Dan Murphy
Dan has been a reporter since the early '90s, working for Bloomberg News and the Far Eastern Economic Review before going to work for the Monitor in 1999
Posted on 06/03/2014 12:23:24 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The Taliban prisoner swap for Bowe Bergdahl might do some good, but fear and anger are getting in the way of a realistic appraisal.
Richard Hofstadter opened his 1968 essay, "The Paranoid Style in American Politics," with this line: "American politics has often been an arena for angry minds."
He continues, "Behind this I believe there is a style of mind that is far from new and that is not necessarily right-wing. I call it the paranoid style simply because no other word adequately evokes the sense of heated exaggeration, suspiciousness, and conspiratorial fantasy that I have in mind."
One wonders what Mr. Hofstadter would have to say about the great gnashing of teeth and anger today over President Barack Obama's prisoner swap for US soldier Bowe Bergdahl. Lurking behind this is not just disagreement with the decision – to release five men, four of them very senior Taliban leaders at the time of their detention in 2001, in exchange for the army sergeant – but a seemingly deep-seated belief that Obama is unpatriotic, more interested in helping American enemies than helping America.
Lending to the outrage is credible evidence that Bergdahl, an odd duck who had grown to hate the war according to people who served with him, deliberately walked off post before his capture. Nathan Bradley Bethea, who was serving in Afghanistan at time with Bergdahl's unit (the 1st Battalion, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment) makes it clear that Bergdahl went AWOL from his platoon's small outpost in Paktika Province in an in-depth piece on the events before his capture and how members of his unit, which lost soldiers trying to track him down, feel about the event. Many are understandably angry and consider the man a deserter....
(Excerpt) Read more at csmonitor.com ...
The National Defense Authorization act of 2013, signed by Obama, required certification to Congress of an intention to transfer prisoner(s) being held in Gitmo, and all thirty days before any transfer.
Also he swore:
I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.
I wasn’t able to find any explantion in the NDAA of penalties for violation of this act (I suppose it was unthinkable that any president would intentionally violate a law he signed, and a year ago), but if this isn’t a high crime or misdemeanor, then no such thing exists.
He has become so accustomed to `thumbing his nose’ at laws that this is just one more to be followed—or not—as it suits him. As of 2008, we were no longer a nation of laws.
"Bethea writes that Bergdahl left most of his gear – his flak, his rifle – behind, taking only his compass."
Left his flak behind? Well damn...in 11 years in boots, I never went anywhere without my flak...
Hey Murphy, you dork...I assume you're talking about his body armor???
Dan Murphy obviously knows not the first friggin' thing about the Army. As if the above facepalm-worthy mistake isn't enough, look at his picture...looks to me like he's better suited to covering Burning Man than Afghanistan.
Scouts Out! Cavalry Ho!
Even the left was so stunned by this atrocity that it took them a few days to get cranked up.
The war had been going on for seven years when he joined.
He deserted when his tour was less than half over.
There are three scenarios:
(1) He was a wide eyed innocent who had no idea what was going on.
(2) He was legitimately on board with the program and motivated when he went to Afghanistan and within 14-16 weeks his views and personality completely changed to the point he was making up nonexistent war crimes.
(3) He enlisted with a specific plan, and carried it out.
Dan Murphy
Dan has been a reporter since the early '90s, working for Bloomberg News and the Far Eastern Economic Review before going to work for the Monitor in 1999
Dan Murphy @bungdan · 2h
I’m not sure setting US foreign policy on what makes some combat veterans very angry is a good idea.
Dan Murphy
@bungdan Is the WaPo deliberately lying about Afghan complaint over prisoner swap, or simply ignorant? I’m going with lying. http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/was-price-to-win-release-of-an-american-soldier-from-taliban-captivity-too-high/2014/06/02/7ee295e4-ea72-11e3-93d2-edd4be1f5d9e_story.html …
Retweeted by Dan Murphy
Michael Cohen @speechboy71 · 9h
You should be ashamed MT @AriFleischer: Q for Pres O: Can you assure American people that Sgt. Bergdahl served with “honor and distinction”?
Works for the Christian Science Monitor. It is more complicated than that.
Of course. “The paranoid style.” Meaning, anyone suspicious of government is automatically labelled paranoid. But of course, government would never want to hurt anyone.
This “man of straw” tactic is getting old.
Dan Murphy first admits that Bergdahl was AWOL and that people have good reason to be angry about US soldiers losing their lives looking for a deserter, etc. Then he tries to hedge, by suggesting maybe Bergdahl meant to walk to India. I guess abandoning your post during a war for a trek vacation doesn’t count as “desertion” desertion. And Murphy admits it’s fair to question why we would trade 5 senior enemies for a deserter. In the face of these admissions, Murphy inexplicably asserts that criticism of Obama’s choices must derive from paranoid delusions that Obama did this deliberately to harm America.
Sorry, Dan. I think Obama did it in a bungled attempt to take heat off his VA debacle by taking credit for bringing an American “POW” home. He thought it would make him look competent. It didn’t.
The residue of the article is given to bone-brained musings, like “perhaps” the five released Taliban will be older and wiser, and work for peace. Choom-bayah baby, roll those dice. And the Taliban wanted to surrender in 2001, but we didn’t want them to. Uh huh. He misses the point of the administration’s foreign policy mess that this exposes and aggravates: Obama did this behind Karzai’s back, further alienating and weakening him, just as we are pulling out. Lesser men than Obama would try to strengthen a US ally/puppet, in the absence of a back-up plan. Do I think he’s acting from a devious agenda within a complex conspiracy? Heck no. I think he is a doofus advised by incompetent politicians.
Mr. Murphy seemed to think that it was not big matter to live under the constant threat of Gaza rocket fire. He wrote “Israeli spokesmen say more than 750 rockets fired from Gaza have hit southern Israel this year. The rockets sow real and deep terror in Israeli communities. But that’s about all they can do. The vast majority of the rockets from Gaza are like C-minus high school science fair projects, carry limited amounts of explosive, and are impossible to aim. For all that rocket fire, not a single Israeli has been killed by one this year.”
Not only is this notion offensive, it was wrong. Three people did die less than 12 hours after he so arrogantly wrote this statement.
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/boycott-dan-murphy-and-the-christian-science-monitor.html
“seemingly deep-seated belief that Obama is unpatriotic, more interested in helping American enemies than helping America”
Why qualify this with “seemingly”?
We do have a deep-seated and well founded belief that Obama is intentionally trying to destroy America. He said he was going to and we believe him.
Bravo bravo!
You got it. End of that story. The story of Obama releasing 5 Taliban is yet to play out.
Dan Murphy’s “Utter Hooey” About Necrophilia in Islam
by sheikyer mami on April 29, 2012
Necrophilia in Islam
If you reject Necrophilia, you might be Islamophobic (Walid Shoebat)
Muhammad did it, so how can it be wrong? Muhammad was the perfect man, ‘al insan al kamil’, the leading light of Islam, whose misdeeds must be emulated by 1.5 gazillion muselmaniacs worldwide. Does Dan Murphy from the Christian Science Monitor know better than the profit of Islam? Is Dan Murphy a learned scholar of Islam?
Christian Science Monitor writer says Egypt’s proposed “necrophilia law” is “utter hooey” because…he wants it to be
So many people have sent this story to me this morning that it seemed worth posting, but not as the cautionary tale it was meant to be. Rather, it is an object lesson in irresponsible journalism. Several days ago I posted this story from al-Arabiya, which has now circulated around the world and aroused considerable disgust. Even the most indefatigable Islamic supremacist apologists, such as the serial liar Sheila Musaji at The American Muslim, are embarrassed by it, and immediately tried to start explaining it away. Now Dan Murphy of the august Christian Science Monitor has come to their aid, reassuring us all that the story is “utter hooey.” His evidence? Read on:
“Egypt ‘necrophilia law’? Hooey, utter hooey,” by Dan Murphy for the Christian Science Monitor, April 26 (thanks to JW):
http://sheikyermami.com/dan-murphys-utter-hooey-about-necrophilia-in-islam/
The first thing a unit does in a combat zone when it stops moving is to prepare defensive positions. Bergdahl’s unit circled their vehicles and set up wire. Now, if they circled their vehicles, that means they figured they could be attacked from any direction. That means YOU NEED EVERY RIFLE READY TO DEFEND FROM AN ASSIGNED POSITION. The enemy doesn’t like to attack straight into heavy fire. They watch and probe to see if they can find a spot to just walk in. Had the enemy attacked, they would have found that empty spot where Bergdahl was supposed to be. They could have then walked into the position and shot the American Soldiers in the back. Those Soldiers were DEPENDING on Bergdahl being where he was supposed to be.
Bergdahl ran off and left his fellow American Soldiers open to defeat and slaughter. You think you might be a little pissed if you were in a combat zone and some dipstick ran off with no concern for your life?
Sooner or later, someone is going to call this "aid and comfort to the enemy in a time of war".
Maybe one of the mediots will realize they are frequent flyers...and there are a lot of shoulder-launched antiaircraft missiles unaccounted for.
Is this rag for real?
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