Matt Yglesias at TMP Café (try the Orange Cappuccino) alerted us to Michael Ledeen’s Final Solution for the New York Times:
[Executive Editor Bill] Keller et al have confirmed yet again that they don’t care about national security, at least in this war (sorry, the current circumstances; they don’t think we’re at war). What they really want is the defeat of George W Bush, and the devil take the consequences.They have forgotten that the terrorists love to behead journalists. But Daniel Pearl, well, it’s such a long time ago, you know…
Because terrorists murdered an American journalist in Pakistan, the New York Times should stop investigating a potential abuse of power by the executive branch of the U.S. government. I just want to be clear—is that the message? Because that would seem to turn Daniel Pearl’s death into quite the little windfall for the Administration. A few more decapitated reporters and the president could look forward to a remaining term of office wholly untroubled by investigative journalism.
Maybe it’s just me, but I was under the impression that by beheading Daniel Pearl the killers were trying to intimidate the American people, not hand Michael Ledeen a prop that he could grab by the hair and brandish in Bill Keller’s (so far still attached) face, in order to quash any press inquiries into potential criminal activity by the Administration. Personally, I’d prefer to believe that the gruesome execution of a journalist onlyunderscores the importance of a free press to a free society, since these crimes seem most often to occur in places were the rule of law is least respected, and where public scrutiny is least tolerated by those in power. Because the alternative is to accept that the terrorists did Michael Ledeen and his ilk a favor
The next point is: Who leaks? The answer is, enemies of the president’s policies leak. His supporters don’t.
Yes, we really need to get this straight, people! What Rove and Libby did in the Valerie Plame case was not leaking, since the classified intelligence they exposed was intended to support the president’s policies. That falls under the honorable and patriotic category of micturition.
That basic rule…
(that when you do it, it’s leaking, when we do it, it’s atransurethral intelligence emission. And please stop calling at the front door; we have a tradesman’s entrance for a reason)
…helps understand both the background and the current state of play regarding the classified document that Hoekstra and Santorum are trying to get declassified. The media reaction is twofold: First, to pooh-pooh its significance (the kind of stuff I might find under my sink, the drooling Jane Harman says). Second, to ignore it, to bury it in distant pages of the paper, to touch on it lightly in the evening news.
Honestly, Michael…What do you expect the NYT to do, when even Fox News couldn’t trowel enough Clarins-Rouge Laque Lip Glaze on this razorback to tart it up? We found some surplus artillery shells left over from the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War, which makes this degraded ordnance older than most of our own troops; they predate not only this war, but the first Gulf War. I mean, come on, they’re still finding unexploded Luftwaffe bombs in London; my dad unearthed a musket ball from a Civil War battlefield when he was a kid, but that didn’t make page 1 above the fold either.
The NYT and its ilk pound their chests about the revelations of the successful search of financial data to catch terrorists. They declare they are acting because of the public’s right to know. But in the matter of WMDs found in Iraq, the public’s right to know is totally dissed.
Knahmsayin?
There is NO call for the declassification of that document
And NO need, since Senator Rick Santorum thoughtfully flashed it to the world on Fox News. (At his last public appearance I almost got him to flash me the nuclear launch codes too, but I didn’t bring quite enough beads.)
NO investigative action to discover why this information was suppressed, NO curiosity about how Hoekstra and Santorum found out it existed.
They made it up? (Somebody check the kerns!) Perhaps they subcontracted the same fine Italian craftsmen who produced the Yellowcake Forgery. If you mention Michael Ledeen’s name, you get the 10% Frequent Forger discount. Or maybe Libby passed it to Santorum during a conjugal visit.
And above all , NO concern, despite the clear statement in the document itself, and despite the explicit statement from Rumsfeld yesterday
RUMSFELD: They are weapons of mass destruction. They’re harmful to human beings.
Which makes the asbestos curtain at the Liberty Theatre on 42nd Street a weapon of mass destruction. Also methane gas. And Adam Sandler. But I repeat myself.
These people are not acting like journalists at all. They are acting as a fourth branch of government, co-equal with the others.
Yeah, almost like some sort of…of…Fourth Estate! Damn that flaming leftist, Edmund Burke!
They arrogate to themselves the power to classify and declassify
I remember during the 1986 World Series when the Times arbitrarily classified the box scores. MAN, that was arrogant.
They aren’t journalists at all, they’re pols. And they should be treated that way.
We should buy them golf trips and hookers?
But they are not yet being held accountable for their actions, as elected and appointed pols are.
Um, apparently Michael is speaking to us from another planet. SETI for the win!
They should be. The other branches of government should fight them with every weapon in their arsenal
Well, that would include actual weapons, wouldn’t it? Sounds like things are about to get a lot more interesting on West Forty Third Street. I wonder if you’ll be able to see the white phosphorous rounds hit the City Desk from that choice front window in the ESPN Zone in Times Square…?
And we should demand they honor their calling, we should demand that the whole document be declassified and released, so that we can evaluate it ourselves, and decide how important it is or isn’t.
Wait, I’m confused. We should demand that the Timesdeclassify the whole document? Is that before or after we roast them alive with thermobaric bombs for printing actual information in a newspaper?
Because we know that the fourth branch isn’t going to give us the facts, unless they fit their agenda.
The snark fails.
Declassify the WMD document now. We’ll tell you what it means.
Okay, so the WMD document is like a Rorschach blot? And if I look at the black, redacted parts, and see, say, a Venus flytrap (not that I do!), that means I have unresolved erotic feelings toward my mother, right?
And while you’re at it…
Whoa, whoa, whoa there, Skippy. I am not your personal amanuensis. Take a number, I’ve got other customers who need fake documents too, you know.
…how about producing the other Iraq documents—the stuff from Saddam’s files—that you promised to give us? We haven’t seen much of that of late, have we? I wonder why…
Oh, Mikey. Why don’t you ask your buddies in the Administration to give you a peek if you’re so anxious? Or better yet, just make ‘em up yourself. You’re good at that.
16 Responses to “Begin the Ledeen”
In 1975 when I was in 11th grade they dug a 500 lb bomb up from our football field. I lived in Germany. When I was 4 and in Germany the first time, my dad took me to work and showed me hand grenades and told me to run if I saw one.
A couple of German kids were killed by one.
A couple of German kids were killed by one.
high school football field. I didn’t own it .
Ledeen, don’t transurethral intelligence emit on my shoes and tell me it’s raining.
Your closing comment — Is Mike Leeden behind the times? The Bush Administration already publicized the “stuff from Saddam’s files”. Eighteen parts filler with one part vague and two parts misassociation. And spiced up to taste. (http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2006/04/13/document_dump/index_np.html)
[Concerning the media:]“The other branches of government should fight them with every weapon in their arsenal.”
Tell that to al Jazeera. The military “branch” of our government specifically targeted their offices in Baghdad, you know. Specifically and knowingly and deliberately. Targeted. Their offices. A word to the wise, NYT?
Ed
Tell that to al Jazeera. The military “branch” of our government specifically targeted their offices in Baghdad, you know. Specifically and knowingly and deliberately. Targeted. Their offices. A word to the wise, NYT?
Ed
You have to enjoy the pure green sight of people using their First Amendment freedoms to demand that others be stripped of theirs.
Oh, and, Scott, you’re a doll.
Oh, and, Scott, you’re a doll.
The next point is: Who leaks? The answer is, enemies of the president’s policies leak. His supporters don’t.
Sorry, I’m sticking with my theory that this program had outlived its usefulness (the terr’ists had figured out that they should stop using the banking system), so Bush/Cheney/Rove had it leaked (to everyone! NYT! LAT! WSJ! who else wants a leak?) just so that the publication of the story could be denounced as treason, to the delight of newly inspired angry-Republican voters.
Sorry, I’m sticking with my theory that this program had outlived its usefulness (the terr’ists had figured out that they should stop using the banking system), so Bush/Cheney/Rove had it leaked (to everyone! NYT! LAT! WSJ! who else wants a leak?) just so that the publication of the story could be denounced as treason, to the delight of newly inspired angry-Republican voters.
Pearl wrote for the Wall Street Journal. if for nothing else, that ought to make the Times even more brazen.
Now, get Johnny Apple’s head off, then maybe they’d back off…
Now, get Johnny Apple’s head off, then maybe they’d back off…
Knahmsayin?
Nome sane?
Nome sane?
1. I have had comments deleted for even hinting in jest that so-and-so should be killed. Why does Ledeen get a pass on calling for people to be beheaded? Maybe I’d like to see him beheaded. (Damn, now my comment’s going to be deleted.)
2. I can’t tell if Ledeen is joking or seriously deluded. Michael Ledeen, a man who apparently thinks Rick Santorum actually found something worth talking about, is what passes for an intellectual on the right. These are the people providing the guiding philosophies to the madmen who are running our country.
2. I can’t tell if Ledeen is joking or seriously deluded. Michael Ledeen, a man who apparently thinks Rick Santorum actually found something worth talking about, is what passes for an intellectual on the right. These are the people providing the guiding philosophies to the madmen who are running our country.
From what I understand there’s nothing remotely secret about this program. As usual the right wing is blowing smoke. Secondly,in a Nation blog posted at smirkingchimp William Greider, who has followed issues like this for years, states that the real scandal is what isn’t being done. Greider cites the views of an investigator named Jack Blum:
“The political influence of bankers tops all other sectors, I learned as a young reporter. Regardless of party or ideology, politicians seek their friendship. So the United States has created a truly bizarre banking code that legalizes–and keeps secret–vast flows of ill-gotten gains. For what purpose? Terrorist financing, yes, but that business is dwarfed by the drug trade profits, insider looting of corporations, offshore tax evasion, securities fraud, plain-vanilla fraud and other uses.
The American dollar is lingua fria for illegal commerce and Congress protects the sanctity of its privacy, even allows it the criminal proceeds to flow freely through government-chartered and regulated financial institutions.”
“… Blum knows the offshore outposts where US corporations and wealthy Americans dodge taxes or US regulatory laws. Congress could shut them tomorrow if it chose. Instead, it keeps elaborating new loopholes that enable the invention of exotic new tax shelters for tainted fortunes. The latest to flourish, he says, are shell corporations– freely chartered by states.”
From here:
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=26638&mode=nested&order=0
“The political influence of bankers tops all other sectors, I learned as a young reporter. Regardless of party or ideology, politicians seek their friendship. So the United States has created a truly bizarre banking code that legalizes–and keeps secret–vast flows of ill-gotten gains. For what purpose? Terrorist financing, yes, but that business is dwarfed by the drug trade profits, insider looting of corporations, offshore tax evasion, securities fraud, plain-vanilla fraud and other uses.
The American dollar is lingua fria for illegal commerce and Congress protects the sanctity of its privacy, even allows it the criminal proceeds to flow freely through government-chartered and regulated financial institutions.”
“… Blum knows the offshore outposts where US corporations and wealthy Americans dodge taxes or US regulatory laws. Congress could shut them tomorrow if it chose. Instead, it keeps elaborating new loopholes that enable the invention of exotic new tax shelters for tainted fortunes. The latest to flourish, he says, are shell corporations– freely chartered by states.”
From here:
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=26638&mode=nested&order=0
Declassify the WMD document now. We’ll tell you what it means.
Dun. Any conservative worth his salt could tell us what it means without waiting for declassification.
Dun. Any conservative worth his salt could tell us what it means without waiting for declassification.
Pearl was killed by ISI because he was getting far too close to some very uncomfortable facts. This episode in The War Against Terror has been fairly consistently under-reported and uninvestigated, not just Pearl but ISI in general really.
Nick Berg is another
Nick Berg is another
Don’t be silly. Scott. When the administration does it, it’s called selective declassification.
Someone should shove a sock in the mouth of this shrieking nincompoop, bind his hands tightly behind his back so that he cannot ever reach a keyboard, stuff him in the trunk of Ann Coulter’s car. Then, for good measure, the super-bass sound system in the car could blare a reading by Richard Dysart of the Constitution and Bill of Rights of the U.S. on an endless loop.
Chimpy bragged about monitoring the financial transactions of Al-Qaeda a couple of years ago and now he’s sounding the alarm that they just found out about it from the NYT? And don’t the terrorists also read the Wall Street Journal? Why no whooping pogrom for them? The GOoPer base must really be thick to fall for this con.
No comments:
Post a Comment