It was two for one day. First the US killed Anwar al-Awlaki's 16-year old son. He was a US citizen. The government's official response: no comment. Glenn Greenwald, today, writes:
It is unknown whether the U.S. targeted the teenager or whether he was merely “collateral damage.” The reason that’s unknown is because the Obama administration refuses to tell us. Said the Post: “The officials would not discuss the attack in any detail, including who the target was.” So here we have yet again one of the most consequential acts a government can take — killing one of its own citizens, in this case a teenage boy — and the government refuses even to talk about what it did, why it did it, what its justification is, what evidence it possesses, or what principles it has embraced in general for such actions. Indeed, it refuses even to admit it did this, since it refuses even to admit that it has a drone program at all and that it is engaged in military action in Yemen. It’s just all shrouded in total secrecy. (Source: The killing of Awlaki’s 16-year-old son.)
President Obama, on the other hand, had no problem bragging about the death of Gaddafi:
So this is a momentous day in the history of Libya. The dark shadow of tyranny has been lifted and with this enormous promise, the Libyan people now have a great responsibility. To build an inclusive and tolerant and democratic Libya that stands as the ultimate rebuke to Gaddafi's dictatorship. We look forward to the announcement of the country's liberation, the quick formation of an intern government and a stable transition to Libya's first free and fair elections. (Source: Obama: Gaddafi death is warning to iron-fist rulers.)
Lucky Libya. Now they have a chance to get a democracy like the United States. Goodbye universal health care. Goodbye free college education. Goodbye, high living standard. Gaddafi, in his own words:
Now, I am under attack by the biggest force in military history, my little African son, Obama wants to kill me, to take away the freedom of our country, to take away our free housing, our free medicine, our free education, our free food, and replace it with American style thievery, called "capitalism," but all of us in the Third World know what that means, it means corporations run the countries, run the world, and the people suffer, so, there is no alternative for me, I must make my stand, and if Allah wishes, I shall die by following his path, the path that has made our country rich with farmland, with food and health, and even allowed us to help our African and Arab brothers and sisters to work here with us ... I do not wish to die, but if it comes to that, to save this land, my people, all the thousands who are all my children, then so be it. ... In the West, some have called me "mad", "crazy". They know the truth but continue to lie, they know that our land is independent and free, not in the colonial grip. (Source: Anti-Empire Report 97.)
