We don't push back hard enough against the government. We could use, the country in general could use a more adversarial press corps, especially when it comes to matters of national security.
We're a country that allowed waterboarding and indefinite detention, and we're a country where the NYPD Intelligence Division has police files on what Muslims think of the State of the Union address.
The Nisour Square shooting is a signature point in the Iraq war, one that inflamed anti-American sentiment abroad and contributed to the impression that Americans were reckless and unaccountable. The Iraqi government wanted to prosecute the security contractors in Iraq, but the American government refused to allow it.
We have institutionalized a drone program where the oversight is almost completely internalized.
At the NYPD, a judge doesn't need to sign off on opening up an investigation into a mosque as a terrorism organization. The oversight is internal.
We interviewed many, many men and women from the NYPD and the NYPD Intelligence Division, specifically, and they're really good, dedicated people who want to keep the city safe.
When you look at the big issues post-9/11 in the United States, whether it's water boarding, warantless wire tapping, surveillance, Gitmo, black sites rendition, all of those have been legal. Nobody has gone to jail for those programs.
When I write that I've known about something for a long time, that's not a boast. That's a confession. It's me acknowledging that I have withheld something important from the public.
