| “The Wreckage of the Consensus Revisited” by Harry Binswanger (a board member of ARI). Subtitle: “New York Times Company Admits to Spreading Lies to Undermine America’s War Effort” (Capitalism Magazine May 18, 2004). |
At the time Mr. Binswanger wrote this article the tip of the iceberg of U.S. torture had come into view the previous month with the news about Abu Ghraib, featuring photos about which any decent man would have been sickened and outraged.
And then someone brings more photos to the Boston Globe. The Boston Globe fails to investigate their authenticity and publishes an article about them as if they were genuine, printing one of the photos along with the article. The Globe editors soon learn the photos are fake and immediately publish a retraction. After obscuring the issue by saying the printed photo was too ugly to have been printed, they write:
“... the purported abuse portrayed had not been authenticated. The Globe apologizes for publishing the photo.”
Mr. Binswanger’s begins his essay by describing the Globe fiasco. He carefully avoids mentioning the hundreds of authentic Abu Ghraib photos (the worst of which have never been shown the public for the same reason given by the Globe). Then he says the Globe’s retraction is “lame.”
Finally he insinuates that the Globe’s owner, the New York Times Company, tried to lie to the public:
“The Boston Globe is published by the New York Times [sic regarding the italics] Company. What consequences will befall the editors of the Globe? Probably a reprimand. And a wink.”In other words, the editors knew the photos were fake all along and the NYT Company was willing to go along with the deception. How on earth does Mr. Binswanger know this? Mystic insight, wishful thinking? Mr. Binswanger’s accusation is absurd.
In all his puffed up concern over a little retracted news story the real story of Abu Ghraib – people tortured at the behest of the Bush administration – just disappears. To Mr. Binswanger the fake photos are real, the real ones are blanked out. (*)
Mr. Binswanger concludes by quoting Ayn Rand. “Thirty-seven years ago, Ayn Rand spoke on ‘The Wreckage of the Consensus’ at the Ford Hall Forum. The talk included this passage:
“ ‘A country at war often resorts to smearing its enemy by spreading atrocity stories—a practice which a free, civilized country need not and should not resort to. A civilized country, with a free press, can let the facts speak for themselves. But what is the moral-intellectual state of a country that spreads smears and atrocity stories about itself ...?’ ”Mr. Binswanger leaves us to conclude that America must be in a sad state to resort to faking torture photos. As for the real torture photos ... blank out.
The key word in his quote is “facts.” Ayn Rand sincerely believed that the accounts of atrocities committed by U.S. troops in Vietnam were false. The evidence at the time was hard to believe and, contrary to the situation today, leftists really were the only people paying attention to it – most not to help but to harm America.
By quoting Ayn Rand out of context Mr. Binswanger insinuates that all the prison Abu Ghraib photos are fake – or at any rate of no real consequence – and that only people who hate America worry about what they mean.
“The Wreckage of the Consensus” is worth revisiting though. Her full article makes abundantly clear that she opposed the Vietnam War.
Mr. Binswanger has no kind word for the whistleblowers who brought sunshine into Abu Ghraib. Among these Army specialist Joseph Darby stands out because he was the first to protest in a formal written complaint. He later said: “I didn’t want to see any more prisoners being abused, because I knew it was wrong.” (**) Evidently this man is not barbarian material.
And that’s all we’ve heard – and haven’t heard – from Mr. Binswanger about U.S. torture. (***)