We were then treated to grainy video of the khaki-dressed Engel "rolling out" with the Brigade, interviews with American soldiers describing what a historic event this was, all while the "NBC NEWS EXCLUSIVE" logo was plastered on the screen -- quite reminiscent of the embedded media coverage that glorified the invasion itself.  Even Williams noted the similarity:  "We watched the invasion happen on live television thanks to, at the time, some brand new and exclusive technology.  Well, tonight again we have watched the pullout of combat troops the same way."  At the end of the 7-minute segment, Williams heaped praise on Engel, whom he hailed as "our own young veteran of this conflict," for this "astounding bit of reporting."

Meanwhile, over at MSNBC, hours of continuous melodramatic coverage were devoted to this story, and the cable network's various personalities treated the event at least as reverentially as Williams did.   Keith Olbermann donned his most solemn baritone to begin his program this way:  

Two thousand six hundred and sixty-six days since President Bush declared "mission accomplished" in Iraq.

Two thousand seven hundred and eight days since American forces invaded Iraq.

At this hour, American combat forces are leaving Iraq.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RICHARD ENGEL, NBC NEWS CHIEF FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT: I think we‘re coming right up to the Kuwaiti border now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

OLBERMANN: This is a special edition of COUNTDOWN.

Chief foreign correspondent, Richard Engel, in a world exclusive, embedded with, reporting live from the last convoy of American combat troops as it leaves Iraq via the Kuwait border.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're watching the end of an era of the American military.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

OLBERMANN: With Rachel Maddow inside the Green Zone in Baghdad, and Chris Matthews, Lawrence O‘Donnell, Eugene Robinson, Howard Fineman, Jim Miklaszewski at the Pentagon, retired General Paul Eaton, retired Colonel Jack Jacobs, Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon and former weapons inspector Charles Duelfer.

From Baghdad, from the Iraq-Kuwait border, from Washington, from New York -- this is COUNTDOWN's special continuing live coverage of the end of America's Iraq combat mission.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

As Olbermann indicated, Maddow was in Baghdad's "Green Zone," and she explained:  "it is really, really hot right now. But yet, seeing what we just saw, right here live with that gate closing, the last U.S. combat troop, I'm totally covered in goose bumps. It is an important moment."

It's not difficult to understand why NBC and MSNBC hyped the event the way they did.  The reason they had what Olbermann touted as a "worldwide exclusive" is because -- in response to NBC embed requests -- the Pentagon contacted them and offered exclusivity, knowing that the arrangement would incentivize NBC to treat the event as something of monumental historic importance.  By selecting NBC as the only broadcast network to be told in advance, swearing them to secrecy, but arranging for them to cover it exclusively with video, it became their story, and they thus, predictably, were eager to tout its importance.  That's the natural inclination when someone is given exclusive access by the Government.  Maddow explained how the Pentagon arranged in secret for this exclusive coverage of the "momentous" event to be given to NBC and MSNBC:

By offering it exclusively to both NBC and MSNBC, the Pentagon ensured that this narrative would be given the Seriousness imprimatur from NBC, and would produce base-pleasing, Obama-favorable praise from MSNBC personalities.  Having Engel embedded in a Stryker vehicles as it "rolled out" of Iraq, and Maddow stationed in the Green Zone, added to the historic tone of the evening.  As The New York Times' Brian Stelter reported:  "David Verdi, an NBC News vice president, added, 'The military had said, 'You are the ones who are going to broadcast it first'."  About that, Mediaite's Steve Kraukauer wrote:  "That’s a stunning admission, and shows a degree of coziness between both sides here."  With this cooperative venture, the White House got exactly the coverage it wanted:  the repeatedly hyped claim that under Barack Obama, "American combat forces are leaving Iraq," as Olbermann intoned at the start.

One of the few sour notes in this coverage came when Olbermann briefly interviewed McClatchy's Jonathan Landay, and asked him what the 50,000 remaining soldiers would be doing.  Landay explained:

This is the great irony for me, Keith. The fact is that under the delusional plans that former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld had approved for the invasion of Iraq, they had intended to come down to 50,000 troops within three or four months of that invasion. . . . .That, for me, is the ultimate irony, is the fact that more than seven years later, we‘ve now gotten down to the 50,000 troops that they thought they could get down to within three months of the invasion. . . . . [T]hose 50,000 men and women include special forces who will be going out on counter-terrorism missions with Iraqi forces. That, to me, is combat.  They're armed. They're going into combat.  There will be American, quote/unquote, advisers going out with Iraqi forces on regular patrols. That to me opens the door to combat.

So I don‘t think we‘re going to see the end of -- we are not going to see the end of combat for American forces I don‘t think in Iraq.

The 50,000 troops staying in Iraq were noted several times by the various MSNBC commentators, especially Maddow, but, other than the Landay interview, it did not detract from the repetitious claim that -- to use Brian Williams' formulation -- "U.S. combat troops have pulled out of Iraq."  This, of course, was the same message touted in Barack Obama's Oval Office address to the nation on Wednesday night:  

So tonight, I am announcing that the American combat mission in Iraq has ended. Operation Iraqi Freedom is over, and the Iraqi people now have lead responsibility for the security of their country.

Yesterday, however, the Associated Press' Standards Editor, Tom Kent, issued a memorandum to AP editors and reporters instructing them not to use this White-House-created formulation that "combat operations in Iraq are over," on the simple ground of inaccuracy:

Whatever the subject, we should be correct and consistent in our description of what the situation in Iraq is. This guidance summarizes the situation and suggests wording to use and avoid.

To begin with, combat in Iraq is not over, and we should not uncritically repeat suggestions that it is, even if they come from senior officials. The situation on the ground in Iraq is no different today than it has been for some months. Iraqi security forces are still fighting Sunni and al-Qaida insurgents.  . . . .

As for U.S. involvement, it also goes too far to say that the U.S. part in the conflict in Iraq is over. President Obama said Monday night that "the American combat mission in Iraq has ended. Operation Iraqi Freedom is over, and the Iraqi people now have lead responsibility for the security of their country."

However, 50,000 American troops remain in country. Our own reporting on the ground confirms that some of these troops, especially some 4,500 special operations forces, continue to be directly engaged in military operations. These troops are accompanying Iraqi soldiers into battle with militant groups and may well fire and be fired on.

In addition, although administration spokesmen say we are now at the tail end of American involvement and all troops will be gone by the end of 2011, there is no guarantee that this will be the case.

Our stories about Iraq should make clear that U.S. troops remain involved in combat operations alongside Iraqi forces, although U.S. officials say the American combat mission has formally ended. We can also say the United States has ended its major combat role in Iraq, or that it has transferred military authority to Iraqi forces. We can add that beyond U.S. boots on the ground, Iraq is expected to need U.S. air power and other military support for years to control its own air space and to deter possible attack from abroad.

The ability of the Pentagon to shape coverage through controlling access, offering embedding, and doling out exclusives is too well-known and well-documented by now to require much discussion.  The problem, however, is that it remains irresistibly enticing for many media outlets to submit to it.  The fact that NBC/MSNBC was the only television news outlet with video of the "last combat brigade rolling out of Iraq" was a major coup.  The only way that coup matters -- the only way the journalists covering this event "exclusively" can feel as though they're doing something important -- is if they vest the event with historic significance, accomplished by touting it as "the end of America‘s Iraq combat mission," exactly the message the administration wanted disseminated.

The fact that this phrase -- "the end of America‘s Iraq combat mission" -- is more propagandistic than anything gave no pause.  The withdrawal of 100,000 troops from that country since Obama's inauguration is not insignificant, and it's a good thing that he's adhered to the withdrawal schedule.  But, as Landay explained, 50,000 troops is a huge number -- it's what Rumsfeld originally envisioned as the occupying force to be used three months after the invasion -- and it's inevitable that they will be in combat.  And that's to say nothing of the large number of private-militias which remain -- paid for by American citizens -- as well as the so-called "private army" which the State Department is currently assembling, to be deployed in that country.  That's why AP refuses to use these misleading terms "even if they come from senior officials."  That, and because they weren't the ones gifted with the "worldwide exclusive" coverage by the Obama administration and its Pentagon.

(2) In November, California voters will vote on Proposition 19, which would legalize marijuana in that state (I'm on the Board of Advisers of Just Say Now, an organization working for its passage).  It was announced today that Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein -- Iraq War supporter, champion of Bush appointees Michael Hayden and Michael Mukasey, Surveillance State cheerleader, and beneficiary of her husband's vast, defense contracting wealth -- will take the lead in working to defeat Prop 19 and thus keep marijuana criminalized, in turn keeping Mexican cartels empowered and adult American citizens prosecuted for using this substance which is far less harmful and dangerous than alcohol, if it is even "harmful" or "dangerous" at all.

(3) Substantial polling data makes clear that Latinos are among the most disenchanted Democratic voting bloc, as they are furious at the White House for repeatedly violating promises on immigration reform.  Large numbers of Latino voters now blame both parties almost equally for failures in immigration policy.

(4) At Daily Kos, Joan McCarter documents that progressive and even Democratic Party journalists are now openly acknowledging what has long been clear:  President Obama's Deficit Commission was structured so as to ensure recommendations for, among other things, cuts in Social Security benefits, to be voted on right after the election is nice and over with (an election the Democrats are trying to win by parading around as the protectors of Social Security).  Also at Daily Kos, Laurence Lewis describes how similar this dynamic is to prior political controversies, where Democrats held themselves out publicly as believing one thing while privately working for the opposite.

(5) Following Robert Gibbs' announcement that liberal Obama critics should be drug tested, and before that, Rahm Emanuel's declaration that the same group is "fucking retarded," a new book by former Obama "car czar" Steven Rattner describes how Emanuel worked to thwart union interests and declared, in the midst of the auto bailouts:  "Fuck the UAW."

(6) Daphne Eviatar of Human Rights First argues that the military commission prosecution of child soldier Omar Khadr is itself a war crime.

(7) Several people emailed me links to comments and diaries over the last couple days viciously complaining about my observation of a worsening economy since Obama became President.  I suppose it all depends on what metric you use and whose economic interests you care about.  While it's true that the crisis of a full-scale collapse was temporarily averted, I was actually referring to this:

And, of course, the only reason for the recent, slight "decline" is because so many people have stopped looking for work altogether that they are no longer even counted.  Robert Reich has more today on the attempt to seize on largely unimportant data to proclaim an improving economy.

Assembling all of these facts together, one is left with this befuddling mystery:  why is there such a huge and growing "enthusiasm gap," where so many Democrats and progressives are unmotivated even to bother to vote in November, notwithstanding all the fear-mongering (much of it legitimate) over the GOP extremists?  Is it really hard to see?

 

UPDATE:  Public Policy Polling's Tom Jensen compiles data on exactly this question today, and explains:

This year isn't getting away from the Democrats because voters are moving toward the Republicans en masse. But the enthusiasm gap is turning races that would otherwise be lean Democratic into toss ups, turning toss ups into leaning Republican, and turning leaning Republican into solid Republican.

What's most amazing about this is that Democrats generally and the White House specifically seem completely uninterested in doing anything about this -- other than exacerbating it.  The need to do something is what leads me to believe (without knowing) that Obama will nominate (without necessarily causing to be confirmed) liberal favorite Elizabeth Warren to head the new Consumer Protection Agency created by the Financial Regulation bill.  If they do that and are serious about it, that would definitely be a good thing, but at this point, Democratic malaise and apathy are so entrenched that it's hard to imagine a single nomination doing much to change it.

Because the political class is treating today as some sort of melodramatic milestone in the Iraq War, there is a tidal wave of those self-defending claims crashing down around us.  The New York Times' John Burns -- who bravely covered that war for years -- presents a classic case of this mentality today in a solemn retrospective entitled "The Long-Awaited Day."  I realize we're all supposed to genuflect to Burns' skills as a war journalist -- I've personally found him far more overtly supportive of the war than most others covering it and certainly more than his claimed objectivity would permit, even when his reporting was illuminating -- but if he's right about what he says today, it's a rather enormous (albeit unintentional) indictment of himself and his colleagues covering the war:

Hindsight is a powerful thing, and there have been plenty of voices amid the tragedy that has unfolded since the invasion to say, in effect, "I told you so." But among that band of reporters --  men and women who thought we knew something about Iraq, and for the most part sympathized with the joy Iraqis felt at what many were unashamed then to call their "liberation" -- there were few, if any, who foresaw the extent of the violence that would follow or the political convulsion it would cause in Iraq, America and elsewhere.

We could not know then, though if we had been wiser we might have guessed, the scale of the toll the invasion would unleash: the tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians who would die; the nearly 4,500 American soldiers who would be killed; the nearly 35,000 soldiers who would return home wounded; the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis who would flee abroad as refugees; the $750 billion in direct war costs that would burden the United States; the bitterness that would seep into American politics; the anti-Americanism that would become a commonplace around the world.

If Burns wants to claim that he and his American media colleagues in Baghdad were unaware that any of this was likely, I can't and won't dispute that.  In fact, it's probably true that they were unaware of it -- blissfully so -- which is why media coverage in the lead-up to the war was so inexcusably one-sided in its war cheerleading, as even Howard Kurtz documented.  But Burns' claim that they "could not know then" that the invasion could unleash all of the tragedy, violence and anti-Americanism it spawned is absolutely ludicrous, a patent attempt to justify his severe errors in judgment as being unavoidable.

Aside from the obvious, intrinsic risks of invading a country smack in the middle of the Muslim world, with much of the world vehemently opposed, there were countless people warning of exactly these possibilities from invading.  If Burns and his friends were unaware of those risks, it was only because they decided to ignore those voices, not because they could not have known.  Here, as but one example, is Jim Webb in 2002, arguing against an attack on Iraq in The Washington Post:

Meanwhile, American military leaders have been trying to bring a wider focus to the band of neoconservatives that began beating the war drums on Iraq before the dust had even settled on the World Trade Center. Despite the efforts of the neocons to shut them up or to dismiss them as unqualified to deal in policy issues, these leaders, both active-duty and retired, have been nearly unanimous in their concerns. Is there an absolutely vital national interest that should lead us from containment to unilateral war and a long-term occupation of Iraq? . . . .

With respect to the situation in Iraq, they are conscious of two realities that seem to have been lost in the narrow debate about Saddam Hussein himself. The first reality is that wars often have unintended consequences -- ask the Germans, who in World War I were convinced that they would defeat the French in exactly 42 days. . . . .

The issue before us is not simply whether the United States should end the regime of Saddam Hussein, but whether we as a nation are prepared to physically occupy territory in the Middle East for the next 30 to 50 years. Those who are pushing for a unilateral war in Iraq know full well that there is no exit strategy if we invade and stay. . . . .

The Iraqis are a multiethnic people filled with competing factions who in many cases would view a U.S. occupation as infidels invading the cradle of Islam. Indeed, this very bitterness provided Osama bin Laden the grist for his recruitment efforts in Saudi Arabia when the United States kept bases on Saudi soil after the Gulf War.

In Japan, American occupation forces quickly became 50,000 friends. In Iraq, they would quickly become 50,000 terrorist targets. . . . It is true that Saddam Hussein might try to assist international terrorist organizations in their desire to attack America. It is also true that if we invade and occupy Iraq without broad-based international support, others in the Muslim world might be encouraged to intensify the same sort of efforts.

And here's Howard Dean, in one of the more prescient political speeches of the last decade, speaking at Drake University, roughly one month before the war began:

We have been told over and over again what the risks will be if we do not go to war.

We have been told little about what the risks will be if we do go to war.

If we go to war, I certainly hope the Administration's assumptions are realized, and the conflict is swift, successful and clean. . . .

It is possible, however, that events could go differently, and that the Iraqi Republican Guard will not sit out in the desert where they can be destroyed easily from the air.

It is possible that Iraq will try to force our troops to fight house to house in the middle of cities -- on its turf, not ours -- where precision-guided missiles are of little use.

It is possible that women and children will be used as shields and our efforts to minimize civilian casualties will be far less successful than we hope.

There are other risks.

Iraq is a divided country, with Sunni, Shia and Kurdish factions that share both bitter rivalries and access to large quantities of arms.

Iran and Turkey each have interests in Iraq they will be tempted to protect with or without our approval.

If the war lasts more than a few weeks, the danger of humanitarian disaster is high, because many Iraqis depend on their government for food, and during war it would be difficult for us to get all the necessary aid to the Iraqi people.

There is a risk of environmental disaster, caused by damage to Iraq's oil fields.

And, perhaps most importantly, there is a very real danger that war in Iraq will fuel the fires of international terror.

Anti-American feelings will surely be inflamed among the misguided who choose to see an assault on Iraq as an attack on Islam, or as a means of controlling Iraqi oil.

And last week's tape by Osama bin Laden tells us that our enemies will seek relentlessly to transform a war into a tool for inspiring and recruiting more terrorists.

We should remember how our military presence in Saudi Arabia has been exploited by radicals to stir resentment and hatred against the United States, leading to the murder of American citizens and soldiers.

We need to consider what the effect will be of a U.S. invasion and occupation of Baghdad, a city that served for centuries as a capital of the Islamic world.  

I could literally spend the rest of the day quoting those who were issuing similar or even more strident warnings.  Anyone who claims they didn't realize that an attack on Iraq could spawn mammoth civilian casualties, pervasive displacement, endless occupation and intense anti-American hatred is indicting themselves more powerfully than it's possible for anyone else to do.  And anyone who claims, as Burns did, that they "could not know then" that these things might very well happen is simply not telling the truth.  They could have known.  And should have known.  They chose not to.

 

UPDATE:  Perhaps even worse than the strain of "nobody-could-have-known" excuse-making invoked by Burns is the claim that "nobody could have known" that Iraq did not really have WMDs.  Contrary to the pervasive self-justifying myth that "everyone" believed that Saddam possessed these weapons -- and thus nobody can be blamed for failing to realize the truth -- the evidence to the contrary was both public and overwhelming.  Consider the March 17, 2003, Der Spiegel Editorial warning that "for months now, Bush and Blair have been busy blowing up, exaggerating and deliberately over-interpreting intelligence information and rumours to justify war on Iraq," or a September 30, 2002 McClatchy article -- headlined: "War talk fogged by lingering questions; Threat Hussein poses is unclear to experts" -- which detailed the reasons for serious skepticism about the pro-war case.

Or simply recall the various pre-war statements by the ex-Marine and U.N. weapons inspector for Iraq, Scott Ritter ("The truth of the matter is that Iraq has not been shown to possess weapons of mass destruction, either in terms of having retained prohibited capability from the past, or by seeking to re-acquire such capability today"), or Howard Dean in his Drake speech ("Secretary Powell's recent presentation at the UN showed the extent to which we have Iraq under an audio and visual microscope. Given that, I was impressed not by the vastness of evidence presented by the Secretary, but rather by its sketchiness").  All of that, too, was brushed aside by government officials and suppressed and even mocked by most of the  American media, all of whom were determined to allow nothing to impede the march to war.  Rather than take responsibility for their failings, they instead insist -- as Burns did today -- that they could not have known.

 

UPDATE II:  Every retrospective from supporters of the attack on Iraq, if they're to be honest and worthwhile, should read more or less like John Cole's, from 2008.

 

UPDATE III:  After Obama's Iraq speech last night, I was on CBC -- Canada's broadcasting network -- discussing that speech.  It can be seen here.  As you can see, Skype video technology is improving rapidly and enabling acceptance of more TV offers.

 

UPDATE IV:  For sheer factual inaccuracy in John Burns' observations, see here.

 

UPDATE V:  Speaking of accountability for those responsible for the Iraq War, Simon Owens has a very good article on the criticisms provoked by Jeffrey Goldberg's Iran article in The Atlantic -- featuring my criticisms of him -- and what that dynamic reflects about the new media landscape.

 

UPDATE VI:  Here's someone who, back in 1994, definitely understood what invading Iraq would unleash (and note the sociopathic, though quite typical, refusal to factor in "deaths of Iraqi civilians" as one of the "costs"):

With the license now issued, the ACLU and CCR this afternoon filed a lawsuit on behalf of Anwar Awlaki, with Awlaki's father as the named plaintiff, to prevent the Obama administration from proceeding with Awlaki's due-process-free assassination.  Awlaki is unable to file the lawsuit on his own because the U.S. government's threats to kill him, as well as its prior unsuccessful attempts, cause him to be in hiding and thus make it infeasible for him to assert his legal rights directly. 

The lawsuit -- captioned Al-Aulaqi v. Obama -- was filed in federal court in the District of Columbia, and names Barack Obama, Leon Panetta and Robert Gates as defendants.  Among other relief, the Complaint asks the court to (a) "declare that the Constitution [along with 'treaty and customary international law'] prohibits Defendants from carrying out the targeted killing of U.S. citizens, including Plaintiff’s son, except in circumstances in which they present concrete, specific, and imminent threats to life or physical safety, and there are no means other than lethal force that could reasonably be employed to neutralize the threats"; (b) "enjoin Defendants from intentionally killing U.S. citizen Anwar Al-Aulaqi" unless they demonstrate the applicability of those narrow circumstances; and (c) "order Defendants to disclose the criteria that are used in determining whether the government will carry out the targeted killing of a U.S. citizen" (emphasis added).

Just how perverse is the Obama administration's assassination program is reflected in the rights Awlaki is forced to assert.  He alleges -- as the Complaint puts it -- that the Government is violating his "Fifth Amendment Right Not to be Deprived of Life Without Due Process."  Just re-read that and contemplate that in Barack Obama's America, that right even needs to be contested.  The Complaint also alleges that using lethal force against a U.S. citizen in these circumstances violates the Fourth Amendment's guarantee against unreasonable searches and seizure, and also violates the Alien Tort Statute, which bars "extrajudicial killings."  Reading Awlaki's Brief in support of his request for injunctive relief is almost surreal, as one witnesses an American citizen try to convince a federal court to stop the Government from trying -- far away from a battlefield and without any violence used to resist apprehension -- to murder him without due process:

The right to life is the most fundamental of all rights protected by the Constitution and by international law.  Outside the context of armed conflict, the intentional killing of a civilian without prior judicial process is unlawful except in the narrowest and most extraordinary circumstances.

The United States is not at war with Yemen, or within it. Nonetheless, U.S. government officials have disclosed the government’s intention to kill U.S. citizen Anwar Al-Aulaqi, who is believed to be located there, without charge, trial, or conviction. . . .

Outside of armed conflict, both the Constitution and international law prohibit the use of lethal force against civilians except as a last resort to prevent concrete, specific, and imminent threats that are likely to cause death or serious physical injury.  An extrajudicial killing policy under which individuals are added to "kill lists" after secret bureaucratic processes and remain on the lists even in the absence of any reason to believe that they pose a threat of imminent harm goes far beyond what the Constitution and international law permit.

That the government has kept secret the standards under which it targets U.S. citizens for death independently violates the Constitution: U.S. citizens have a right to know what conduct may subject them to execution at the hands of their own government. Due process requires, at a minimum, that citizens be put on notice of what may cause them to be put to death by the state.  

Periodically, I hear some people assert that American citizens have no Constitutional rights once they physically leave the country.  Just as is true for the ludicrous claim that the Constitution only applies to American citizens -- a proposition which has been squarely rejected by the Supreme Court for more than a century, which has held that it applies equally to non-citizens on American soil -- this notion that the Constitution extends only to America's borders is rooted in pure ignorance of the law:

It is "well settled that the Bill of Rights has extraterritorial application to the conduct abroad of federal agents directed against United States citizens." In re Terrorist Bombings of U.S. Embassies in E. Africa, 552 F.3d 157, 167 (2d Cir. 2008) (discussing the applicability of the Fourth Amendment to citizens abroad [emphasis added]); see also Reid v. Covert, 354 U.S. 1, 5-6 (1957) (plurality opinion) ("[W]e reject the idea that when the United States acts against citizens abroad it can do so free of the Bill of Rights. The United States is entirely a creature of the Constitution. Its power and authority have no other source. It can only act in accordance with all the limitations imposed by the Constitution."); United States v. Verdugo-Urquidez, 494 U.S. 259, 270 (1990) ("[Reid v. Covert] decided that United States citizens stationed abroad could invoke the protection of the Fifth and Sixth Amendments").

What I've found most disturbing about this controversy from the start is how many Americans are willing to blindly believe the Government's accusations of Terrorism against their fellow citizens -- provided they're Muslims with foreign-sounding names -- without needing to see any evidence at all.  All government officials have to do is anonymously leak to the media extremely vague accusations against someone without any evidence presented (Awlaki is involved in multiple plots!!), and a substantial number of people will then immediately run around yelling:  Kill that Terrorist!!  

It's an authoritarian scene out of some near-future dystopian novel, yet it's exactly what is happening.  This is precisely the reaction of a substantial portion of the population which has been trained to believe every unproven government accusation of Terrorism.  The mere utterance of the accusation -- Terrorist -- sends them into mindless, fear-driven submission, so extreme that they're willing even to endorse a Presidential-imposed death penalty on American citizens with no due process:  about the most tyrannical power that can be imagined, literally.  The fact that this very same Government is continuously and repeatedly wrong when it makes those accusations does not seem to be even a cause for hesitation among this faction.  They just keep dutifully reciting the ultimate authoritarian anthem:  if my Government says it, it must be true, and I don't need to see any evidence or indulge any of this bothersome process stuff -- trials and courts or whatever -- before punishment is meted out, including the death penalty. 

So now Barack Obama is being sued by an American citizen who is forced to plead with a court to protect him from due-process-free, state-sanctioned murder.  There are multiple reasons why this lawsuit may not succeed, beginning with the demonstrated reluctance of federal judges to "interfere with" war-related decisions of the President, particularly when the specter of Terrorism is raised.  The power-revering factions on the Right have joined with some Democratic loyalists who are comfortable with any power now that their Party controls the White House.  But if the Obama administration succeeds in vesting itself with the power to order American citizens killed far from any battlefield, with no evidence of violent resistance to arrest and no due process whatsoever to contest the accusations, that is a power that will endure with future Presidents as well.

* * * * * 

The New York City cab driver who was stabbed in the throat last week for being Muslim, Ahmed Sharif, is unable to work due to his injuries and is struggling to be able to support his family.  Those interested in donating to help him can do so here.

 

UPDATE:  As always with this topic, it's worthwhile to recap the worldview of many Democrats (including Barack Obama) on such matters: 

It was an extreme outrage of the highest order -- a shredding of the Constitution -- when George Bush imprisoned or even just eavesdropped on American citizens without any due process.  But it's perfectly acceptable -- even noble -- for Barack Obama to kill them without any due process.

 

UPDATE II:  The ACLU has produced this excellent 4-minute video about Obama's assassination program and this lawsuit:

What makes this so amazing is that Kurtz himself does not merely sound like an employee of Time Warner; he is one.  Time Warner pays him a substantial salary -- and gives him a prominent television platform -- for hosting CNN's Sunday morning show, Reliable Sources.  In return, Kurtz then uses his Post column to glorify Time Warner's magazine and its executives.  The fact that The Washington Post employs as its media critic an employee of Time Warner, the largest media conglomerate in the world, has to be the most mammoth and inexcusable conflict of interest in American journalism, one that simply cannot be cured even with full disclosure.

And there isn't even full disclosure.  While an astute reader can piece together this conflict by connecting several clues from today's column -- in the course of trumpeting Time's recent hiring of CNN's Fareed Zakaria, Kurtz mentions that CNN is a "unit of Time Warner," and then a line appears at the end of the column stating that Kurtz "works for CNN" -- a conflict this huge requires, at the very least, direct, unambiguous, prominent disclosure:  Time Magazine is owned by Time Warner, Inc., which also employs Kurtz.  In the past, Kurtz has simply omitted any disclosure at all when writing for the Post about Time Warner properties.

This conflict is nothing new, as it has been noted many times by many people.   Even the Post's own Ombudsman, Andrew Alexander, wrote last November:

[B]eing paid by CNN presents an inescapable conflict that is at odds with Post rules. They state that a reporter or editor "cannot accept payment from any person, company or organization that he or she covers." There can be exceptions for some groups, such as broadcast organizations, "unless the reporter or editor is involved in coverage of them." . . . . .would The Post allow a reporter who covers energy to be paid on the side by a big oil company?

[And, obviously, covering media issues for CNN while taking a paycheck from The Washington Post Company poses the same conflict].

In the scheme of media sins, this one is relatively small.  But on days when Kurtz uses his Post column to pen Time Warner Press Releases under the guise of media criticism, it's nonetheless worth noting.  It demonstrates just how captured the establishment media is by large corporate interests -- that's why they're the establishment-serving media, after all -- and, above all else, demonstrates the Post's utter contempt for its own readers and its alleged "ethical standards" and claim to independence.  The very idea that it employs a "journalist" to write about Time Warner properties -- while being paid a salary directly and substantially by Time Warner -- says all you need to know about that newspaper.

 

UPDATE:  From commenter db1978:

Washington Post Chat

Howard Kurtz just finished an hour long chat on the Washington Post website.

http://live.washingtonpost.com/media-backtalk-08-30-10.html

Although he routinely uses this forum to discuss his latest column, he declined to address Glenn's criticism at all. At the beginning of the chat, I submitted a polite question about whether he felt he had adequately disclosed this corporate relationship. Needless to say, he didn't take my question.

As brave as he is ethical.

Fire at Tenn. Mosque Building Site Ruled Arson

Federal officials are investigating a fire that started overnight at the site of a new Islamic center in a Nashville suburb.

Ben Goodwin of the Rutherford County Sheriff's Department confirmed to CBS Affiliate WTVF that the fire, which burned construction equipment at the future site of the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro, is being ruled as arson. . . .

The chair of the center's planning committee, Essim Fathy, said he drove to the site at around 5:30 a.m. Saturday morning after he was contacted by the sheriff's department.

"Our people and community are so worried of what else can happen," said Fathy. "They are so scared" . . .

Opponents of a new Islamic center say they believe the mosque will be more than a place of prayer; they are afraid the 15-acre site that was once farmland will be turned into a terrorist training ground for Muslim militants bent on overthrowing the U.S. government.

"They are not a religion. They are a political, militaristic group," Bob Shelton, a 76-year-old retiree who lives in the area, told The Associated Press.

Shelton was among several hundred demonstrators who recently wore "Vote for Jesus" T-shirts and carried signs that said "No Sharia law for USA!," referring to the Islamic code of law.

Others took their opposition further, spray painting a sign announcing the "Future site of the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro" and tearing it up.

Earlier this summer opponents criticized the planned mosque at hearings held by the Rutherford County Commission, as supporters held prayer vigils.

At one such prayer vigil, WTVF reported opponents speaking out against construction.

"No mosque in Murfreesboro. I don't want it. I don't want them here," Evy Summers said to WTVF. "Go start their own country overseas somewhere. This is a Christian country. It was based on Christianity."

The arsonists undoubtedly will be happy to tell you how much they hate Terrorism.  And how there's a War on Christianity underway in the U.S.  The harm from these actions are not merely the physical damage they cause, but also the well-grounded fear it imposes on a minority of the American population.  If you launch a nationwide, anti-Islamic campaign in Lower Manhattan based on the toxic premise that Muslims generally are responsible for 9/11 -- and spend a decade expanding American wars on one Muslim country after the next -- this is the inevitable, and obviously dangerous, outcome.

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Three other items worth noting:

(1) Kudos to The New York Times for publishing this Op-Ed by Palestinian-American journalist Ali Abunimah, with views on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict -- and the role played by the U.S. -- which are typically excluded from the American debate on those issues.

(2) Reflecting the fact that primitive fundamentalism is found in all religions and is by no means unique to Islam, this Jerusalem Post article details how an Israel singer was sentenced by a rabbinical panel to receive 39 lashes for the crime of singing in front of an audience mixed with men and women.  That article rather substantially exaggerates the punishment -- the video reflects that the "lashes" were essentially symbolic and undertaken voluntarily, fundamentally distinguishing it from involuntary, genuine punishment for moral "sins" -- but the notion that such an act merits punishment is nonetheless instructive.

(3) This short though important post documents how children are being trained to give up all privacy, and to be good, dutiful Surveillance State citizens, through constant, pervasive surveillance in schools.   As I wrote recently here, what is lost from the societal elimination of privacy is difficult to describe but of incomparable value:

Many people are indifferent to the disappearance of privacy -- even with regard to government officials -- because they don't perceive any real value to it. The ways in which the loss of privacy destroys a society are somewhat abstract and difficult to articulate, though very real. A society in which people know they are constantly being monitored is one that breeds conformism and submission, and which squashes innovation, deviation, and real dissent.

The old cliché is often mocked though basically true: there's no reason to worry about surveillance if you have nothing to hide. That mindset creates the incentive to be as compliant and inconspicuous as possible: those who think that way decide it's in their best interests to provide authorities with as little reason as possible to care about them. That's accomplished by never stepping out of line. Those willing to live their lives that way will be indifferent to the loss of privacy because they feel that they lose nothing from it. Above all else, that's what a Surveillance State does: it breeds fear of doing anything out of the ordinary by creating a class of meek citizens who know they are being constantly watched.

Training children from an early age to have no expectation of privacy -- to live on the assumption that their every move and even thought (which is what Internet activity is) will be monitored and recorded by authority figures -- exacerbates these harms quite substantially.

 

UPDATE:  As The Nashville Scene reported, Tennessee Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey -- during his Tea-Party-endorsed, unsuccessful bid to become the GOP nominee for Governor -- had this exchange with a citizen last month who was attending one of his campaign events (begins at 3:10 of the video below; h/t Gawker):

Q.  A point of national concern -- and it is in my mind and my heart -- and that's more of a national threat coming to the State of Tennessee -- we have a threat invading our country from Muslims.

RAMSEY: OK, absolutely, up in Rutherford County . . . . They're trying to put a mosque into Rutherford County.

Now, you know, I'm all about freedom of religion. I value the First Amendment as much as I value the Second Amendment as much as I value the Tenth Amendment and on and on and on.  But you cross the line when they starting trying to start bringing Sharia Law here to the State of Tennessee -- to the United States.  We live under our Constitution and they live under our Constitution.  But it's scary . . . . nobody asked me about this on the Governor's race until this mosque started coming up there.  I've been trying to learn about Sharia Law, and it is not good if that's what's going on.

You could even argue whether being a Muslim is actually a religion or is it a nationality, way of life or cult, whatever you want to call it. . . . That's become an issue, but I've read enough about Sharia Law to know it's crazy.

The gentleman who asked the question then went on to assert that 22 communities in the U.S. now live under Sharia Law, and -- he warned -- "it's expanding rapidly."

Until this investigation is completed, it will be uncertain who started this fire or why, but one thing is perfectly clear:  the attitudes in this video are as pervasive as they are pernicious, and if anything is "spreading rapidly," it's this.