We Need More Brain Power

by Errington C. Thompson, MD –

I have been re-reading Senator Bob Graham’s book, Intelligence Matters.

It was about the intelligence failures of 9/11. Re-reading this book reminded me of how unprepared we were for a terrorist attack here in the United States, as well as how we diverted our attention away from the war on terror to attack Iraq.

For those of you who have a little gray hair, you’ll remember that the Bush Administration told us that Iraq had biological and chemical weapons. We were told they had these mobile devices that could be deployed almost anywhere and release devastating biological or chemical weapons. We were also told that Iraq was building a nuclear weapon and that they were months away from having a workable nuclear bomb. Finally, we were told that Saddam Hussein was in cahoots with Al Qaeda.

Although CIA Director George Tenet said in the Oval Office that this information was a “slam dunk,” it turns out he was 100% wrong. After we invaded Iraq, the public found out that they had no significant amounts of biological or chemical weapons. We learned that their nuclear program had been defunct for years. Vice President Dick Cheney and other members of the Bush Administration had cherry-picked and distorted the intelligence to paint an ominous picture of Iraq, which was not true.

The biggest problem we had in the United States after we invaded Iraq was that there was no reckoning. Nobody was held accountable for lying to the American people. The lies that the Bush Administration told us cost the American taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars. That war also cost us the lives of thousands of service members. Yet, for some reason, there was no accountability.

Iran

To quote Yogi Berra, “This is déjà vu all over again.” Instead of the Bush Administration, we now have the Trump Administration. We have Donald Trump and others in his administration who are telling us that Iran posed a threat to the United States.

So what was the threat? Was it nuclear weapons? I don’t think the Trump administration has made a convincing case that Iran had reconstituted its nuclear program in any meaningful way. Was it long-range missiles? The administration has not presented any evidence that Iran possesses intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching the United States.

But the Trump administration is not going to make the mistake that the Bush administration did. Bush’s cabinet presented data to the American public, even though it was skewed, distorted, and in some cases simply false. This time, this administration isn’t bothering to present any data whatsoever: instead, they’re just asking us to trust them, which is absolutely ludicrous.

The Trump administration appears to be failing us. They have not put in the requisite brain power to figure out the consequences of their actions. They have not thought the scenario through.

I feel pretty confident that nobody in the Trump administration, including Pete Hegseth, has considered the Powell Doctrine. This was the doctrine that was adopted by Colin Powell, a four-star general, to help us avoid foreign entanglements. The Powell Doctrine consists of these seven points:

• Is a vital national security interest threatened?
• Do we have a clear, attainable objective?
• Have the risks and costs been fully analyzed?
• Have all other non-violent policy means been exhausted?
• Is there a plausible exit strategy?
• Is there broad international and domestic support?
• Decisive Force: If action is taken, should it be applied with overwhelming force to ensure a swift victory with minimal casualties?

Invading Iran was not in our national security interest. We have no clear objectives. The risks and costs were not even superficially analyzed. We had a nuclear treaty, which was negotiated under Obama, but torn up under Trump, and therefore, non-violent means were not exhausted. We have no exit strategy. We went into this conflict without domestic or international support. The only thing we got right was decisive force.

In other words, this entire operation against Iran is a major disaster that was completely avoidable.

We need our elected officials to think critically about these issues. Knee-jerk reactions are NOT acceptable. But unfortunately, this group doesn’t even know what “critical thinking”* means. Their knee-jerk reaction to thinking critically is to claim that anyone who thinks differently from them is simply being critical.

Security Breach

The annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner at the Washington, DC, Hilton began shortly after all the patrons had been seated and the staff had begun serving food. There was a commotion outside the door. It appears that a gunman had run past the security scanners and either tripped and fell or was tackled to the ground. Shots were fired. A Secret Service member was hit in the vest and was taken to the hospital for evaluation. It is unclear from what I’ve read whether he was released immediately or later.

The gunman, who was from California, traveled all the way across the country to disrupt the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. He had checked into the hotel before the event. From his writings, it appears that he harbored a grudge or took offense at the Trump administration.

Was this an assassination attempt? It doesn’t appear that shots were fired at the president. It appears that this gentleman had a plot to kill or harm high-ranking officials in the Trump administration, which would include the vice president and the president. Yet thankfully, no shots were fired within the ballroom. All the commotion took place upstairs outside the ballroom.

Should the Secret Service be reprimanded or should they be praised? We need to wait for more information, but it seems like both praise and punishment are probably in order.

Several questions need to be asked. Why wasn’t the whole hotel on lockdown? This was a major event that was well publicized. It was an event at which the president, the vice president, and multiple cabinet members were present. Why didn’t we have the highest level of security available at this event? Why weren’t all the guests in the hotel searched for weapons?

At every TSA checkpoint in the United States, before you get to the metal detectors, there is a serpentine line to impede anyone who wants to run through the checkpoint. Why wasn’t this same practice employed at the Washington Hilton?

Yes, the Secret Service agents acted rapidly to subdue the suspect and make sure that he did not get into the ballroom. They are to be commended for this. Yet seems that somebody in charge of security wasn’t thinking straight. Aren’t we at war with a country that we know sponsors terrorism? Where were their thinking caps?

It sure seems we should be doing everything we can to keep ourselves safe in these dangerous times. That means locking down events like these, so they are as tight as Fort Knox.

Bear in mind, the events at the DC Hilton have nothing to do with whether we should build a $400 million ballroom for the president. The two things are not related and should not be tied together. But that was President Trump’s immediate reaction: that holding these events in his new ballroom would make them safer. Yet it is perfectly possible to hold a locked-down, secure event in Washington without spending $400 million on a drone-proof ballroom.

Moreover, the White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA), which sponsors the annual dinner, is not a government agency. It is a private organization that invites public officials and celebrities to their event. They are the hosts, not the White House or any government agency. So, first of all, they would have no legal right to invite guests to the White House—the People’s House. They’d have to ask the president’s permission even to consider it. And that’s not what a free press does.

Furthermore, if they did ask and if the administration granted such permission, then the administration would control the guest list. The president could veto the name of any media outlet, journalist, or celebrity who might make a joke about him or insult him.

And, finally, a present or future administration could cancel such a dinner after it was scheduled, with little notice to the hosts, if, say, it doesn’t like the news coverage it’s getting. Or if it dislikes the constitutional guarantee of freedom of the press, or, like this president, considers the media “the enemy of the people.”

The Civil Rights Act

The significance of the Civil Rights Act cannot be overstated. It may be the single most important piece of legislation ever passed since 1960. It effectively ended “separate but equal.” All of those “white only” signs had to come down. Segregation had ended. The Civil Rights Act also required equal opportunity in hiring, firing, and promotions. It created the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. It completed what Brown v. Board of Education began. Under that law, the federal government could file lawsuits to force desegregation. It could withdraw federal funding if you were found to discriminate in a school district.

The Civil Rights Act was quickly followed by the Voting Rights Act of 1965. All of those hurdles and barriers to voting were removed—no more literacy tests, no more poll taxes, no more discrimination in voting. The Voting Rights Act allowed for majority minority districts, meaning that states couldn’t dilute the votes of Blacks, Hispanics, or women, for that matter. This single provision allowed for minority representation in the House of Representatives.

Unfortunately, the Supreme Court just overturned this provision by a six-to-three margin. Now, states like Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and other southern states—and even some in the Midwest, like Ohio, or the West, like Utah—may rush to redraw their maps to dilute minority votes. Getting this overturned will be no easy feat. It will take a long, sustained effort, just like overturning Citizens United. This is bad, very bad.

Cryptocurrency

Donald Trump continues to enrich himself. It is hard for me to understand why nobody has tried to stop Donald Trump and his embrace of cryptocurrency. Soon after returning to the office, Donald Trump embraced cryptocurrency, having originally called it a scam.

In my opinion, cryptocurrency is no more than a Ponzi scheme. Each coin has no inherent value; its value is made up and agreed upon by people trading cryptocurrency. Donald Trump has made an estimated $1.5 billion to $2 billion in one year trading cryptocurrency. If you want to look for corruption, here it is. The best way to bribe Donald Trump is to buy into World Liberty Financial (Donald Trump’s crypto venture).

What are we doing, allowing this man to profit off the presidency? Why isn’t this illegal? (It is, of course, under numerous laws, including the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution.)

Why can’t Congress grow a spine and investigate this bribery? (That’s a rhetorical question.) The president’s acts of bribery, extortion, and outright theft are not even taking place secretly, behind closed doors, but right out in the open, right in front of our faces. Why do the people, and the people’s representatives, allow this to continue?

This has to stop! We must amend the Constitution and give the Emoluments Clause some teeth. While we are at it, we need to add an amendment that solidifies the Voting Rights Act and fixes the Second Amendment! And we need to clearly state that corporations are not people or citizens. We need to take our country back!

*Merriam-Webster’s dictionary defines critical thinking as “the act or practice of … applying reason and questioning assumptions in order to solve problems, evaluate information, discern biases, etc.”

NOTE: The views and opinions expressed here, as well as assertions of facts, are those of the author. They do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of The Urban News.