New York Times Reporter James Risen Finds ‘Crazy Is The New Normal' In War On Terror

My sense is that these times, in part, are here to cut through our illusions, to dash our justifications for polarizing, to see the emperors who have no clothing, and to try to recognize our part in unknowingly colluding in much that has been and is harmful. Humility coupled with courage can be a transformative experience. I still have a photo on my blog that I took of Obama in 2008, a time when I was full on with Obama is great and Bush is beyond bad. No more. Disillusionment can be a powerful incentive and push into greater awakening. And into fierce compassionate action.

Meanwhile, today I heard James Risen interviewed on both NPR and on our local non-corporate KBOO radio, both illuminating his new book, Pay Any Price: Greed, Power, and Endless War, and his commitment to truth-telling that the root of true investigative journalism. Quoting from this article: In public appearances, Risen has harshly criticized the Obama administration, which has used the Espionage Act to prosecute more leakers to the media than all previous administrations combined. Risen told an audience at Colby College last week that Obama “hates the press.” He told The Huffington Post that the president “is the greatest enemy of press freedom that we’ve had in generations.”

This man is courageous. His actions are rooted in integrity, truth, courage, and commitment to a higher good. May he inform and inspire us all.

Peace ~ Molly

 

 by Michael Calderone

NEW YORK –- New York Times reporter James Risen was surprised Sunday when former National Security Agency chief Michael Hayden said he doesn’t see a need for the government to prosecute Risen for refusing to reveal a source.

“I’m glad to see he feels that way these days,” Risen said in an interview Monday with The Huffington Post. “I’m not sure how long he’s felt that way.”

Hayden's comment on CBS's "60 Minutes" suggested a grudging respect for the work of Risen, an investigative reporter who has challenged Bush and Obama administration rationales and strategies for an “endless war” in response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Risen was one of a the few reporters to seriously scrutinize the Bush administration’s case for war in Iraq, even as his own paper downplayed that skeptical coverage. The next year, Hayden and the Bush White House successfully pressured the Times not to publish Risen and colleague Eric Lichtblau’s blockbuster report on the NSA’s warrantless wiretapping program. The Pulitzer Prize-winning story finally appeared on the front page in late 2005, just weeks before Risen planned to reveal it in a chapter of his book, State of War.

But it was another chapter in Risen's January 2006 book, on a bungled CIA operation in Iran, that sparked the leak investigation that’s dogged Risen for seven years, with the reporter saying he’d go to jail before revealing a source. 

In his latest book, out Tuesday, Pay Any Price: Greed, Power, And Endless War, Risen continues to report on the breakdown of law, the billions of dollars wasted, and the government’s ends-justify-the-means strategy for a war on terrorism, which, asanother war in the Middle East escalates, shows no signs of ending.

“ISIS is a serious group, but it’s not an existential threat to the United States,” Risen told HuffPost. “You would think, though, after 13 years, we’d begin to become more skeptical of these threats and the people who do all this fearmongering.”

Risen likened public perception of Islamic extremists to the early days of the Cold War. “Back then they thought of Russian troops as 10 feet tall and about to march down Broadway,” he said. “Today, we think of Islamic terrorists as 10 feet tall and about to walk down Broadway.”

Such exaggerated fears, in Risen's view, have helped create a climate that permits anything, if it's ostensibly about fighting terrorism. Risen said national security became "deregulated" after 9/11, with the established rules and regulations dismissed as outdated.

“We’ve had a national security crisis that’s led to some bizarre outcomes,” Risen said. “So what I was looking for were bizarre stories that told what I think is the basic theme of the book: Crazy is the new normal in the war on terror.”

Please continue this article here:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/14/james-risen-pay-any-price_n_5985382.html