The Treason Card
Friday, July 7th, 2006 by RLRFrom The NY Times
By Paul Krugman
The nature of the right-wing attack on The New York Times — an attack not on the newspaper’s judgment, but on its motives — seems to have startled many people in the news media. After an editorial in The Wall Street Journal declared that The Times has what amount to treasonous intentions — that it “has as a major goal not winning the war on terror but obstructing it” — The Journal’s own political editor pronounced himself “shocked,” saying that “I don’t know anybody on the news staff of The Wall Street Journal that believes that.”
But anyone who was genuinely shocked by The Journal’s willingness to play the treason card must not have been paying attention these past five years.
Over the last few months a series of revelations have confirmed what should have been obvious a long time ago: the Bush administration and the movement it leads have been engaged in an authoritarian project, an effort to remove all the checks and balances that have heretofore constrained the executive branch.
Much of this project involves the assertion of unprecedented executive authority — the right to imprison people indefinitely without charges (and torture them if the administration feels like it), the right to wiretap American citizens without court authorization, the right to declare, when signing laws passed by Congress, that the laws don’t really mean what they say.
But an almost equally important aspect of the project has been the attempt to create a political environment in which nobody dares to criticize the administration or reveal inconvenient facts about its actions. And that attempt has relied, from the beginning, on ascribing treasonous motives to those who refuse to toe the line. As far back as 2002, Rush Limbaugh, in words very close to those used by The Wall Street Journal last week, accused Tom Daschle, then the Senate majority leader, of a partisan “attempt to sabotage the war on terrorism.”
Those of us who tried to call attention to this authoritarian project years ago have long marveled over the reluctance of many of our colleagues to acknowledge what was going on. For example, for a long time many people in the mainstream media applied a peculiar double standard to political speech, denouncing perfectly normal if forceful political rhetoric from the left as poisonous “Bush hatred,” while chuckling indulgently over venom from the right. (That Ann Coulter, she’s such a kidder.)
But now the chuckling has stopped: somehow, nobody seems to find calls to send Bill Keller to the gas chamber funny. And while the White House clearly believes that attacking The Times is a winning political move, it doesn’t have to turn out that way — not if enough people realize what’s at stake.
For I think that most Americans still believe in the principle that the president isn’t a king, that he isn’t entitled to operate without checks and balances. And President Bush is especially unworthy of our trust, because on every front — from his refusal to protect chemical plants to his officials’ exposure of Valerie Plame, from his toleration of war profiteering to his decision to place the C.I.A. in the hands of an incompetent crony — he has consistently played politics with national security.
And he has done so with the approval and encouragement of the same people now attacking The New York Times for its alleged lack of patriotism.
Does anyone remember the editorial that The Wall Street Journal published on Sept. 19, 2001? “So much for Florida,” the editorial began, celebrating the way the terrorist attack had pushed aside concerns over the legitimacy of the Supreme Court decision that installed Mr. Bush in the White House. The Journal then warned Mr. Bush not to give in to the “temptation” to “subjugate everything else to the priority of getting bipartisan support for the war on terrorism.” Instead, it urged him to use the “political capital” generated by the atrocity to push through tax cuts and right-wing judicial appointments.
Things have changed since then: Mr. Bush’s ability to wrap his power grab in the flag has diminished now that most Americans no longer consider him either competent or honest. But the administration and its supporters still believe that they can win political battles by impugning the patriotism of those who won’t go along.
For the sake of our country, let’s hope that they’re wrong.
and jonathan pollard? not a traitor? the protection of your homeland is not the business of america. you, pal, are the real traitor.
as they say, “the truth hurts”. spin it any way you want, the NYT has done everything in its’ power to obsrtuct the war on terror.you are overwhelmingly staffed by left-wing blame america first 5th columnists. stop hiding behind the 1st amendments and openly declare yourselves as agents of a foreign power. you may as well be since everything you print favors our enemies. i never buy your rag and i never read it.
Mr. Paul Krugman: Sir, you are a namby pamby wimp, and so is all the media. 911 was an inside job, and you refuse to confront the murderers. The USA is on the verge of downfall, wake up. Kirk Miller
Funny how you complain about abusive goverment, yet at the same time fail to grasp your grade school history lessons. Next week liberals will be telling us we need gun control, talk about trampling on human and civil rights.
I’m reminded of the speech that President John Kennedy gave to the press association, asking them to be responsible stewards of information in an age where free societies where at a disadvantage to more secretive, totalitarian societies when it came to protecting the national security. Too bad those stewards have long passed their torches to such muck wrestlers as we have at the NY Times and folks like Rupert Murdoch have destroyed much more than ethics and standards, they’ve destroyed a pillar in the house of free societies.
I completely agree with Kirk Miller.
Between the:
1. $8 trillion deficit, devaluation of our dollar.
2. The massive illegal alien problem-despite the 9/11-Terrorism blather
Between all this, I fear we are going to wind up the way of Zimbabwe. All because of denial & cover-up.
I’m the one who you said wasn’t “fit to print”..and I don’t care if you still feel that way-there was once upon a time that would have bothered me, now, no more…(However), since you are the professional journalist and I am not, you could have certainly…cleaned up what I wrote & presented it to the audience, but you did not choose to do that.
I’m afraid we’re being taken down intentionally from within and the NYT (and other MainStream Medisa have continuously refused to address this).
What other way can people be truly informed and make the correct decisions?
Instead, Mainstream Media behaves much like they did under both Hitler & Stalin & looked at the tragedy that was the result.
It seems also as a result, America is basically dumbed down and seem to care far more about shows such as Suvivor or where Britney Spears is going to have her baby.
A dictator is a dictator; be he of the Left or the Right. Why do some of Bush’s defenders come off actually supporting by their defense of his tactics, the vivid overthrow of Constitutional goverment? Fascism or Socialism? Neither is a traditional American trait and neither is the “divine right of kings”.
To the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Anyone who undermines these is a traitor..period.
America is a whore.
She is now trying to seduce Prime Minister Harper, and with the help of a highly selected media circle that has hi-jacked our own information networks, are starting to try and con Canadians that we are in this together. Brothers in arms. Perhaps Bush is just testing the waters again, but we aren’t that stupid. Like Andy Rooney proved to us a couple of weeks ago with his warning from former President Eisenhower, regarding the military industry taking over America, “That’s just what’s happened.”
The overwhelming proof that 911 was indeed allowed to take place, government corruption, agent’s posing and setting up people to be the fall guy’s. As you know isn’t at all unusual. So where were you all? Sitting in a corner trying to figure out your credit card bills? Oh well!
The last time Bush visited Canada , the only thing he said that was worth remembering was when he used the phrase “New World Order,” in his final sentence before leaving for Washington.
What does ‘NWO’ mean anyway?
I want to know, do most journalist’s have any morale conscience or feeling that they have betrayed the people. Who are more important, the taz payer or the tax taker? And when a writer falls out of favor with big brother, will anyone be willing to catch you? You never-ever mention those who fronted this false war on people and NEVER remind us about the neo-conservatives power grab and the man who was rewarded with a sweet job at the world bank, Mr. Paul Wolfowitz.
“We are grateful to the Washington Post, The New York Times, Time Magazine and other great publications whose directors of ‘discretion’ for almost forty years…It would have been impossible for us to develope our plan for the world if we had been subjected to the lights of publicity during those years. But, the world is now more sophisticated and prepared to march towards a world government. The supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national auto-determination practiced in past centuries.”
DAVID ROCKEFELLER-Bilderberg Meeting-June1991,Germany.
Oh! That’s why.
So paul, whatever your intentions are now, it’s just tool late. You all created and fed this beast of burden and we and our children can only wait for it to burns itself out. And when you can no longer carry it today, it will simply eat you where you stand.
Billy
Billy Geier, you are soooo right.
America is a whore!
Let’s see, so called conservatives (I care about fetuses, but let’s poison them for virtually ever with radiation from depleted uranium ammo yea! BUT -I care about fetuses!!) who sound more like Nazi’s (your a traitor!!!!!!) Democrats that sound more like Communists. What a political system. SOME FREEDOM, UH, YOU MORONS!
Billy, your right. WE WILL JUST HAVE TO WAIT FOR THEM TO “BURN OUT”. Their performance now is quickly hastening that day’s arrival.
To most of my fellow MORONIC AMERICANS — go screw yourself if you don’t like my opinion.
Roxan, I had to laugh — your comments are full of grammatical mistakes and sloppy thinking, and you conclude by bemoaning the dumbing down of America. I’m afraid you’re Exhibit A on that score.
I agree that 9-11 was an inside job. I also agree that Israel is the 800-pound elephant in the room that no one including Krugman is willing to talk about. But on the narrow point that he raises, he is certainly right, as he almost always is.
Treason and a few other offenses including violation of the 1st Amendment by caging protestors and pressuring book outlets to ban the book “America Deceived” by E.A. Blayre III, violation of the 4th Amendment by wire-tapping every call without a warrant and violation of the entire Constitution by participating in a false-flag operation known as 9/11.
Support indy media.
Last link (before Google Books gets a call from the gestapo):
http://www.iuniverse.com/bookstore/book_detail.asp?&isbn=0-595-38523-0
First of all 9-11 definitely was allowed to occur by this craphole non-elected (twice)administration….no doubt!
Second the last writer was right on in mentioning Israel as the root of a lot of world misery and they should never have the influence on this country and our politicians that they do, it’s pathetic.
Third the hypocrisy of this administration in regards to who may or may not develope nuclear weapons for a deterrent against the U.S. makes me ill.
Fourth the war in Iraq was about only one thing….OIL and establishing U.S. dominance of the entire Middle East (better us than China b.s.) China could take over this country without firing a shot…hell they own half of it already.
I always thought when I was younger and foolish that the longer this world went on the more understanding and tolerant it would become. Instead money rules EVERYTHING and killing is the norm….well might doesn’t make right and I’m afraid there is no turning back…we will never be a peaceful planet and we all might as well get used to that sickening fact….The New World Order (industrial/military complex) will only be the super rich (Windsor’s Rothschild’s and whoever the Chinese super power broker’s are)They make sure there is constant war somewhere in the world at ALL times….That is truly their plan…. The Bush criminal family are still small players as far as the super rich go but they will have their wealth and place in the NWO…normal people will just grovel for mercy and scraps from the rich one’s dinner plates. I am not a religious man by any means but I hope there truly is an Armeggedon some day and the rich fucks who screw everyone else for their own benefit get what they deserve…..The older I get the farther away my vision of the American Ideal fades away….what a shame
Ref:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig7/fassanella1.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul331.html
I am Angry too.
I thank the New York Times for its patriotism. Treason is what they are exposing.
As Congressman Ron Paul says:
“Today patriotism has come to mean blind support for the government and its policies. In earlier times patriotism meant having the willingness and courage to challenge government polices regardless of popular perceptions.”
“Remember, the original American patriots challenged the abuses of King Geroge, and wrote and carried out the Declaration of Independence.”
Thank the New York Times, the rest of the major media our just wimps.
A Patriotic American
There is no war on terror.
There is only state terrorism of the fascist Bush administration.
Impeach all fascists who would destroy this country over fake terror incidents they themselves perpetrated. Bush stood down on 9-11. NORAD did nothing.
However, there is such a thing as treason. Mix that with mass murder. Add two illegal pre-emptive wars without Congressional authorization.
And what do you got?
It’s name is George W. Bush.
“Of course the people don’t want war. But after all, it’s the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it’s a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger.”
– Herman Goering at the Nuremberg trials
George Bush is a wicked, wicked man. I say this from the point of view of a pro-environment paleoconservative, not as a NYT liberal. He is bringing us close to facism, all in the name of “protecting our freedoms”. Let us assume that the standard story about 911 is correct (despite its gaping holes, like the collapse of WTC 7, which not even the 911 Commission made any attempt to explain). The fact remains that Al Qeada didn’t attack us because they “hate our freedoms” (which they don’t care a flying fig about), but because of:
1. Our sanctions against Iraq (now, of course, an occupation that is leading to civil war).
2. Our keeping our military forces in Saudi Arabia, long after Gulf War I ended.
3. Our one sided support of Israel, despite its decades long illegal occupation of the West Bank.
Even if one believes we should be doing all of the above, the opposition to such policies is a far cry from “hating our freedoms”. No empire is ever loved by the citizens of its vassal states.
The first casualty of war is the truth, which the Bush administration has demonstrated time and time again.
Other reasons to despise George Bush:
1. His virulently anti-environment policies.
2. His monstrous fiscal irresponsibility. Even aside from the hundreds of billions squandered on the Iraq war, he has overseen and advocated the biggest increases in domestic spending and new entitlement programs since the Johnson administration. Neither he nor Cheney is at all concerned about our out of control budget deficit.
3. His advocacy of illegal immigration and mass immigration, and of displacing every American from his job with cheap third world labor. Of course the NYT and the rest of the mainstream media is on the same page as Bush on this issue.
Maybe the NY Times realizes as a lot of us do that there is no war on terror! If there were a real war on terror the dictator in charge would have closed the borders. Anyone who has an ounce of sense would realize what is really going on after reading the stories of the OTM’s (other than Mexicans) coming across our border nightly. The fact that the Times publishes info to reinforce others beliefs that Bush is starting a police state is certainly not the greatest of our problems.
BTW, I have no respect for the NY Times because of a guy named Walter Durante who reported in the 1930’s that Stalin was a good guy while he was murdering millions of Russians.
America is the new Russia…but with a Nazi twist. As a Canadian, I’ve always thought of my southern neighbours as brothers. Now, I feel pain for the American population, because they’re stuck in a very precarious situation. They’re vulnerable from the outside AND the inside. I can’t imagine what it must be like to be governed by such a group of rotten politicians and being lied to so much about pretty much everything. The Bush administration exists in a weird surreality that none of us can begin to understand. They lie like they breathe, straight to our faces, and the scary thing is, you can tell they totally convinced themselves of the bullshit they’re spouting! Do they really think we’re THAT dumb?! Do they really think we can’t see right through their bullshit?? I think one of Bush’s worst crimes is the damage he’s doing to America. The entire world is mad as hell at the US for all they’ve set in motion since 9/11. But the invasion of Iraq is something for which I will never forgive the US government. Maybe Americans are my neighbours, but now I know how dangerous and treacherous they can be. I am so incredibly disappointed in their hypocrisy. They say they’re bringing democracy and freedom to Iraq. Man, they don’t even HAVE those things to give. They like to say that America is a shiny city on a hill. Well, NO IT’S NOT. It’s a fucking mirage. Bullshit. You lie, you steal, you kill and you lie some more. That’s all America ever does, now. Terror? That’s bullshit too. If the US foreign policies of the last 60 years hadn’t been messing with Middle Eastern governments (illegal arms sales to rebel groups, assassinations, coups etc etc), maybe those people wouldn’t hate America so much. But of course, we all know the US would kiss anybody’s ass for a lick of oil. And what about that Israel lobby in America? Wtf is that relationship all about?
Well, food for thought. I wish my American brethren much luck. And I hope all this makes them realize how profoundly fucked up their voting system is. I’d get that fixed pronto, if I were them.
Now that the Supreme Court has found Bush&Co. guilty of overstepping their legal bounds, it’s time for war trials to begin.
If we can’t get the Department of Justice to prosecute Bush for war crimes, then let some of us hope over to Germany or Belgium or Holland or some country that remembers Nazism; and let the legal manipulations begin, to rid ourselves of this unwanted, unelected, inarticulate, stumbling, bumbling pest of a pResident.
It’s long past time to get him and the rest of his mercenary family out of any and all leadership roles. They’re just too predatory. It’s not appropriate for all these skulking, two-faced, double-dealing, low-down corporate foxes to be guarding the chickenhouse and squandering everything our people are and have.
Out out out out out out!!
Neither the WSJ nor the NYT deserve to be called news outlets. Both indulge in government propoganda. It can be seen that virtually everybody who has posted before me is a avowed Facsist. I am so glad that I do not live in your soon collapse nation.
The best thing that can be said for being an Aussie these days, since we have sold our soul by being the little bitch of the USA in its illegal war of terror against innocent Iraq and Afghanistan, is that “At least we are not AMERICANS!”
Of course Krugman’s a traitor, he’s a Jew isn’t he?
I see alot of empty , stone-cold souless eye’s around government today. And shame hidden behind the smiles of a few news anchors as of late. They who cock their heads and lift their eyebrows, shift their eye’s and laugh on cue. Look at the ticker and read off what someone else wrote and between every word they utter they must know it’s just a scam. How can they not? They hear it from the people on the street and on the web and [lightly] speak of it in the elevator. Only pure fear, keeps some of them from developing a well enough conscience of right and wrong and would rather live a very loud lie. Let that little whisper of common sense poke through too many times and you risk insanity.
Dave Chappel pretty much summed it up for Anderson Cooper. Describing those who run America and it’s stimulation networks, how they unsympatheticly view the general population. Which is kinda why he left the biz. “You’re a product before your a human being.” Simple as that.
I can almost picture these old, sub-human tiny terminators giggling over their inside jokes. Like everytime Arnold gets nearer the WhiteHouse , is probably one. He married a Kennedy, c’mon!
well, for the first time the NYT has decided to do their job. One would be led to believe after the Judith Miller fiasco that this paper was on its way out. Maybe it still is, after all they are still very responsible for their silence.
As far as traitors, it is those who support this regime in the Whorehouse who are the traitors. Some of you need to read the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and get your heads straight. We are headed toward a dictatorship! This regime must be removed for America to remain free and liberty to be ours.
The Jacobian and NWO Bushco have only the worst planned for America and they mean to implement their treasonous plans.
I wonder how Juden Miller’s book deal is coming? The news teams really went out of their way to make this traitor appear as a hero for the little people. Fighting evil government and seeking truth and justice when she’s nothing but a poster bitch for the neo-conservatives.
Our own media went AWOL on the Canadian people a long time ago, so there on the out’s too. For the last couple of years they’ve been trying to get us all to lose our own indentity and Canuck value’s for a more Americanization corporate mix, but it still ain’t taking. First off, we donot hate America, we just don’t want a full-out borgish , US corporate government style take-over. PM Harper attended a bilderberger in 2003 so it was a sure bet he was being lined up for the throne while the company selected party crew [who are total Bush backers] expect us to roll-over like stupid inbred dogs begging for meat cuts. Tens-of-thousands of Canadian passports have gone missing the last 4 years, fake custom made terrorists are getting busted on both sides of the border now, so it doesn’t take a genius to know they are gearing up again for another 7/7-911.
But Harper can kiss-off getting a majority in government if he thinks holding Bush’s hands is a good tactic for the next election run. Bush and Cheney are hated beyond anything in the history of politic’s anywhere on this planet.
Our former Prime Minister Chretien’s communication’s director called Bush a “moron” and Pat Buchanan replied with that kind of tone is proof, “Canadians are the spoiled brats of the new world order.” To this day, Pat is still a regular Canada-basher. So we have Neo-Consevatives in charge of America and Conservative Harper moving into our lives in Canada and now Mexicon Conservative Felipe in charge over the people.
This red state republican does not believe this president is good for America. The harm he has done this country will not be fixed in several generations. They are one sorry bunch in that white house.
Oh yes, I am a former Marine having served.. during the Korean (Police Action!)
I applaud the NYT’s for their stand on this total unecessary war, King George’s war.
HEY: dominick j perez
GO BACK TO MEXICO !!!!!
Nobody “hides behind the First Amendment.”
But those who know what the First Amendment is for — must use it to preserve it. They must join together and stand firm upon it, confident that in the light truths shine and lies whither — confident that while government uses and sometimes abuses the media, the media must also use and sometimes abuse the government — and firm in the conviction that those who use the media to promote themselves and their agendas among the public, must do so knowing they expose themselves to media and public scruitiny and criticism.
Our Constitution establishes our government of menials, employees to serve the people — us, we who pay for it. While words alone, our Bill of Rights, are all that insulates us as individual citizens from the awesome force those servants in our government can bring to bear on us, NOTHING written in that entire Constitution protects our government from the people.
Count news reporters among the people, for they have no special rights not granted to the people as a whole. They carry no weapons. They can arrest, imprison, or bring to justice no one. They cannot penetrate walls of secrecy around embarrassing facts or photographs.
Only our menials in the government can open chinks in those walls — and when the menials bring a lie or a truth into the light, it’s up to reporters to make the most of it. It may be the job of those menials in our government to hide secrets, and those who let the cats out of the bag may not be doing their jobs properly, but once the secret’s out, especially if it bears that embarrassment-hiding shield of “National Security,” it’s the news media’s job to decide if it’s news — and if it is news, to broadcast it wide, loud, and immediately — and to hell with what anybody in the government thinks.
Again we’re peering through the holes. Truth and lies are slowly emerging so we can see them. We discover again to our astonishment that politicians lie, and news reporters catch them.
So now, we are identifying the liars among our menials — those who think of us as stupid children — those who would rule us.
FEAR US, TYRANTS.
hey vicente fox!
i was born in nj to puerto rican and italian parents. i served my country with honor for 4 years. what have you done except be an ungrateful, whining little conspiracy nut?