Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh dropped a bombshell* on Tuesday when he told an audience at the University of Minnesota that the military was running an “executive assassination ring” throughout the Bush years which reported directly to former Vice President Dick Cheney.
The remark came out seemingly inadvertently when Hersh was asked by the moderator of a public discussion of “America’s Constitutional Crisis” whether abuses of executive power, like those which occurred under Richard Nixon, continue to this day.
Hersh replied, “After 9/11, I haven’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 haven’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.”
“It’s an executive assassination ring essentially, and it’s been going on and on and on,” Hersh stated. “Under President Bush’s authority, they’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. That’s been going on, in the name of all of us.”
I want the Republicans to insist on an investigation into this matter, and to subpoena Hersh. Sounds like he may have had a bit too much of the Syrian Hariri Kool-Aid.
*Or maybe I misunderstand this figure of speech? Bunnies!
Rachel Maddow is a clueless bimbo. But you already knew that.
So long as Mr. Hersh wants President Obama to succeed it’s okay.
i wish
So, Mr. Hersh didn’t feel he would be “rubbed out” if this cloak-and-dagger stuff were to be revealed?
Some secret execution squad…….
I saw that movie. Hackman was awesome. Redford phoned it in.
This sounds just like a Vince Flynn novel.
Where’s Mitch when we need him ….
name a spokesmodel/anchorette that mitch rapp would
marry?
i’d go meagen kelly
cuz i almost forgot laurie dhue
or
anderson cooper…
bi-party foo faw
and such
Has the old wiffle-butt finally gone senile altogether?
Anyway, his methodology, i.e. article after article out of off-the-record comments from unidentified sources, has always reeked:
A. We only his word to rely upon.
B. He appears utterly blind to the possibility that he’s being played.
Yes, subpoena him. Subpoena the Wiffle-Butt. Let’s get to the bottom of this terrible government crime-wave at once.
christianne amanpour[sp]
scares the bee-gees outta me
[u 2]
Amanwhore. I used spell-check.
don’t worry-snowflake…
we’ll always have [paris]
pbs
it’s not her man hands…
or her una-brow..
or the way her deep voice shrivels me
in the lonely night
no…
i’m petrified of her taking me in the woods
What was the last statement of Hirsh’s backed up by evidence? How many times was the Bush administration weeks away from invading Iran? At this point I wouldn’t believe him if he said that the sun was going to rise in the east tomorrow morning unless he had two sources that were willing to go on the record.
I’d love to see Cheney sue him for libel.
Another Smear Attempt, Rock Steady & a Everyone Just Keep Your Head UP…
Today has dealt the worst blow imaginable to a former soldier spouse I used to have that called to tell me about a article in the newspaper and a story at these links that I have sat and read over and over to include the comments and seen why she was s…
Yeah, I’d love to see the lying POS sued for libel by Cheney or anyone else. This is his usual method, BTW – he sticks very close to the line in his published articles, but Katy-bar-the-door when it comes to his public appearances.
Just for fun, and because I have no skill for embedding links, here is the entire memo I posted on “The Daily Brief” a couple of years ago:
Memo: See More, Harshly
To: New Yorker Magazine
From: Sgt. Mom
Re: Seymour Hersh’s Lecture Circuit
1. For nearly as long as I have been paying attention to news in general, Mr. Hersh has been represented to the public at large as a fearless and principled investigative reporter, with connections and sources in the corridors of power that lesser mortals can only dream of, and gnash their teeth in helpless envy to contemplate. After all, he won (insert portentous drum-roll here) a Pulitzer Prize for breaking the story of the My Lai Massacre – never mind that a veteran and minor journalist named Ron Ridenhour had already done much of the legwork, tracking down the source of ugly rumors that he had heard as a GI, locating and interviewing many key witnesses.
2. Mr. Hersh has since gone on from strength to strength in his journalistic endeavors, culminating in his employment at your hallowed establishment. Funny thing, though: none of his more current journalistic scoops are usually cited when he is introduced, perhaps because of the suspicion that his “sources†over the years are feeding him questionable data for their own purposes. Or that his journalistic crystal ball sees but murkily these last few decades; he has proposed for example that the US was deeply involved in the Soviet shoot-down of KAL Flight 007, and that the war in Afghanistan was toppling into the deep abyss of failure-quagmire-gloom-despair-and-misery. This last magisterial judgment had the ill-luck to be published just before Taliban rule collapsed like a wet paper bag, inspiring at least one wit to comment that Mr. Hersh was an invaluable source for knowing what was really going on — given that in hindsight, he was invariably wrong.
3. Over the last five years, Mr. Hersh has chosen to spread the blessings of his special insights to a wider and more uncritical audience on the lecture circuit. Like some unsavory chunk of solid waste, he has popped to the surface of the slightly-less-than-mainstream-media-sewer in the same week that John Kerry clumsily maligned the education and intelligence of those currently serving in Iraq and by extension in today’s military. Senator Kerry has been savagely mocked for appearing to forget that there is no draft any more and the military today is for damn sure not the military that he condescended to grace with his presence forty years ago. Mr. Hersh, who appears to also be stuck in a similar meme and time, is currently improving the idle hour by lecturing receptive audiences on the endless series of ghastly atrocities being perpetrated by American forces in Iraq, describing in loving detail, assorted crimes of massacre, rape, sodomy and torture .
4. Strangely, for a hard-charging investigative journalist, he is a little short on the actual specific details of these incidents, or any of those described in other lectures – say, a specific time, place, unit or other disinterested witnesses. Corroborative information is a little thin on the ground; a curious omission, considering the numbers of personnel who have rotated in and out of country and the military, NGO busy-bodies, other media outlets and other investigative reporters desirous of winning a Pulitzer. But Mr. Hersh insists that he has listened to tapes, taken phone calls, seen the documents – but of course, he can’t share these with the audience, for some reason, can’t publish the specifics and most certainly has not shared what he knows with those who would be rightfully charged with investigating such crimes. How very convenient – and recalls Senator Joe McCarthy, with his so-called incriminating and ever-changing little list which he kept in his pocket and waved around when he needed to intimidate the doubters.
5. This particular story quoted him indirectly saying that if Americans knew the full extent of U.S. criminal conduct, they would receive returning Iraqi veterans as they did Vietnam veterans. Well since so many of the so-called Vietnam atrocity stories turned out to be fraudulent and related by equally fake veterans, I wish Mr. Hersh and the rest of the legacy media the best of luck getting that to happen. In these days of google searches, internet access, e-mail and mil-blogs, we can fact-check all kinds of fakes now: fake veterans, fake atrocities – even fake investigative reporters, in a way that we couldn’t forty years ago. Jesse McBeth, anyone?
6. Seriously, have you ever considered suggesting a career change to Mr. Hersh, since the actual investigative reporting thing may be played out? Walmart greeter, perhaps? Just a thought.
Sincerely
Sgt Mom
NG saw me laughing at #12 and she sighed. Audibly. I tried to sigh back but it turned into a yawn.
This Hersh person is entering the lean years I think. He’s an unuseful idiot. He should sign up for a cooking class.
Leftist conspiracy
Investigativereporter Seymour HershThis is crazy for Sy Hersh. However, he’s popped off some loony tunes theories at the Riverside Church in Manhattan as well.
I’ll never forget his “8 man cabal runs the United States”, er, speech.
does seymour wear glasses b/c that’s cheating
If only we were killing Jihadis the way Sy fantasizes. There were rumors that Green Beret long range recon patrols witnessed Serbs murdering civilians in Bosnia and responded with devastating ambushes. If only those stories were true.
Thanks, SGT Mom. Spot on.
“And they’re STILL reporting to Cheney!”
/wistful
How to make ravioli from scratch. Or porridge. The really good Scottish kind. I went to get some of that steel cut oatmeal yesterday but … 11.99? No way. I will check Trader Joe’s.
OT: Madoff plead guilty, possible 150yrs max.
Where’s the rest who helped him or covered it up for so long? Given Cabinet positions?
Scottish ravioli? I don’t want to think about what they stuff it with
hersh reads ludlum too?!?!?!?
I thought that this might prove to be important. ** [italics in the original]
scottish law ravioli: the mark of arlen specter
Comment by happyfeet on 3/11 @ 5:59 pm #
Scott’s Porridge Oats
The. Best.
Wow, Sy, leap the shark ever? This reminds me of Ross Perot’s paranoid panicking about hit squads and Bush government teams messing up his house parties.
The only part of the Hollywood story Seymour is always missing is where the journalist who knows too much has his car get blowed up with him in it.
Your media at work, Sdferr.
JSOC? He thinks
is assassination central? Commit the man, posthaste.
Sy Hersh needs to turned out to pasture, stat. The man can’t even minimally fact-check himself. Oh, who is this USCINCSOC? Admiral Eric Olson, currently.
Congress doesn’t have oversight of DoD? Someone tell Oliver North.
I left a link or two out of there, and screwed up italics tag closure.
No biggie. JSOC reports to USCINCSOC, which in turn reports to SECDEF.
Hersh is lucky some daiquiri-slurping community college professor wasn’t there to fact-check him. All heck might have broken loose.
Dude, it’s a “special wing.” You think you’ll be able to clear all that up with a mere link to a .org or .mil website?
We’re still waiting for Sy’s Abu Ghraib kiddie rape videos. Sy is still waiting for a satisfying morning constitutional.
Sy Hersh? I thought he retired after he came up with the concept of “Ghost Whisperer”.
Yeah JSOC certainly has a chain of command and significant accountability to their superiors for actions taken. I assure you, cover your ass is in practice at all levels of power in the military. It is a shame the same cannot be said in journalism.
She’s just a tv hoochie mama, Jonas. Ain’t nothin’ but a thang.
Can I say I think their plan is we do it their way or they purposely fail. It all comes down to Republicans telling democrats they were right about Bush and American Imperalism.
Or the … ok insert Blazing Saddles joke here…
“She continually invites conservatives in to discuss alternate views on her MSNBC show.”
Riight. Just like O’Reilly has an open invite to Michael Moore for cupcakes and a narcissist showdown. You lost my interest with “alternate views on her MSNBC show.” Because that is what they’re known for…alternate views.
Jonas,
Maddow does not have a PhD in philosophy. She had a Doctor of Philosophy in political science. You know, because she studied in Britain, being a Rhodes Scholar and all.
Quoth Wikipedia, her dissertation was titled “HIV/AIDS and Health Care Reform in British and American Prisons.”
And being a PhD student in political science, I assure you that while many PhDs are brilliant and/or thoughtful scholars, they needn’t be. You have just made an argument from authority. Cheers!
“Sy Hersh had better . . .”
That ‘had better’ doesn’t mean what you think it does.
Aren’t you all about getting people fired from their jobs?
this is the craziest thing i have heard from Sy in a long time.
True Story (fair warning: involves a famous lefty media personage at uber-rich limosine liberals house in East hampton this summer. There is a fair chance I will come off like a pompous dick.)
I was talking to Carl Bernstein about people we know and he told me about when he and Bob were covering watergate in 73 and they had dinner with Sy (who was the NYT’s main reporter on the story) in a Chinese restaurant in Alexandria and they were shooting the breeze. Eventually, Sy had had a few beers and he unpacked on his theory on watergate, politics and the like.
Carl described it as just short of having the US government run “By a bunch of fucking UFOs.”
Which was sort of damning as Bernstein is a flat-out leftie.
Sy is officially turning the corner into a structurally comic relief. Ideally, the New Yorker drops him in a year.
Mastiff is an elitest.
I’m stating the obvious.
41–yes. I am ashamed.
46–Im not sure thats what Dan’s all about. If I was editor of the New Yorker however, I would be all about not renewing that crazy mother’s contract though.
I’m just spitballing here, mcgruder, but I have this theory that Sy’s sources know he’s outlived his useful idiocy and have decided to see who can one-up the next by feeding him teh crazy and seeing what comes out.
Ideally, the New Yorker drops him in a year.
Confirmed, via mcgruder, if you take him seriously.
Ichee, I’m just trying to get the whole, earth-shattering truth out there. And I’m sure Seymour will agree, it’s out there.
he’s outlived his useful idiocy and have decided to see who can one-up the next by feeding him teh crazy and seeing what comes out.
That’s why you post here right, Dan?
dan, has to be.
Ichee, i have no idea what youre talking about.
Oh, it’s a full-blown griefer.
You’re getting ahead of yourself there Dan.
Great! Who let the cantankerous drunk in? Security!
Why don’t you just go watch some X-Files, Ichee? Then come back here and write us a report.
Sorry mc, if you can’t follow Dan’s pre-wisdom.
Sy Hersh is Lewis Lapham channelling Art Bell with a head full of peyote.
There’s a killer what was named Ichi. He was Japanese. They made a movie. It was gross.
49. As well you should be…
Ichee, im not sure you can point to one story Hersh has done in the past 8 years where he broke hard news or had a good enterprised second daye lede. mind you, this is in a time where we launched two wars, damn near lost one of them, threw away the interrogation rulebook and ramped up the world’s largest terrorist holding camp. In other words, if you were an investigative reporter on the national security beat and you didnt break one or two major stories, you are pathetic. Hersh was given the most fertile ground in history and he farted out 1/5 true conspiracy tales…remember the one where we were invading Iran?
Punking Dan on this story is just a little absurd. Hersh and his screw ups are a standing joke.
Is this IP info familiar to any of you folks?
Country: United States
State/Region: TX
City: Nacogdoches
You guys are much better than any decades old teevee show.
Let me see, oh yes. Cheney had a secret plan. Well that’s unpresidented! It’s not like energy had anything to do with energy policy.
Let’s look at Sy. Has his reporting been bad or good?
All you lot can do is try to get people fired.
I have one question: How successful have you been?
Predictable like clockwork.
You all want to get me fired.
Go ahead. Try it.
Your trying that makes it clear that you are unemployed.
Naconowhere!! I been there. I remember there were these trees.
And a Dairy Queen.
LOL, unpresidented.
Somebody–I won’t mention who–is being sentenced tomorrow. Just why is an interesting question. Who are all these people I’m supposed to have tried to get fired?
65. Your sentences. Fragmented. Consider revising. You’re fired.
“unpresidented”
Isn’t that what they tried to do to Bill Clinton?
It’s this sort of thing that you are famous for.
Stop trying to figure out who I am and trying to get me fired and debate me.
You’re a funny person, Ichee. You’re saying in effect, “I’m going to sit here and insult you, because you’re the sort of person who breaks people’s noses. And if I insult you and you break my nose, it’s going to prove that you’re that kind of person.”
“Please don’t break my nose!”
71. I thought that was impeachify. Or impeachulate. Should have gone with defenestrate…more to the point.
Dan, That’s Michelle the Internationalist/high sodium vaguely Latino snack chip. Ignore at will.
Are you a master debater? Great. Well, riddle me this: whom have I tried to get fired?
Resolved: Them little fried jalapenos thingies at the Dairy Queen is good eatin.
Yup, unpresidented.
You like them dumb, no?
I’ve got a strenuous argument going with an empty Maker’s Mark bottle. I’ll be with you as soon as I wrap this up. Stupid wax.
Stop trying to get Ichee fired. He’s already unemployed anyway.
This is not her first visit under this moniker. The last one wasn’t any more coherent.
You can’t debate what you can’t comprehend.
b/c we need green energy NOW TO SAVE THE CHILDREN!! (or our worthless gov’t jobs provided by the demorats) yea messiah.
pablo — Jeff — wins the prise — oh I mean prize.
He knows the answer to your question, Dan. He knows all. The rest of you guys can wonder . . . until you get your email.
Jeffy that didn’t take long.
Either way, you know that one of your pleaders . . . I mean readers has been accusing me of terrible things and links back to your now restored archives.
Delete my work info, if for no other reason than it is wrong to have linked to it in the first place. You have changed your archives for a lesser reason and you know it.
Okay, that clears things up to my satisfaction. Guys, you clear on that?
Fucking crystal. Douchebag says what?
If I were Jeff, I’d find what you’re talking about and link it again on the front page. But then, I’ve got a bit of a mean streak and the degeneracy of a target doesn’t deter me from exercising it.
Be glad I’m not Jeff, Michelle. Be very glad.
She makes me uncomfortable, Dan.
She should just fuck off. There’s no upside for her here.
stop smoking obama dope
89. It is the attention. Like Sy Hersh’s bullshit…sort of. Sy does it cause he’s batshit crazy though.
so insanity is the new black? oh damn racist no
PJaebflfo,
You don’t scare me. No need to be afraid. It’s odd that those without jobs seem to feel threatened by those who do.
And since you have been out of the academic field for so long, you don’t know how things work.
Back off and stop trying to mess with people’s jobs.
It’s probably too late though. No one with any sense would hire you. They would be too worried that you would do what you have done for years — personal attacks — and then not want to have anything to do with you.
Rachel Maddow is a clueless bimbo.
…but you already knew that.
Black beans are truly good. I likes ’em way better than lychees.
Wait. Was that a Barack Obama fart joke Matt?
She makes me uncomfortable, Dan.
She makes me uncomfortable, Dan.
I suspect that’s not the first time you have heard that comment directed at you.
Michelle, you may have noticed that Jeff’s not here to read your messages. Why don’t you email him, insult him, and ask him to do you a good turn? I mean, it’s not the strategy I’d pursue, but he might actually receive the message.
Black beans are good with sour cream and chives and cilantro.
And you had better make your next utterance in this thread a good one, because it’s going to be your last.
Lychees are nuts, you know.
those w/o jobs should find new jobs. the messiah will save all.
She should just fuck off. There’s no upside for her here.
There is huge upside for me.
Every day I go to work. And I have the satisfaction of going to work. It’s good. I do my job and little weasles may think about contacting my work, but it doesn’t impact anyone. It’s just so much spam.
You all should stop trying to out people.
It makes you look small and petty.
Trying to get people fired for their ideas would seem to go against your ideas, no?
Apparently Ichees are nuts too.
hey michelle O! has toned arms. YES
Okay, everybody please give Michelle a round of applause. Thank you, Michelle. That was illuminating. Maybe we can do this again some time. I’ll call you. Really.
I am unpresidented.
happpyfeet’s got hammertoe.
“Trying to get people fired for their ideas would seem to go against your ideas, no?”
If you were the head of a daycare facility and you suddenly thought it might be a neat idea to make sandwiches of children’s feet, then you would certainly be fired for your ideas. Its the substance of the idea, not the existence that matters.
OK, I’m at a loss here. Did Ichee actually present any ideas? Other than the fact that tin foil hats are still in fashion?
what the f%%k are you’re ideas obamabot?
“Care to threaten me again?”
…because I will spell-check the shit outta you.
that obama going to STOP THE PORKULUS BILL?
I don’t know what that means. brb.
How … odd. I don’t have hammertoe. I have really small feet though. Like I wear a size 8. Really really high arches. Freakishly high arches, really. Dunno what’s up with that.
Perhaps, after more lurking, I will understand what the hell that was about. Whackadoo?
On’tday orgetfay the sanityinay. I am he and you are he and we are us and we are all together. Rosebud.
Precisely.
Oh, get this, they’re givin out wings. The ascendants soar, and then their wings melt.
oh shut up and get with the program:
Obama National Anthem
True. She’s not really running anything.
i would not hire an idiot like Ichee.
yo barry did you ever run a lemonade stand or just shake down rackets in chitown?
Maybe that’s why you are a router.
though, I give that one to you
Wow – Doritas/michelelines/whack-a-doodle is really off the deep end today, more than normal. Which is no small feat. Step away from the bong, ESL lady.
Sy Hersh may be talking about programs such as this and this.
And I say, I welcome more of the same. We are at war in Iraq and of course we target enemy leaders? Or perhaps we should just arrest them and put them on trial in U.S. Courts? I am one of those wimps who oppose torture of detainees, but I am all for killing the mother fuckers on the battle field. I hope it can be implemented successfully against al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan too.
If you put lipstick on a pig, is it still Rachel Maddow?
There’s a killer what was named Ichi. He was Japanese. They made a movie. It was gross.
I saw that movie. That director is really into needles – he has more like that one, too. But none of the Japanese people I know have ever heard of him.
No, Joe. Sy was pulling shite out of his arse.
Cheney should sue him for libel. Discovery would be fascinating.
[…] out of his office. Not surprisingly, perhaps, bloggers on the Right, such as Jules Crittenden and Dan Collins, think Hersh is crazy as a loon while those on the Left, like Marcy Wheeler, Kathy Kattenberg, and […]
I liked the comments. They were almost as cool as the Pogues. I’d also like to hire Seymour to play The Laugh Factory (Or whatever comedy club).
“Perhaps, after more lurking, I will understand what the hell that was about. Whackadoo?”
Yeah, I think I missed a few things too. Maybe some lithium would help this Ichee person? Stephen F. Austin University is in Nacawhatever, if I recall correctly. Only thing I know about that town.
As for Hersh – I have been promised, repeatedly, about big stories on the rape-kill-burn activities of all sorts of shadowy folks in the Armed Forces or CIA or whatnot. So where are they?! I have had such a boring time in OEF and OIF in comparison…
See, I should have been here last night instead of watching tv. I used to be a big fan of X-Files, so I’m comfortable with the weirdness that was here.
Isn’t it time for the Sarin gas story to be recycled? Maybe the lawyer Cheney accidentally shot was not a hunting accident, but practice for a personal, top secret assassination attempt.
If this IT gig doesn’t work out, I could always try the Enquirer. The Times has more prestige, but I don’t think they’ll be around long. Hirsch might beat me to the Enquirer gig if I procrastinate too much.
I beg to differ. See: whore, attention.
Wow, that’s the definition of a Griefer.
*pokes with a stick
HELP HELP DON’T OPPRESS ME
*pokes with a stick
HELP HELP DON’T OPPRESS ME
Thank you, doritos/michele/ESL lady. Your public meltdown was rather amusing.
This reminds me of the secret program during the Clinton Administration:
Seems that the Clintons were in possession of a map to the richest Saudi gold treasure in modern history. Hillary had the map broken into 20 segments and placed on microchips that were no bigger than a freckle. An unnamed doctor, who has recently passed away, would secure one of the microchips to the end of Bill’s wiener, and Bill would plant the chip on the back of the throat of an otherwise, unwitting intern. For redundancy, Bill splooged a mirror-image of the entire map onto a blue dress and stored it under his side of the bed in a box along with his lucky 50 cent piece, the Vicky LaMotta Playboy issue and a bottle opener/compass.
““Trying to get people fired for their ideas would seem to go against your ideas, no?â€
If you were the head of a daycare facility and you suddenly thought it might be a neat idea to make sandwiches of children’s feet, then you would certainly be fired for your ideas. Its the substance of the idea, not the existence that matters.”
Thank you blankminde. I will steal that. That was great.
Nacogdoches, TX?
I thought Thor said he lived in Florida?
I solemnly swear to not attempt to get ichee/Michelle/whatever fired from the Diary Queen.
In fact, I’ll go by today to make it up to her. I’ll be wearing pants w/ a button-up shirt.
[…] surprisingly, perhaps, most bloggers on the Right, such as Jules Crittenden and Dan Collins, think Hersh is crazy as a loon while most on the Left, like Marcy Wheeler, Kathy Kattenberg, and […]
[…] Protein Wisdom: Congressional investigation, please. You’d think the “no congressional oversight” claim would get their goat. […]
Nacogdoches, Texas, is in fact the home of Stephen F. Austin University. It is located in the Piney Woods of East Texas. I am most familiar with the music programs — several of my classmates went there to become band directors — but it also has a couple of thoroughly-entrenched “communications”-related departments, including journalism. A little patch of blue surrounded by red counties.
Think of Ichee as Ric Caric, except not as facile with the language.
Regards,
Ric
Hopefully, with better hair.
pussy galore could sure fly a plane
odd job hats could sure fly 20 feets
’tis not ur shadow they bomb
’tis teh heat seek
cower dunt do it…
run about
serpintine
that last one sucked/ i just wanted to say bobby orr
forgive?
I don’t know how many have already pointed this out above, but if Hersh had even a smidgeon of the truth here, we would have found Sy’s rotting head on a pike on a hill in Arlington National, placed there as a warning to others. His continued freedom to be stupid is proof that he is stupid and full of feathers.
Forgive? Never.
Why do I fear Cheney will do nothing, just hope for it to go away. But it won’t.