David Gregory asked Glenn Greenwald on Meet the Press today why Greenwald "shouldn't be charged with a crime" for publishing Edward Snowden's leaks about NSA snooping on American phone calls and Internet activities. So this is how far we've come: a journalist doing precisely the job intended by the First Amendment, being a watchdog on the American government, is asked why he shouldn't be considered a criminal - and, most pathetically, by another so-called journalist. John Adams, who signed the Alien and Sedition Acts that threw journalists into jail who criticized the President in the 1790s, would likely have approved of the question and answered it in the affirmative. Thomas Jefferson no doubt would not.
But we shouldn't be surprised, and certainly not that this demonization of the press is going on in a Democratic, so-called progressive administration. After all, Democrats as well as Republicans have sent our nation to war in Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, twice in Iraq, and once in Afghanistan, without the Declaration of War required by our Constitution. We're on the road to doing that again in Syria. And Democrats as well as Republicans have trampled on the First Amendment for almost a hundred years, fining radio and television stations for broadcasting "objectionable" content, and arresting reporters trying to do their job during Occupy Wall Street.
You have but to look at MSNBC, the so-called progressive voice, to see how far and badly we've come. In prime time, only Rachel Maddow and Chris Hayes have been strongly and unambiguously supportive of Greenwald. Lawrence O'Donnell, acknowledging the damage wiretapping did to Martin Luther King, Jr., says he's not too worried about the damage that can do today. Chris Matthews is typically on all sides of this issue.
Only Ron Paul and Ran Paul - whom I wouldn't vote for because of their fiscal policies and positions on women's issues and immigration and other reasons - have come down hard on the right side of this issue.
Whatever happens, I hope no one votes for a Democrat as the lesser of two evils in the next election, because the evil they pose to our freedom and rights is too much to bear. We can fight terrorists and totalitarians without becoming them ourselves.
See also The Fraudulent Hunt for Snowden
But we shouldn't be surprised, and certainly not that this demonization of the press is going on in a Democratic, so-called progressive administration. After all, Democrats as well as Republicans have sent our nation to war in Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, twice in Iraq, and once in Afghanistan, without the Declaration of War required by our Constitution. We're on the road to doing that again in Syria. And Democrats as well as Republicans have trampled on the First Amendment for almost a hundred years, fining radio and television stations for broadcasting "objectionable" content, and arresting reporters trying to do their job during Occupy Wall Street.
You have but to look at MSNBC, the so-called progressive voice, to see how far and badly we've come. In prime time, only Rachel Maddow and Chris Hayes have been strongly and unambiguously supportive of Greenwald. Lawrence O'Donnell, acknowledging the damage wiretapping did to Martin Luther King, Jr., says he's not too worried about the damage that can do today. Chris Matthews is typically on all sides of this issue.
Only Ron Paul and Ran Paul - whom I wouldn't vote for because of their fiscal policies and positions on women's issues and immigration and other reasons - have come down hard on the right side of this issue.
Whatever happens, I hope no one votes for a Democrat as the lesser of two evils in the next election, because the evil they pose to our freedom and rights is too much to bear. We can fight terrorists and totalitarians without becoming them ourselves.
See also The Fraudulent Hunt for Snowden
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