{"id":16434,"date":"2021-09-08T11:07:29","date_gmt":"2021-09-08T15:07:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/?p=16434"},"modified":"2021-09-09T12:23:12","modified_gmt":"2021-09-09T16:23:12","slug":"9-11-and-my-pariah-decade-counterpunch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/2021\/09\/08\/9-11-and-my-pariah-decade-counterpunch\/","title":{"rendered":"9\/11 and My Pariah Decade Counterpunch"},"content":{"rendered":"

Counterpunch, September 8, 2021<\/span><\/p>\n

9\/11 and My Pariah Decade<\/a><\/h1>\n

by<\/span> James Bovard<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\"\"Life in American changed 20 years ago after the 9\/11 attacks.\u00a0 Many Americans became enraged at anyone who did not swear allegiance to President George W. Bush\u2019s anti-terrorism crusade. Anyone who denied \u201cthey hate us for our freedoms\u201d automatically became an enemy of freedom.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Plenty of stalwart defenders of liberty quickly found themselves banished from polite company.\u00a0 At the time of the 9\/11 attacks, I had been bashing government policies for 20 years. Conservatives relished my battering of the Clinton administration in books such as Feeling Your Pain<\/em><\/a> (St. Martin\u2019s, 2000). But past writing provided no indemnity for subsequent sins.<\/p>\n

Regardless, nothing happened on 9\/11 to make the government more trustworthy. Two years after the 9\/11 attacks, St. Martin\u2019s Press published my\u00a0 Terrorism and Tyranny: Trampling Freedom, Justice, and Peace to Rid the World of Evil<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>attacking the war on terror across the board.\u00a0 I scoffed, \u201cThe Patriot Act treats every citizen like a suspected terrorist and every federal agent like a proven angel.\u201d\u00a0 When the Justice Department launched a Patriot Act propaganda website, http:\/\/www.lifeandliberty.gov,<\/a> it included an attack on my writing. As one book publicist told me, I was in \u201cthe untouchable part of the intellectual caste system.\u201d Luckily, some outlets did not go to the Dark Side, including the Mises Institute, the Future of Freedom Foundation, and Antiwar.com. Counterpunch <\/em>never flinched from debunking official BS from the start of the War on Terror. My first CounterPunch <\/em>article, \u201cThe Reagan Roadmap for an Antiterrorism Disaster<\/a>,\u201d was published in October 2003.<\/p>\n

I soon recognized that the feds had more fans than I realized, especially among self-proclaimed friends of freedom. In February 2004, I spoke to a hundred folks at the best known libertarian forum in New York City.\u00a0\u00a0 Some of the attendees had followed my work for years, while others may have shown up simply to howl at a heretic.<\/p>\n

Three minutes into the speech,\u00a0 a paunchy middle-aged guy leaped to his feet and denounced me: \u201cYou sound like are an isolationist \u2013 and that means you are anti-Israel!\u201d<\/p>\n

What the hell?<\/p>\n

I began to suspect that only people with unmedicated ADHD were permitted in the audience and I\u2019d be lucky to speak three sentences in a row. Attendees were not considered to be hecklers unless they threw physical objects at the speaker. The scene quickly became akin to a political convention, with random people jumping up to make speeches, most of them bad.\u00a0 It is tricky to argue with self-evident truths that were established solely by echo chambers. Plenty of attendees never recovered from their own high SAT scores.<\/p>\n

As the evening progressed,\u00a0 I was accused of everything except advocating infanticide. Perhaps the biggest surprise that night was that many people objected to making fun of the government. A tall, elderly gentleman\u00a0 declared that comical pratfalls by the Transportation Security Administration and the FBI were irrelevant to the \u201cBig Picture.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s is the \u2018Big Picture\u2019?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fact that there haven\u2019t been any terror attacks since 9\/11 proves the feds are doing a good job,\u201d he declared, spurring loud assents from the audience. He insisted that hundreds of Muslim sleeper cells in the U.S. were waiting for the signal to sow mass death and chaos. I was chagrined to see folks more fearful of alleged invisible Muslim perils than of rampaging federal agencies.\u00a0 I have always considered mocking the government as a trademark of a free citizen.\u00a0 And, as H.L. Mencken wrote, \u201cOne horse laugh is worth 10,000 syllogisms.\u201d At the end of two hours sparring, the host gave me a check that was larger than I expected, so all\u2019s well that ends well (or at least profitably).<\/p>\n

That brawl was a bellwether on how the freedom movement had changed. A few months later, the Abu Ghraib photos and memos from the Justice Department authorizing torture leaked out. A top Justice Department official had assured the White House that the president was entitled to violate criminal laws (such as the Anti-Torture Act) during wartime. That preemptive \u201cget out of jail free\u201d card unleashed interrogation methods such as waterboarding (simulated drowning), pummeling,\u00a0 and long-term sleep deprivation.<\/p>\n

There was no way to deny the depravity of Bush\u2019s war on terror after that, right? No such luck. When I spoke at the largest nationwide gathering of freedom activists in Las Vegas and at the national Libertarian Party conference in 2004, I was booed for my criticisms of Bush\u2019s warring and torturing. I was also later booed for opposing torture at the Foundation for Economic Education in Irvington, New York.\u00a0 Plenty of libertarians were no longer in favor of freedom \u2013 unless it included the freedom to torture terrorists.\u00a0 And how do we know who is a terrorist? That\u2019s easy \u2013 because someone somewhere claims to suspect them of something. (CounterPunch<\/em> was always open to my anti-torture bashes, including here<\/a>, here<\/a>, and here<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

A few months before the 2004 election, St. Martin\u2019s Press published my book titled The Bush Betrayal<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>which flogged Bush\u2019s secret arrests, \u201cTotal Information Awareness\u201d surveillance schemes, and cult of presidential supremacy. The blog site the publisher created for the book included an email link so readers could send me their thoughts unimpeded by spellcheckers.\u00a0 Here\u2019s a sampling of the fan mail which was reposted in LewRockwell.com piece headlined, \u201cBush Supporters Vindicate the President<\/a>\u201d:<\/p>\n

* \u201cYou are a communist bastard! \u2026 So don\u2019t forget that there are those out here who put there lives on the line for assholes like you to have the freedom of speech- to say what you will \u2013 and so can I!\u201d<\/p>\n

* \u201cAre you dilusional or just trying to make a buck?\u201d<\/p>\n

* \u201cI think we should be torturing these SOB\u2019s\u2026\u00a0 Your concern over the so called \u2018torture\u2019 of the prisoners is ludicrous when one looks at how barbaric they are to begin with. What you are caling \u2018torture,\u2019 most people would call callege hazing.\u201d<\/p>\n

* \u201cYou are a very little man. Those of you who don\u2019t appriciate the freedom our sons and daughters paid for make a mockery of their sacrifice. May God have mercy on your soul, you ignorate little person.\u201d<\/p>\n

* \u201cYou are one sick mother fucker. Why not just support the troops instead of criminilizing them. does history not teach you anything? Like John Kerry is a fucking liar\/traitor.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

MIDDLE SEAT EDIFICATION<\/strong><\/p>\n

But maybe not everybody thought like that?\u00a0 Maybe folks would simmer down after Bush was re-elected?\u00a0 Alas, as Shakespeare observed, \u201cHope is a curtail dog in some affairs.\u201d<\/p>\n

A few months later, I was flying from Washington to Dallas,\u00a0 two days after Bush\u2019s second inaugural speech. The flight was overstocked with of Texans returning after attending celebrations for their former governor.\u00a0 \u00a0One frumpy lady loudly gushed to an acquaintance in the next row: \u201cLaura looked so wonderful with that designer dress at the ball.\u201d\u00a0 I had no regrets about not being invited to that shindig.<\/p>\n

I was\u00a0 stuck in a middle seat between a chubby little 14-year-old boy and a tripwire-tense Air Force enlisted man who spent the entire flight watching reruns of bad situation comedies on his laptop.\u00a0\u00a0 The kid devoted himself to paging through a school textbook and highlighting almost every paragraph with a yellow marker.<\/p>\n

As the plane taxied to its takeoff position, the kid asked me, \u201cDid you go to the inauguration Thursday?\u201d<\/p>\n

I smiled and said no, and asked if he had gone.<\/p>\n

His eyes lit up, his face suddenly seemed cognizant, and he declared, \u201cYes!\u201d He told me he was from Bush\u2019s hometown, Midland, Texas.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat did you think of the speech?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cI loved every word of it!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo you think it is a good idea for the U.S. to be spreading freedom?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh yes. We have to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAre you concerned about going to war to spread freedom?\u201d I asked nonchalantly.<\/p>\n

The Air Force dude erupted: \u201cDON\u2019T LISTEN TO HIM! This guy hates America! This guy hates our president! Don\u2019t listen to a single thing he says!\u201d Maybe he didn\u2019t like my beard.<\/p>\n

This guy \u2013 mid-30ish with a semi-jarhead hair cut \u2013 swore that the Bush administration never made any false statements on the road to war with Iraq.<\/p>\n

I shrugged. \u201cCheney said Saddam had a reconstituted nuclear weapon.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHE NEVER SAID THAT ! HE SAID NUCLEAR WEAPONS PROGRAM!! THAT\u2019S WHAT HE SAID!!!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cActually, it was on March 17, 2003 \u2013 on Meet the Press \u2013 and \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTHAT\u2019S A LIE! THAT\u2019S A LIE! SHOW ME THE EVIDENCE!!!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, if I had my book with me, I could show you.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTHAT\u2019S A LIE!\u201d He was absolutely convinced that I was determined to smear the nation, the military, and Bush \u2013 of whom he proudly said: \u201cHe\u2019s my LEADER!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou people are going to proven all wrong next week!\u201d he declaimed very fervently for someone practically sitting on my elbow.<\/p>\n

\u201cWho is \u2018you people\u2019?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople like you that hate America and oppose the Iraq war!\u201d\u00a0 Pounding his fist on the armrest, he declared that I was \u201cone of those people who thinks that Arabs don\u2019t want to be free \u2013 you don\u2019t care about liberating the Iraqi people. Next week, when the Iraqis go out and vote and become a democracy, you and your kind will be proven totally wrong!\u201d<\/p>\n

At that time, the Bush administration was claiming that upcoming parliamentary elections would prove that Iraqis approved of the U.S. invasion. On Election Day, U.S. military convoys rolled through Iraqi neighborhoods shortly after sunrise with loudspeakers blasting orders in Arabic for people to go vote. The Bush administration also secretly and illegally delivered millions of dollars in cash to boost political campaigns of its favored candidates.<\/p>\n

As that flight crossed over the state of Mississippi, the boy proudly told me that he was president of his school class in Midland.<\/p>\n

After I congratulated him, he declared that he planned to go into politics.<\/p>\n

I asked: \u201cWho is your congressman?\u201d<\/p>\n

He gave me a blank look. \u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d he said, followed by a momentary grimace. This kid was definitely not in the league of Lyndon Johnson, another ambitious Texan famous for coming to Washington as a youth and exploiting every human contact he ever made to maximize his future clout.<\/p>\n

During the flight, I was hand-editing printed chapters of a forthcoming book. As we neared landing, the boy asked a question or two about my political views. I said I admired the Constitution and favored leashing all politicians and federal agencies.<\/p>\n

He squinted and said warily: \u201cYou sound like you hate the government.\u201d<\/p>\n

I laughed. \u201cNo. I don\u2019t hate the government. I just think its power should be limited.\u201d<\/p>\n

My answer did nothing to placate his suspicions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do you think the government should be doing? What is its main purpose?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

The kid paused, struggled briefly, and then replied, \u201cKeep people under control?\u201d<\/p>\n

Since that was the new American vision of freedom Bush sought to impose at home and abroad, that boy was backing the right politician.\u00a0 Unfortunately, tens of millions of Americans also revered their ruler\u2019s iron fist.<\/p>\n

WHACKED AND STACKED?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I attended most of the major antiwar protests from 2002 onwards.\u00a0 With each passing year, the police became more heavily armored and more aggressive.<\/p>\n

In September 2005,\u00a0 hundreds of thousands of marchers protested the Bush administration\u2019s Iraq War. The well-organized event included bevies of activist lawyers stationed along the main route with video cameras to document any police brutality against demonstrators. I walked my bike with the marchers as they passed the Treasury building on the east side of the White House, where I snapped my all-time favorite photo of a overfed stupefied cop.<\/p>\n

After hoofing for a mile with the crowd, I rode off to reconnoiter. There were metal sawhorses scattered all over the nearby streets, making it difficult to recognize what roads were open and which were restricted.<\/p>\n

I zipped down the street between Lafayette Park and the White House and then swung down Seventeenth Street on the west side of the White House, heading towards the National Mall. That road was deserted except for two cops standing in the middle twenty-five yards ahead of me. As I got closer to them, a fat cop suddenly raised his four-foot wooden pole over his head and began lumbering directly into my path.<\/p>\n

I was puzzled until I heard the other cop mumble about how I wasn\u2019t allowed on that street. His partner was getting ready to bust his stick over my head.<\/p>\n

I sped up, veered left, and laughed at the G-man over my shoulder. The street closing was not marked, but cops were still entitled to assail any violators\u2014as long as there was no one around to film the beating. Actually, if that cop had smashed me with that pole, I might have been arrested on ginned-up charges for assaulting a policeman. In the same way that cops routinely justify shooting motorists by claiming the driver was trying to run them down, so the pole dude might have claimed I was trying to run him over.\u00a0 Or maybe I would have been booked on \u201cconspiracy to damage a federal pole\u201d that he wanted to break over my bike helmet.<\/p>\n

This struck me as a microcosm of what American society is becoming\u2014more and more government agents waiting to whack anyone who doesn\u2019t obey the latest secret rules.<\/p>\n

After leaving those chumps behind, I swung down a side street away from the main action. But then I heard loudspeakers in the distance, perhaps coming from the Ellipse in front of the White House.\u00a0 Was another demonstration busting out? Like a moth attracted to a flame, I bustled down a mostly empty street back in the direction of the White House. As I arrived within sight of the President\u2019s Palace, a gnarly police commander with a burning cigar butt clenched between his teeth screamed at me: \u201cHow did you get here!?!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI rode down the street,\u201d I replied.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re not allowed to come down on this street!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t see any signs or anything prohibiting it,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had two policemen at the entrance of the street,\u201d he raged. \u201cHow did you sneak by them?\u201d<\/p>\n

I said I hadn\u2019t seen anyone.<\/p>\n

The cop boss was tottering on the edge of arresting me. Another policeman, dressed in civvies, suggested to this cigar chomper that he just let me go through the opening of the metal sawhorses.<\/p>\n

Not a chance. The boss cop insisted that I reverse course and ride back down that street. I did so and, at the end of that block, I saw four DC police officers lounging in the shade, perhaps yammering about the Washington Redskins\u2019 latest loss. Regardless of his subordinates\u2019 lethargy, that police commander took great satisfaction in compelling one bicyclist to reverse course.\u00a0 Maybe he even touted it as a \u201cpotential terrorist incident averted\u201d in his official report on the day\u2019s action.<\/p>\n

NEW PRESIDENT, SAME VITRIOL<\/strong><\/p>\n

After Obama was elected, I thought folks might simmer down.\u00a0 Wrong, dude.\u00a0 While Obama unleashed plenty of policies that reasonable Americans could justifiably condemn, some of his loudest adversaries were hellbent on reviving Bush\u2019s worst practices.\u00a0 After attending a Tea Party rally in Rockville, Maryland in 2010, I wrote, \u201cMany \u2018tea party\u2019 activists staunchly oppose big government, except when it is warring, wiretapping, or waterboarding<\/a>.\u201d Speakers bitterly complained that Obama gave orders to cease using \u201cenhanced interrogation\u201d torture methods on detainees. I was not charmed by folks clamoring for war with Iran and denouncing the president for finding his \u201cinner Muslim.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 That piece, published by Christian Science Monitor<\/em>, concluded: \u201cAmerica needs real champions of freedom \u2013 not poorly informed Republican accomplices.\u201d<\/p>\n

My ringside report was not universally appreciated. Tea Party zealots took to Yahoo.com with verbal pitchforks and torches:<\/p>\n

Buzz: \u201cLibs are traitors and should be treated as such. Traitors have very few rights. I can only think of 2, and they are more of a courtesy then rights. (blindfold,smoke).\u201d<\/p>\n

RAGNAR: \u201cJust another dihonest bit of editorializing nothing new to see here just move on everyone\u201d<\/p>\n

RJ: \u201cThe first Liberal since the beginning of time, a Lier, a Thief and a Murder, satan.\u201d<\/p>\n

JH: \u201cWhat make him a Nazi and not just a Liberal? Why a Nazi, as Nazi must defend and promote a position with lies and not stand on facts.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scott: \u201cIts funny how WE stand up for our RIGHTS and BELIEFS and get attacked and told to shut up.. But we are subjected to your apathetic ideas by force of Gov\u2019t. HOW VERY COMMUNIST OF YOU\u2026\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Obama White House soon became as power-crazed as the Bush administration. In May 2011,\u00a0 the Christian Science Monitor<\/em> published another piece of mine, \u201cAssassination nation<\/a>: Are there any limits on President Obama\u2019s license to kill?\u201d\u00a0 I derided the Obama administration\u2019s claim that the president possessed a \u201cright to kill Americans without a trial, without notice, and without any chance for targets to legally object\u2026. Killings based solely on presidential commands radically transform the relation of the government to the citizenry.\u201d<\/p>\n

Testy online responses confirmed the sea change in how absolute power was viewed. My article mentioned an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit pressuring the Obama administration \u201cto disclose the legal standard it uses to place U.S. citizens on government kill lists.\u201d \u201cWill R.\u201d was indignant: \u201cWe need to send Bovard and the ACLU to Iran. You shoot traders and the ACLU are a bunch of traders.\u201d (I was pretty sure the ACLU was not engaged in international commerce). \u201cJeff\u201d took the high ground: \u201cHopefully there will soon be enough to add James Bovard to the [targeted killing] list.\u201d Another commenter \u2013 self-labeled as \u201cIdiot Savant\u201d \u2013 saw a grand opportunity: \u201cNow if we can only convince [Obama] to use this [assassination] authority on the media, who have done more harm than any single terror target could ever dream of\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

What the heck \u2013 they haven\u2019t taken me out yet.<\/p>\n

An earlier version of this piece was published by Mises Institute.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

James Bovard<\/em><\/strong> is the author of <\/em>Attention Deficit Democracy<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>The Bush Betrayal<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>Terrorism and Tyranny<\/em><\/a>, and other books.\u00a0Bovard is on the\u00a0USA Today Board of Contributors. He is on Twitter at @jimbovard. His website is at <\/em>www.jimbovard.com<\/em><\/a> \u00a0This essay was originally published by <\/em>Future of Freedom Foundation<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Counterpunch, September 8, 2021 9\/11 and My Pariah Decade by James Bovard Life in American changed 20 years ago after the 9\/11 attacks.\u00a0 Many Americans became enraged at anyone who did not swear allegiance to President George W. Bush\u2019s anti-terrorism crusade. 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