This is America?

This is a very interesting video in and of itself, but there are many finer points which also attract my attention.

In the cookie jar


Ray McGovern is a CIA alumni of some 27 years and worked at a level high enough to provide briefings for George H.W. Bush.

In the video he confronts Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld with his own words and asks him, "Did you lie?"

As I said the video is interesting in and of itself.

What is also interesting, though, is how hostile the crowd is to Mr. McGovern. I find that inexcusable considering his service record.

Someone that has spent a lifetime defending America deserves, at minimum, courtesy and respect. I think that Donald Rumsfeld, to his credit, agrees and at one point seems to interrupt Ray's ejection (while he asks "This is America?").

Mr. Rumsfeld's respect doesn't seem to go so far as to answer Mr. McGovern's questions honestly, but I expect answering the question truthfully would make it easy to convict him as a war criminal.

What seems left hanging in the air is Donald Rumsfeld did say two things demonstrably false:

1. He knew where the weapons of mass destruction were located (near Tikrit).

2. There was bullet-proof evidence of an Iraq/Al Qaeda link.

What also seems to hang in the air is a room so partisan that what matters is not, "What is True?" but "What color are your politics?".

I also would like to compliment Keith Olbermann of MSNBC for fact-checking Ray's questions for the audience. I wish more so-called news broadcasts contained such context.

Facts matter, aye?