In my previous post on WikiLeaks, a commenter included a link to this Salon article by Glenn Greenwald defending WikiLeaks' actions as good and even necessary. The article is very long and I can't respond point-by-point to everything in the article, but I wanted to respond to some of the major claims made in the article, which are similar to some other comments that I have heard in conversations on the topic.
Key to everything Greenwald writes is his claim that "those who expose secrets are far more hated than those in power who commit heinous acts using secrecy as their principal weapon." Now, the question is, what exactly are these "heinous acts" that Greenwald refers to? He doesn't explicitly define them, but one can hazard a pretty good guess about what he means by reading the entire article. He clearly considers the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to be in this category -- later in the article he goes so far as to include a "superb" quote that claims the U.S. "lie[d] blatantly to the entire world in order to invade a country it has long wanted to invade." This is completely false, of course -- Bush relied on U.S. and foreign intelligence agencies in determining that Iraq had WMD's, and nearly everyone else in Congress with access to that intelligence believed the same thing. The war was definitely based on faulty intelligence, but that is very different from claiming that Bush lied or misled the public into a war, a claim for which there is zero evidence. It is also fairly clear that Greenwald considers pretty much all of our country's tactics in the War on Terror, from wiretapping to enhanced interrogations to military tribunals to drone attacks against terrorists, to be "heinous acts."
This is an extremely important point to understand about Greenwald's argument. He not only does not support an aggressive prosecution of the War on Terror, but he actually thinks the U.S. has committed war crimes and deliberate murders of innocent civilians. Therefore, he believes the leaking of classified documents by WikiLeaks is justified because it exposes these crimes by our government. He believes the U.S. government is committing heinous crimes and therefore must be exposed, thwarted, and opposed in whatever way possible. Now, whether my readers agree or disagree with this, I don't see how there can be any debate that it is a deeply anti-American position. It assumes the U.S. is to blame for most of the problems in the world, and therefore cheers an organization that exists for the sole purpose of embarrassing its leaders and jeopardizing its international missions.
I couldn't be more passionately opposed to such a view. I believe our government has become sadly incompetent and corrupt in many ways, but I do not believe for a moment that the U.S. has committed heinous crimes on the international scene. Supposedly, according to Greenwald, WikiLeaks is shining a spotlight on these heinous crimes, but he provides not one example of a heinous crime committed by the U.S. government in any of these thousands of leaked documents. That is because the documents do not expose wrongdoing by the U.S. government. They do not reveal heinous crimes. It would be one thing if Assange were leaking a couple of specific documents that reveal crimes perpetrated or covered up by our government. That, in my opinion, would be justified. Instead, Assange is indiscriminately leaking thousands of classified documents, none of which expose crimes but all of which compromise our government's position in some way on the international scene. Assange is not a whistle-blower; he is an anti-American troublemaker. This provides an answer for the question that seems to puzzle Greenwald -- the question as to why so many liberals as well as conservatives have condemned WikiLeaks so harshly. The answer is simple: liberals as well as conservatives love our country and want to see it succeed and prosper.
What Greenwald doesn't seem to understand (or care about) is that our country is at war. There is an organization out there called Al Qaeda that wants to kill as many Americans as possible. Al Qaeda is supported and aided by many other radical organizations and national governments around the world. It has been a long time since 9/11, but several recent terrorist attacks and narrow escapes should remind us that this war is still very real. Because our enemies transcend national borders and operate with deception and secrecy, we cannot wage a conventional war against them. We also have to operate with deception and secrecy to track them down and destroy them. We have to take proactive measures such as enhanced interrogations to determine their plans before they strike and kill thousands of civilians. And of course, there is the little fact that we have hundreds of thousands of troops on the ground in countries like Afghanistan and Iraq. Classified documents are classified to protect their lives and the lives of foreign individuals and governments who are cooperating with and helping them. When that classified information is released indiscriminately, the lives of our military men and women are endangered and their mission is threatened. Leaking classified information is always dangerous, but especially so during wartime. Perhaps Greenwald doesn't think the wars are just, but is that any reason to put the lives of our troops in danger? They are just following orders and putting their lives on the line to defend us. Must they be sacrificed as collateral damage so Assange and Greenwald can get their kicks from embarrassing the U.S. government?
Greenwald's attitude is sadly typical of a sizable group of liberals and libertarians who think they are being patriotic when in fact they oppose our country at every turn. I am proud of our country and the fact that we have stood and continue to stand on the side of freedom and democracy around the globe while opposing tyranny and aggression (admittedly, this is becoming less and less of the case under Obama). You can argue about whether not the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were worth the cost or whether they made us safer, but you can't argue about the fact that we rescued millions of Muslims from two of the most evil, repressive regimes in the world -- Saddam Hussein and the Taliban. After taking control of Iraq, we worked to create a stable government and transition to local rule instead of exploiting it for personal gain. When we entered Iraq, we were welcomed as liberators, and the Iraqi people willingly tried Hussein for war crimes and executed him. We rescued Kuwaiti Muslims from Iraqi invasion, and Bosnian Muslims from Serbian brutality. We saved Grenada, South Korea, and most of Europe from the evil of Communism. We have spoken out against human rights abuses around the world, stopped genocide in Rwanda, fought the AIDS epidemic in Africa, and stood in solidarity with dissidents in China and Iran. Not every action we have taken internationally has been successful or turned out the way we wanted (think Vietnam War), but I would challenge Greenwald to point out even one example where our intention was not clearly to protect the security of our country and our allies and to promote freedom and democracy. Our international involvement for the past century has meant nothing but good to the world. When our country fails in its international missions and goals, democracy is set back and terrorists and dictators everywhere are emboldened. If we fail in Afghanistan, who wins? The Taliban and the terrorist organizations they support. If we fail to kill terrorist leaders and dismantle terrorist organizations around the world, then the lives of millions of Americans are endangered. Our country is at war, and Greenwald apparently is not on our side.
Some of Greenwald's points are just laughable. For example, he ridicules Wolf Blitzer of CNN for making the obviously correct point that the government should take swift action to keep our national secrets secure. The fact that Greenwald thinks its an outrage for journalists to call on the U.S. government to guard important national security secrets more closely shows just how radically anti-American he is. Sorry, but in wartime every government has the obvious right to keep certain information secret, and if you don't believe that you are either too clueless to be writing a national column or you are actively rooting for our country's military to be defeated. To attack journalists for taking steps to protect sensitive information that could endanger the lives of our troops or our allies is really rather shocking to me. If the New York Times is too hawkish and pro-military for Greenwald, then he truly is delusional. The fact is, even an organization as deeply distrustful of the U.S. military as the Times still has enough moral decency and respect for our troops and our country to not blab every national security secret willy-nilly. The American media has an ethical responsibility to not endanger our troops overseas or to unnecessarily oppose our country's legitimate international objectives. They take that responsibility far less seriously today than they have for most of our country's history, but apparently the fact that they have any moral qualms whatsoever about actively rooting against our country's wartime interests is upsetting to some people.
That doesn't mean that EVERYTHING Greenwald writes is off base. He is right that Assange cannot be tried for treason, as he is not an American citizen. However, the army private that stole the documents for our government IS an American, and he can be tried for treason. He also makes a good point that the U.S. government needs to be very careful about assassinating supposed enemies without due process, including Assange, and that we as conservatives should be careful to be responsible and thoughtful in our comments about the government "eradicating" people we don't like. But overall, I think Greenwald is deeply misguided and is supporting an organization that is deeply hostile and dangerous to U.S. interests.
Showing posts with label anti-Americanism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label anti-Americanism. Show all posts
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Thoughts on WikiLeaks
Once again, WikiLeaks is back in the news. You know, the organization that specializes in leaking stolen classified documents to a eagerly complicit press, endangering the lives of thousands of Americans and American allies.
On the Washington Post website, Marc Thiessen blasts the Obama Justice Department for taking no action to shut down WikiLeaks and prosecute its founder Julian Assange. I guess they're too busy suing Arizona for enforcing federal immigration law to bother with threats to our national security.
Over at National Review, Andrew McCarthy notes the irresponsibility of The New York Times and other media sources and also addresses the constitutional questions of free speech and the "right to know."
Also at National Review, Rich Lowry notes the raw anti-Americanism of WikiLeaks and discusses how Obama's election has done nothing to appease these America-haters, contrary to fashionable liberal opinion.
Peter Wehner from Commentary Magazine's Contentions blog notes that the confidential, private conversations of Arab leaders leaked in these documents demonstrates that most of them recognize the grave threat that Iran poses to the world -- a threat that cannot be defeated through appeasement. It's a sad day when the Arab world is more hawkish against Iran than much of the American left (and the current administration).
And then of course there are the liberals, who simply can't seem to get too upset over these leaks, no matter how many lives are endangered or no matter how much our international relations are damaged, as long as our efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan are hindered and Bush is made to look bad. Enter Richard Cohen of the Washington Post, who manages to allow that he doesn't "much like" what WikiLeaks has done before spending the rest of the column exulting in how the leaks supposedly embarrass Bush and make the war in Iraq look bad. It's hard to avoid the conclusion that liberals like Cohen are happy to see America embarrassed and defeated for the sake of their ideology.
Assange and the Army private responsible for leaking many of these documents, Bradley Manning, should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. I don't even think the death penalty is too extreme, given the fact that these treasonous leaks have (and will) doubtless cost American lives. Also, the Justice Department should determine how these leaks were able to happen in the first place. Whoever was responsible for the lax security of such important confidential documents should lose their job, and new measures should be put in place to prevent this from happening in the future. Our government must send a clear message that such leaks will not be tolerated, if we expect other countries to trust us and continue to cooperate with us in the future.
On the Washington Post website, Marc Thiessen blasts the Obama Justice Department for taking no action to shut down WikiLeaks and prosecute its founder Julian Assange. I guess they're too busy suing Arizona for enforcing federal immigration law to bother with threats to our national security.
Over at National Review, Andrew McCarthy notes the irresponsibility of The New York Times and other media sources and also addresses the constitutional questions of free speech and the "right to know."
Also at National Review, Rich Lowry notes the raw anti-Americanism of WikiLeaks and discusses how Obama's election has done nothing to appease these America-haters, contrary to fashionable liberal opinion.
Peter Wehner from Commentary Magazine's Contentions blog notes that the confidential, private conversations of Arab leaders leaked in these documents demonstrates that most of them recognize the grave threat that Iran poses to the world -- a threat that cannot be defeated through appeasement. It's a sad day when the Arab world is more hawkish against Iran than much of the American left (and the current administration).
And then of course there are the liberals, who simply can't seem to get too upset over these leaks, no matter how many lives are endangered or no matter how much our international relations are damaged, as long as our efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan are hindered and Bush is made to look bad. Enter Richard Cohen of the Washington Post, who manages to allow that he doesn't "much like" what WikiLeaks has done before spending the rest of the column exulting in how the leaks supposedly embarrass Bush and make the war in Iraq look bad. It's hard to avoid the conclusion that liberals like Cohen are happy to see America embarrassed and defeated for the sake of their ideology.
Assange and the Army private responsible for leaking many of these documents, Bradley Manning, should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. I don't even think the death penalty is too extreme, given the fact that these treasonous leaks have (and will) doubtless cost American lives. Also, the Justice Department should determine how these leaks were able to happen in the first place. Whoever was responsible for the lax security of such important confidential documents should lose their job, and new measures should be put in place to prevent this from happening in the future. Our government must send a clear message that such leaks will not be tolerated, if we expect other countries to trust us and continue to cooperate with us in the future.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Tell me now, why is this bill "controversial"?
The intertubes are all abuzz with another "controversial" bill passed by the Arizona legislature. ("Controversial" has come to mean, simply, "offensive to the Left".) This bill, if passed into law, would prohibit courses in public schools which...
I have a few reservations about the other recent bill, but I wholeheartedly support this one. It is not the job of a teacher to pontificate on his anti-American political views to a captive audience of impressionable young students. Public schools should also emphasize our common heritage as Americans rather than pitting one racial or ethnic group against another.
- Promote the overthrow of the United States government.
- Promote resentment toward a race or class of people.
- Are designed primarily for pupils of a particular ethnic group.
- Advocate ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of pupils as individuals.
I have a few reservations about the other recent bill, but I wholeheartedly support this one. It is not the job of a teacher to pontificate on his anti-American political views to a captive audience of impressionable young students. Public schools should also emphasize our common heritage as Americans rather than pitting one racial or ethnic group against another.
Friday, March 26, 2010
Seeing Red
This article from Fox News made me see red.
This is a new low for the American presidency. Our idiotic president invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the White House for a meeting. When Netanyahu refused to let Obama tell him how to run his country and did not agree to stop building settlements in his own capital of Jerusalem, Obama WALKED OUT on Netanyahu in the middle of the meeting to have dinner in private. He said Netanyahu could stay in the White House and let him know "if there is anything new."
What kind of way is this to treat a supposed friend and ally? Netanyahu is snuck in the back door of the White House, with no photographers permitted, and is left hanging when the U.S. president walks out of the meeting. As one Israeli newspaper put it, the Israeli prime minister received "the treatment reserved for the President of Equatorial Guinea." This is a public humiliation of the only democracy in the Middle East and our only reliable ally on the War on Terror in that region of the world. Israel exists in an increasingly anti-semitic world and is surrounded by enemies whose stated goal is to wipe her out of existence. One of those enemies, Iran, is developing nuclear weapons. Europe despises Israel. We are their only real ally in the world. And now our president, who can't even bring himself to use tough rhetoric (much less tough action) against terrorist-sponsoring, election-rigging, dissident-murdering Iran, goes ballistic against Israel over a lousy building development.
This behavior is worse than just childish and petty (although it certainly is that). This tells me where Obama's real sympathies lie. And they are not with our country's democratic values. How many times does Obama have to suck up to anti-American dictatorships and terrorist-sympathizing Muslim states while publicly snubbing democratic allies before we realize that he doesn't share our country's values? He bends over backwards to accommodate our enemies but gives the back of the hand to our friends. Hugo Chavez is Obama's amigo but Netanyahu can't even get the normal respect given to any overseas visitor, much less a friend's welcome? Iran and North Korea and Russia get whatever concessions they want out of Obama. He agitated to get the socialist president of Honduras reinstated (he was deposed for openly violating the country's constitution). At the same time, in one year in office he has succeeded in angering England, France, Germany, Japan, and most of Eastern Europe. He has filled his Justice Department with attorneys who have spent their lives defending and apologizing for terrorists. And it shouldn't come as a surprise to any of us, because this guy sat under the preaching of "Reverend" Jeremiah Wright for 20 years. You know, the preacher who said "God damn America" and said that our country deserved 9/11 and that our government deliberately injected inner-city blacks with the AIDS virus. Obama counted terrorists like Bill Ayers among his friends and associates in Chicago. And now we're surprised because his foreign policy is anti-American and he is destroying decades-old alliances and friendships? His entire view of the world is upside down and backwards because his mind has been poisoned his whole life by anti-American friends and mentors.
Every time I hear about Obama's latest outrage, I keep thinking that it can't get worse. And then it does.
This is a new low for the American presidency. Our idiotic president invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the White House for a meeting. When Netanyahu refused to let Obama tell him how to run his country and did not agree to stop building settlements in his own capital of Jerusalem, Obama WALKED OUT on Netanyahu in the middle of the meeting to have dinner in private. He said Netanyahu could stay in the White House and let him know "if there is anything new."
What kind of way is this to treat a supposed friend and ally? Netanyahu is snuck in the back door of the White House, with no photographers permitted, and is left hanging when the U.S. president walks out of the meeting. As one Israeli newspaper put it, the Israeli prime minister received "the treatment reserved for the President of Equatorial Guinea." This is a public humiliation of the only democracy in the Middle East and our only reliable ally on the War on Terror in that region of the world. Israel exists in an increasingly anti-semitic world and is surrounded by enemies whose stated goal is to wipe her out of existence. One of those enemies, Iran, is developing nuclear weapons. Europe despises Israel. We are their only real ally in the world. And now our president, who can't even bring himself to use tough rhetoric (much less tough action) against terrorist-sponsoring, election-rigging, dissident-murdering Iran, goes ballistic against Israel over a lousy building development.
This behavior is worse than just childish and petty (although it certainly is that). This tells me where Obama's real sympathies lie. And they are not with our country's democratic values. How many times does Obama have to suck up to anti-American dictatorships and terrorist-sympathizing Muslim states while publicly snubbing democratic allies before we realize that he doesn't share our country's values? He bends over backwards to accommodate our enemies but gives the back of the hand to our friends. Hugo Chavez is Obama's amigo but Netanyahu can't even get the normal respect given to any overseas visitor, much less a friend's welcome? Iran and North Korea and Russia get whatever concessions they want out of Obama. He agitated to get the socialist president of Honduras reinstated (he was deposed for openly violating the country's constitution). At the same time, in one year in office he has succeeded in angering England, France, Germany, Japan, and most of Eastern Europe. He has filled his Justice Department with attorneys who have spent their lives defending and apologizing for terrorists. And it shouldn't come as a surprise to any of us, because this guy sat under the preaching of "Reverend" Jeremiah Wright for 20 years. You know, the preacher who said "God damn America" and said that our country deserved 9/11 and that our government deliberately injected inner-city blacks with the AIDS virus. Obama counted terrorists like Bill Ayers among his friends and associates in Chicago. And now we're surprised because his foreign policy is anti-American and he is destroying decades-old alliances and friendships? His entire view of the world is upside down and backwards because his mind has been poisoned his whole life by anti-American friends and mentors.
Every time I hear about Obama's latest outrage, I keep thinking that it can't get worse. And then it does.
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