Bradley Manning is a “true American hero,” a modern-day Daniel Ellsberg, a brave and selfless patriot and soldier who sacrificed his own freedom in order to fight against the “enemies of public liberty” and awaken the American masses to the realities of war.
But even if you believe Manning is a “true American traitor,” a modern-day Benedict Arnold who betrayed his unit and disavowed his oath to country by haphazardly leaking hundreds of thousands of war reports and State Department cables, most of which he didn’t bother reading, Manning is entitled to a fair trial nonetheless.
Unfortunately for the Puritopian emoprogs of the far left who fueled this hero motif by peddling “Free Manning” T-shirts and tweeting “Free Bradley” hashtags, being a hero and getting a fair trial are mutually exclusive, at least as far as his attorneys can tell.
Their pre-trial defense focused on their client’s “gender identity issues” and personal struggles as a homosexual in the military, and how these factors may have diminished his mental capacity at the time of the alleged offenses.
Obviously, one cannot be anointed as a hero if he was mentally incapacitated at the time of said heroic actions.
Not even Manning’s biggest critics would expect his defense team to walk into court and start ranting about government transparency and “the fog of war” and how the heroic nature of his actions somehow overshadows the treasonous nature of his actions, but he’d probably have a better chance of freedom if they did, because the “gay defense,” aside from being a slap in the face to every gay or gender-confused soldier who has ever served in the military without being accused of treason, is legally no more relevant than the “Twinkie defense.”
If Manning does get off, what happens to the gay, lesbian, transgendered and/or gender-confused soldiers who are now allowed to serve openly in the military? Are they going to be looked upon by their superiors as potential threats to national security, as potential traitors, because there is now a precedent that says a “confused” soldier will not be held to account for stealing secret documents and leaking them to the world?
The truth is, anyone could have stolen and leaked these documents. Any soldier with Manning’s level of security clearance could have leaked these cables. And yet, anyone didn’t. Bradley Manning did. And despite the Glenn Greenwalds and Jane Hamshers of the world trying to make a “true American patriot” out of Manning, his own attorneys say he did it not because of patriotism or heroism but because he was mentally incapacitated by gender identity confusion and from living in a “hyper-hetero” environment with “a bunch of hyper-masculine trigger happy ignorant rednecks” in the Army.
Some have argued that the weakness of the defense is excusable because it’s mere “self-preservation,” basically Manning’s willingness to play the victim in order to preserve his freedom. Others have said you can’t fault the defense for trying whatever they can to get him out of jail.
I say the criticism is warranted, because a soldier’s inability to cope with the emotional stress of being homosexual who’s confused about his gender identity isn’t likely to be made into a legal precedent that excuses treason.
Manning deserves a fair trial. This defense won’t provide that.
Manning is neither a hero, nor a victim. He has not even been bound over for trial, much less convicted.
No one, in the media or on line, know Manning well enough to say or write anything probitive. His intentions and motivations are unknown. We do not even have detailed proof of what he actually did.
We, in fact, know next to nothing.
I will wait to see what is given in evidence at trial.
The truth is, anyone could have stolen and leaked these documents. Any soldier with Manning’s level of security clearance could have leaked these cables. And yet., anyone didn’t. Bradley Manning did.
Well said. The information coming out should be interesting, but in the end it all comes down to one man and his choices.
Like I said before, the “Crazy Queen with a Hand Grenade” defense isn’t going to work, as it flies in the face of the death knell of DADT as well as the civil rights gains of any non-white male group (minorities, women, etc.) have made in the military, since it was thought that women were too emotional and Black men were too stupid and timid to fight honorably the battlefield. Beyond the fact that “War is Hell” and most soldiers simply don’t betray their buddies in the field, even if they’re in the closet. If this accurate, its the ultimate Hail Mary pass for the defense.
And let me state, again, that Bradley Manning isn’t a hero, a victim or a villain – he is a dumb kids who is now simply a pawn in a bigger chess game from three different factions in politics, a trifecta of our political establishment.
Folks like Hamshear, Greenwald and Assange make their bread and butter “flipping off the man” – no matter what. They’re not real liberals, their simply anti-establishment hucksters, ala Ron Paul. Free or locked up for life, these clowns will make a mint on the lecture circuit lecturing well-meaning but naive middle class college students on the ills of the great Satan and their heroism of Manning. He’s a pink poodle or a show pony for them.
On another side of the triangle, the Obama administration has egg on its face as international secrets were leaked not by a master spy, but some rookie private with a Jones for Lady Gaga and cross dressing. So they need someone to flog and skin, metaphorically speaking, to save face on the world stage, as well as stave off the GOP.
Which leaves me to our favorite circus barkers – the Republican primary contenders. The 101 Chair-borne want push for Bradley Manning to literally be dragged through the street so they can show their tougher on terrorists than Obama. ***
In short, Bradley Manning is on trial primarily because everyone wants a pieces of his hide — the Emo Progs ‘intelligensia’ need a martyr to sell books and mug for the cameras on KO, the Obama Administration needs a fall guy to save face, and the GOP desperately need a campaign issue on foreign policy, since most of their other ideas just plain suck.
***(And yes many Americans are dumb enough to somehow think that a bunch of Republican kicking around an unstable Army private who gave away state department memos like he’s Julius Rosenberg stealing A-Bomb blueprints is a better ‘tough guy’ than the quiet mulatto cat who dirt napped bin Laden)
Like I said before, the “Crazy Queen with a Hand Grenade” defense isn’t going to work, as it flies in the face of the death knell of DADT as well as the civil rights gains of any non-white male group (minorities, women, etc.) have made in the military, since it was thought that women were too emotional and Black men were too stupid and timid to fight honorably the battlefield. Beyond the fact that “War is Hell” and most soldiers simply don’t betray their buddies in the field, even if they’re in the closet. If this accurate, its the ultimate Hail Mary pass for the defense.
And let me state, again, that Bradley Manning isn’t a hero, a victim or a villain – he is a dumb kids who is now simply a pawn in a bigger chess game from three different factions in politics, a trifecta of our political establishment.
Folks like Hamshear, Greenwald and Assange make their bread and butter “flipping off the man” – no matter what. They’re not real liberals, their simply anti-establishment hucksters, ala Ron Paul. Free or locked up for life, these clowns will make a mint on the lecture circuit lecturing well-meaning but naive middle class college students on the ills of the great Satan and their heroism of Manning. He’s a pink poodle or a show pony for them.
On another side of the triangle, the Obama administration has egg on its face as international secrets were leaked not by a master spy, but some rookie private with a Jones for Lady Gaga and cross dressing. So they need someone to flog and skin, metaphorically speaking, to save face on the world stage, as well as stave off the GOP.
Which leaves me to our favorite circus barkers – the Republican primary contenders. The 101 Chair-borne want push for Bradley Manning to literally be dragged through the street so they can show their tougher on terrorists than Obama.
In short, Bradley Manning is on trial primarily because everyone wants a pieces of his hide — the Emo Progs ‘intelligensia’ need a martyr to sell books and mug for the cameras on KO, the Obama Administration needs a fall guy to save face, and the GOP desperately need a campaign issue on foreign policy, since most of their other ideas just plain suck.
Bradley Manning isn’t a hero, a victim or a villain – he is a dumb kid who made a terrible decision and is now simply a pawn in a bigger chess game from three different factions in politics, a Trifecta of our political establishment.
Folks like Hamshear, Greenwald and Assange make their bread and butter “flipping off the man” – no matter what. They’re not real liberals, their simply anti-establishment hucksters, ala Ron Paul. Free or locked up for life, these clowns will make a mint on the lecture circuit lecturing well-meaning but naive middle class college students on the ills of the great Satan and their heroism of Manning. He’s a pink poodle or a show pony for them. Like I said before, Bradley Manning is the 21st Century Mumia Abdul Jamal.
On another side of the triangle, the Obama administration has egg on its face as international secrets were leaked not by a master spy, but some rookie private with a Jones for Lady Gaga and cross dressing. So they need someone to flog and skin, metaphorically speaking, to save face on the world stage, as well as stave off the GOP.
Which leaves me to our favorite circus barkers – the Republican primary contenders. The 101 Chairborne will push for Bradley Manning to literally be drawn and quarter so they can show their tougher on terrorists than Obama. Because, you know, beating up a goofball kid sitting in a jail cell is a lot tougher than taking out the world biggest terrorist.
In short, Bradley Manning is on trial primarily because everyone wants a pieces of his hide — the Emo Progs ‘intelligensia’ need a martyr to sell books and mug for the cameras on KO, the Obama Administration needs a fall guy to save face, and the GOP desperately need a campaign issue on foreign policy, since most of their other ideas just plain suck.
I really want the phrase “whistle-blower” to stop being used in conjunction with Manning. He’s not Karen Silkwood. It seems pretty clear that he had no clue what was in the vast amount of stuff he sent to Assange, and didn’t care. He wasn’t pinpointing specific abuses that he felt strongly enough about to go public and risk his career and freedom. (That’s the key point about civil disobedience that so many get wrong — you break an unjust law with the EXPECTATION that you will be arrested, with the larger aim of calling more public attention to the unjust law.)
It’s an insult to real whistle-blowers to toss him in the mix.
Um. Y’know, I’d be more annoyed at your bisexual erasure in there if you hadn’t managed utter fail at writing about transgender people. The phrase “gender-confused” is offensive. And calling Manning gay when that hasn’t been determined but the odds are who we call Bradley ought to be Breanna but doesn’t have the liberty to do so yet is also offensive. It’s allowing the gays to co-opt yet another trans person into their umbrella in a way that erases the trans person’s true status. Manning might be a lesbian, but that’s not yet sure, either.
Twice now, someone here writes about Manning and their lack of couth when it comes to trans issues flops out. Please educate yourself before you do this again, and I say that to ALL of ABL’s writers.
Agreed, and thank you for saying something, Lysana. “Gender-confused”? That is a massively insulting term to use, and shows the author as either very ignorant on trans* issues or maybe just transphobic. I’ll be generous and assume the former, and hope he’s willing to listen and learn. But I have to say, the only people I’ve seen use a term like “gender-confused” are people who think anyone on the trans*/genderqueer spectrum – i.e., anyone who is outside of the strict male/female binary – has something wrong with them. Which, NO.
To be fair, the above quote on ‘gender-confusion’ are siting the official news reports which are here. Now, that said, I empathize with how the transgender community would find such a term insulting, as it denotes a binary understanding of sexuality.
And with that said, it really doesn’t matter. Whether Bradley Manning was ‘transitioning’ into ‘Breena’ or was just shell shocked is irrelevant. The man committed a crime and should stand trial.
I’ve seen a few people transition genders. The worst side effect I’ve ever seen is weepiness and irritability from massive hormone doses. (Which, AFAIK, Bradley was not taking). Low self esteem and depression in people who are fighting it, or stressed about it. No one I know has ever committed a crime under the influence of being transgendered.
If he’d killed someone who was tormenting him about his sexuality/gender (and I’m going to say he, until he actually announces it’s she, because what the defense is saying seems pretty thin and shaky to me), I might be pretty sympathetic, although I would expect him to be prosecuted and sentenced. I do not understand how being transgender is supposed to have led to what he’s accused of.
Good points, and I agree with you and Lysana that we all need to be more aware of how we bring up transgender issues and discuss them.
There’s been no direct proof showing that Manning turned anything over to Assange. As for alleged crimes, Manning’s oath was to ‘uphold and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic’ per the UCMJ. This includes an obligation to not commit war crimes, to stop war crimes and to report war crimes. When after reporting war crimes Manning was told to shut up and get back to aiding in more war crimes, he released documents to expose the truth more US war crimes. The documents released on Wikileaks exposed many war crimes, which is evidence of war criminal’s covering them up, which is also war crime.
So you’re going with “You can’t prove Manning did it and he was a hero for doing it”? Interesting combo.
There’s a big big difference between what I think and what’s been shown beyond a reasonable doubt. Manning exposed the the truth, for which the world should be thankful.
quote:
Tom Baxter says:
There’s a big big difference between what I think and what’s been shown beyond a reasonable doubt. Manning exposed the the truth, for which the world should be thankful.
Mr. Baxter, with due respect, let me dig into your two main arguments to expose a fallacy from my POV – you’re equating a pissed off grunt selling hundreds of random secret documents to a blogger to an act of heroism and on top of that, there’s very little evidence of his actual involvement. Here’s where the weakness comes in, as I see it – Manning wasn’t interested in really exposing anything in particular & what he exposed wasn’t really worth crap. Also, his digital fingerprints were all over the case.
First, what did he expose? That Haiti has sweatshops? That some of our soldiers are trigger happy goons? That the late Gaddhafi had a thing for busty blond nurses? He didn’t expose anything the most people didn’t know from a regular newspaper, couldn’t figure out or didn’t really matter, in terms of the war. We’re luck he didn’t expose anything damaging, just politically embarrassing, so far. As others have pointed out, whistle blowers tend to target their data to specific details. Manning didn’t do that, he dumped everything and anything he got his hands on, because he didn’t care about actually exposing stuff, just flipping off the military.
And from the reports that have been release, there is little doubt that the leak came from Manning, or at least someone who works around Manning. I’ve been in the technology field for over 12 years. In the modern IT world, its pretty easy to tell who did what on your network, particularly if only certain people have the security clearance to do certain things. If you can track who is downloading porno in your run of the mill small office, I’m sure the State Department and the DOD tech support knows which analyst was looking at what files. Otherwise, his lawyers wouldn’t trump out this emotional stress defense.
Let the man have his day in court, but from what I’ve read from news sources, pro con and in the middle, Manning is probably guilty.
If you want Manning to have his day in court, you should probably stop “defending” him by stipulating that he did the deeds for which he is charged.
That doesn’t follow. Someone forming a hypothesis on a blog from what they know about the case does not hinder a fair trial.
The documents released on Wikileaks exposed many war crimes, which is evidence of war criminal’s covering them up, which is also war crime.
Let’s set aside that the vast majority of documents released didn’t expose anything that is arguably a war crime – “John Kerry thinks Syria is ready to make peace!”
If you’re going to make this defense, you need to affirmatively prove war crimes. And by “war crimes,” I don’t mean anything that you, Mr. Leftist Internet Commenter, would define as a war crime. Someone using this defense has to be able to prove that he was blowing the whistle about something that would actually be found to be a war crime, as the UN, the JAG’s office, the Justice Department, or the federal courts would define as a war crime.
“Bradley Manning can’t be a hero AND a victim”
Sure he can. He is neither, but that headline is just plain stupid.
The whole point of the Baby Jesus Manning movement is to prevent this fool from having to face the known impending consequences of (you choose) his rank stupidity or his reckless, traitorous acts.
He’s not a hero, he’s not a victim. At best, he’s a damn fool. At worst, he’s a traitor to his country.
And his defense is just the newest, arguably most pernicious version of “the devil made me do it” in recent memory. In other, simpler words, pure bullshit.
On top of that, people who are calling for Manning to walk free on some higher principle are giving into the Right’s old Ollie North argument for Iran Contra, because he was following the principles of democracy and greater good, he was above the letter of the law. In that case, Greenwald & Hamshear should be arguing for exoneration of most of the Reagan-Bush cabinet involved in the scandal, because its basically the same idea.
If Manning does get off, what happens to the gay, lesbian, transgendered and/or gender-confused soldiers who are now allowed to serve openly in the military? Are they going to be looked upon by their superiors as potential threats to national security, as potential traitors, because there is now a precedent that says a “confused” soldier will not be held to account for stealing secret documents and leaking them to the world?
If I was Manning’s lawyer, I’d reply, “DADT Repeal changed everything. My client was subject to official, legally enforced persecution under the old system.”
How does it change anything, though? What he is accused of doing has no connection to persecution he may have experienced under DADT.
A few thoughts. First, whether Manning is gay or transsexual is irrelevant to what he’s accused of. Second, there was a massive failure in his leadership chain, because he should have been booted out long before he ever deployed. Third, this is not a “whistleblowing” case, and trying to paint as such really denigrates real whistleblowers. Finally, it wasn’t just “harmless” or “embarrassing” documents, or even “proof of wrongdoing.” that were leaked. There were some serious intelligence leaks that put people in danger. As in “on a kill list” because their names were mentioned.
Spectacular comment by Quell at the ridiculous and moronic link posted by Norbrook. Btw, you may want to inform yourself about what Sec Gates has said about the impact the document dump has had on ongoing operations and diplomatic relations.
Here is Quell’s comment:
“quell July 31, 2010 at 10:03 pm
Any murder of civilian informants is the fault of the custodians of the classified data– the US government.
Those names are the RESPONSIBILITY of the US government that apparently let Manning walk 92000 files on r/w media out of a “SECURE” SECRET facility.
You, Joshua Foust and the rest of these asshole war pimps can stop whining about Assanges “moral obligation” and get the fuck in there and extract any burned contracts.
Presumably they know WHO THEY FUCKING BURNED, and aren’t going to sit on their hands bitching about Assange while the Talis grease any friendlies foolish and unfortunate enough to have trusted us.
You don’t give a shit about the afghan people, Foust. You are throwing radar chaff so people won’t notice what is really in the Wikileaks docs. We have lost already.
You and Exum and the rest of the COINdinistas war pimps just want to get to your table-top wargaming.
Look at the Time pic of the mutilated girl. Her nose was CUT OFF LAST YEAR in the middle of 100k american troops. The Taliban are ALREADY RESURGENT. We are cutting a deal with them right now. Right now the ratio is one single Talib fighter is pwning 13 coalition/afghan security forces. The Talib ARE NOT GOING AWAY—THEY ARE WINNING. The Wikileaks docs show exactly the same thing. WE ARE LOSING. And there is no way to win.
Even if we can stand up a “democratic” government the afghan people are going to vote for shariah and the Talibs will be part of the goverment!
So we can keep pouring blood and treasure into a rat hole while you tell yourself we are protecting India or Israel or muslimah noses or w/e fucktard reasons you want to manufacture, but the truth is we are there because GW was a WEC retard that didn’t get that muslims like Islam. And all this blood and shit flowed right from that.
And I dont think one single more american soldier or one single more afghan muslim should die because Bush was a moron and his advisors were evil manipulators and we can’t bear to admit that we fucked up that bad, that we elected a man so deeply and profoundly stupid that he nearly destroyed our country. And its idiots like you, Exum, that are going to let the war pimps bleed us dry so we don’t have to admit that the greatest country in the world SCREWED UP.”
So uncovering malfeasance, corruption, lies, propaganda, and war crimes is now considered treason by you nitwits? Good thing you’re all Obots, that way, we can wage constant drone and covert wars and never ever look backward, only forward. Well except for Manning, of course, he kills people dontcha know?
Who the fuck is “quell” anyway? You with a non-tongue-up-Greenwald’s-ass handle?
And why are we supposed to care about that comment?
Or you, for that matter?
If you are incapable of understanding that getting out of a war is often far more difficult than getting into one in the first place, you don’t have any real credibility. (Note: Rhetorical)
I’m wagering you’re maybe early twenties, never had any real adversity in life, and fancy Baby Jesus Manning as some sort of hero for “burning (intelligence assets)” – in other, simpler words, getting people killed. And the little shithead’s actions, if they got even one person killed, do amount to either espionage or treason, your choice. Both are punishable by death.
So by lionizing the worthless little attention-whore’s actions and proudly proclaiming his guilt you are very possibly sentencing him to death. But that, of course, doesn’t matter quite so much with your manic bent toward ideological purity, does it?
Life is not pure, life is not an abstraction. It’s messy and noisy and it really gets wet/dirty sometimes. Deal with it. Or go kill yourself. You’d be improving things here dramatically, you do realize that?
How do ya like them apples, Sparky?
Tossedgreenwald salad:
get a grip
As a USMC vet and a former SpecOps team member I sat in briefings which were ‘secret’. I signed the NSA statement that outlined what would occur if I should break the ‘special trust and confidence’ found in every promotion warrant. ‘Go to Leavenworth’.
To suggest that being a homosexual is an explanation for handing over sensitive diplomatic, military communications is pathetic. A careful examination of intelligence history, spies shows that white heterosexual christian’s are a much larger, more historically consistent threat to the security, intelligence services than any homosexual.
Bradley Manning will die in jail for breaking the law.
Manning will be secluded from other prisoners otherwise he will be beaten and raped regularly. If for some reason B.M. were released his life expectancy would be short in the civilian world.
No Job.
No chance of resuming a typical life.
No clubbing- at least not the traditional definition.
Bradley Manning grabbed his star, received his fifteen minutes of infamy. Mr. Manning has embarrassed the Dept. of State- they are able to do this on their own. Endangered the lives of Diplomat’s, families in return for what?
Yes. Prison sucks.
Perhaps Bradley should have considered this beforehand.
No one looks good in a orange jumpsuit and they don’t use fabric softener. Boo Hoo. Snivel.
One could ask some additional questions-
The desperation of the Armed Services (especially the Army) in their recruiting methods and languishing standards. The taxpayer paid for a professional volunteer force.
What happened?
A million Americans volunteered for two recent wars.
Don’t let one little snippy, wannabe drag queen ruin it for the rest of us.
Regards
OldAdopedBastardWhiteHomosexualEvangelicalPreachersKid.