Just as the Occupy Wall Street protest changed the focus of America’s U.S. economic discussion, Justice Party presidential candidate Rocky Anderson is changing the focus of the 2012 presidential election. For too long, there had been only the voices of the right wing Republicans and the center right wing Democrats. Now, along with Jill Stein, Rocky Anderson is bringing a real liberal voice to the 2012 election.

That’s often not to the benefit of Barack Obama, who as President has taken the support of progressive Americans for granted. Rocky Anderson is more than happy to point out the many ways in which Obama has proven to be a terrible fit with Democratic voters’ political ideals.

In a recent interview with Wikinews reporter William Saturn, Rocky Anderson brought a harsh and clear focus on Barack Obama’s terrible record on civil liberties and the rule of law. Anderson told Saturn:

“He never stood up against torture or the other human rights abuses that were occurring during that time. He promised us before he received the Democratic nomination that he would join the filibuster in opposition to Congress providing retroactive immunity for the telecom companies for their illegal participation in the Bush surveillance program. And by the way, not all the telecom companies participated in that, they recognized that it was illegal so it wasn’t a matter of people were fooled about whether it was legal or not. But for those telecom companies that did violate the law, they should have been held accountable. But in the classic American way, the corrupt way that has developed in our system of government, three telecom companies spend some twelve million dollars on lobbyists during the course of three months they put on the press, Congress passed legislation providing for the retroactive immunity and among those voting for the immunity, now after he received the Democratic nomination was then-Senator Obama, completely betraying those that he had promised to join the filibuster. But it was just a sign of things to come, they always talked about the rule of law, he has greater contempt for the rule of law, I think, than George W. Bush. He comes into office, says, ‘oh, we’re going to look forward, not backwards’ in terms of holding accountable war criminals? And those were criminals not only under international law, the Geneva Convention, the Convention Against Torture, but under our own laws passed by Congress: War Crimes Act of 1996 and the federal torture statute. Clearly, an illegal act, and he says, lets just look forward, not backwards.’”

This statement brings back memories for me. Rocky Anderson reminds me that Obama’s troubling disregard for America’s constitutional rights was made quite clear during the 2008 presidential election. We spent a great deal of time here at Irregular Times during the summer and autumn of 2008 discussing Barack Obama’s support for the terrible FISA Amendments Act – a law that gave immunity to telecommunications corporations for breaking federal law by providing government spies with information about millions of Americans’ private communications data.

During the 2008 presidential election, Democratic apologists depicted Obama’s support for Big Brother government spying in the form of the FISA Amendments Act as a temporary aberration, a compromise made necessary by the election. They promised that, after Obama became President, he would reform the FISA Amendments Act. That didn’t happen. It turned out that Obama’s vote for the FISA Amendments Act was just a precursor of more compromises of constitutional rights to come.

Barack Obama has not brought the change that voters were looking for in 2008. He won’t bring us that change if he’s re-elected in 2012, either. Obama has continued and expanded George W. Bush’s attack on the Constitution, and there’s no reason to believe that he’s going to change his ways.

If you’re looking for real change, help Rocky Anderson get on the ballot in the coming year’s presidential election.