We have been discussing the collapse of the American civil liberties movement and the attacks on the free press and privacy under the Obama Administration. As discussed in prior columns, we continue to refer to the United States as the “land of the free” despite a comprehensive reduction of civil liberties and due process in this country. The Snowden affair has put that record in sharp relief as the White House and Congress has joined together in barring the prosecution of perjury by high ranking officials and pursuing Snowden with close to unhinged rage. As previously discussed, our governing class has created a new American Animal farm. Long ago, American politicians adopted a type of dismissive paternalism toward the public as shepherds to so many sheep. Then one sheep goes and spooks the flock. The response has been bipartisan rage that has included demands to cut off aid to entire nations if they grant sanctuary to this whistleblower and even boycott the Olympics. The shepherds want Snowden made into mutton for stampeding the flock and no measure appears too extreme. Now Jimmy Carter has entered the fray and said what many citizens are saying in denouncing our duopoly. Carter told Spiegel “America has no functioning democracy.” Of course, you have to live in Germany to read such views.
Carter has rightfully pointed to the dramatic reduction of the United States as a moral authority in the world after Bush and Obama. He clearly views Edward Snowden as a whistleblower. Yet, the media has yielded to the demand of the White House that Snowden not be called a whistleblower. This is follows media allies who have attacked Snowden and even mocked his concern about coming back home. As for the refusal to call him a whistleblower, it seems part of the full court press to demonize Snowden or prevent favorable references to him. [It brings to mind the successful effort to convince media to call waterboarding “enhanced interrogation” in the media rather than “torture” as it has long been defined by courts] Snowden is a whistleblower in my mind. It is true that the Administration can argue that these programs were lawful to the Supreme Court’s precedent stripping pen registers of full constitutional protection in Smith v. Maryland, 442 U.S. 735 (1979). Many of us disagree with that ruling, but this is a new application of the precedent. While the government has long sought the information for individuals, the Administration is essentially issuing a national security letter against the entire population. Moreover, it does appear that violations have occurred in these programs.
Putting aside the legality issue, whistleblowers are defined more probably by public interest organizations. For example, The Government Accountability Project, a leading nonprofit handling whistleblowers, defines the term as “an employee who discloses information that s/he reasonably believes is evidence of illegality, gross waste or fraud, mismanagement, abuse of power, general wrongdoing, or a substantial and specific danger to public health and safety. Typically, whistleblowers speak out to parties that can influence and rectify the situation. These parties include the media, organizational managers, hotlines, or Congressional members/staff, to name a few.”
Snowden clearly fits that more common definition of whistleblower, even if the government contests the application of statutory protections. Many can legitimately question Snowden’s chosen means for objecting to this program. However, the hostile and dismissive treatment by the establishment reflects an obvious fear of the implications of this scandal. We saw the same full court press in defining Julien Assange in a way that avoids calling him a journalist or a whistleblower. He is just an Assange.
Carter’s voice at this moment is incredibly important. Most media has ignored such criticism of Obama and his authoritarian powers. Even the story on Carter has been given limited attention and only because smaller blogs have continued to spread the word. We are living in the greatest crisis of civil liberties in our history and the public is facing a unified front of all three branches against efforts to deal with erosion of the rights of citizens in this country. The question is whether the public will finally awaken to this peril. Carter’s courageous voice could not have been heard at a more critical time for this nation.
Well … hyperbole doesn’t usually work to persuade and it doesn’t here either with me. Carter is right that we are regressing on basic civil liberties and that needs to be shouted from the rooftops (and if the polls are any indication, it is working) but to suggest that we are even in the same dimension as Iran and North Korea does him no credit. We have plenty of problems with our democracy but saying it doesn’t exist simply adds fuel to those America-haters –home and abroad — who find everything we do as the source of evil in the world. Carter is an honorable person and one with a high degree of principle. The problem is that a leader needs those qualities tempered by the judgment to balance them against the nation’s interest in preserving itself. Those who would let the heavens fall so that principle might triumph never ran a nation state or stood for election. Jimmy Carter never learned that lesson and the results are obvious.
Duopoly! We ain’t got No Stinkin Duopoly!!,.. Why just yesterday Harry Reid put his Big Boy pants on and after 5 years of possing and vinigering He has a tentative deal to get an up and down vote for 7…er 5 of Obamas executive appointments.
WOW, one of Huff po headlines was “Mitch Slapped” ….as if a functioning Senate has to resort to threats to intimidate each other to pass consent on a Presidential appointment.
This is a Dysfunctioning Washington DC. Except the dysfunction seems to be lining the pockets and future pockets of the exceedingly rich.
Methinks the dysfunction is well-guided and most profitable to a select few.
It seems this thread is derailing.
. Not sure how the issue of conflating the US with N.Korea/Iran got into the conversation. It isnt part of the original statement or post as far as I can tell..
. The point about Gates et al, seeking to reduce the population (euphemism for kill? genocide?) is quite far from the discussion of the core proposition whether America has a functioning democracy. Besides being fatuous on the face of it. (Some solid evidence/documentation is in order if you’re going to toss out that level of accusation.)
. and etc…
I think, or thought, there was a valid conversation to be had about this question/assertion: Does America has a functioning democracy? It certainly is germane to current events. I hope we can return this discussion to this point.
Elaine:
And your point is? A westernized semi-dictator for a vicious 8th century barbarian dictarship isnt even a toss up.
You and Bush wanting to spread democracy all over the globe. 🙂
Anonymous 1, July 18, 2013 at 2:10 pm
“We didn’t love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation…. We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.” -Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Let’s hope that we “love freedom enough.”
=================================
Very true.
But it is not that we love it enough.
It is that we do not have an adequate idea about what it is and is not.
We think it is a commodity delivered by the military.
I’m fine with that.
Gene,
I’ve stated my case and you have stated yours. I will let my words stand as is. Any further comments I make are strictly on what Carter said. That is what I care about and that is what I will comment on.
Back to the original proposition : The US has no functioning Democracy.
This is a point in favor of the proposition.
———-
“The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit has dealt a terrible blow to Chris Hedges, Daniel Ellsberg, Noam Chomsky and the other activists and journalists suing to prevent the indefinite military detention of American citizens.
Sections 1021 and 1022 of the National Defense Authorization Act for 2012 would allow the military to detain indefinitely persons who are deemed to consort with terrorists or those who commit “belligerent acts” against the United States. Journalists, whose job it is to do just that, would undoubtedly qualify, Hedges has argued.
The plaintiffs have had successes and setbacks in court.
Here is what Hedges wrote after Wednesday’s decision:
This is quite distressing. It means there is no recourse now either within the Executive, Legislative or Judicial branches of government to halt the steady assault on our civil liberties and most basic Constitutional rights. It means that the state can use the military, overturning over two centuries of domestic law, to use troops on the streets to seize U.S. citizens, strip them of due process and hold them indefinitely in military detention centers. States that accrue to themselves this kind of power, history has shown, will use it. We will appeal, but the Supreme Court is not required to hear our appeal. It is a black day for those who care about liberty.
http://www.truthdig.com/eartotheground/item/chris_hedges_responds_to_ndaa_defeat_20130717/
———–
I suppose what also interests me about the proposition is that no one on this blog has offered any opposition to it. (Unless I missed something?) Is that not itself a data point?
Michael
Bob K.,
That’s why I have a lesser issue with InfoWars on this particular story: they are not the primary source. One thing I think it is safe to say is that if Carter was misquoted, he won’t be shy about making a clarification.
____________
Jill,
Now that was propaganda. The disagreement isn’t about truth. It’s a disagreement about what constitutes an ad hominem attack and what constitutes best evidence. “Right” sometime doesn’t change the fact that in general InfoWars (and the National Enquirer) are generally not trustworthy sources. They get a lot of things simply wrong. Much of what they report is whole cloth fabrications. They are generally not best evidence even remotely.
However, that being said, most who attack Greenwald are engaged in pure ad hominem and without merit. From what I’ve seen, his personal reporting practices are performed to a very high standard of evidence and professionalism compared to many. That his efforts make some in power so uncomfortable that they resort to trying to smear him directly for exposing their wrong doing is simply a sign of the efficacy of his work.
There is no comparison in the quality of journalism between a Glenn Greenwald and an Alex Jones.
Gene,
HuffPo is using the same source, Der Spiegel, which is the same one person reporting what Carter said.
There’s no transcript.
As I said, I hope Carter said it. I hope he says it in public, where more than one person can quote him.
If people pester Carter enough, he’ll tell us whether he really said that, and he’ll say it again.
Someone needs to take a video of Carter saying it.
As for Info Wars, it’s quite possible that they could report the truth, just from random babbling.
Alex and his buddies would never deliberately tell their dittoheads the truth, but I’m sure they slip up, now and then.
Just because you’re profoundly ignorant, doesn’t mean you’re not manipulative. Sarah comes to mind.
Gene, I am not confused about infowars or Alex Jones. As I said above my personal opinion is that site is a rightwing honeypot for USGinc. I have no quarrel with saying many things Jones does are odious. It doesn’t matter if you want to call Jones a journalist or just an idiot with a media backdrop. If he makes a claim that you have an intellectual interest in, you are bound by intellectual honesty to evaluate that claim by reference to evidence.
Even the National Enquirer has gotten things correctly.
Glenn Greenwald has been accused of not being a journalist either. This cannot negate the truth value of the information he published. We’ll just need to agree to disagree about what matters as far as truth value is concerned.
Gene,
As you know SwM has been posting to this site as far back as the days of Patty C … she knows how to source … even foreign press links.
(OT … I started posting within a week or so after Patty C left, as far as I can ascertain, and I wish I’d had a chance to get to know her.)
Jill,
Don’t confuse Jones the person with his programming, content and practices as a nominal journalist and news outlet. Just because there is evidence from more credible sources as to Carter’s statements does not negate the other odious reporting habits found on InfoWars in general. It’s no more ad hominem than attacking the credibility of something like the National Enquirer as a source.
Considering the source is important, I agree. Nevertheless, any source may be correct or incorrect. The way to know that is to check what the source is saying against evidence. This is truly important when engaged in finding out the truth. Only evidence rules something in or out, not past behavior, not ideology, not anything but evidence.
Gene, it is an ad hominem attack. All statements are required to be measured against evidence, even statements by very dodgy sites or people. For me, for example, the pope is a very dodgy person whom I would be unlikely to give much credence to at all. However, if he makes a claim about something that I am engaging intellectually, I am required to evaluate it on evidence, not my like or dislike of him as a person.
Using a source of information to discredit that evidence is a common practice. In an age of lies and liars, it is important for all of us to maintain evidence based thinking even in cases where we do not like a site or person.
2.44 hours long.
You might have to crew through it in smaller bites?
Oh, and thanks for asking, Jill.
It has been (and remains) a goal with the Propaganda 10 series of articles to educate (and thereby inoculate) people about the nature and methodologies of propaganda as an applied science. Considering the source is always critical in examining the propaganda value and intent of information.
“We didn’t love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation…. We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.” -Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Let’s hope that we “love freedom enough.”
Jill,
Not really. There is some speculation, but my one quibble is with characterizing the attack on InfoWars as ad hominem. They report a lot of flakey non-factual poorly evidenced dreck even though sometimes they do get it right (the rubric of just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean someone isn’t out to get you applies). The source is simply not as credible as other sources as a general rule. That being said, what was reported about Carter’s statements was also reported by other, more reputable news outlets (Der Speigel has a very good reputation for factual reporting) that don’t cater to conspiracy theory (sometimes at the expense of fact as with InforWars). Due to this circumstance, I have no issue with using InfoWars as a source, but it wouldn’t have been my first choice simply because of their generally questionable and sensationalistic reputation. It’s more a question of best evidence than ad hominem.
None of us can know for sure who did a good job or not so good of a job, all we can do is attempt to put our best efforts forward & let Prof Turley’s 17 Million viewers decide for themselves.
We’ll all know down the road.
Res ipsa loquitur (“The thing itself speaks”)
Gene,
I am wondering if you think I participated in propaganda in anything I said above. If I did, will you point it out? If I did so I will correct it.
Smom,
What Blouise said. Good job, you anti-propagandist you. 😉