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| More Conspiracy Theories from Seymour Hersh |
| 2009-03-15 |
| After authoritatively and wrongly claiming the United States would go to war to halt Iran's nuclear program six times during the Bush administration, The New Yorker's Seymour Hersh is back at peddling conspiracy theories. His latest: Former Vice President Dick Cheney personally ran an "executive assassination ring." "After 9/11, I havenÂ’t written about this yet, but the Central Intelligence Agency was very deeply involved in domestic activities against people they thought to be enemies of the state. Without any legal authority for it. They havenÂ’t been called on it yet." Hersh then went on to describe a second area of extra-legal operations: the Joint Special Operations Command. "It is a special wing of our special operations community that is set up independently," he explained. "They do not report to anybody, except in the Bush-Cheney days, they reported directly to the Cheney office. ... Congress has no oversight of it." "ItÂ’s an executive assassination ring essentially, and itÂ’s been going on and on and on," Hersh stated. "Under President BushÂ’s authority, theyÂ’ve been going into countries, not talking to the ambassador or the CIA station chief, and finding people on a list and executing them and leaving. ThatÂ’s been going on, in the name of all of us." Like every good tale, there is some truth to it. The Joint Special Operations Command, or JSOC, does participate in the black operations hunt for al Qaeda and other terrorist groups' leaders. This is done in conjunction with the CIA's Special Activities Division. There is little secrecy about this, just read Jawbreaker or this article by Bob Woodward from back in November of 2001. But to claim that JSOC does not "report to anybody, except in the Bush-Cheney days, they reported directly to the Cheney office," or that "Congress has no oversight of it" is just false. JSOC was established in 1980 after the failed mission to rescue the hostages at the U.S. embassy in Iran. JSOC is a component command of the U.S. Special Operations Command, which reports to the Secretary of Defense. JSOC, like the CIA, certainly falls under congressional oversight. Hersh has made a living of making fantastic claims that don't quite live up to the hype. Chalk this one up as another Hersh fantasy. |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #8 I agree w/AC 100%. How seriously awesome would it of been if Darth Cheney ran a wet worx/star chamber?! It would of been efficient and utterly ruthless. Asshole jihadis and CAIR traitors disappearing w/out a trace. Chicoms having their servers die w/out explanation. 3 Gorges' Dam mysteriously showing cracks. Earthquakes hitting Iran every month. The weather dominator coming on-line! If they did have such a thing I am deeply offended...that I wasn't asked to apply for a job. :) |
| Posted by: Broadhead6 2009-03-15 22:57 |
| #7 I am in agreement with AC, with one minor change. Pistol shots are way too quick to even the score with the carnage and evil wrought on innocents by many of these folks. I always thought it would be most fitting that if every time their car was started, it exploded. Ditto for every time they flushed the toilet. And so on, until the final end is reached. There just has to be a general understanding that some behaviors will not be tolerated by society. |
| Posted by: Snosh Poodle2979 2009-03-15 12:44 |
| #6 When the Republicans regain control of Congress, it would be interesting to have a Congressional committee drag this fellow in and investigate his various claims over the years. It would be fun to watch. |
| Posted by: Richard of Oregon 2009-03-15 12:20 |
| #5 JSOC, like the CIA, certainly falls under congressional oversight. Few would believe the level of "oversight" given JSOC and related activities. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2009-03-15 12:01 |
| #4 If Dick Cheney has indeed been running an "executive assassination ring", how is it that Sy Hersh is still alive? You mean, he's not that important? |
| Posted by: Steve White 2009-03-15 10:36 |
| #3 I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Hersh has not uttered a truthful word since 1972. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't expect to hold a job if I had been wrong about EVERYTHING for 37 years. |
| Posted by: Parabellum 2009-03-15 09:36 |
| #2 Actually, I rather think he is talking out of his ass, as usual - our very own journalistic Grima Wormtongue. What I would like to see is have him subpoenaed and under oath to testify about his grotesque series of fantasies about American military atrocities in the Iraq War.... "Yes, yes, Mr. Hersh, you have claimed detailed knowledge of these atrocities you claim have been committed by American troops, and all sorts of "evidence" - don't you wish to have the perpetrators charged and convicted of those ghastly crimes? Dates, locations, names, units, circumstances, please Mr. Hersh... and take your time..." He's been going around peddling that kind of 'winter soldier' atrocity stories at his speaking engagements since the Iraq War began. He would s**t a brick the size of a Conex box if that ever happened, and it might just get him to shut up for a while. But it would be amusing to watch him being forced to put his money where his mouth is, for once. |
| Posted by: Sgt. Mom 2009-03-15 09:06 |
| #1 I sincerely hope See-more is right this time. Along with none other than veteran lib journalist Bob Simon of CBS, I am a long time advocate of clandestine wet work as a remedy for global terrorism: A terrorist banker falls down the stairs in Rome and breaks his neck, a pro-terror propaganda shill dies a gruesome death when his Bentley unaccountably runs off a British road at 200 KPH; a safe-house burns down in Caracas, taking a nest of Al-Quds operatives with it; a Saudi-registered Gulfstream vanishes over the Indian Ocean, with a prince of the realm at the controls; a prominent academic disappears from his yacht during a fishing trip in the Gulf of Mexico. There are many possibilities here if we just use our imaginations. I think, in fact, that 100 well-aimed pistol shots would have done more good than all the bombs and missiles we have so far used in this war; and I am not averse to bombs and missiles at all. As Mr. Simon pointed out, this approach has one great but unappreciated advantage: Nobody even claims that it is legal and it therefore requires no changes to the law or administrative rules that could later be turned against freedom-loving people. |
| Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2009-03-15 03:39 |