CNN host Michael Smerconish (Huffington Post, 11/23/15) brought onto his November 21 show former CIA officer Michael Scheuer, who said that if the US is going to go after ISIS, it should
take out every piece of infrastructure—hospitals, universities, irrigation systems—that make it impossible [sic] for the Islamic State to raise money, to provide electricity, sanitation, potable water. Do exactly what we did to the Germans.
Asked by the CNN host whether the US public would tolerate the “so-called innocent civilian death count,” Scheuer replied:
They should. What’s the difference? They’re not Americans.
Scheuer’s proudly sociopathic views should come as no surprise. In December 2013, he called for the assassination of President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron, approvingly citing 17th century political theorist Algernon Sidney’s assertion that
by an established law among the most virtuous nations, every man might kill a tyrant; and no names are recorded in history with more honor, than of those who did it.
Of course, Scheuer’s enthusiasm for murdering world leaders didn’t keep him from being a guest on Lou Dobbs’ Fox News show the very next month (FAIR Blog, 1/7/14).
As far back as 2009, Scheuer (News Corpse, 7/1/09; FAIR Blog, 7/2/09) was hoping for a weapon of mass destruction to be used against the US, as he told Fox‘s Glenn Beck:
The only chance we have as a country right now is for Osama bin Laden to deploy and detonate a major weapon in the United States…. Only Osama can execute an attack which will force Americans to demand that their government protect them effectively, consistently and with as much violence as necessary.
As a news producer, you can take two approaches: You can view news as a form of entertainment whose only goal is to maximize ratings, in which case bringing on an obvious kook to rant like a James Bond villain makes perfect sense. Or you can consider that you live in a real world with real people, many of whom are likely to die when you give fanatics a prominent platform to advocate for war crimes. It’s quite clear which approach they’ve decided to go for at CNN.
Jim Naureckas is the editor of FAIR.org. Follow him on Twitter: @JNaureckas.
Messages to CNN can be sent to here (or via Twitter @CNN). Please remember that respectful communication is the most effective.
A circus complete with killer clowns
In my email the word “he” is replaced with “Smerconish” before “called for the assassination of Obama”, etc.
It speaks volumes about our media that this sociopath keeps getting air time and a portion of our population that agrees with him. With guests like this, remind me, is CNN part of the fictitious liberal media?
I’ve often thought that public insane rantings such as these were just probes to see if despite the public appearance of complacency there exists some with a consciousness worthy of being spared the meat grinder of war, or who will resist it.
If none complain then what matters 30 or a hundred million dead who never valued human life, or who are willing to sacrifice their own lives to the conceptual object of their political theology.
Or so I would imagine the sociopaths in charge would calculate.
It seems to me that Scheur’s comments are more supremely ironic: “Asked by the CNN host whether the US public would tolerate the “so-called innocent civilian death count,” Scheuer replied:
They should. What’s the difference? They’re not Americans.” As in: American’s have never cared about other people’s deaths, so why should they now…?”
Additionally, when stating that all infrastructure should be destroyed–as what we did to the Germans (and Iraq,etc… etc.. etc….), his point is: if we are calling this a war, then lets conduct war on this group and get it over with. I don’t believe he is advocating this.
This is a strange post by FAIR. Not sure what to think about it. Also, interesting that MR. Scheur is one of the most outspoken critics of Israel, and our craven policy regarding such..
Force — Does it always beget more force?
For governments all demand a monopoly on the use of force and violence, their logic being that force is the organic law of nature, that if we want peace we must allow the greater force to rule over the lesser. On the other hand, major religions claim that force always begets more force. A dichotomy to say the least, a good example of this being the state of war between Old Testament Jews and New Testament Christians, for in Matthew 5:37 we read: “You have a Command from Moses, ‘Eye for eye, tooth for tooth,” but now I give you a new Command. Do not use force to overcome evil. If they strike you on the right cheek, turn to them the other.”
So, as Scheuer feels that the nation most deadly has an organic right to rule, he sees nothing wrong in taking the use of force to it’s ultimate conclusion, such that it causes an enemy nation to suffer an irreversible and total destruction of all life.
And so, as Western governments have already caused an enemy nation to suffer total destruction, as wasted Iraq stands as a monument to such stupidity, what does Scheuer propose we do for an encore? For Western Empire building has caused vengeance driven terrorism to create more enemy nations then we can shake a stick it, refuges from these enemy nations are flooding the West and terrorism has finally gone full cycle with vengeance driven blowback about to give the West an overpowering taste of it’s own senseless deadly force.
We may not agree with this man’s perspective, but if all he’s done is started a conversation, then one has to admit he has accomplished a lot.
We cannot simply write people off because we disagree with them. His approach may appear extreme. So to those that disagree strongly, I dare ask, what’s your solution?
It is terribly easy to sit back and criticize arm chair quarter backing and all. Give us solid and rational alternates then…
Food For Thought!
He speaks out against Israel’s criminal behavior and the USA’s unwavering unbreakable bond and unconditional support for and gifting of $8 million per day to Israel who then uses it to maintain the occupation of Palestine and to oppress, and commit genocide against Palestinians, essentially ‘wiping Palestine off the map’ and continue the ethnical cleansing of Palestine using mass murder against a group that has no equivalent means of defense, and Hamas having noise maker rockets cannot fight back but symbolically as done also with rock throwing. I cannot abide by calling him a kook, as he may be exaggerating to make a point, but what he says on its face it’s easy to claim the man’s a nut, but some context may be missing. Of course his ideas are simliar to Bill O’reilly on Afghanistan, to basically take them back to the stone age, but forgets there are people in those built infrastructures.