Posted on 12/01/2003 10:06:10 AM PST by Maria S
Treason doth never prosper, what’s the reason? For if it prosper, none dare call it Treason. – Sir John Harington
The Thanksgiving Day presidential visit to the troops in Baghdad was a brilliant finesse. Although the mean-spirited, petty, partisan assaults were inevitable, the scope of the whining is still flummoxing.
Howard Kurtz (from the Washington Post) had a hissy fit over the president lying to the press.
Huh? The "lie" was a function of security that any reasonable person can understand. The myriad of other presidential lies should bother Kurtz more – such as those concerning the sinking of the Lusitania, Pearl Harbor, James Forestall, the JFK assassination, Vince Foster, Waco and the Branch Davidian mess, Ruby Ridge, Oklahoma City, TWA Flight 800, Area 51, Bill Clinton et al.
Hey, prior to the Mogadishu disaster, official policy was to deny (lie about) the existence of Delta Force.
Lady Macbeth (Sen. Hillary Clinton) was apparently miffed over her Afghanistan/Iraq sojourn with Sen. Jack Reed being overshadowed by the President’s Baghdad lunch. The result of which, apparently, has compelled her to provide aid and comfort to the enemy as payback. Hillary actually told our troops that "the outcome [of the war] is not assured," and her comment that we "must stay the course" in both Afghanistan and Iraq is insufficient mitigation for her other egregious comments.
Some have argued that the two Democrat senators actually provided AID & COMFORT to the ENEMY. It is arguable how significant the intelligence they offered was ... lawyers can (and probably will) argue whether it is criminal.
According to Section 2381 of U.S. Code Title 18, “Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States, levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason and shall suffer death, or shall be imprisoned not less than five years and fined under this title but not less than $10,000; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.”
[http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/casecode/uscodes/18/parts/i/chapters/115/toc.html]
Demoralizing American troops and encouraging enemies to continue the battle is not what U.S. senators ought to be doing. Telling our armed forces in a combat zone, "... there are many questions at home about the administration's policies," should qualify for a ‘walk to the woodshed’. That ‘Congressional Immunity’ policy only works for dumb stuff said on the floor of Congress.
Al Jazeera was obviously jazzed by her rhetoric. [http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/A72E913B-8E34-4F5E-8380-1215D17D3C36.htm]
• She said more troops, preferably an international force, were needed in both Iraq and Afghanistan.
• "We are fighting an enemy which has a lot of impact by relatively small numbers and we've got to provide security throughout large countries. That's not easy with the force numbers that we have.”
Will someone please slap her?
Telling the bad guys they are being effective because they have “a lot of impact by relatively small numbers” is monumentally foolish.
Sen. Reed said the U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan had critical shortages of specialized troops such as military police, civil affairs and psychological operations troops. Shame on you, Jack! YOU ought to know better (Reed was an Army officer).
The morale of the troops, Clinton said, "is very high," but she said the military personnel with whom she spoke in meetings and during "two turkey dinners" wanted to know "how the people at home feel about what we are doing."
"Americans are wholeheartedly proud of what you are doing, " Clinton said she replied, "but there are many questions at home about the [Bush] administration's policies."
Both Clinton and Reed claim the expense and political weight in administering Iraq would be made easier with the U.N.'s imprimatur of legitimacy and U.N. help in transferring power to Iraqis.
"I'm a big believer that we ought to internationalize this, but it will take a big change in our administration's thinking," the former first lady said. "I don't see that it's forthcoming."
You damnbetcha it’s not forthcoming. Unlike the previous "co-presidents," this president understands the lessons learned from Bosnia, Rwanda, Mogadishu and the serial terrorist attacks President Clinton responded to with only bluster. THIS president is a leader who understands the imperative of "Lead, follow or get out of the way."
The ‘United Nothing’ is a dysfunctional bureaucratic accident waiting to happen. It has proven itself to be the personification of incompetence and corruption. Albert Camus once observed, "Integrity has no need of rules." The converse is also true: The degree of integrity is inversely proportional to the number and complexities of rules and bureaucracy.
Pick me, pick me!!!!
I would agree with you as far as public criticism taking place within our borders or on neutral territory. Let the Dixie Chicks, Patty Osama Murray and their ilk take their lumps through consumer and voter displeasure. But, making the sorts of comments this witch and her lap dog, Reed, made to our troops in the combat zone is, in my opinion, the definition of treason. Not that anything will be done about it.
-PJ
No. Quite stupid, though.
I hate defending Hillary, but I don't see how location has anything to do with whether her comments were treasonous or not. She is a US Senator, after all, and has a duty to make her opinion known on important political issues. Undermining the president is not treason.
Giving aid and comfort to the enemy covers things like providing them with supplies to fight the war or divulging military secrets. Expressing doubts about the war and telling our troops that some people back home don't support the war is just an expression of opinion and pointing out the obvious, respectively.
No government official should tell a soldier who is putting his life on the line for his country that there are those in his country who are questioning why he's there. And the senator was saying those things for her own political gain.
Hillary's ankles are treasonous. Hillary's wide-load rump is treasonous. Hillary's Saul Alinsky ethic is treasonous.
This country stopped adhering to this when Jane Fonda joyfully embraced the Viet Cong.
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