{"id":14130,"date":"2019-11-13T08:15:23","date_gmt":"2019-11-13T13:15:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/?p=14130"},"modified":"2019-11-14T16:42:50","modified_gmt":"2019-11-14T21:42:50","slug":"usa-today-no-deep-state-deliverance-for-democracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/2019\/11\/13\/usa-today-no-deep-state-deliverance-for-democracy\/","title":{"rendered":"USA TODAY: No Deep State Deliverance for Democracy"},"content":{"rendered":"

USA TODAY, November 13, 2019<\/h3>\n
\n

As the deep state attacks Trump to rave media reviews, don’t forget its dark side<\/a><\/h2>\n

The deep state has a long history of betraying the trust of the American people. They aren’t our friends just because we share an enemy in common.<\/h3>\n
by James Bovard<\/div>\n
\n

\u201cThank God for the deep state<\/a>,\u201d declared former acting CIA chief John McLaughlin recently while appearing on a panel at George Mason University. A year ago, the deep state was routinely reviled as a figment of paranoid right-wingers\u2019 imagination<\/a>. But much of the news media are\u00a0now conferring the same sainthood on the deep state that was previously bestowed on special counsel Robert Mueller.<\/p>\n

A New York Times article last month gushed that \u201cover the last three weeks, the deep state has emerged<\/a> from the shadows in the form of real live government officials, past and present … and provided evidence that largely backs up the still-anonymous whistleblower\u201d on President Donald\u00a0Trump\u2019s phone call to the president of Ukraine.\u00a0Times columnist James Stewart declared: \u201cThere is a deep state<\/a>, there is a bureaucracy in our country who has pledged to respect the Constitution, respect the rule of law\u00a0… protecting the American people.\u201d Times editorial writer Michelle Cottle proclaimed that \u201cthe deep state is alive and well<\/a>\u201d and hailed it as \u201ca collection of patriotic public servants.\u201d<\/p>\n

Intelligence agencies gone rogue<\/h2>\n

Former CIA Director John Brennan, appearing on the same panel as McLaughlin, declared, \u201cThe reason why Mr. Trump<\/a> has this very contentious relationship with CIA and FBI and the deep state people … is because they tell the truth.\u201d<\/p>\n

Much of the news coverage of the Trump impeachment is following that storyline \u2014 even though it is astonishing as an overheated Trump tweet.<\/p>\n

Five years ago, Brennan\u2019s CIA ignited what should have been a constitutional crisis when it was caught illegally spying upon the Senate<\/a> Intelligence Committee, which was compiling a massive report on the CIA torture program. After 9\/11, the CIA constructed an interrogation regime by \u201cconsulting Egyptian and Saudi intelligence officials and copying Soviet interrogation methods<\/a>,\u201d The Times reported in 2007. Secret Bush administration torture memos \u201cset the CIA\u00a0loose to slam suspects\u2019 heads into walls up to 30 times in a row<\/a>, to deprive suspects of sleep for more than a week straight, to confine them to small dark boxes for hours at a time … and to suffocate them with water to induce the perception that they are drowning,\u201d Georgetown University law professor David Cole noted. But the only official who went to prison was John Kiriakou, a former CIA operative\u00a0who publicly admitted that the CIA was waterboarding<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"President<\/p>\n
<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Is the deep state more trustworthy when it is killing than when it is torturing?<\/p>\n

Brennan declared in 2016 that \u00a0\u201cthe president requires near certainty<\/a> of no collateral damage\u201d before approving a drone strike. Confidential CIA documents revealed that the CIA had little or no idea who it was killing most of the time with its drone attacks in Pakistan, Somalia, Afghanistan, Yemen\u00a0and other nations. A Salon analysis, summarizing an NBC News report<\/a>, noted, \u201cEven while admitting that the identities of many killed by drones were not known, the CIA documents asserted that all those dead were enemy combatants. The logic is twisted: If we kill you, then you were an enemy combatant.\u201d Lying about drone killings quickly became institutionalized throughout the deep state. The\u00a0Times reported in 2015: \u201cEvery independent investigation<\/a> of the (drone)\u00a0strikes has found far more civilian casualties than administration officials admit.\u201d<\/p>\n