“Gen. Tommy Franks says that if the United States is hit with a weapon of mass destruction that inflicts large casualties, the Constitution will likely be discarded in favor of a military form of government.”
Left-Wing Media In An Uproar Over Report Taken From Right-Wing Media Source – But Does Either Side Have It Right (And Should We All Be Very Afraid?)
by Samuel A. Stanson
DECEMBER 12, 2003 - The above quote is taken from a right-wing news source called NewsMax. General Tommy Franks, the man who led our recent invasion of Iraq, was interviewed this month in Cigar Aficionado magazine (also a right-wing news source) and NewsMax did a story on the interview.
NewsMax wrote: “In (Cigar Aficionado magazine’s) December edition, the former commander of the military’s Central Command warned that if terrorists succeeded in using a weapon of mass destruction (WMD) against the U.S. or one of our allies, it would likely have catastrophic consequences for our cherished republican form of government.”
Their lead-in paragraph was even starker: “Gen. Tommy Franks says that if the United States is hit with a weapon of mass destruction that inflicts large casualties, the Constitution will likely be discarded in favor of a military form of government.”
Now, go take a look at the NewsMax site. There is no question it is a heavily right-wing biased news source.
They go on to assert: “Already, critics of the U.S. Patriot Act, rushed through Congress in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, have argued that the law aims to curtail civil liberties and sets a dangerous precedent. But Franks’ scenario goes much further. He is the first high-ranking official to openly speculate that the Constitution could be scrapped in favor of a military form of government.”
Well, numerous left-wing news sources, websites, and commentators are in a fury over the comments. They are posting this NewsMax coverage of the Cigar Aficionado interview on their pages as a shocking, alarming warning; more proof that the Bush administration and people associated with it are out to turn us into a dictatorship – and on the verge of doing so. In fact, these quotes absolutely make it sound like they are just waiting for an excuse to get rid of the Constitution and impose “martial law,” as Tina Brown of the Washington Post (link: Paris Hilton, In An Age Beyond Embarrassment) deemed Franks’ comments to be speaking of.
In fact, if you look at the report from NewsMax, backed up and supported by direct quotes from General Franks, you can easily get alarmed that there is something very devious afoot.
But while in many ways this Bush administration is clearly acting as if they find our Constitutionally guaranteed freedoms are a hindrance, General Franks in no way says what they say he says, even if the quotes are entirely accurate. In fact, the General Franks interview is positive and negative for both the Bush side and the opposition.
How can such an alarming statement not be as bad as it sounds? Well, it comes down to one misrepresentative word and one omitted sentence.
Notice above in both of the first two quotes from NewsMax the word “likely.”
“… Franks says that if the United States is hit with a weapon of mass … the Constitution will likely be discarded.”
“…warned that if terrorists succeeded in using a weapon of mass destruction (WMD)… it would likely have catastrophic consequences for our cherished republican form of government.”
The quotes they back it up with really seem to support this. Franks is quoted as saying (and, in fact, we checked the interview and he does): “If (terrorists use WMD’s,) Franks said, “... the Western world, the free world, loses what it cherishes most, and that is freedom and liberty we’ve seen for a couple of hundred years in this grand experiment that we call democracy.”
Wow, that sounds terrible. They then continue, quoting entirely accurately: “Franks then offered “in a practical sense” what he thinks would happen in the aftermath of such an attack. “It means the potential of a weapon of mass destruction and a terrorist, massive, casualty-producing event somewhere in the Western world – it may be in the United States of America – that causes our population to question our own Constitution and to begin to militarize our country in order to avoid a repeat of another mass, casualty-producing event. Which in fact, then begins to unravel the fabric of our Constitution. Two steps, very, very important.”
So if you are reading this, thinking this is what General Franks said will “likely” happen in the event of a WMD attack on the US – or even just on one of our allies – you might see it as the left-wing sites are seeing it, as General Franks tipping the Bush administration’s hand, accidentally spilling the beans of their secret plan to get rid of the entire Constitution the next chance they get.
Now remember, the news source that wrote this article, NewsMax, is a staunch Bush ally, and about as much of a right-wing puppet as a news source gets. So it seems unlikely they would make up something to sound so bad about their own side.
Well, as we like to say at The Moderate Independent, choose your news sources carefully. Just as a person who doesn’t see lying as wrong will lie for no reason other than they want to, it is no different with a news source. So while usually NewsMax bends the truth to make things sound good for the right, this time they twist things just to make a story seem exciting, important, and interesting, when in fact, the comments Franks made were not quite such a big deal.
No, General Franks never used the word “likely.” In fact, he made clear he was talking about the most extreme possibility and one of the two ultimate goals of terrorism.
Yes, NewsMax ignored the sentence preceding the above quotes, in which General Franks made clear that all he was going to do was lay out a worst-case scenario, the most extreme hypothetical he could think of as representing the ultimate goal of terrorists.
Describing why he felt the War on Terrorism was important, Franks explained that the terrorists had two aims: first, to affect the culture of a country, causing the people to alter their lives and for the country to lose, “what it cherishes most, and that is freedom and liberty we’ve seen for a couple of hundred years in this grand experiment that we call democracy.”
Oops. Nothing like the “likely” doomsday in the event of another attack that both right-wing NewsMax and the left wing alarmist press is making it out to be.
What about the second part of the General’s comments, about the “likely” “martial law” in the event of another attack?
Look at his comments again, this time realizing he is talking about the ultimate goal of terrorists and worst scenario he can imagine:
“In a practical sense… it means the potential of a weapon of mass destruction and a terrorist, massive, casualty-producing event somewhere in the Western world – it may be in the United States of America – that causes our population to question our own Constitution and to begin to militarize our country in order to avoid a repeat of another mass, casualty-producing event. Which in fact, then begins to unravel the fabric of our Constitution. Two steps, very, very important.”
Is this, in fact, alarming and more evidence, as the NewsMax article relates and the left-wing sites pick up, supporting what “critics of the U.S. Patriot Act,” are worried about, only that “Franks’ scenario goes much further?”
Clearly, no. It is just an answer most educated, properly-valued Americans would give if asked, “What do you think the worst result of terrorist attacks could be?” Most Americans would, and indeed have, said that it would be to destroy the freedom-enjoying country we are.
NewsMax is even playing on genuine concerns that the Bush administration has taken steps toward giving terrorists that victory with their freedom- and Constitution-attacking PATRIOT Act.
And then, just completely giving up on any semblance of truth, the story declares, entirely falsely, “He is the first high-ranking official to openly speculate that the Constitution could be scrapped in favor of a military form of government.”
This whole statement is just a fiction and distortion of the highest magnitude. Speaking in the general sense that General Franks was – discussing worst-case scenarios for terrorism – most, if not indeed all, high-ranking officials acknowledge that the ultimate goal of the terrorists is to get us to give up our Constitutionally guaranteed freedoms.
And the word “could” is a flat-out lie; General Franks never once said that this “could” happen. He was saying we must be vigilant and aggressive in the War on Terror to ensure that this never does happen, and he never, at any point, suggested that we would fail in that war or that, under any circumstances, this “could” happen to America. He only said that was the goal of the terrorists.
Yes, he spoke of it as a worst-case scenario possibility, but he never said that he saw this, “in a practical sense,” as something that could happen in America. He only said that “in a practical sense” that is what the terrorists want to achieve.
Now, the General does say a number of provocative things that are big news.
For example, he states plainly that he disagrees with President Bush and everyone else who chastises the French and Germans for not going along with us. They each have their own “interests” to look out for, he says, and he has respect for that, unlike the President and others who act as if the French and Germans are acting incomprehensibly and inexcusably.
He also disses the notion that Bill Clinton ran the military down. Franks says he does believe the military has been made to atrophy too much, but it was not Clinton, he clearly states, but the whole direction of things in the “post-Vietnam era.”
This also shines very well upon Franks, showing he is not a partisan – as he points out repeatedly – who will play the unfair game of saying everything was bad when Clinton was President and everything is perfect under Bush. In one breath he praises President Bush as “the best” type of Commander-In-Chief, but in the next he in effect slams the President and his administration politically by pointing out how unfair the claims are that Clinton had run the military into a reduced state of readiness – claims which Bush, Cheney, et. al used both in the 2000 campaign and since.
Franks shows himself to be a man of integrity, not a villainous man on the inside of a dastardly plot that has us a step away from losing our Constitutionally guaranteed freedoms. You can tell – and as he admits – he is very conservative, but he is conservative in the honest sense of the word, not in the Bush/Limbaugh distortive use of it. Franks has conservative values and ideologies, but isn’t unfair and dishonest, or political at all.
So, in this instance you see how important it is to choose your news sources wisely. Both the right-wing puppet press and the left-wing press are at fault. The right-wing press, so used to lying it is now like breathing for them, lied this time just to try and make an interesting, alarming story out of something not so big. And the left-wing press did not fact check or bother to spend the five dollars to buy the crappy, right-wing magazine carrying the interview and read to see if NewsMax was reporting things accurately. This is a big lesson for both right-wingers and lefties, and, indeed, for us Moderate Independents. Be careful who you trust, and don’t take up a cause without checking your facts first.
Kudos to Franks, who may be a conservative, but he is also clearly an independent. In both praising and criticizing the President’s policies, he shows what democracy is supposed to be, and what matters most to we apolitical independents: truth, and what is best for America.
