Within the so-called intelligence community (IC), you are allowed to be a cheerleader, a booster, even a selective critic in the sense that you may call for more money for the IC because of certain limitations or oversights, but you are not allowed to question America’s disastrously wasteful imperial foreign policy. No matter how poorly the IC performs (consider the colossal failure of 9/11, or the total obliviousness about the impending collapse of the Soviet Union in the late 1980s, or recent disastrous wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya), no one is ever held accountable, even as the IC gets more money and authority. “Nominating Gabbard for director of national intelligence is the way to Putin’s heart, and it tells the world that America under Trump will be the Kremlin’s ally rather than an adversary,” Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a professor of history at New York University and the author of “Strongmen,” a 2020 book about authoritarian leaders, wrote on Friday.
Author: William Astore
Published at: 2024-11-19 23:46:25
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