TiLTNews Network: Earth Watch - Freedom is defined by the ability of citizens to live without government interference, not by safety. It is easy to clamor for government security when terrible things happen; but liberty is given true meaning when we support it without exception, and we will be safer for it ~ Dr. Ron Paul
No Charges For Police Officer Who Shot Unarmed Man Seven Times
BenSwann.com has become TruthInMedia.com CLICK HERE to learn more.By Chuck Ross A Madison, Wisc. police officer will not be charged in the
The post No Charges For Police Officer Who Shot Unarmed Man Seven Times appeared first on Ben Swann's Truth In Media.
No Charges For Police Officer Who Shot Unarmed Man Seven Times
TIMP Staff
Wed, 13 May 2015 00:31:10 GMT
Walmart and Nestle Pillaging California’s Water Supply For Profit
By Claire Bernish
In the midst of an exceptional drought in California, Nestle is not only refusing to stop bottling water, but if the head of the company had his way, production would increase.
Nestle Waters North America CEO Tim Brown has decided to put profit over people in the face of devastatingly arid conditions that have caused one water company to begin rationing its supply. Starbucks has already halted its bottling in the state, but when Brown was asked in a radio interview if Nestle would follow suit, well, his reply says it all:Absolutely not. In fact, if I could increase it, I would. The fact is, if I stop bottling water tomorrow, people would buy another brand of bottled water. People need to hydrate. As the second largest bottler in the state, we’re filling a role many others are filling. It’s driven by consumer demand; it’s driven by an on-the-go society that needs to hydrate. Frankly, we’re very happy they are doing it in a healthier way.The fact actually is, not only does Nestle continue sucking up California’s most precious resource, the company wastes 700 million gallons of it — 30% of the total it pulls from the ground — each year.
Though the company has finally announced plans to curb the waste problem by 12%, this is hardly consolation for the more than 82,000 people who signed a petition demanding they stop bottling in the southern part of the state, or for the protesters who brought plastic pitchforks to form a blockade of Nestle’s plant in Sacramento.
With fines and rationing implemented to various degrees statewide, Nestle’s choice to continue bottling from scant resources epitomizes corporate thirst for profit over human rights. Government refusal to step in and stop the company has only added to people’s ire. Arrowhead 100% Mountain Spring Water comes from the San Bernadino National Forest, and though the company has had longstanding rights to draw from a spring there, the US Forest Service hasn’t kept track of any environmental consequences. Even worse, the permit which grants Nestle the right to transport the water expired . . . in 1988. But what does Brown have to say about the outrage people have expressed about such corporate profit-seeking?We feel good about what we’re doing, delivering healthy hydrating to people throughout the state of California.Unfortunately, Nestle is not alone in the quest for profit over common sense. Local Sacramento station CBS-13 investigated Walmart’s bottling practices in the state and found it gets its water from quite a controversial place: the Sacramento Municipal Water Supply. Gallon jugs of “Great Value” Walmart water say as much in the fine print, which means huge profit for the company. DS Services of America purchases water from the city for the same 99¢ per 748 gallons rate that other commercial businesses and residents pay, but then bottles and sells it through Walmart for 88¢ per gallon. When calculated, this means $1 of Sacramento’s water reaps a profit of $658.24 for the two companies. A Walmart spokesperson had this to say about its refusal to stop bottling in the drought-stricken state:The drought in California is very concerning for many of our customers and our associates. We share those concerns and are tracking it closely. Our commitment to sustainability includes efforts to minimize water use in our facilities. We have and continue to work with our suppliers to act responsibly while meeting the needs of customers who count on us across California.It would seem obvious that Nestle and Walmart should take a cue from Starbucks, who moved bottling operations for its environmentally conscious Ethos brand to a location in Pennsylvania until drought conditions improve. Their Senior Vice President of Global Responsibility and Public Policy, John Kelly, described their decision in a statement last week:
We are committed to our mission to be a globally responsible company and to support the people of the state of California as they face this unprecedented drought.Profit over public interest seems to have reached a new level with corporations gobbling up what should be a human right. Public relations expert Doug Elmets explained the best course of action in an interview with CBS-13:The reaction should be immediate. And that is to find another [supply] outside of California that can be able to meet the needs that they have and also the needs of the consumer.In the meantime, private profiteering in the face of rationing and fines for the people of California is nothing short of absurdly disgraceful.
Related Activist Post Article:
Nestlé CEO Denies That Water is an Essential Human Right
Claire Bernish writes for TheAntiMedia.org, where this article first appeared. Tune in! The Anti-Media radio show airs Monday through Friday @ 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific.
Walmart and Nestle Pillaging California’s Water Supply For Profit
Activist
Sat, 16 May 2015 15:08:00 GMT
“Current TPP negotiation member states are the United States, Japan, Mexico, Canada, Australia, Malaysia, Chile, Singapore, Peru, Vietnam, New Zealand and Brunei. The TPP is the largest economic treaty in history, including countries that represent more than 40 per cent of the world´s GDP.”(Wikileaks)
“Since 1945, no American President has escaped vetting by elite Globalists. Partisan politics plays no role in this process. The one overriding issue of every Presidency has been: make sure Globalist legislation and treaties pass through to completion. Do not obstruct them. A little crooked President named Nixon got it in his head to erect anti-Globalist tariffs. He found himself on the floor looking up, with Henry Kissinger, David Rockefeller’s man, staring down at him, assuring him his days in the White House were over.” (The Underground, Jon Rappoport)
Obama is under the gun. Not since he pressured Congress, on behalf of the pharmaceutical companies, to pass Obamacare, has he worked so hard and sweated so much.
The latest Globalist treaty, the TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership), is on the table.
Elite mega-corporations all over the world, the Council on Foreign Relations (Rockefeller), the Bilderberg Group, the Trilateral Commission (Rockefeller) want the TPP to be ratified by the 12 member nations. They really want it. They insist on it.
Obama has run into Congressional roadblocks. They appear to be temporary, but make no mistake about it, he was put into office to bring this treaty to fruition. Failure is not an option.
Whatever Obama has to promise, to whomever he has to promise it, he’s making deals. Side deals, back room deals, upside down deals.
His masters don’t care that he’s a lame duck President at this point. Lame duck, waddling duck, it makes no difference. He’s got to come through.
And he knows it.
He also knows, because the TPP is another Globalist treaty, that more jobs will flee the US, more cheap imported goods will flood the US market from countries where slave wages prevail, where environmental laws aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on. He knows those cheap goods will sink more American businesses.
He knows no private citizen anywhere in the world who doesn’t run a big corporation has read the contents of the TPP—and won’t read them before its passage.
Obama has had his marching orders for 10 years. He realized going in who his bosses were.
The Globalists don’t play games when it comes to a treaty like this. The TPP is their baby.
Remember Pelosi? She blew the whistle during the midnight negotiations on Obamacare. She said to her Congressional colleagues: “If you want to know what’s in the bill, you have to vote for it. Then you can read it.”
People began to wake up to the fact that, when thousand-page bills are on the table, legislators either can’t read them or choose not to. They just vote the way they’re told to.
So here is another one: the TPP. Congressional representatives have to go into a sealed room and read it. They can’t make copies. They can’t tell the public what’s in it.
Senator Rand Paul just went into the room. When he came out, he said he didn’t even know whether he’d read a draft or the final version.
He said he couldn’t disclose what was in the treaty. Why not? Who made that decision? Under what illegal authority are legislators prohibited from revealing the details of a treaty that will, when passed, bind all Americans and citizens of 11 other countries?
Leaks indicate that the TPP will set up private courts to rule on disputes between corporations and governments. For example, a foreign corporation tries to export a product to the US. They’re blocked. They appeal to this court. Relevant US law and US courts are ignored. Questions pertaining to environmental harm or toxicity re the product are decided in secret.
As Wikileaks notes, “Similar mechanisms have already been used. For example, US tobacco company Phillip Morris used one such tribunal to sue Australia (June 2011 – ongoing) for mandating plain packaging of tobacco products on public health grounds; and by the oil giant Chevron against Ecuador in an attempt to evade a multi-billion-dollar compensation ruling for polluting the environment. The threat of future lawsuits chilled environmental and other legislation in Canada after it was sued by pesticide companies in 2008/9. ISDS [Investor-State Dispute Settlement] tribunals are often held in secret, have no appeal mechanism, do not subordinate themselves to human rights laws or the public interest, and have few means by which other affected parties can make representations.”
Like GATT, NAFTA, and CAFTA, the TPP is a Globalist treaty that expands the power of mega-corporations around the world. At will, they move their manufacturing operations to places where workers are virtual slaves. They sell goods across borders, without paying billions in tariffs, regardless of the effects on smaller competitors, who are torpedoed and forced out of business.
All treaties under consideration should be published in full, at least two years before member nations vote on them. Then we would have time to see and understand what’s in them.
The secret shroud surrounding the TPP is a criminal farce.
Mainstream media dupes are fond of saying that those who warn against global dictatorship are crazy conspiracy theorists.
Well, what do you call it when a secret treaty expanding the international power of mega-corporations is passed into law, when that law supersedes every other law and court of the member nations?
Would you call it “a good business decision?” “Employment enhancement?” “Smarter people helping the rest of us?”
In the US, Congressional legislators are prancing and dancing and fencing. They aren’t at all sure they know what’s in the TPP. But their debates are taken seriously, as if they actually mean something.
It’s the blind leading the blind leading the blind. But behind it all, the architects of the TPP are fully aware of the meaning and consequences of what they’re doing.
They plucked Barack Obama out of obscurity to carry out a job. This job. Passage of the treaty.
So much for “the leader representing the people.”
Ditto for the other 11 members of the TPP.
Puppet show. Shadow play.
Organized crime.
The TPP treaty is a kind of religious document. We have to take it on faith. We have to accept what the priests are telling us.
They’re our pipeline to the corporate gods.
I’ve quoted the following interview in previous articles. It reveals the kind of Globalist power I’m talking about.
Here is a close-up snap shot of a remarkable moment from out of the past. It’s through-the-looking-glass—a conversation between reporter, Jeremiah Novak, and two (Globalist/Rockefeller) Trilateral Commission members, Karl Kaiser and Richard Cooper. The interview took place in 1978. It concerned the issue of exactly who was formulating US economic and political policy, which would include trade treaties like the TPP.
The careless and off-hand attitude of Trilateralists Kaiser and Cooper is astonishing. It’s as if they’re saying, “What we’re revealing is already out in the open, it’s too late to do anything about it, why are you so worked up, we’ve already won…”
NOVAK (the reporter): Is it true that a private [Trilateral committee] led by Henry Owen of the US and made up of [Trilateral] representatives of the US, UK, West Germany, Japan, France and the EEC is coordinating the economic and political policies of the Trilateral countries [which would include the US]?
COOPER: Yes, they have met three times.
NOVAK: Yet, in your recent paper you state that this committee should remain informal because to formalize ‘this function might well prove offensive to some of the Trilateral and other countries which do not take part.’ Who are you afraid of?
KAISER: Many countries in Europe would resent the dominant role that West Germany plays at these [Trilateral] meetings.
COOPER: Many people still live in a world of separate nations, and they would resent such coordination [of policy].
NOVAK: But this [Trilateral] committee is essential to your whole policy. How can you keep it a secret or fail to try to get popular support [for its decisions on how Trilateral member nations will conduct their economic and political policies]?
COOPER: Well, I guess it’s the press’ job to publicize it.
NOVAK: Yes, but why doesn’t President Carter come out with it and tell the American people that [US] economic and political power is being coordinated by a [Trilateral] committee made up of Henry Owen and six others? After all, if [US] policy is being made on a multinational level, the people should know.
COOPER: President Carter and Secretary of State Vance have constantly alluded to this in their speeches. [untrue]
KAISER: It just hasn’t become an issue.
Source: “Trilateralism: The Trilateral Commission and Elite Planning for World Management,” edited by Holly Sklar, 1980. South End Press, Boston. Pages 192-3.
This interview “slipped under the mainstream media radar,” which is to say, it was ignored, buried, sat on, censored.
US economic and political policy run by a committee of the Trilateral Commission—the Commission had been created in 1973 as an “informal discussion group” by David Rockefeller and his sidekick, Zbigniew Brzezinski, who, much later, was Obama’s mentor in the months before he was sworn in for his first term as President.
To inhale the scent of Obama’s approach to TPP negotiations, here is a quote from his first appointed US Trade Representative, Ron Kirk. Replying to his critics, Kirk wrote: “I am strongly offended by the assertion that our [TPP negotiating] process has been non-transparent and lacked public participation.”
This comment, in the face of the fact that the exact terms of the TPP are still secret.
This post originally appeared at NoMoreFakeNews.com
This article was posted: Friday, May 15, 2015 at 5:37 am
TODAY AT 11:18 AM
(This post is from our new blog: Unofficial Sources.)
The Bush administration’s decision to keep bulk collection of domestic phone records a secret was a strategic mistake, former NSA Inspector General Joel Brenner told his former colleagues on Friday.
But in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Vice President Dick Cheney’s office was so determined to assert untrammeled executive power that any internal debate about going public or telling Congress was “academic” at the time, said Brenner, who served as the agency’s in-house watchdog from 2002 to 2006.
Brenner published his prepared remarks Friday morning, just before delivering them at the National Security Agency headquarters at an event marking the 40th Anniversary of the Church Committee, the special congressional committee that exposed surveillance abuse and led to the passage of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
Brenner concluded that the program blatantly violated FISA, and he recalled asking his NSA colleagues why the White House didn’t just go to Congress and get the law changed. But, he noted: “This was actually an academic question, because policy was being driven, and driven hard, by [Cheney legal counsel David] Addington, who detested the FISA statute.”
Brenner said bulk collection was a part of the now “mostly declassified” program called STELLAR WIND, which “was run directly by the Office of the Vice President and put under the direct personal control of the Vice President’s counsel, David Addington.”
(On his personal website, Brenner further explains that Cheney and others hated FISA because “They thought it impinged on Executive authority, and they were intent on exercising untrammeled Presidential power under Article II of the Constitution — as if Congress didn’t also have power to regulate interstate and foreign commerce under Article I.”)
But NSA officials were also opposed to asking Congress for permission, if for slightly different reasons. “It was that amending FISA would require a public debate; that the public debate would educate our adversaries; and that we would lose intelligence as a result.”
Brenner said he didn’t buy it: “My response was that the program could not be kept secret forever, and that its eventual disclosure would create a firestorm and divide the country. The broad unity of the country behind the agency’s activities was a strategic asset; the loss of collection was likely to be tactical and temporary; and sacrificing a strategic asset for tactical advantage was as foolish in politics as it is in military operations.”
As for why President Barack Obama heeded the NSA’s advice to keep the program secret, Brenner writes that Obama “had no appetite” for the battle that would have ensued if had made it public. “The fight in 2008 was bruising enough.”
Brenner’s view was of course vindicated by the strong public reaction when that program and others were exposed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden nearly two years ago.
In his remarks, Brenner made light of some of the actual revelations. “Overseas, people were stunned to learn how extremely good NSA really is at its business — sometimes at their expense,” he said. “You were being criticized for being too good. And of course the dough of outrage rose higher and higher when leavened with the yeast of hypocrisy.”
But he acknowledged that the leaks hurt the NSA domestically, by showing that the agency operated under “secret law.”
“[I]n retrospect there’s a lesson to learn. The public, not just the three branches of government, must know what kinds of things we are allowed to collect domestically,” he said.
“You now live in a glass house,” he said. “How could anyone think the bulk collection program would remain secret? I’m not telling you there are no more secrets. You still have plenty of them. I am telling you that with instantaneous electronic communications, secrets are hard to keep; and that which can be kept secret does not stay secret for long. The idea that the broad rules governing your activities — not specific operations, but the broad rules — can be kept secret is a delusion. And they should not be kept secret.”
(Please see: How to Leak to The Intercept.)
Brenner was NSA’s inspector general from 2002 to 2006. He was later head of U.S. counterintelligence under the director of national intelligence, and senior counsel at the NSA. He now has a private legal and consulting practice.
Photo of Joel Brenner in 2014 by Robin Zielinski/Las Cruces Sun-News via Associated Press.
Email the author: dan.froomkin@theintercept.com
After a trial which lasted over two months, a federal jury needed just 14 hours of deliberations to come to the unanimous decision that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev should be executed. Tsarnaev, who along with his brother Tamerlan planted bombs at the 2013 Boston Marathon, did not express any emotion in the courthouse as the verdict on his punishment was announced late this afternoon. In the immediate aftermath of the ruling, newly appointed Attorney General Loretta Lynch called the sentence “a fitting punishment for this horrific crime.”
Tsarnaev, who was 19 years old at the time of the bombing, will soon be moved to the federal death row penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana.
As I watched the trial up close, this outcome seemed preordained. The government was set on the death penalty, and today they achieved that goal.
Before the start of the trial, Tsarnaev’s lawyers had made repeated entreaties to settle the case with a sentence of life imprisonment without parole. These were denied by the government despite widespread opposition within the city of Boston to executing him, and mitigating factors which strongly suggested that Dzhokhar played a secondary role in the crime and the events leading up to it.
Presiding Judge George O’Toole made decisions throughout the process which seemed to ensure it would be more a public spectacle than an impartial administration of justice. (O’Toole also tried the case of Tarek Mehanna, and sentenced him to 17 years imprisonment for translating an al Qaeda document on the internet.) Defense lawyers submitted numerous desperate requests to move the trial from Boston, on the grounds that it would be impossible for Dzhokhar to get a fair hearing there. These were all summarily dismissed. O’Toole also declined defense requests that he explain to the jury that if they failed to reach a unanimous verdict on Tsarnaev’s punishment, he would not be obligated to declare a mistrial — as he would have been if they had not been unanimous on Tsarnaev’s guilt — but instead would be obliged to administer a life sentence.
In an op-ed published in the Boston Globe several weeks before today’s verdict, the family of 8-year-old Martin Richard asked that Tsarnaev not be given the death penalty. Their reason was not necessarily borne of compassion for Tsarnaev, but rather a desire that they should be allowed to move on with their own lives. Writing that “the continued pursuit of [death] could bring years of appeals and prolong reliving the most painful day of our lives,” the family asked prosecutors to settle on life imprisonment without parole. Richard’s family was in the courthouse today and saw Dzhokhar sentenced to death.
Given the pain it will cause the families of the victims, and the oppositionwithin the city of Boston to such an outcome, why did the government seek the death sentence in this case? As Boston U.S. Attorney Carmen M. Ortiz said in her statement today, the execution of Dzhokhar will send a message that “we are not intimidated.”
Read also:
Photo: In courtroom sketch, Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev arrives in the courtroom at the Moakley Federal court house in the penalty phase of his trial in Boston, Friday, May 15, 2015. (Jane Flavell Collins via AP)
Email the author: murtaza.hussain@theintercept.com
by JON BOWNE | INFOWARS.COM | MAY 15, 2015
by INFOWARS NIGHTLY NEWS | MAY 15, 2015
The U.S. is bringing in 100,000 Muslims every year through legal channels such as the United Nations refugee program and various visa programs, but new reports indicate a pipeline has been established through the southern border with the help of the federal agency whose job it is to protect the homeland.
IAN HANCHETT
Breitbart
May 15, 2015
Kentucky Senator and Republican presidential candidate Rand Paul (R-KY) argued George Stephanopoulos is “too close to the Clintons” and “it’s just impossible” for him to be objective on Thursday’s “Hannity” on the Fox News Channel.
Paul stated, “For the year or so, we haven’t gone on [‘This Week’], particularly since it’s looked like a contest where I may be in the contest against Hillary Clinton. We have made the decision that he’s too close to the Clintons to really give an objective interview. And I don’t mean that to be mean. It just is what it is. I would say the same for myself. I don’t think I could separate myself and be an objective — I could be an opinion maker on TV, but I couldn’t be someone who is seen as an objective, you know, nonpartial journalist, and I think that’s difficult because he spent so many years inside the Clinton operation and also now still appears to be within the consortium that is Clinton, Inc.
Earlier, he said, “There’s a direct conflict of interest there, and I think really a breach of journalistic etiquette. And I don’t know what’s in Stephanopoulos’ heart, what he believes, or whether he could try to be objective. It’s just impossible. You know, I’ve grown up a partisan. I don’t think I’m going to get the Sunday morning show as a nonpartisan ever, because my whole life has been spent as someone who believes in a certain point of view towards limited government.”
This article was posted: Friday, May 15, 2015 at 10:06 am
Kit Daniels
Prison Planet.com
May 15, 2015
The drought affecting Texas that was blamed on irreversible “climate change” is now over thanks to recent statewide rain.
Credit: Angi English / Flickr
The U.S. Drought Monitor reveals that only small pockets of Texas are still undergoing drought conditions, in stark contrast to last year when the state was experiencing a severe drought which mainstream scientists blamed on permanent “global warming.”
“The climate scientists have been warning us for decades that, due to climate change, there is likely to be a desert emerging in the Southwest — including West Texas, the area where most of Austin’s water comes from,” global warming proponent Roger Baker wrote last year.
And about year ago CNN’s Donna Brazile infamously tweeted that “climate change is real” in response to the drought.
“Most southerners now experience only 2 seasons – hot & humid,” she wrote. “Drought is present in places that had plenty of H20.”
But the contrary, West Texas and other regions of the state just experienced rain storms lasting days.
“Reports from across the [West Texas] region indicate rainfall totals for the past week or so range from as little as just more than an inch to a foot or more,” Ron Smith with Southwest Farm Press reported. “Some fell in a short period of time, creating erosion and flooding problems, but farmers say they’ll take on the repair chores in exchange for much needed moisture in the soil profile.”
All Hail West Texas
In fact, the U.S. Drought Monitor shows that on May 13, 2014, nearly 21% of Texas was under “exceptional drought” conditions, but on Tuesday that percentage was zero.
Overall, moderate to exceptional drought in Texas declined from 73% to just under 23% over the past year, a drop of over 50%.
It’s funny how “global warming” proponents are constantly disproven by the weather, and in a lame attempt to downplay their failed predictions, they are now trying to replace the phrase “global warming” with “man-made climate change.”
“Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians,” MIT Professor Richard Lindzen admitted. “The opportunities for taxation, for policies, for control, for crony capitalism are just immense, you can see their eyes bulge.”
Follow on Twitter:
@RealAlexJones | @KitDaniels1776
This article was posted: Friday, May 15, 2015 at 1:38 pm
In a blockbuster 10,000-word story for the London Review of Books this week, longtimeNew Yorker investigative journalist Seymour Hersh called into question the official account of the American raid that killed Osama Bin Laden, and argued that what is arguably seen as the apex of Barack Obama’s presidency is actually built on a lie.
Hersh’s piece claims that Bin Laden was being held prisoner by the Pakistani military and intelligence service (the ISI), who were using him as a means to control Taliban and al-Qaida elements, and hoping to use him as leverage in their relationship with the United States. According to Hersh, who relied largely on an anonymous intelligence source, the Obama administration found out that Pakistan had Bin Laden, and eventually convinced Pakistani military leaders to allow a raid on the compound where Bin Laden was being held. The plan, Hersh writes, was to say publicly that Bin Laden was killed not in the raid but in a drone strike. The White House, however, supposedly broke this deal because of the political value of making the details of the raid public.
Hersh’s story has been much debated over the past several days, with many calling it into question and (a comparable few) others applauding its willingness to undercut the official narrative. NBC News and the AFP have both backed up small elements of Hersh’s story, although both outlets have also called other elements of his piece into question (and NBC later backed away from its original reporting). And no news source has supported Hersh’s largest claim—that the president lied about the raid.
I spoke to Hersh by phone this week. Here is a transcript of our conversation, which has been slightly condensed and edited for clarity.
Isaac Chotiner: If the plan until the night of the raid was to use the cover story that he had not been killed in a raid but in a drone strike, then why have the raid at all? Why not just have the Pakistanis kill him? Why risk Obama’s presidency?
Seymour Hersh: Of course there is no answer there because I haven’t talked to any of the principals. But I can just give you what the people who were in the process believed to be so, which is that for [Gens.] Pasha and Kayani, the chance of something like that getting leaked out would be devastating. America was then running at about 8 percent popularity in Pakistan, and Bin Laden was running at 60, 70 percent. He was very popular.[Editor’s note: This 2010 opinion poll says that Bin Laden’s popularity was at 18 percent in Pakistan.] You couldn’t just take a chance, because if someone ratted you out—I can only give you a basic theory.
Chotiner: It just seems like a huge raid with Pakistani complicity brings up just as many problems for the Pakistanis.
Hersh: If you believe, as a smart guy said to me, if anybody, if anyone didn’t think the president was going to fuck [the Pakistani military] they are out of their mind. He was always going to fuck them.
Chotiner: OK. In your piece you call into question that the Americans got valuable documents in the raid. But Ayman al-Zawahiri, the current head of al-Qaida, himself seemed to confirm that this was true. How do you handle that contradiction?
Hersh: I handle it pretty easy. [Laughs] The issue for me is the treasure trove issue. Did the SEALS take out piles of computers? There were claims they found computers and disks and sticks, what do they call those sticks?
Chotiner: I don’t know.
Hersh: You’re not as old as I am. You should know that. Anyway, the SEALs mission was to go kill the guy. They did pick up some papers, but most of the papers were delivered by the ISI. He was a prisoner under their control. He wasn’t beaten and could walk around but it was a prison. He couldn’t get out. They kept encouraging him to write stuff. And he did. But I am bothered by the contradictions. [The] president said it was a treasure trove so there had to be a treasure trove. Is it real? I don’t know. It was used in a trial. Is it real? Is it not? I don’t know.
Chotiner: You seem slightly annoyed that Obama double-crossed the Pakistanis.
Hersh: Double-crossed is your word.
Chotiner: OK fine. I want to understand why you seem bothered by that, aside from the lying. Turning our back on the worst elements in Pakistan who we have long nurtured doesn’t seem so bad. We have supported them forever.
Hersh: Why do we do that?
Chotiner: Because we see it as being in our own interest.
Hersh: Well no, we do it for nukes.
Chotiner: Fine, we see that as being in our interest.
Hersh: In my experience in the last 30 years, one of the major worries was about the “Islamic bomb,” about Pakistan. If you knew the lengths to which we go, working with the ISI, to make sure some ultranationalist or ultrajihadist doesn’t get [control of nukes].
Chotiner: Yes, although you could argue that if we hadn’t nurtured these elements for so long, the country would be less of a threat.
Hersh: You could argue anything.
Chotiner: I want to—
Hersh: Swing away fella.
Chotiner: You sent me—
Hersh: You probably don’t know that NBC reported, and now they have reported it on one of these dopey afternoon shows with that woman, what’s her name, the NBC woman who claims to have some knowledge of foreign policy, married to Alan Greenspan.
Chotiner: Andrea Mitchell.
Hersh: She’s comical. On her show the administration is acknowledging walk-ins but saying the walk-ins aren’t necessarily linked to Bin Laden.
Chotiner: The AFP piece, which you sent me approvingly, says the same thing, that there is no evidence the walk-in led to Bin Laden, and that the walk-in did not even know the target was Bin Laden.
Hersh: Uh huh, OK.
Chotiner: OK but here is my question about journalism, since you have been doing this longer than I have—
Hersh: Oh poor you, you don’t know anything. It is amazing you can speak the God’s English.
Chotiner: Are you hoping with this piece to say that you made no mistakes, or that OK there were mistakes because I am getting the ball rolling? You have quoted two pieces very approvingly, from NBC and AFP, that differ from key points in your own story. I want to know how accurate you think your story now is.
Hersh: [Laughs loudly] Well I will tell you one thing: At one point a copy editor in England confronted me about the SEALs training in Nevada and changed it to Utah, and the line made it because according to her they were sort of the same.
Chotiner: The AFP piece contradicts your piece but you aren’t running around worried about that.
Hersh: I sent it approvingly because it crossed my desk and it does say there were walk-ins. [Laughs] You can read it any way you want. The White House has been very clever about this. They have gone after me personally. They don’t like me boo hoo hoo. But they have been very careful to hedge everything, they quote Peter Bergen. Bergen or Berger, is that his name?
Chotiner: Bergen.
Hersh: They quote him. He views himself as the trustee of all things Bin Laden.
Chotiner: I just want to talk to you about your piece and journalism.
Hersh: What difference does it make what the fuck I think about journalism? I don’t think much of the journalism that I see. If you think I write stories where it is all right to just be good enough, are you kidding? You think I have a cavalier attitude on throwing stuff out? Are you kidding? I am not cavalier about what I do for a living.
Chotiner: I don’t think you are cavalier. That was not my question.
Hersh: Whatever it is, it’s an impossible question. It’s almost like you are asking me to say that there are flaws in everybody. Yes. Do I acknowledge that not everybody can be perfect? But I am not backing off anything I said.
Chotiner: Well let’s talk about sources. A lot of the reporting that got us into the last stupid war was based on bad and often anonymous sources. Is there a problem with journalists having a limited number of sources, just generally speaking? Is this a problem? With unnamed sources—
Hersh: Are you kidding me? Unnamed sources? You are smarter than that. This is too boring.
Chotiner: Let me finish my question and then you can yell at me.
Hersh: I am done yelling.
Chotiner: Is there some sort of journalistic standard that reporters should try to meet to prevent more errors?
Hersh: Let me say something to you. There was a practice at the New Yorker that continued at the London Review of Books. The reason I like the LRB is that it isn’t tied down to Americana. It is more open to being … In Europe people think this story makes sense. There is not the quibbling. It is a different approach. By that I mean that the view of America is less cheery abroad but the standards are the same. The people at the London Review knew whom I talked to. It is the same at the New Yorker. David Remnick knows who I talk to. I do have sources, which is a problem for a lot of people that don’t.
Chotiner: OK well it seems like the upshot of what you are saying, and correct me if this is wrong—
Hersh: I just said what I said. I don’t want to hear what the upshot is. If you have another question then ask it. This is going on too long. I am too old and too cranky and too tired. I have been doing this fucking thing for a day. I told you, I warned you, that I am really irritable.
Chotiner: OK so if both places check your sources, and the New Yorker—
Hersh: Now you are restating it. In Europe it is an easier path. The notion that somehow America—I have one slight layer less. Believe me. I don’t know if you know who Mary-Kay Wilmers is. You probably don’t.
Chotiner: She is the editor of the LRB.
Hersh: Do you know how smart she is?
Chotiner: I have heard stories.
Hersh: She is fantastic. She is as good as they say. They go gaga over her. She was married to Stephen Frears. She is tenacious. But believe me this piece took a long time to get into print. A lot of questions. A lot of nasty questions.
Chotiner: OK—
Hersh: Don’t turn this into some sort of profound anti-American statement.
Chotiner: It seems like you are hinting the New Yorker rejected it for reasons having to do with politics.
Hersh: Would you care to hear the truth? Would you care to hear something that didn’t come from Vox, whoever Vox is? I am not sure you are that interested in it. I am doing a book. Within four or five days I hear that there are problems with the [official] OBL story. A lot of problems. And I have good friends in Pakistan. Really good friends. I go there a lot. Hold on, I just walked out of a two-room suite and the fucking movie crew. The fucking movie crew just leaves the desk. God dammit. [A film crew had been in Hersh’s office.] Anyway. First of all, you may get some suggestion of this. Maybe I am not an easy guy.
Chotiner: I wouldn’t dream of suggesting that.
Hersh: There was a point with the New Yorker where I thought they should rename the fucking magazine the Seymour Hersh Weekly. David Remnick has his own theories and opinions. He is not cowed by me. We have a lot of fights. We have a lot of disagreements. I don’t find that so shocking. I like him a lot, he is brilliant, he is great. I think he is even a better writer than editor. I have always been a freelancer. I always work for myself.
Chotiner: I get that.
Hersh: So, all that happens is I tell him about the story, and his initial approach was to say do a blog item. Go fuck yourself! A blog? I have done a couple blogs when it is 1,000 words but this is worth more. At that point it was very early. So I was on contract for a book and said fuck it … You want to make a lot out of it? David always says he welcomes another view. I am the guy who said fuck it, I will do what I want to do. [Editor’s note: Other news sources have reported that the New Yorker declined to publish a version of the story.]
[Hersh picks up other phone]: Yeah. Yeah. Oh no, fuck no … I don’t want to do it there! Go fuck—
Hersh: You there?
Chotiner: Yes.
Hersh: Fucking TV interview sets up in the hall of my office building. It’s a lawyer’s building.
Chotiner: I was just asking—
Hersh: You want to write about this totally tedious shit? Yes, I am a huge pain in the ass. I am the one that decided to publish it wherever the hell I please. That’s the story. You want to listen to hall gossip about me? Go ahead. [Sarcastic voice] It is so immensely important to so many people to know where I published. I can’t believe it.
Chotiner: Can I tell you why?
Hersh: I don’t want to hear why. You think there is a different standard in London?
Chotiner: I wish you would listen.
Hersh: All right, maybe I will listen, but I gotta hang up.
Chotiner: If people here are turning down stories because of certain politics—you yourself said it was easier in Europe—that is a story that should be written.
Hersh: Now you said the first intelligent thing you have said. If you had asked whether he didn’t run this because he is in love with Obama and all that stuff that people think, no … It is a very good question. Although we have huge disagreements. My children and I have huge disagreements. I have a huge disagreement with my dog. We have a lot of disagreements and there are times when he will call me and I will not answer the call. Oh fuck hold on. He always has said to me he welcomes any information and it was I who said fuck it.
Chotiner: OK but you have talked about the New Yorker’s Americana and said my question was a good one, so is there something to it?
Hersh: I think it is a great question.
Chotiner: So what do you think of it?
Hersh: I just told you what I think. In the case of the Bin Laden story, he is open for anything. It was I who made the decision.
Chotiner: I feel like you are telling me two different things. One is that you get less pressure in Europe, and the other is that this story would have been fine at the New Yorker.
Hersh: So fine, I am glad you are confused. Write whichever one makes you happy.
Chotiner: OK.
Hersh: I don’t mean to yell at you but I feel good doing it. Goodbye.
This article was posted: Friday, May 15, 2015 at 5:45 am
Jon Loudon