The Pentagon Vs. Journalists

Kevin Gosztola at Shadowproof:

Pentagon War Manual Gives Military License To Target & Attack Journalists

The Pentagon has adopted a “law of war manual” [PDF], which enables commanders to treat journalists as “unprivileged belligerents.” It suggests that correspondents who report some information about combat operations may be taking “direct part in hostilities,” a disturbing argument for justifying the killing of reporters in war zones. There also is a part of the manual that encourages journalists to submit to censorship of news reports that might aid enemies.

On July 31, the Committee to Protect Journalists published an analysis on the Pentagon’s weak justifications for treating journalists as spies. The New York Times Editorial Board also condemned the guidelines in an August 10 editorial.

...

Here we go again; the Obama administration, like the GeeDubya Bush administration before it, has repeatedly treated American journalists like the enemy. Now they merely assert the right to f^<king kill the enemy. What nation did I wake up in this morning? China? Nazi Germany circa W.W. II?

Please read Mr. Gosztola's piece and then the NYT condemnatory editorial, both linked above. Then take some comfort: this is a war game the military ultimately cannot win, although they can certainly leave a lot of journalists' bodies beside the road in the process of realizing that in a genuinely free and open society,

• the press is more powerful than even the overwhelmingly powerful military, and
• between the press and the military, the press is more essential to the survival of openness and of democratic government.

Yes, you read that right: the press tops the military. Think about it for a moment. If the course of action reflected in this manual is indeed pursued, the military can successfully physically protect a society which, thanks to that very military, is neither free nor open. Ya pays yer money 'n' takes yer choice... takes yer chances, too.

The US has been through literally dozens of wars, "police actions," etc. from W.W. II to the present, and not once has the military been granted a leash on the press, let alone a whip and a chair, in wartime. In turn, the press has been largely cooperative except on those occasions in which the military has deliberately squelched things the press had every right to publish. (Obama has been as bad as Bush in trying to shut down the press.) The NYT editorial gets that part just right: the new manual is not aimed at reinforcing the unavoidably uneasy relationship between the press and the military, but rather at giving the military the authority to silence the press when it finds them inconvenient. That is not how a free society is supposed to work. I have no desire to learn military secrets or to see them exposed in the popular media, but I see no justification in America for accomplishing that protection by nailing journalists' feet to the floor. That's not merely unnecessary: it's unacceptable.

The NYT editorial asserts that "[t]he White House should call on Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter to revise this section, which so clearly runs contrary to American law and principles." As I see it, that is the focus of the matter. Will the White House do that? I'm not holding my breath...

(courtesy freepress.net)

President Carter On American Government Today

Interviewed by Thom Hartmann (YouTube), the venerable former President Jimmy Carter has something to say about the nature of American government today:

... It [the extreme role of money in politics since the Citizens United ruling - SB] violates the essence of what makes America a great country, in its political system. Now it's just an oligarchy with unlimited political bribery being the essence of getting the nominations for president or elected president. And the same thing applies to governors and US senators and Congressmembers. So now we've just seen a complete subversion of our political system as a payoff to major contributors, who want and expect and sometimes get, uh, favors for themselves after the election's over. ...

Please, readers, be sure to listen to the entire interview. And to Mr. Carter: you go, Mr. President! (We all should exhibit such crystal clarity at age 90. Carter was not the greatest president, but he was probably the most honest one since Honest Abe...)

(H/T Sara Jerde at TPM.)

SCOTUS To Hear Case That May Redefine ‘One Person, One Vote’ — UPDATED

Tierney Sneed at TPM:

The Supreme Court on Tuesday opted to hear arguments in a case that could redefine "one person, one vote" -- one of the bedrock principles of modern voting rights law. The case could change how electoral districts are drawn across the country, revamping who comprises electoral districts and reshaping the idea of who is ultimately "represented" by elected officials.

The case, Evenwel v. Abbott, originated in Texas and is being spearheaded by a conservative legal group. Legal experts tell TPM that the impact of the case could be far-reaching, especially for Latinos and residents of urban districts.

...

I do not understand how the conservative Justices on SCOTUS, operating in response to politically conservative legal entities like the self-proclaimed "Project on Fair Representation" (yeah, right), believe they can get away with this bullshit indefinitely without provoking a rebellion by people defending the Guarantee Clause of Article IV of the US Constitution. Please read about the Guarantee Clause, then read the above linked article about what the PoFR is appealing to SCOTUS to have imposed on all the states, a procedure that would change the redistricting rules in most of the states and render the phrase "One Person, One Vote" practically meaningless, in a fashion that might guarantee each state, not a (small-r) republican form of government as assumed for at least 50 years based on several prior Court rulings, but in fact a (cap-R) Republican form of government, which is clearly the goal of PoFR.

People who are poor, or Black or Hispanic, or are forcibly redistricted in ways that geographically concentrate their cohort so as to dilute the power of their votes, already have a hard enough time exercising any actual power by casting their votes. These days, most of the people affected by tweaking redistricting are those who tend to vote for Democrats. If the Court rules in this case in favor of the PoFR position, those poor/Black/Hispanic/etc. people are going to be fucked at the polls even worse than they already are, and thus so will be the Democratic Party.

And the Roberts Cadre, the Gang of Five, will have another weapon to join with Citizens United etc. to assure that elections can be bent to their own political liking.

Kuffner

Seriously: how long will it be before the actual majority of Americans, who are mostly not racially white, not male, not young and not wealthy, tire of having their expressed political will deliberately thwarted, and take to the streets? Do the Supremes really think they have enough police lined up to enforce a Republican [sic] government forcibly installed against the will of the popular majority?

Time will tell. Not a very pleasant time, and probably a rather painful tell...

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UPDATE: a bit more detail from Kuffner, who is arguably, and certainly IMHO, the definitive Texas blogger.

Well, Du-uh... America Now Oligarchy, Not Democracy — Princeton Study

Brendan James at TPM:

A new study from Princeton spells bad news for American democracy—namely, that it no longer exists.

Asking "[w]ho really rules?" researchers Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page argue that over the past few decades America's political system has slowly transformed from a democracy into an oligarchy, where wealthy elites wield most power.

Using data drawn from over 1,800 different policy initiatives from 1981 to 2002, the two conclude that rich, well-connected individuals on the political scene now steer the direction of the country, regardless of or even against the will of the majority of voters.

...

Mr. James appears to be a young man, but damn, he's learning fast...

‘National Security’ And National/International Abuse Of Government Power: Chomsky

His ideological personal history aside, Noam Chomsky has, in the past two decades, struck me as one of the clearest thinkers of our age on issues involving both international relations and relations between individuals and government. His latest article for The Nation is no exception. Wait until late at night when you have fewer distractions, brew yourself some really strong tea and read Chomsky's response to the question, Should We Stop Talking About National Security? / Our government has always justified its worst abuses of power—here and abroad—on the basis of “national security.” His themes will not surprise you if you've read any of his other articles, but you may appreciate his synthesis in one place of policy issues seldom mentioned together in the American press and media.

How The Global War On Terrorism Has Supplanted The American Bill Of Rights

Via l'Enfant de la Haute Mer in comments here, we have two versions of an excellent article by Peter van Buren, "RIP, The Bill of Rights" (at TomDispatch) and "How the ‘War on Terror’ Became a War on the Constitution" (at The Nation). Van Buren's thesis is that America has lived through two eras and into a third era of governance:

• a monarchy when America was England's colony, 
• a constitutional era after the American Revolution and for approximately two centuries, and 
• a post-constitutional era beginning (as I perceive it) not later than the presidency of Ronald Reagan and coming to fruition in the presidencies of Dick Cheney, er, I mean, George W. Bush and Barack Obama. 

We may call the last era the era of the imperial presidency, or the era of the unitary executive. The first and third eras bear a striking and painful resemblance to each other: unitary rule is always arbitrary rule, no matter what you call the chief executive. The difference is how he (in America it's always been a "he"; see many European examples of a "she" as chief executive) is chosen: a kingship is an hereditary position with the initial king allegedly chosen by God; a presidency is not hereditary but rather, um, er, not really elected by the people either, unless you consider monetary units as ballot-weighting units. Once an American president or a constitutional monarch takes office, the differences are few.

Van Buren has done such a fine job of exploring the particulars of America's government and its relationship (if any) to democracy that I hardly need repeat his work... you may productively give both his versions a good read.