WHERE DID THE OUTRAGE GO?
By Mary Coen
Back in late June information came out Russia was paying bounty to
Afghan militants for dead American soldiers. It was simply stunning news, and
most of America was outraged. Even some Republicans were appalled. It is now
two weeks later, and I wonder, "Where did all the outrage go?”
The problem is that outrage is difficult to sustain; it is
somewhat dependent on a wave of shock, and in the last 3 1/2 years in the
United States shock has become an almost daily meal. Human beings are
adaptable. The most outrageous things become the norm if one is fed a constant
stream of them. It's a self-protection thing - one can't live in a
constant state of high emotion, so even the most upsetting incidents have
to be reduced to the banal. And outrage becomes lost.
Back in late February, the CIA and analysts at the National
Counterterrorism Center expressed "with moderate confidence"
that the Russia's military intelligence agency, the GRU, had turned several
large sums of money over to the Taliban. Based on interrogations of detainees
and intercepted Intelligence data it was determined that this was payment for
the death of American soldiers.
Any information that was found by any intelligence agencies to
have "moderate confidence" would routinely be included in daily
intelligence briefings to the White House and would have been sent on to
Congress. Trump does not read briefings, and apparently this was not one of the
things actually told to him by his briefer, but the information was also
available to other upper staff. But no one bothered to follow up with questions
or discussions with either the Military or Intelligence, or send the info on to
the Armed Services or Intelligence Committees of Congress as would have been
the routine in previous administrations. In other words, it was blown off by
Trump as another "hoax", and not one member of his administration
cared enough about American soldiers to look any further.
This was the outrage. Not one step was taken to discuss and
investigate, let alone to confront Russia.
Just yesterday, July 9, two committees in the House
held hearings: the Armed Services Committee questioned military leaders
and the Intelligence committee questioned CIA personnel. There was outrage
expressed by committee members not just on the Russian actions, but also on the
fact the it took a leak (again) for this to be brought to the attention of
Congress.
So where are we now? The normal process of further
investigation will go on by Congress, the military (if Esper allows it) and the
intelligence services. And we may hear little about it, since Trump wants it
gone and he is a genius at redirecting attention by doing something else
outrageous.
It's up to us to remember. And talk. And ask. And then for God's
sake, vote.
