I thought: Obama did something good.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 18 2017, @11:34AM
Quick, give the guy the Nobel peace price... oh.... wait.
(Score: 2) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Wednesday January 18 2017, @11:58AM
That would be a good first move towards actually deserving his Nobel prize.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 18 2017, @01:57PM
They gave him the nobel peace prize as an incentive.
They intended to remind him to not be a warmonger like his predecessor.
On one hand it worked - no new occupations.
On the other hand, he kinda found a loophole and went balls deep with drones.
And a case can be made that maybe we should have intervened in Syria - the million+ people displaced have experienced severe misery and death and destabilized europe. Refusing to support the rebels forced them into the hands of radicals like ISIS, now the rebels lost but ISIS still gained influence.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 18 2017, @01:31PM
Uhm, what do you call of this, chopped liver?
Healthcare for 20 million people who did not have it before
Signing the paris climate agreement
Killing bin laden
Auto industry bailout, preserving millions of jobs
Support for lgbtq rights like repealing dont ask dont tell, full marriage rights and trans equality in a state of the union speech
First president to call himself a feminist
1000+ pardons of non-violent drug offenders, more pardons than all other presidents combined
Ending the embargo on Cuba
Police accountability via DoJ investigations from small towns like ferguson to big cities like chicago and baltimore
4+ million children protected from deportation by DACA
Contained Iranian nuclear development
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 18 2017, @10:44PM
Healthcare for 20 million people who did not have it before
A baby step in a better direction.
What 80 percent of USAians want is Medicare for All.
(If we actually had a democracy--AKA "The Majority Rules"--we'd already have that.)
What happened was mandated payments from anybody with an income to a for-profit insurance company (a middleman which doesn't actually provide any care)
Signing the paris climate agreement
Symbolic but actually meaningless.
Killing bin laden
...who was unarmed at the time.
Execution without due process of law by order of a "constitutional scholar".
Auto industry bailout, preserving millions of jobs
...then handed right back to the executives who had driven those for-profit corporations into the ground.
A proper response would have been for the gov't to buy those up for pennies via eminent domain and turn them into worker-owned cooperatives.
Allow the workers to get rid of the failed managers (with their compensations hundreds of times what the productive workers take home).
First president to call himself a feminist
Call yourself anything you want but actions speak louder than words.
Ending the embargo on Cuba
Window dressing.
When there is actual trade going on and USA's imperialism stops, write back.
Police accountability via DoJ investigations
More window dressing.
When there is a federal law without a giant loophole for murderous cops and federal special prosecutors are putting them in jail, write back.
Contained Iranian nuclear development
Iran never had a nuclear weapons program.
The strongest stuff they ever produced was medical grade isotopes.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Justin Case on Wednesday January 18 2017, @11:08PM
Support for lgbtq rights like repealing dont ask dont tell, full marriage rights and trans equality in a state of the union speech
1000+ pardons of non-violent drug offenders, more pardons than all other presidents combined
Police accountability via DoJ investigations from small towns like ferguson to big cities like chicago and baltimore
OK, I'll give you those. The rest, I'm either ambivalent, or those actions in my opinion were harmful.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 19 2017, @12:23AM
Yeah, healthcare for 20 million people. No biggee. I'm sure they are pretty ambivalent too.
(Score: 2) by Justin Case on Thursday January 19 2017, @01:10AM
Hey, anyone who can dip into my pocket and get free stuff is going to be happy about it. That doesn't mean it is a net good for society.
(Score: 2) by Username on Thursday January 19 2017, @04:16PM
Sure there are maybe a few people who couldn’t get some kind of disability payment, but I’m assuming the vast majority of those 20 million are people who didn’t need or want health insurance. They were just coerced into getting it under threat of IRS penalties. Even then they probably just got the cheapest plan about $4,500 a year. With credit the plan may have been zero out of pocket for them. Since they will never visit a hospital, it’s just pure profit for the insurance agency. The government likes it since they’re the creditor. Person paying zero out of pocket has to pay back the debt at any time of their choosing.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 19 2017, @09:40AM
Killing bin laden
Thus ensuring that he will always be innocent by definition to anyone who subscribes to the principle of "innocent until proven guilty in a court of law".
- It's not like Osama was killed in a firefight or anything, they had him in a position where they could easily have brought him back to the US to stand trial.