Helen Thomas: Listen Up Mr. President

Helen Thomas has co-authored a new book with Craig Crawford entitled, Listen Up Mr. President.

Here is a brief bio of 89 years old correspondent Helen Thomas from Wikipedia:

Helen Thomas (born August 4, 1920) is an American news service reporter, a Hearst Newspapers columnist member of the White House Press Corps and author. She served for fifty-seven years as a correspondent and, later, White House bureau chief for United Press International (UPI). Thomas has covered every President of the United States since John F. Kennedy. She was the first female officer of the National Press Club, the first female member and president of the White House Correspondents Association, and, in 1975, the first female member of the Gridiron Club. She has written five books; her latest with co-author Craig Crawford is Listen Up, Mr. President: Everything You Always Wanted Your President to Know and Do.

I have not read the book yet but watched her on CNN along with Mr. Crawford being interviewed by Rick Sanchez. She is simply a very fascinating woman and exceptionally bright. She was asked, among other things, who is the worst president of United States as she covered 10 Presidents. Without any hesitation she said George W. Bush, referring to the way he undermined the constitution, carried out an illegal war in Iraq when there were no WMDs, no Al-Qaeda and which had absolutey no participation in 9/11. She also talked about the torture of foreign nationals at Gitmo and in Iraq and Afghanistan. She did not hesitate for a moment and hit the nail right on the head in pointing what a tragedy it was to elect George W. Bush as the President. She did not use that word "tragedy" but the implication was there.

If an ordinary person is accused of committing a crime they go to jail and sometimes innocent people are executed as happened in Bush's own state of Texas when an innocent person, Cameron Todd Willingham, was executed. According to media reports Governor Rick Perry had the information that the man was innocent and yet the execution took place in 2004. However a person can be a mass murderer and if he is President then the story is quite different.

For the President, even if he is a war criminal, he is provided bodyguards on taxpayers' expense, a fairly good pension and earns millions of dollars from speaking engagements. No questions asked. George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and associates were involved in such war crimes and all are enjoying very comfortable lives and being given awards as Cheney received recently. What an unjust, cruel, barbaric world we live in and yet pretend we are civilized. Especially in the west and we want other nations to adopt our way of life. If you think the era of despotic kings is over then think again.

Update: To learn more about injustice done to Cameron Todd Willingham Click here .This tells you that capital punishment is wrong. No one should be allowed to take another person’s life.

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