Obama Commutes Bulk of Chelsea Manning’s Sentence
Seven years is still a long time for whistle blowing. I&#x27;m glad to see she is still getting released though. It&#x27;s important to note commuting the sentence is not a pardon. Chelsea will still have this conviction for the rest of her life.<p>I know there is a lot of controversy with Manning compared to Wikileaks et. al. as far as not redacting documents or using a discriminating news source to filter them. Still, I oppose state secrets and the Hillary e-mails are actually very chilling when you start reading through them. I still side with Manning. Too many of the Snowden documents were redacted with critical information (like which hardware encryption chips were compromised by the US government). No one has the actual Pentagon Papers outside of very specific news agencies. Manning gave the entire story to the people .. and I find it more sad that we didn&#x27;t see more outrage and change from that release.<p>I also see another message here. Obama is trying to leave a positive view of the Democratic legacy with this lasting memory. It helps people forget about the predator drones, secret kill lists, continuation of torture, NSA spying and the expansion of war, military and the American hegemony throughout the world. I wish people would see this manipulation; this handout to the left to keep them angry at the incoming administration and not at the government that continues to spy on them and kill people without trial in and endless sea of never ending conflict.