Glenn Greenwald's Blog, page 85

Obama the Warrior

"I am not going to play in this dirty game. This is not democracy. These elections are a joke" -- Abdel Fattah, Egyptian subway worker, explaining why he cannot support either Mohamed Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood candidate, or Ahmed Shafik,President Hosni Mubarak’s final prime minister, in the two-candidate election runoff to determine Egypt's next President (NYT, "Some Disdain Both Options in Egypt’s Narrowed Race," May 26, 2012).

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Last week, the journal Foreign Policypublished an...

“Militants”: media propaganda

Virtually every time the U.S. fires a missile from a drone and ends the lives of Muslims, Americanmediaoutletsdutifullytrumpetin

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The Authoritarian Mind

(updated below - Update II)

Yesterday, I wrote about the rotted workings of Imperial Mind, but today presents a tragic occasion to examine its close, indispensable cousin: the Authoritarian Mind. From CNN today:

A suspected NATO airstrike killed eight civilians -- including six children -- in eastern Afghanistan, a provincial spokesman said.

The airstrike took place Saturday night in Paktia province, said Rohullah Samoon, spokesman for the governor of Paktia. He said an entire family was killed...

The Imperial Mind

Americans of all types -- Democrats and Republicans, even some Good Progressives -- are just livid that a Pakistani tribal court (reportedly in consultation with Pakistani officials) has imposed a 33-year prison sentence on Shakil Afridi, the Pakistani physician who secretly worked with the CIA to find Osama bin Laden on Pakistani soil. Their fury tracks the standard American media narrative: by punishing Dr. Afridi for the "crime" of helping the U.S. find bin Laden, Pakistan has revealed tha...

Warrantless spying fight

In 2006, The New York Times' James Risen and Eric Lichtblau won the Pulitzer Prize for their December, 2005 articlerevealing that the Bush administration was eavesdropping on the electronic communications of Americans without the warrants required by the FISA law (headline: "Officials Say U.S. Wiretaps Exceeded Law"). Even though multiple federal judges eventually ruled the program illegal, that scandal generated no accountability of any kind for two reasons: (1) federal courts ultimately acc...

Egyptian wisdom

The New York Timesreportson the inspiring scenes across Egypt as millions wait in line to elect their new President. The article contains numerous quotes from ordinary Egyptian citizens explaining their sense of optimism that democratic accountability is coming to their country for the first time in a very long time, as illustrated by this passage:

Others felt their own power as citizens, for the first time. In a country where a journalist was fined and jailed two years ago for speculating in...

WH leaks for propaganda film

(updated below)

As is now well documented, the Obama administration has waged an unprecedented war on whistleblowers, prosecuting more of them under espionage statutes than all prior administrations combined: twice as many as all prior administrations combined, in fact. They are attempting, or have attempted, to imprison whistleblowers who exposed corrupt and illegal NSA eavesdropping, dangerously inept efforts to impede Iran's nuclear program (which likely strengthened it), the destructive us...

Rep. Smith on his controversial bills

Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.) is the co-sponsor of two controversial amendments to the National Defense Authorization Act: one which would ban the use of indefinite detention for any accused Terrorist apprehended on U.S. soil (the House rejected that amendment earlier this week), and the other, as Michael Hastings first reported, which would repeal a long-standing prohibition under the Smith-Mundt Act of 1948on the dissemination inside the U.S. of State Department information campaigns (what the...

John Brennan’s new power

(updated below)

In November, 2008, media reports strongly suggested that President Obama intended to name John Brennan as CIA Director. But controversy over Brennan's recent history -- he was a Bush-era CIA official who expressly advocated "enhanced interrogation techniques" and rendition -- forced him to "withdraw" from consideration, as he publicly issued a letterciting "strong criticism in some quarters" of his CIA advocacy.

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Re-visiting Assange’s show

When it was announced last month that the Kremlin-backed networkRTwould broadcast a new show from Julian Assange, American media figures predictably erupted with mockery and scorn despite not having seen a single episode (nobody provokes the animosity of America's establishment media class more than those who meaningfully challenge American government power). Since I participated in the ensuing debate, I thought it would be worthwhile briefly to review the six programs Assange has now produce...