Seymour Hersh: "After 9/11 We Became a Different Country"

[babylonsister]

Seymour Hersh: "After 9/11 We Became a Different Country"

By Faisal Abbas, Asharq Al-Awsat. Posted December 25, 2008.

The New Yorker's star reporter discusses Abu Ghraib, the "war on terror," and why U.S. reporters don't pay enough attention to the Arab press.


Asharq Al-Awsat, London -- In this interview, Asharq Al-Awsat speaks to veteran American reporter Seymour Hersh, who, four years ago, exposed the now infamous prison abuse scandal of Abu Ghraib in Iraq at the hands of U.S. soldiers.

In 1969, Hersh brought to light the My Lai massacre carried out by U.S. forces in Vietnam, for which he received a Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting in 1970.

However, as most journalists know, it is impossible to please everybody. Hersh has been praised and is often regarded as "the last American reporter," while on the other hand he is also criticized and described as "the closest thing American journalism has to a terrorist," particularly for his outspokenness against the American administration and U.S. forces.

The interview proceeded as follows:

Asharq Al-Awsat: Many Arab journalists say that it is shameful that the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal was uncovered by a Western journalist rather than an Arab journalist. What is your view of the Arab media and its failure to expose this incident?

Seymour Hersh: I can't answer on behalf of somebody as to why he did not do something but what I can say is thank God it was reported by a Westerner, whether it was me or anybody else. Just imagine how mush worse it would have been for America if {the} Abu Ghraib {prison abuse scandal} had been reported by the Arab press. I can also say that as an American, it shows that there is at least a little bit of integrity left in the system.

I would not defend the American press with regards to reporting on {U.S. President George W.} Bush; I think we did a terrible job, particularly on the Weapons of Mass Destruction issue. However, in this {Abu Ghraib} case, you should not be too tough on the Arab press simply because the photographs and the report that I obtained came from within America, not from the Middle East.

One of the things about Abu Ghraib is that the story was there to be had; if you had read the reports by the various groups that monitor abuses and torture, you would have known that they had already been talking about Abu Ghraib, so it was not really newly discovered that it was a hell-hole. What was new was that there were photographs, and those were not available to anyone outside the American system.

I can also say that in general, one of the things that drives me crazy about my country and our reporters is that they do not pay enough attention the Arab press, which has more reporters to move around locally and has better language skills.

more...

http://www.alternet.org/rights/114994/seymour_hersh%3A_%22after_9_11_we_became_a_different_country%22_/?page=entire

[LynnTheDem]

1. And not for the better.

Far from it.

[Peace Patriot]

2. Here's the quote and I don't think I agree with it...

"What I have said is that there are a lot of people that I have talked to who will be much easier to talk to after the inauguration of (President-elect) Barack Obama.

"I will be writing a book with a very fine publishing house and a very bright group of people; the idea is to write a book from the inside.

"I really believe something happened to America; after 9/11 we became a different country. That is fine, presidents sometimes might want to do that, but my issue is how did Bush do it? How did he beat the press? How did he beat the military and Congress and turn everyone into a coward? Why didn't people stand up to him in this situation? In other words, how fragile is the American constitution; it turns out that it is much more fragile than people think."--Seymour Hersh

Nope, we didn't become a "different country." Nearly 60% of the American people opposed the invasion of Iraq (Feb '03, all polls), despite relentless, 24/7, lies and propaganda. 63% opposed torture "under any circumstances" (May '04). Our progressive values as a people remained in tact, in quite remarkable majorities. Something else happened--the hijacking of our government and our military; election fraud; and corpo/fascist media psyops (aimed primarily at making the members of the progressive majority feel isolated and alone in their views, and powerless).

I have enormous respect for Seymour Hersh, but I think he has the "old leftist" blind spot of undervaluing and underestimating the American people. This Bush/Cheney junta was a fascist coup, nothing less. WE didn't change. They TRIED to change US--and failed. Part of this particular blind spot is ignoring election fraud. Count all the votes in this country and you will find, lo and behold, big majority opposition to unjust war, torture and other abominations, and big majority support for good government, the rule of law, fairness and justice, and humane values.

So, why couldn't we get leaders with OUR values? We were not changed. Our government was taken over by a corpo/fascist cabal. And we are only just now figuring out how they did it. (And, frankly, considering the damage to our election system, it's not over yet, in my opinion. Obama may just be a short period of niceness and consolidation of global corporate predator gains, until Hitler II is brought along and is Diebolded into the White House in 2012. With 100% non-transparency in half the voting systems in the country, and the media the way it is, we cannot prevent it.)

[bemildred]

3. Yeah, looked like the same old country to me.

I like Mr Hirsch, but we don't always see things the same way.

[BrklynLiberal]

5. It was the government that became different. The first crime was prez shit-for-brains

being put into the White House. The second crime was their ignoring all the warnings about an attack on US soil. The question of course is whether they ignored the warnings with a purpose in mind. As it turned out, the attack played perfectly into the hands of the Neocons, who then proceeded to use hate and fear to turn the government the way they wanted. They used virtually every trick in the book and had the vast majority of the media as accomplices.
Looking back on the size of the peace marches all over this country before the Iraq invasion, and even afterward, I do not believe that it was the people of this country that changed that much. The Neocons worked hard to hide the truth, to create as much hate and divisiveness as possible, and to assume the role of speaking for the American people.
They were able to put into place all the tools they needed to steal the next "election". It was a worldwide embarrassment to most Americans to have the outcome be prez shit-for-brains "re-elected". We knew that he had actually not even been elected once.
I believe that the first chance they got, the American people dumped this blithering idiot and all he stood for.
The 2006 elections were the first baby-steps in that direction.
The election of Barack Obama was the final step in the re-awakening of the Americans, and their seizing back control of their country.
The world celebrated with us. I believe everyone knew that it was the government, and not the people who had really changed.
I hope that the government of this country and its people are never again at such odds with each other.

[hay rick]

4. 9-11 accelerated a process already underway.

The election of GWB in 2000 was an act of moral surrender enabled by the American media and assented to by the American people. Bush's early popularity was based on little more than his willingness to execute far more people than any previous American governor. Americans were encouraged to think of themselves as victims and of Bush as their avenger.

Bush's aura of competence was a media-construct based on his old-boy network business "success" and his close connection with high-flying Enron. He would be the first CEO/President. The fact that he couldn't put together a coherent sentence should have been viewed as obvious proof to the contrary but instead was sold as evidence of his close connection to the common folk. The lie that Al Gore claimed to have invented the internet was coddled by a complicit media. Bush v. Gore was only the cherry on a shit sundae.

9-11 added fuel to the fire of Americans-as-victims. The need for vengeance overwhelmed the tradition of respect for justice. In short order, Americans bought the ideas that chemical and biological weapons were "weapons of mass destruction", that Saddam Hussein had WMD until he could prove otherwise (an obvious impossibility), and that we had the right to preemptively invade anyone who MIGHT have WMD and who MIGHT use them against us.

By the time that Abu Ghraib came to light, we were no longer sliding down a slippery moral slope. We were sprawled out at the bottom.

[Peace Patriot]

7. But you, like Hersh, are ignoring what the polls at the time said: the great majority

of the American people (nearly 60%) OPPOSED the invasion of Iraq (Feb '03, all polls). They did NOT buy the Bushwhacks' BS about WMDs. About half of those opposed were against the war without reservation. The other half said that they would only approve if the UN agreed (i.e., there was an international consensus that Saddam Hussein posed a serious threat to peace). There was no such agreement by the UN. Major allies did not agree. In sum, about 30% of our people were anti-war, period. Another 30% did NOT trust Bush/Cheney to make a war judgment.

Yes, a lot of people were confused about a lot of issues (whether Saddam had WMDs, whether he had anything to do with 9/11)--they were being hit with 24/7 propaganda on all channels TO confuse them--but they did NOT trust Bush/Cheney to make those judgments or to commit the U.S. to war, without the more objective assessment of the United Nations.

It is very important, in my opinion, to distinguish between the country and its people, and the government and its propaganda horn--the corpo/fascist 'news' monopolies. Hersh fails to make this distinction. He says we became "a different country." Not true. Our government was hijacked for a corporate resource war and for massive looting of the American people. This was accomplished with stolen elections. We and our government diverged. Our government became our enemy.

Why is this so important? Because if we don't understand how this Bush disaster happened, we can't fix it.

When the Iraq War came down, I really, really wanted to know what was going on with my fellow Americans. I couldn't believe this was happening again--not after Vietnam. And my question to myself was this: Have my fellow Americans gone crazy--goosestepping to Bush? Or is something else going on? The answer to this question is critical to a strategy for progressive change. If the American people had become so stupid and ignorant that they were following Bush off this cliff, then what was needed was public education. But if something else was going on--the disempowerment and, very important, disenfranchisement, of the majority--then the strategy should be quite different--with the main focus on RE-enfranchisement, and RE-empowerment.

So I began to pay close attention to opinion polls--and, boy, was I surprised at what I found! The great progressive American majority was still in tact--big majorities opposed to virtually every Bush policy, foreign and domestic. So, what the hell was going on? Why did it seem in the media that everybody wants war? Why was the media ignoring the big opposition to Bush's war and other policies, and failing in any way to reflect majority opinion? And why was Congress so unaffected--and giving away its war powers to Bush, and giving the Bushwhacks trillions of dollars, in known and secret budgets, to conduct an unjust war, to enrich their friends in mind-boggling amounts, to torture prisoners, to spy on all of us, and to shred the Constitution and the rule of law?

Stolen Election I set this up. But Stolen Election II was the clincher, because, between Stolen Election I (via the Supreme Court) and Stolen Election II, a NEW voting system was fast-tracked, all over the country, funded by a $3.9 billion electronic voting boondoggle, in which all the votes would now be counted using 'TRADE SECRET,' PROPRIETARY programming code, owned and controlled by rightwing Bushwhack corporations, with virtually no audit/recount controls.

The illegitimate Bush junta was cemented into power for four more years by installing a blatantly fraudulent election system, from which all transparency was eliminated.

The bill that destroyed our election system was passed in the same month (Oct '02) as the Iraq War Resolution, and is closely connected to it. The IWR guaranteed unjust war; the "Help America Vote Act" provided the means for shoving that unjust war down the throats of the American people, nearly 60% of whom opposed it.

While the corpo/fascist media were ignoring their own polls (regarding the will of the great majority of Americans)--and thus, most Americans didn't even know that the majority opposed the war--our warmongering politicians were certainly following the polls and making provision for defeating the will of the people.

Our government changed, true enough. It became a FASCIST JUNTA. But WE did not change. And we began to fight back, beginning right here at DU in the Election Forum, where analysis of the 2004 election results went forward, when it was blacklisted everywhere else, and where evidence was assembled, and networking took place, that initiated the election reform movement across the country.

We ARE a "changed country" in the sense that we are a looted and bloodied country. But we have NOT changed in wanting peace and justice, and good government. The great majority of us have never wanted anything else.

[hay rick]

8. Perhaps I'm cynical.

Thank you for the thoughtful response to my post. We agree on much- particularly as regards the failure of our media.

You state your point of disagreement with me in your first sentence: "But you, like Hersh, are ignoring what the polls at the time said: the great majority of the American people (nearly 60%) OPPOSED the invasion of Iraq (Feb '03, all polls)." I confess I do not remember the polling data from the time- only the oppressive feeling of living in a state in which the media, at the bidding of some obscene cabal, was whipping the citizenry into a lynch-mob frenzy of paranoia and vengeance. However, I did find a Wikipedia article on the subject: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_popular_opinion_of_invasion_of_Iraq

Excerpts from the article:

<snip>
February 2003

Following Powell's February 5 speech at the UN, most polls, like one conducted by CNN and NBC, showed increased support for the invasion. NBC's Washington bureau chief Tim Russert, said the bumps in support were "largely" due to president Bush's State of the Union speech in January and to Powell's presentation on February 5, which most viewers felt offered strong evidence for action against Iraq. Bush's approval ratings jumped 7 points, and support for the invasion jumped 4 points. Only 27% opposed military action, the smallest percentage since the polls began in April of 2002. The percentage of Americans supporting an invasion without UN support jumped eight points to 37%. 49% of those polled felt that President Bush had prepared the country for war and its potential risks, a 9 point jump from the previous month. <8> A Gallup poll showed the majority of the population erroneously believed Iraq was responsible for the attacks of September 11.

<snip>
<snip>

March 2003

Days before the March 20 invasion, a USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll found support for the war was related to UN approval. Nearly six in 10 said they were ready for such an invasion "in the next week or two." But that support dropped off if the U.N. backing was not first obtained. If the U.N. Security Council were to reject a resolution paving the way for military action, 54% of Americans favored a U.S. invasion. And if the Bush administration didn't not seek a final Security Council vote, support for a war dropped to 47%. <9>

An ABC News/Washington Post poll taken after the beginning of the war showed a 62% support for the war, lower than the 79% in favor at the beginning of the Persian Gulf War. <1>

April 2003

A poll conducted by the Washington Post and ABC News found that 72% of Americans supported the Iraq War, despite finding no evidence of chemical or biological weapons.

A poll made by CBS found that 60% of Americans said the Iraq War was worth the blood and cost even if no WMD are ever found.

May 2003

A Gallup poll made on behalf of CNN and the newspaper USA Today concluded that 79% of Americans thought the Iraq War was justified, with or without conclusive evidence of illegal weapons. 19% thought weapons were needed to justify the war.<10>
<snip>

What strikes me about this account is the malleability of public opinion. I left out the January 2003 part of the article in the interest of keeping this concise- anyone can read the whole article- but the trajectory of public opinion is clear: 69% of Americans had some sort of reservations about an invasion in January and by May, "79% of Americans thought the Iraq War was justified." The war had been sold. And that's pretty much the disheartening way I remember it.

You go on to state:"If the American people had become so stupid and ignorant that they were following Bush off this cliff, then what was needed was public education. But if something else was going on--the disempowerment and, very important, disenfranchisement, of the majority--then the strategy should be quite different--with the main focus on RE-enfranchisement, and RE-empowerment." From my point of view, both are needed. I agree we need a robust and reliable electoral system, but it is useless if the electorate can be easily manipulated by entrenched interests. As regards the electorate, I think a lot of our citizens need an intervention- they need to be deprogrammed.

I like your closing words: "We ARE a "changed country" in the sense that we are a looted and bloodied country. But we have NOT changed in wanting peace and justice, and good government. The great majority of us have never wanted anything else." I am not so cynical as to disagree. Rather, I would argue that the media has painted a picture of the rest of the world as a threatening and hostile place in which paranoia is prudence and peace and justice are luxury items to be put off to an indefinite future. We need to tear down that perception and replace it with something better.

[Politicalboi]

6. 9/11 gave Bush/Cheney

Everything they needed. In July of 01 there is video of Condi and Colin saying Saddam was not a threat at all. First crime stolen election, second crime 2.3 Trillion dollars gone at Pentagon on 09/10/01. Third crime 9/11. Everything else Priceless. We are in deep shit if NORAD can miss 4 planes in one day with 45 minutes delay on someone's part. And no plane reconstruction of any kind. 2 months later Bush said he saw the first plane hit the tower live. Nobody saw that till hours later or the next day on video. The "Stand Down "order by Cheney. And we haven't even begun to get into the stock trading the week before 9/11. I wish the press would ask Bush how he saw the first plane. He was on his way to the school when the first plane hit. He says he was in the classroom when he saw it on the TV in the classroom which has enough money to have cable TV apparently. History Triva: Groundbreaking ceremony of the Pentagon 09/11/41.