The Manning Conviction

By Austin Bay

Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Following his conviction this week on at least five counts of espionage and several lesser charges, including fraud and theft, U.S. Army Pfc. Bradley Manning will now do hard time in prison.

In certain circumstances, spies deserve capital punishment. Several decades in jail strikes me being as Manning's criminal due, however.

Treason rates the death sentence, but Manning didn't commit treason. In fact, he beat that rap.

Manning admitted he gave Julian Assange's Wikileaks organization at least 700,000 pages of classified U.S. documents, as well as numerous classified videos. The massive document release included classified State Department cables and military information related to operations in combat zones. So prosecutors charged Manning with "aiding the enemy," an act of treason. The prosecution argued that Manning knew the information he released would aid al-Qaida.

Proving treason involves proving "specific intent." Prosecutors had to prove Manning specifically intended to aid specific enemies. They failed to make that case.

Manning's theft and espionage, in fact, were rather unspecific. He stole information by the megabyte, with scant selectivity and little reflection. He looked for secrets addressing topics that assured sensational media coverage.

Theft, however is still theft; violating military oaths and ironclad laws protecting classified information are military crimes.

Leaking unspecific classified information, especially trainloads of it, can damage U.S. defenses.

I think it already has. Manning's filched documents provide everyone -- friend, foe or bystander -- with a detailed look at American information gathering, information assessment and decision-making in the sensitive realms of foreign policy and defense.

Liberals forever extoll "soft diplomacy," the goodnik mission of diplomats in contrast to the "hard diplomacy" soldiers wield. Diplomacy requires able, careful diplomats. Yet Manning's leaked State Department cables provide our adversaries with a highly granular, candid and often personal portrait of a generation of U.S. diplomats. The cables reveal how specific diplomats operate, what they seek to accomplish and with whom they talk.

Though Manning's leaks did not place American diplomats in immediate mortal danger (a treasonous act), the leaks damaged their ability to conduct diplomacy, both near and long term. The private first class clearly does not understand that diplomacy is America's first line of defense.

Manning claims he became "disillusioned" with a foreign policy focused on "killing and capturing people" -- people, he said, not terrorists. So he spied and leaked information that would damage the agencies and agents conducting American foreign policy.

Manning's passionate defenders argue this damage serves the greater good, but they bear no personal responsibility for protecting American lives and vital interests even if they benefit from that protection.

Excusing Manning's crimes demonstrates a narrow, to the point of benighted, understanding of foreign policy in a dangerous, complicated world. "Burning" U.S. diplomats doesn't simply damage U.S. foreign policy, it hinders constructive, stop-the-killing diplomacy globally.

Several State Department cables were classified in deference to the sensitivities of foreign diplomats. One quotes a senior Chinese official bluntly describing North Korea's regime as crackpot. Is an honest comment, very likely an incremental step toward diplomatically reducing the threat of nuclear war in East Asia, worth keeping secret? Manning and Assange exposed it, but their vision of greater good is rather criminally self-serving.

Eventually an adversary will use insights gained from analyzing Manning's stolen documents to conduct operations that threaten American lives and livelihoods. Delayed treason, however, isn't a crime.

Manning, demoted to the rank of convict, has earned his next military tour. Before his trial, the military kept Manning in its Joint Regional Correctional Facility. The JRCF incarcerates pretrial defendants and prisoners with short sentences (five years or less). It's located at Ft. Leavenworth, Kan. -- but don't confuse it with its famous Leavenworth neighbor, the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks. The "DB" is what Hollywood means by "Leavenworth." News media report Manning will do his stretch in a DB cell.

The U.S. Army Command and General Staff School is also located at Ft. Leavenworth. The staff school runs what joking soldiers attending it refer to as "the short course." The Disciplinary Barracks? It runs Leavenworth's "long course." Would-be spies, take note. The long course isn't a death sentence, but it is certainly no joke.

Bending the Trayvon Martin Tragedy To Fit

By Jonah Goldberg

Wednesday, July 31, 2013

I never thought the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman case deserved nearly the attention it got. But reasonable people can disagree about that. What strikes me as unconscionable, however, is the way the supposedly objective media have not only sensationalized a tragedy but at times appear to deliberately bend the facts to fit a desired story line. Maybe it started with the use of pictures of a younger Martin or with the sudden embrace of the term "white Hispanic" to describe Zimmerman in order to more easily paint him as a racist.

NBC News was the most egregious offender on this score. Producers edited Zimmerman's 911 call to make it sound as if he were targeting Martin because of his race. The "Today" show ran audio of Zimmerman saying, "This guy looks like he's up to no good ... he looks black." Those ellipses hide the fact Zimmerman said "he looks black" only after the operator asked him to describe Martin. (NBC has apologized, and Zimmerman is suing.)

Any hope that the editorializing would end with the trial was naive. National Public Radio recently profiled Sybrina Fulton, Martin's mother. In response to the tragedy and the trial, Fulton has become a civil rights activist, NPR reported.

It was a deferential piece, and understandably so. Who wants to add to the woman's pain? But there's a difference between deference and advocacy. In a speech to the National Urban League, Fulton said her son was killed "all because of a law, a law that has prevented the person who shot and killed my son to be held accountable and to pay for this awful crime."

And how did NPR's Greg Allen put that statement in context? He told listeners: "Fulton is one of many pushing for a repeal of Florida's 'stand your ground' law." He noted that sit-ins have been staged but that the Florida governor remains "unmoved." And that was it.

Allen then went on to report that one of the jurors told ABC News, "George Zimmerman got away with murder but you can't get away from God." We owe that revelation to ABC's interview with Juror B29, a.k.a. "Maddy." The sole nonwhite juror in the case, Maddy made that remark to ABC's Robin Roberts. The quote went viral across electronic and print media.

The only problem: It's not clear that's what she thinks. As Will Saletan of Slate magazine notes, the video was artfully edited to make it appear as if Maddy generated this thought on her own. But when you watch an unedited segment, she's repeating back a statement by Roberts, and ABC News was happy to let the misinterpretation stand.

Letting misinterpretations stand is the hallmark of the media's coverage of this story. For instance, nowhere in NPR's report did Allen mention that Zimmerman's defense team never mentioned Florida's "stand your ground" law. They argued traditional self-defense. The decision not to arrest Zimmerman in the first place wasn't about that law either, despite widespread insistence that it was.

Much has been made of the fact that the judge's instructions to the jury included the phrase "right to stand his ground," without noting that it is part of a standard jury instruction. As prosecutor John Guy declared, "This case is not about standing your ground."

This is not to say that "stand your ground" laws have no conceivable bearing on the Zimmerman case. Thoughtful critics of such laws, including President Obama, worry that they might create a climate in which people are too quick to resort to deadly force.

But that is an airy justification for the media to treat the law as if it were central to the whole controversy. Is it conceivable that NPR would let, say, a gun rights activist's wildly tendentious interpretation of a law stand without some explanation or context? Why should opponents of "stand your ground" laws get different treatment?

I think part of the answer is that the media and civil rights groups want a consolation prize. They didn't get the verdict -- or the story line -- they wanted. But they need to get something positive out of this. I certainly understand why Trayvon Martin's family feels that way. I fail to see why the media should so eagerly oblige.

Who Cares What Jay Z Thinks and Why Don Lemon Is Right about Blacks in America

By Crystal Wright

Wednesday, July 31, 2013

The fact blacks praised Jay Z for his comments on the Zimmerman verdict and bashed CNN’s Don Lemon for pointing out the problems blacks bring on themselves is exactly what’s wrong with “Black America.”

I’ve always rejected the news media and self-appointed black leaders' persistent efforts in relegating blacks into a group of political zombies, void individualism and personal responsibility. But against the backdrop of the George Zimmerman murder trial of Trayvon Martin and the race hustlers’ desperate attempt to turn the “event” into a white on black hate crime, the ugly scab of black culture was revealed.

This fake race war also brought out the worst behavior in black Americans who called people like me and Don Lemmon, “house niggas, sellouts, and Uncle Toms” among other unsavory names for daring to offer constructive criticism and say blacks are their own worst nightmare and need to take responsibility for their bad behavior!

During his CNN show this weekend, Lemon admitted now the trial was over he felt he could offer some “tough love” about the ills facing the black race. He said he didn’t want to do that during the trial because it was a “deflection” from what happened to Trayvon.

In a pointed monologue, Lemon agreed with Bill O’Reilly’s observations the near collapse of the black family (73% of black babies born out of wedlock) is the number one cause, as I have said repeatedly, for the pervasive violence gripping the black race and driving its economic decline.

But Lemon said O’Reilly didn’t go far enough. He told blacks there were five things they shouldn’t do.

Five: Wear their pants hanging off their butt because it comes from the prison culture where inmates aren’t allowed to wear belts and the lower hanging pants indicate “which role a prisoner will play during male on male prison sex.” 

Four: stop using n***er in any way because it’s abhorrent.

Three: stop trashing the neighborhood where you live. 

Two: get an education. 

One, “just because you can have a baby, it doesn’t mean you should.”

Basic common sense advice. But many blacks didn’t want to hear this truth and insulted Lemon with profanity laced tweets, making themselves look like the savages other Americans, including other blacks, fear.

In contrast, when Jay Z offered up his cup of Zimmerman racist juice, blacks happily drank it up. Commenting on the not guilty verdict, millionaire rapper Jay Z said, "I was really angry, I didn't sleep for two days.” He added that Trayvon was just going to the store to buy Skittles and a drink and “had no intention of robbing anyone."

“We all know it was wrong. It was wrong. . .First of all, you're not a professional to profile someone. . . This guy's a (effing) mall cop,” Jay Z declared of Zimmerman.

Jay Z must be a mind reader because evidence gathered in the case, some of which the defense wasn’t allowed to present during the trial, revealed Trayvon wasn’t such an innocent 17 year old teen. He was suspended three times from school and stolen jewelry and a burglary tool were found in his locker. Text messages from Trayvon’s cell phone also showed he liked to fight, wanted to buy a gun and get high on codeine. Text messages exchanged with a friend, who told Trayvon how to make Lean or Purple Drank, using fruit juice, Skittles and cough syrup with codeine in it like Robitussin. Martin’s toxicology report showed his liver was damaged consistent with drug abuse caused by Lean.

I guess Jay Z didn’t bother with the fact the FBI’s investigation last year into the incident concluded race had nothing to do with Zimmerman killing Trayvon. And Jay Z couldn’t be bothered with the fact some jurors said there wasn’t enough evidence to convict Zimmerman and the case should never have been brought to trial.

As a former drug dealer, who’s been shot three times, blacks shouldn’t care what Jay Z thinks. Jay Z has no credibility talking about racism or violence, because as Lemon noted, hip-hop and rap stars like Jay Z glorifying a thug culture is “making a lot of people rich, just not you.” In fact Jay Z’s music incites young black males to violence. Maybe Jay Z should lose some sleep over that.

Did Travyon Martin deserve to die? No. Could Travyon Martin’s upbringing and not enough parental attention have had something to do with his death? Possibly. Could Trayvon have thrown the first punch and tragically died as a result of it? Yes.

What angers many blacks about the Zimmerman trial is it uncorked how fed up Americans are with all the excuses so called “black leaders,” Democrats and the media always make for the black race’s failings. A violent, black sub culture that glorifies crime, misogyny, profanity, and hatred of whites is driving the high crime, high school dropout rates, illegitimate births, poverty and government dependency rooted in the black race. We need more black people like Don Lemon to have the audacity to repudiate this behavior, not apologize for it.

Black Self-Sabotage

By Walter E. Williams

Wednesday, July 31, 2013

If we put ourselves into the shoes of racists who seek to sabotage black upward mobility, we couldn't develop a more effective agenda than that followed by civil rights organizations, black politicians, academics, liberals and the news media. Let's look at it.

First, weaken the black family, but don't blame it on individual choices. You have to preach that today's weak black family is a legacy of slavery, Jim Crow and racism. The truth is that black female-headed households were just 18 percent of households in 1950, as opposed to about 68 percent today. In fact, from 1890 to 1940, the black marriage rate was slightly higher than that of whites. Even during slavery, when marriage was forbidden for blacks, most black children lived in biological two-parent families. In New York City, in 1925, 85 percent of black households were two-parent households. A study of 1880 family structure in Philadelphia shows that three-quarters of black families were two-parent households.

During the 1960s, devastating nonsense emerged, exemplified by a Johns Hopkins University sociology professor who argued, "It has yet to be shown that the absence of a father was directly responsible for any of the supposed deficiencies of broken homes." The real issue, he went on to say, "is not the lack of male presence but the lack of male income." That suggests marriage and fatherhood can be replaced by a welfare check.

The poverty rate among blacks is 36 percent. Most black poverty is found in female-headed households. The poverty rate among black married couples has been in single digits since 1994 and is about 8 percent today. The black illegitimacy rate is 75 percent, and in some cities, it's 90 percent. But if that's a legacy of slavery, it must have skipped several generations, because in the 1940s, unwed births hovered around 14 percent.

Along with the decline of the black family comes anti-social behavior, manifested by high crime rates. Each year, roughly 7,000 blacks are murdered. Ninety-four percent of the time, the murderer is another black person. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, between 1976 and 2011, there were 279,384 black murder victims. Using the 94 percent figure means that 262,621 were murdered by other blacks. Though blacks are 13 percent of the nation's population, they account for more than 50 percent of homicide victims. Nationally, the black homicide victimization rate is six times that of whites, and in some cities, it's 22 times that of whites. I'd like for the president, the civil rights establishment, white liberals and the news media, who spent massive resources protesting the George Zimmerman trial's verdict, to tell the nation whether they believe that the major murder problem blacks face is murder by whites. There are no such protests against the thousands of black murders.

There's an organization called NeighborhoodScout. Using 2011 population data from the U.S. Census Bureau, 2011 crime statistics from the FBI and information from 17,000 local law enforcement agencies in the country, it came up with a report titled "Top 25 Most Dangerous Neighborhoods in America." (http://tinyurl.com/cdqrev4) They include neighborhoods in Detroit, Chicago, Houston, St. Louis and other major cities. What's common to all 25 neighborhoods is that their makeup is described as "Black" or "Mostly Black." The high crime rates have several outcomes that are not in the best interests of the overwhelmingly law-abiding people in these neighborhoods. There can't be much economic development. Property has a lower value, but worst of all, people can't live with the kind of personal security that most Americans enjoy.

Disgustingly, black politicians, civil rights leaders, liberals and the president are talking nonsense about "having a conversation about race." That's beyond useless. Tell me how a conversation with white people is going to stop black predators from preying on blacks. How is such a conversation going to eliminate the 75 percent illegitimacy rate? What will such a conversation do about the breakdown of the black family (though "breakdown" is not the correct word, as the family doesn't form in the first place)? Only black people can solve our problems.

Liberalism Makes It Easier to be Bad

By Dennis Prager

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

There are many liberals who lead thoroughly decent lives. And there are conservatives who do not.

But that is not the whole issue.

There is something about liberalism that is not nearly as true about conservatism. The further left one goes, the more one finds that the ideology provides moral cover for a life that is not moral. While many people left of center lead fine personal lives, many do not. And left-wing ideals enable a person to do that much more than conservative ideals do.

There is an easy way to demonstrate this.

If a married -- or even unmarried -- conservative congressman had texted sexual images of himself to young women he did not even know, he would have been called something Anthony Wiener has not been called -- a hypocrite.

Why? Because conservatives -- secular conservatives, not only religious conservatives -- are identified with moral values in the personal sphere, and liberals are not. Liberals rarely called Bill Clinton a hypocrite for his extramarital affair while president. George W. Bush would have been pilloried as such.

Simply put, we do not generally judge personal conduct the same when it comes to liberals and conservatives.

Both liberals and conservatives know this. As a result, as noted, liberal social positions can provide moral cover for immoral behavior in a way that conservative positions cannot.

Though there are many sincere liberals, it is likely that this ability to provide moral cover for a less than moral life is one source of liberalism's appeal.

I first thought about this when I saw how the left-wing students at my graduate school, Columbia University, behaved. Aside from their closing down classes, taking over office buildings, and ransacking professors' offices, I saw the way in which many of them conducted themselves in their personal lives. Most of them had little sense of personal decency, and lived lives of narcissistic hedonism. Women who were involved with leftist groups have told of how poorly they were treated. And one suspects that they would have been treated far better by conservative, let alone religious, men on campus.

My sense was that the radicals' commitment to "humanity," to "peace," and to "love" gave them license to feel good about themselves without having to lead a good life. Their vocal opposition to war and to racism provided them with all the moral self-esteem they wanted.

Consider the example of the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy. He had been expelled from college for paying someone to take his exams. His role in the death of a woman with whom he spent an evening would have sent almost anyone without his family name to prison -- or would have at least resulted in prosecution for negligent homicide. And he spent decades using so many women in so public a way that stories about his sex life were routinely told in Washington. Read the 9,000-word 1990 article in GQ by Michael Kelly, who a few years later became the editor of the New Republic.

When this unimpressive man started espousing liberal positions, speaking passionately about the downtrodden in society, it recalled the unimpressive students who marched on behalf of civil rights, peace and love.

It is quite likely that Ted Kennedy came to believe in the positions that he took. But I also suspect that he found espousing those positions invaluable to his self-image and to his public image: "Look at what a moral man I am after all." And liberal positions were all that mattered to the left and to the liberal media that largely ignored such lecherous behavior as the "waitress sandwich" he made in a Washington, D.C. restaurant with another prominent liberal, former Senator Chris Dodd.

In addition to knowing that liberal positions provide moral cover for immoral personal behavior, liberals know that their immoral behavior will be given more of pass than exactly the same behavior would if done by a conservative.

Women's groups provided Bill Clinton with enormous moral capital because he supported their feminist agenda. One leading feminist famously said she would be happy to get on her knees and pleasure Clinton thanks to his pro-choice position on abortion.

Conservative politicians have the same sex drive as liberal politicians, the same marital problems and the same ubiquitous temptations and opportunities. And some will therefore engage in extramarital sex. But every conservative politician knows that should he be caught, his positions on issues not only do not provide moral cover for his conduct, those very positions condemn it. There is no benefit to the conservative sinner in being a conservative. There is great benefit to the liberal sinner in being a liberal.