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Why Not Simply Abolish the CIA?

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If anyone thinks that CIA Director John Brennan is going to be severely punished for lying about the CIA’s hacking into the computers of members of Congress who were investigating torture inflicted on people by the CIA, think again. It’s not going to happen. Everyone knows that lying is the official policy of the CIA and a well-established, accepted custom, much as it is for the rest of the U.S. national-security state. Indeed, don’t forget Director of National Intelligence James Clapper’s false statements to Congress, in which he lied about the NSA’s surveillance of Americans. Unlike private citizen Martha Stewart, who received a felony conviction and a 6-month jail sentence for lying to federal agents, Clapper got a complete pass — no investigation, no indictment, no trial, no conviction, no sentencing, no fine. That’s because of the wall of protection that has been built around the national-security state apparatus—i.e., the military and the CIA—a wall of protection that has only ...

What Limited Government?

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One of the common misconceptions about the United States is that the federal government is a “limited government,” unlike tyrannical regimes, which are characterized as “omnipotent government” or “unlimited government.” Limited government means that the government’s powers are limited in nature and scope. Omnipotent or unlimited government means that the government can do whatever it wants. Limited government certainly was the founding principle of the U.S. government. That’s what the Constitution was all about. By enumerating the powers that the federal government would be permitted to exercise, the Framers were establishing limited government. The first ten amendments to the Constitution further restricted the powers of the federal government. Yet, how can anyone really say that the United States is still characterized by limited government? Consider the CIA, which is one of the premier agencies of the U.S. government. It wields the power to kidnap people, incarcerate them in secret prisons anywhere in the world, torture them, rendition them to friendly tyrannical regimes, ...

Needed: A U.S. Truth Commission on Horman and Teruggi

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For the past several years, the Chilean and Argentine people have been confronting their dark pasts under military dictatorships during the 1970s. They have been conducting official investigations into the dirty wars the dictatorships waged under the guise of a “war on communism” and a “war on terrorism,” including disappearances, kidnappings, incarcerations, torture, rapes, executions, secret prisons, and assassinations. Among the primary means they have been conducting such investigations is with truth commissions. The American people should do the same, especially since the U.S. national-security state was an important partner in the Chilean and Argentine horrors, not only by instigating and encouraging the Chilean coup in 1973 but also by providing Chile’s military dictatorship with millions of dollars in post-coup foreign aid, along with major technological and communication support that it provided DINA, the top-secret assassination organization in which Argentina, Chile, and other South American dictatorships were involved. A good place for such a truth commission to start would be with a ...

Thailand, Chile, and U.S. Support of Military Coups

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Despite standard superficial expressions of indignation, U.S. officials are undoubtedly ecstatic over the military coup in Thailand. That’s because they believe that an essential step in the achievement of democracy is the smashing of democracy by a country’s military (that is, when the voters elect the wrong person), followed by a military dictatorship devoted to restoring democracy. Chile provides a ...