Double Standard

This is from the Washington Post, Monday April 24, 2006 page A-2. By Walter Pincus "Democrats suggest double standard on leaks."

Situation is that Mary McCarthy was fired from the CIA after she failed a polygraph test. The information that she leaked helped a journalist win a Pulitzer prize for reporting on secret prisons in Eastern Europe that America was using to process alleged terrorists.

Whatever happened to the world of good guys bad guys? White hats, black hats? When good guys were always good and bad guys were totally bad. We fought Nazis and Japanese Industrial Warlords with a clear realization of what was right and wrong. Then we fought Communism with the same black and white confirmation, only the bad guys started to blur and fade to gray the further we got from Moscow and the Kremlin.

Now in the "War on Terror" we have attempted to draw sharp distinctions in who is right and who is wrong. The bad guys are not just wrong, they use methods that are wrong. Then comes Abu Ghraib and all of a sudden the good guys are looking bad. So, to keep us from using bad methods, we outsource to other countries that might not be so clearly on the good side. Eastern Europe still has plenty of bad guys left over from its Communist days.

In times past, leaking classified information would have been treason. Now it seems that everyone is doing it. This is the point where the Terminator punches you in the jaw for doing something wrong and then tells you to get ready to fight because we've got some bad guys to catch. Only thing is, the Terminator is not with us today. We need a good guy and if we can't find him, we better all saddle up.