TV News LIES

Wednesday, Sep 17th

Last update07:13:23 AM GMT

You are here News Politics The Obama officials blocking accountability for Bush crimes

The Obama officials blocking accountability for Bush crimes

E-mail Print PDF

The battle against baseless, worthless grants of anonymity by journalists is, at this point, probably futile, since even many of the nation's best and most valuable reporters -- such as The New Yorker's Jane Mayer -- seem helplessly addicted to it.  In an otherwise solid and at times enlightening article on CIA Director Leon Panetta and his resistance to investigating past CIA abuses, Mayer includes this passage at the beginning of her article to explain how Panetta was chosen only after Obama's first choice, John Brennan, was rejected:


    A friend of Brennan’s from his C.I.A. days complained to me, "After a few Cheeto-eating people in the basement working in their underwear who write blogs voiced objections to Brennan, the Obama Administration pulled his name at the first sign of smoke, and then ruled out a whole class of people: anyone who had been at the agency during the past ten years couldn’t pass the blogger test."

What possible justification is there to grant anonymity to someone to spout these clichéd and factually false insults?  First, as I've documented numerous times and as Mayer herself well knows, the case against Brennan was not that he was "at the agency for the past ten years" or even that he had anything to do with the torture program, but rather that (as she herself documents later in the piece) he explicitly advocated and defended many of the worst torture techniques and other Bush abuses.  Second, unlike the individual who is willing to spout these insults only while cowardly hiding behind Mayer's shield of anonymity, the bloggers who led the opposition to Brennan (including myself and The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan) all attached their names to their views and -- as Spencer Ackerman notes -- are about as far away as one can be from the trite, adolescent cartoons spewed by Mayer's anonymous insulter.  Third, one of the principal points of Mayer's long article is that the objections to Brennan have been vindicated, because -- as Obama's chief counter-terrorism adviser -- he has led the way in urging Obama to keep past CIA abuses suppressed and Bush crimes protected from accountability.

 

More...


Most Recent Related Stories...


University of California students and faculty sue the Trump administration

U of CaliforniaThe Trump administration is using civil rights laws to wage a campaign against the University of...

Appeals court rejects Trump's bid to unseat Federal Reserve governor Lisa Cook ahead of rate vote

lisa Cook reinstatedAn appeals court ruled Monday that Lisa Cook can remain a Federal Reserve governor, rebuffing President...

Bondi threatens charges over Office Depot employee who wouldn’t print Charlie Kirk flyers

AG BondiAttorney General Pam Bondi on Monday said the Justice Department was investigating an incident involving a...

Washington Post columnist says she was fired over posts after Charlie Kirk’s killing

Karen AttiahWashington Post columnist Karen Attiah says she has been fired from the newspaper over social media...
 
America's # 1 Enemy
Tee Shirt
& Help Support TvNewsLIES.org!
TVNL Tee Shirt
 
TVNL TOTE BAG
Conserve our Planet
& Help Support TvNewsLIES.org!
 
Get your 9/11 & Media
Deception Dollars
& Help Support TvNewsLIES.org!
 
The Loaded Deck
The First & the Best!
The Media & Bush Admin Exposed!