Told you so: the New York Times reliving its glory days
About ten days ago I wrote this post, in which I speculated about the motivation of the NY Times in publishing its recent national security revelations. My answer to the question of what the Times editors were really trying to do by their actions was that they were hoping to relive the paper’s own “top of the world, Ma!” days, the heady era of their victory in the Pentagon Papers lawsuit of 1971, when the Supreme Court ruled in their favor.
And now I’m only more certain that I may have been onto something. Why? This piece by LA Times editor Baquet and NY Times editor Keller, appearing in the July 1 NY Times, appears to say as much. They refer to the Pentagon Papers case prominently and early in the article, a clear indication to me that the case represents some sort of inspiration for them.
The piece reads as though we are meant to feel sorry for the editors and the terrible anxiety they experienced when making what they refer to as “excruciating choices” in whether or not to cover these stories. Poor dears; sounds dreadful.
Their article is entitled “When Do We Publish a Secret?” and their answer (which could be paraphrased as “whenever we feel like it”), is expressed this way:
There is no magic formula, no neat metric for either the public’s interest or the dangers of publishing sensitive information. We make our best judgment…It is not a responsibility we take lightly. And it is not one we can surrender to the government.
Isn’t that reassuring? It’s awfully good to know that the unelected editors of the MSM are the final arbiters of which secrets to publish, and when, and that they don’t even seem to have guidelines about it, or feel the need to respect the wishes of the experts in national security who advise them on the matter. After all, that’s “the government,” and we all know better than to trust them right? They never have our best interests at heart and, after all, what do they know? Far better to trust Baquet and Keller, our national security gatekeepers.
Nice to hear you sounding so acid, Neo. Sometimes I think you’re too measured and judicious. (Seriously)
I don’t know why Congress doesn’t simply appoint a Special Prosecutor to investigate the leakers, who have clearly broken some laws, and bring them to justice. A few examples made of the leakers, whether they be Pentagon or CIA(I’m betting CIA), should at least slow the leaks down. They would think twice if they see some of their fellow blabbermouths doing time. Just having a Special Prosecutor chartered to investigate the leaks might put a stop to it. But if they continue to get away with it others will no doubt be encouraged.
Is the Whitehouse the only entity that ever earns a Special Prosecutor? Is it only for the Executive branch? It seems unfair to have Fitzgerald hounding the Whitehouse for years about something that turned out to be, as many thought from the first, trivial and not even illegal and to have these nameless, faceless traitors blithely collecting their pay and benefits while attending to their private political agendas by casually breaking the law along with their oaths of office.
As for the NYT and the others who published – they are scum who sully what used to be a nobler profession and industry. They are beneath our contempt.
Second to mizpants!
I’ve been trying to put my finger on what was bugging me about the NYT’s rationale and I think I’ve got it.
The Times cannot “surrender” that decision to the government because it is not the Times’ decision to make in the first place. Whether the Times likes it or not, it is the government, not the editors in New York, who decide what is classified. If the Times editors decide to publish classified information because they think they know better, then they are committing a crime. It’s that simple.
I’m reminded of the spray-painted message, “GRAFFITI IS NOT A CRIME”. Sorry, but if there’s a law against it, then it is. And asserting otherwise doesn’t change the facts.
We know Neo is abnormally dissatisfied with this because she used some “sarcasm” when she said poor dears ; )
The media doesn’t consider itself part of society. It holds itself above society, above the peons. Narcissistic media, self-reflecting, self-absorbed, totally solipsistic. There is no god but media.
Asher, your logic is good… HOWEVER, it’s also true the U.S. Government has traditionally classified far too much material, frequently for CYA reasons. A citizen press does serve an important watchdog function – even in the case of some “classified” material.
This was discussed in the comments of a Neo post which touched on the NSA controversy. I tried to find the post and comments, and to refresh myself on what was said, but couldn’t identify the proper post.
IMO, the citizen press'(such as the NYT) watchdog function must only be undertaken with awareness of the attendant risks involved. The citizen press MUST BE RIGHT that a classified program deserves exposure. If the citizen press is wrong, criminal consequences should properly await. These criminal consequences, along with societal shaming, are two of the very few things available to dissuade the serial disclosures of important national secrets.
It is these consequences which the NYT is complaining about. Mr. Keller acts as though his actions are above consequence – and why shouldn’t he? We, the news-consuming citizens, have allowed the NYT to operate in a frequently outrageous fashion. We have not forced any negative consequences upon that publication.
I hope it’s a new day for the Mr. Kellers of the world. If the internet, and our little blogs, have even the tiniest impact on introducing the Mr. Kellers to consequences, I shall laugh with delight. I shall then gather with a couple of friends, and hoist cold beers in our honor.
gcotharn: “We, the news-consuming citizens, have allowed the NYT to operate in a frequently outrageous fashion. We have not forced any negative consequences upon that publication.”
I have. They no longer exist for me.
I really don’t understand why anyone visits their site or links to them (other than in context of the ongoing discussion of their leaking secrets), every little bit of ad revenue from a link helps them, I will not help them, they certainly aren’t helping me.
Basically everything they report on is available from other sources, it’s not that tough to erase them from memory.
GC, you ever hear of something called the Freedom of Information Act? Let the NYTimes use it then.
Good call, Neo.
It does seem like the Boomer generation is experiencing some sort of twilight glow in their old minds. Maybe acid flashbacks get kinder and gentler as they age.
The other day I read a commenter over at Gates of Vienna who was saying that, in his opinion, we don’t have to worry about these aging boomers because they are just making a lot of noise before they go into the sunset.
I don’t think this is true. I talk to a lot of young people, and it seems to me many of them have ideas right along the lines of the boomers.
I know the numbers in elections and polls show there are an awful lot of conservative people among us, but I fear that something else is bubbling up underneath.
It really is all about reliving the glory days. They’ve got a Republican president whom they see as an imperial president and their one and only goal is to bring him down a la Nixon and regain their glory, regardless of the damage they do to the country along the way. They are encouraged by the elites to do this, so they can thumb their noses at the rubes and say “see, you should have listened to us and not voted for that scoundrel”.
“Far better to trust Baquet and Keller, our national security gatekeepers.”
Only message I heard loud and clear from them was vote democrat or a brick might go through your shop window… or worse..
“Pastorius wrote:
I know the numbers in elections and polls show there are an awful lot of conservative people among us, but I fear that something else is bubbling up underneath.”
Not really helping that the Bush admin handles media poorly / just looks bad to outsiders…. Reagan was able to hold off the MSM better… so anyway, a lot of young people buy the lefty MSM line because the conservatives are not presenting their case / vision well… that and we don’t have as many extreme leftists in power around the world doing embarrassing things (that domestic lefties try to make excuses for and thereby reveal who they really are)….
Neo,
I read the same article, but I was also struck by the arguement that those in power might use “secrets” as an excuse to avoid embarassment. When or how does the press make the distinction between real “secrets” and “dirty laundry” is what I’m more interested in hearing about.
Here’s my take on it.
The Press calls itself the “4th Estate”, essentially a 4th branch of government. Fine, then let them be investigated by independent news (such as blogs, hostile blogs since the NYT is obviously hostile to the current administration), just as they (the NYT) investigates other branches of government. Make them say “no comment” when asked various probing questions. Treat them as the entity they say they are. They are NOT above being asked hard questions. Then let’s see how they do answering them. I’m betting, not well…
Here is a very important point of view that everybody should read. http://www.saneworks.us has many articles regarding prosecuting the New York Times.
SGT has the right idea, I think.
In an ideal world, the press would be self-policing; one paper would get too big for its britches, and competing newspapers would delight in taking it down. But it practice we do wind up with a lot of newspapers marching in lockstep, afraid to criticize one another.
I heartily wish that some hungry young journalist would start asking “the tough questions” of the NYT. As it is, center-right blogs and talk radio are picking up the slack — and the NYT is still in full backpedal mode.
Bill Keller may yet go the way of Dan Rather; I hope he does.
respectfully,
All of this bellowing at the Times for its publication of investigations into the Bush Administration’s clearly illegal surveillance and other programs underscores a point I’ve been making for more than a year. You all won’t have be confronted by this thinking in a neocon echo chamber like this, so I’ll summarize it as briefly as I can.
The world may have changed for Americans on 9/11, but we are not living an experience that is unique in history. The French and Spanish, for a couple of examples, have lived with the reality of occasional terrorism on their soil for decades. They deal with it without turning their societies and their legal systems inside out. They exercise realistic vigilance, but they go on living more or less as they always have. They have their issues, but they are resiliently French, or Spanish.
We, on the other hand, declare “war on terror.” This is a fiction. I’m certain that the federal government wages a vigorous campaign of interdiction and intelligence gathering to head off future terrorist incidents, but this is not a war. Terrorists are scary, but get used to this — this is what peace looks like from here on in.
This distinction matters, for a couple of reasons. First, a war is an event that has a beginning and a foreseeable, definable end. The shallow locution “war on terror” refers to a state that will continue indefinitely. When do we get to stand out on the aircraft carrier and declare “Mission Accomplished” in the war on terror? When all those dark-complexioned people who have the funny names with “q”s in the middle are dead? When the final Armageddon happens and the righteous are swept up into heaven? We’re going to be at this for a long, long time.
The other reason the words matter is that “war” is a legalism. If we’re “at war,” then the President feels entitled to seize “war powers” that unequivocally are unconstitutional in peacetime. This President has. But there is doubt in many, many minds that this country is legitimately “at war.” (There is, of course, that aggression of ours in Iraq, but that has no more to do with the war on terror than it has to do with weapons of mass destruction. There was no al Qaeda in Iraq before the US invasion and subsequent occupation created the conditions that spawned it. The principal aim of the insurgents we fight in Iraq is to get us to end the occupation.)
You’re probably thinking this all sounds naive. But it is not irrational, and given that most of the US electorate feels the Administration should never have started the Iraq war and is doing a lousy job making us secure, I have to insist that it is a very popular sentiment.
Thus, while you may feel the Administration is justified in doing whatever it feels it must do to provide the illusion of safety from terrorism — and you have lots of company — there is a high level of doubt, very broadly felt, over the legality of the President’s warrantless wireta
Thus, while you may feel the Administration is justified in doing whatever it feels it must do to provide the illusion of safety from terrorism — and you have lots of company — there is a high level of doubt, very broadly felt, over the legality of the President’s warrantless wiretaps and other such programs.
It follows, then, that the media have a duty to investigate these programs and bring them to light, so it can be determined whether they represent executive over-reaching that damages our society by abridging the individual rights our government and our military are supposed to be defending. Like it or not, The New York Times is doing its essential job, and the case that its editors have illegally or even irresponsibly exposed sensitive national security secrets is very, very far from proven. What is clear is that these revelations have embarrassed Republicans in a mid-term election year — painful to neocons, but clearly within the legitmate discretion of a news editor.
That so many are willing to grant the President the authority to ignore the constitution is a bit demoralizing. The White House and their conservative allies have exploited this authority continually to advance their aim of concentrating power in the Presidency at the expense of the other branches, a core neocon goal, under the guise of war powers. It will take enormous will on the part of future Congresses and courts to restore the former balance.
The aim of the terrorists you so obviously fear is to terrorize. They have succeeded in the US; about half of us have allowed their fear to legitimize the undermining of individual rights in sweeping ways.
What this proves is that if there ever really was a war on terror, it’s over, and we lost. When did we become such cowards?
Several neoconservative regular commentators who post in the “comments” section of this blog, such as YmirSakar, espouse the virtues of “checks and balances”. They decry the UN, for example, for supposedly lacking checks and balances.
But they fail to realize that “the fourth estate”, that is the media, play exactly the role of a “check and balance” on untrammelled executive power. And a very important role it is.
How can the media be a check and balance (which they are not- read the constitution) if they are unchecked and unbalanced (in more ways than one)?
Keller was on Charlie Rose- a regular love fest- and talked about how difficult these decisions were- Rose asked how often these issues come to the level of Keller making the decision- and he said a couple times a year. Gee, that would be NSA and SWIFT. Two for two- batting a thousand. Really agonizing over those decisions, eh Bill?
At the Administration’s urging, the Times withheld publication of the NSA story for a year — a year in which the story might have had an impact on the re-election prospects for George W. Bush if it had become public. If Keller was reckless or partisan, would he have held back?
There’s a competency issue here that no one seems interested in: If these are such deep and vital secrets, why do they keep leaking out? Keeping things under wraps is supposed to be everyone’s job at NSA, CIA and DIA. If they’re this bad at keeping secrets, isn’t that a national security issue in itself? Because if the Times can get its hands on this kind of story again and again, surely it’s a walk in the park for the people who spook for a living.
Hey Stupid:
“Why do they keep leaking out?” Because we still have people in government who put Party above Country…for whatever reason.
In a word, they are dishonorable jerks: convinced that, for one reason or another, they are superior to their fellow countrymen and women. Who else should they listen to rather than like minded folk…”No one I knew voted for Nixon in 1972″ said one Pauline Kael.
That remark characterized Kael…just as it does you, Stupid.
*shrug* I know lots of people who voted for Bush.
Now…kindly explain the connection between partisanship and leaks to The New York Times. It may be obvious to you, but I would need to see some kind of evidence that the leaks had anything to do with anyone putting party above country. I’m not aware that the leakers have even been identified, much less stepped up to explain their motives. It sounds more like whistle-blower thinking, and whistle-blowers tend to be motivated by individual conscience, not partisanship.
Do enlighten us, Charles.
What Charles means is that when Republicans leak things that he likes, they are non-partisan, when they leak things he doesn’t like, then they are Rove agents. Supposedly this is putting the country above his politics, but I don’t think so.
Just disregard the previous comment, I jumped in too soon without taking the measure of the latest round of arguments.
But they fail to realize that “the fourth estate”, that is the media, play exactly the role of a “check and balance” on untrammelled executive power. And a very important role it is.
One of the points I describe is that the Constitution that people like country and Nate seems to believe they are fighting for, is not in fact metaphysically the same as the Constitution other people, like neoconservatives, fight for. So when Nate says the fourth estate is a check and balance on Executive Power, neo conservatives say that the Constitution provides only the checks and balances called Judicial independence, Congressional Impeacement, and Congressional purse strings for the purpose of balancing the Executive Power. The Constitution in nowhere does it say that the “press”, an unelected commercial power paid by media conglomerates, is supposed to balance the Executive. The fourth estate is a fourth wheel, our government can only function on three wheels, anymore and it becomes unbalanced. There is no check and balance on the media, since the Constitution didn’t intend for it to do anything in terms of government. The triumverate is one of the most stable systems imaginable, 3 is a magic number. 4 isn’t.
Now building upon this, we have the basis for the counter-argument to country’s stated reasoning. For one thing, Bush didn’t need the Iraq war to gain emergency war powers, so it really wouldn’t have mattered whether Bush did or did not invade Iraq. After 9/11 he had as much power as he required and wished. He just didn’t wish for it. If you look up the War Powers Act of WWII, you will see that they have not been invoked, because Congress has not declared war against anyone, precisely because Bush did not want Executive Power to be unrivaled. The idea that the President is hungry for power and wants more of it, when he doesn’t even use the veto and the pardon to paralyze the Supreme Court and the Congress, is rather irrational. It may not be irrational to consider that a President may become too power hungry in war time (Palpatine), but it is simply untrue for Bush. Country’s logic seems valid to him, but its flaws are glaringly obvious to me.
People like country and nate believe there is the “illusion” of a threat that the President is using to create “illusions” of safety. Both the threat and the safety provided are real, and therefore justified. Country won’t argue about the logical premises of his own arguments since that would just be too much good logic.
That so many are willing to grant the President the authority to ignore the constitution is a bit demoralizing.
So we get back to that thing I said before. Country believes in a different constitution than others. Others believe the threat is real and the safety from terrorism are real, Country believes it’s all an illusion. Country
Country believes the President has enacted the War Powers Act created during/after WWII that allowed the President (Roosevelt) to detain Japanese Americans without trial and to execute any captured enemies without trial. These beliefs should not be taken at face value, they should be challenged, instead of plastered over.
The aim of terroists is to terrorize people into giving them power. Unlike most rational people, the President is not the source of terrorism, and giving the government of the United States the power to protect the citizens of the US, is not giving in to terrorism. It is a mistake to believe in Country’s policies simply because Country doesn’t believe the threat is real, and if the threat isn’t real, then the solutions are different. However, if the threat is real and you act like it isn’t, then more attacks will succede, and the people will demand more protections. So in fact, Country is attempting to do the opposite of what he contends. His policies will lead to more power being given to government, not less. If the threat of terrorism is not real, and 9/11 did not happen, then Country’s policies would be correct. Things may be rational, like when people rationalize their fears, but that doesn’t mean the logic is air tight.
At the Administration’s urging, the Times withheld publication of the NSA story for a year — a year in which the story might have had an impact on the re-election prospects for George W. Bush
Last example of where Country’s premises are reversed in relation to neo-conservatives and others who disagree with Country. The Times withheld publication not because they were afraid to damage George W. Bush, but because they were afraid that popular backlash against the TImes would help the Bush Administration get re-elected. Of course the Times wouldn’t do that, so they waited, like they waited with the NSA taps, until after the elections, when they saw that Bush was still in power and not Kerry.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. –That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
Most people don’t realize this
Most people don’t realize this, but the Declaration of Independence actually is a part of the Constitution. The Constitution gives the law part, the Declaration spells out the spirit part. Safety and Happiness matters, and people can’t just infringe upon the right of Americans to be safe just cause they mistakingly believe terrorism isn’t a threat to America if we just drop our defenses.
Good lord, Ymar. I don’t know where to begin unravelling the tangle of fictions and misconceptions. I have an informal rule I set for myself when I invite myself into debates on conservative blogs: I’ll keep this up as long as people are civil with one another — after that, I just get bored. I’ll hold up my end of that bargain. Accordingly, I’ll just stick to facts:
– The Declaration of Independence is not a part of the Constitution. They are two entirely different documents written by different people for entirely different purposes.
– The Constitution doesn’t require any kind of metaphysicial manifestation. The one I refer to and which most people who engage in responsible political debate mean exists in hard copy form. It’s the only one that matters.
– I’ve never before heard anyone suggest that the Fourth Estate is in any respect a branch of government. “Fourth Estate” is metaphorical. The Constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech, assembly and of the press is what has a tendency to counterbalance unchecked power grabs by the Executive, as we are witnessing today. The Constitution doesn’t explicit assign the media this role, but the Bill of Rights includes these guarantees for precisely this reason.
– Wheels? Magic numbers? Unbalanced? I don’t see where this metaphor is supposed to take us. It certainly doesn’t reflect anything the Framers ever said, and…never mind, I can’t quite figure out what you had in mind here.
– Checks and balances on the media, hmmm. Well, the conservative vision would be that media compete with each other and therefore keep each other in line. Then there’s libel law, and the Federal Communications Commission. (Ask Howard Stern whether there are any checks on the media.) There’s the equal time requirement in election year programming. And so on.
– The idea that “Bush didn’t need the Iraq war to gain emergency war powers, so it really wouldn’t have mattered whether Bush did or did not invade Iraq. After 9/11 he had as much power as he required and wished…” is Bush’s idea. A wide array of people, ranging from Russ Feingold to Grover Norquist, beg to differ. This point is far from proven. A Democratic Congress, if we get one in November, might actually give some consideration to impeachment proceedings over it. That’s just a fact.
– “The idea that the President is hungry for power and wants more of it…is rather irrational.” Bush, and more pointedly and aggressively Dick Cheney, have stated repeatedly that their aim is to shift power from Congress to the Presidency. It is easy to see this ulterior motive in every confrontation between Bush and his supposed overseers in Congress.
I could go on, but it’s too nice a day out.
Ms. Neocon, would you care to jump in here at some point? It’s your blog after all.
– The Declaration of Independence is not a part of the Constitution. They are two entirely different documents written by different people for entirely different purposes.
That’s not a fact, that’s an interpretation. Facts are things that don’t change. Whether something is or is not part of the Constitution has to do with whether it was intended to be part of it, and since we’re talking about several Founding Fathers, that can be mercurial. So it can’t be a fact, a fact is true regardless of what else happens in world. This is mercurial and therefore cannot be a fact.
Country, you don’t even know what a fact is and how to use it, I seriously doubt the rest of your arguments as well tendered.
http://www.lonang.com/exlibris/misc/1839-jub.htm
The nation fell into an atrophy. The Union languished to the point of death. A torpid numbness seized upon all its faculties. A chilling cold indifference crept from its extremities to the center. The system was about to dissolve in its own imbecility – impotence in negotiation abroad – domestic insurrection at home, were on the point of bearing to a dishonorable grave the proclamation of a government founded on the rights of man, when a convention of delegates from eleven of the thirteen states, with George Washington at their head, sent forth to the people, an act to be made their own, speaking in their name and in the first person, thus: “We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty, to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”
This act was the complement to the Declaration of Independence; founded upon the same principles, carrying them out into practical execution, and forming with it, one entire system of national government. The Declaration was a manifesto to the world of mankind, to justify the one confederated people, for the violent and voluntary severance of the ties of their allegiance, for the renunciation of their country, and for assuming a station themselves, among the potentates of the world – a self-constituted sovereign – a self-constituted country.
In the history of the human race this had never been done before.
[…]It is not immaterial to remark, that the Signers of the Declaration, though qualifying themselves as the Representatives of the United States of America, in general Congress assembled, yet issue the Declaration, in the name and by the authority of the good people of the Colonies – and that they declare, not each of the separate Colonies, but the United Colonies, free and independent States. The whole people declared the Colonies in their united condition, of RIGHT, free and independent States.
[….]
At this day it cannot but strike us as extraordinary, that it does not appear to have occurred to an
At this day it cannot but strike us as extraordinary, that it does not appear to have occurred to any one member of that assembly, which had laid down in terms so clear, so explicit, so unequivocal, the foundation of alt just government, in the imprescriptible rights of man, and the transcendent sovereignty of the people, and who in those principles, had set forth their only personal Vindication from the charges of rebellion against their king, and of treason to their country, that their last crowning act was still to be performed upon the same principles. That is, the institution, by the people of the United States, of a civil government, to guard and protect and defend them all. On the contrary, that same assembly which issued the Declaration of independence, instead of continuing to act in the name, and by the authority of the good people of the United States, had immediately after the appointment of the committee to prepare the Declaration, appointed another committee, of one member from each Colony, to prepare and digest the form of confederation, to be entered into between the Colonies.
That committee reported on the 12th of July, eight days after the Declaration of independence had been issued, a draft of articles of confederation between the Colonies. This draft was prepared by John Dickinson, then a delegate from Pennsylvania, who voted against the Declaration of Independence, and never signed it – having been superseded by a new election of delegates from that State, eight days after his draft was reported.
– I’ve never before heard anyone suggest that the Fourth Estate is in any respect a branch of government.
You’re not Nate. Why does the Fourth Estate have to do with you?
A wide array of people, ranging from Russ Feingold to Grover Norquist, beg to differ.
They can beg to differ because Bush allowed the moment of power to pass him by. Dissent always comes when the prey is weak.
That’s just a fact.
You still don’t know what a fact is, Country.
You call yourself the Stupid Country and then say you invite yourself to conservative blogs and then leave when they lose their manners. Your attempts to bait conservatives with such things as “Stupid Country”, inviting people to call you “Stupid” so you can take offense, and using provocative propaganda words like “impeachment proceedings” are glaringly obvious to someone like me.
Uh huh. And this meandering 1839 speech by John Quincy Adams amounts to what, exactly? Are you and Ymar members of some dead presidents fan club I’m unaware of?
Neither it nor the Declaration of Independence has anything approaching the force of law. What point are you attempting to make in this century?
Stupid Country is a name I chose. I take no offense, no matter how anyone chooses to corrupt it.
“Impeachment proceedings” isn’t propaganda. It’s a real possibility, notwithstanding Nancy Pelosi’s argument that Democrats should not belabor this issue during the 2006 election cycle. You’d be amazed at the number of conservatives who understand how real this prospect is and how provocative the case for it actually is.
Oh, sorry — evidently Ymar and Sakar are one and the same 17-year-old. You confused me there, dude.
Omg, omg, you people are so predictable. *snorts*
Sakar, I cannot believe he fell for that same dumb trick Ymar pulled on Roach over at black five *sniggers*
The rule of law is more than just what is written on some paper a judge signed, it also encompasses the spiritual intention and the moral fiber of the nation. The Declaration of Independence is the purpose, the Constitution is the hands by which that purpose shall be dispensed.
Arg, don’t be worried about taking offense. The thing is that most people choose names that identify themselves. Either you’re saying everything you support ends up in a Stupid Country (which begs the question of who is the stupid country) or you are taunting everyone else by saying their country is stupid. Either way, it’s a weird reason for a name. Not as exotic as some others, of course, but still, quite unique.