22 February 2002: Add reader comments 3.
21 February 2002: Add reader comments 2.
20 February 2002: Add reader comments.
19 February 2002
Source:
http://usinfo.state.gov/cgi-bin/washfile/display.pl?p=/products/washfile/latest&f=02021902.tlt&t=/products/washfile/newsitem.shtml
US Department of State
International Information Programs
Washington File
_________________________________
19 February 2002
(Remarks to National Religious Broadcasters Convention) (1900) America's fight against terrorism, says Attorney General John Ashcroft, "is a defense of our freedom in the most profound sense: It is the defense of our right to make moral choices -- to seek fellowship with God that is chosen, not commanded." This freedom is respected and nurtured in the nation's society of laws, Ashcroft told the National Religious Broadcasters Convention in Nashville, Tennessee February 19. "Our system of government respects our freedom to make choices, to accept the consequences and to maximize the potential that God has placed within us," he said. "The purpose of our system of justice is not to crush that freedom or to override that freedom but to respect it, to nurture it and through it, to unleash the potential of every human being." Ashcroft said terrorists have "a different understanding of choices. Because they fear that people with freedom will reject their ideas, terrorists seek to deny us our freedom." He added that terrorists distrust personal choice because they have abandoned every value except their own lust for power. "In a universe of choices -- a marketplace of ideas -- their way offers us nothing," the attorney general said. Following is the text of Ashcroft's prepared remarks: (begin text) U.S. Attorney General John D. Ashcroft National Religious Broadcasters Convention Nashville, Tennessee February 19, 2002 Thank you. And congratulations on this, your 59th annual convention. I want to thank and acknowledge each of you here today for informing and enlightening a grateful nation. We are grateful for the indispensable role religious broadcasters play in connecting communities of faith to each other and to the issues of the day. Although it has been my honor and pleasure to address this convention in the past, this year is unlike other years in that we gather today having lost a great friend and a great American. Dr. Brandt Gustavson died last May. Each morning I conduct a morning devotional for those who wish to begin their day giving thanks and praise to God. Dr. Gustavson attended this morning devotional on more than one occasion. I join you and all religious broadcasters in mourning Brandt Gustavson's death and praising his extraordinary life. This year is also unlike other years because we come together in a time of war. The war against terrorism is now the single, over-arching priority of justice and law enforcement -- not just the men and women of the Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, but of the 18,000 state and local law enforcement agencies as well. This war is unlike any other war we have fought. The men and women of justice and law enforcement are called to combat a terrorist threat that is both immediate and vast; a threat that resides here, at home, but whose supporters, patrons and sympathizers form a multinational network of evil. The attacks of September 11 were acts of terrorism against civilization orchestrated and carried out by individuals living within our borders. In response, we have launched a concerted campaign to defeat terrorism. We have pledged to use every resource in the law against terrorists -- every statute, however obscure; and every law enforcement officer, whether he or she serves in the cities, the states or in Washington, D.C. Some have asked whether a civilized nation -- a nation of law and not of men -- can use the law to defend itself from barbarians and remain civilized. Our answer, unequivocally, is "yes." Yes, we will defend civilization. And yes, we will preserve the rule of law because it is that which makes us civilized. But the call to defend civilization from terrorism resonates from a deeper source than our legal or political institutions. Civilized people -- Muslims, Christians and Jews -- all understand that the source of freedom and human dignity is the Creator. Civilized people of all religious faiths are called to the defense of His creation. In the darkest hours of the Blitz in World War II, Winston Churchill said that when great causes are on the move in the world ... "we learn that we are spirits, not animals, and that something is going on in space and time, and beyond space and time, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty." We are a nation called to defend freedom -- a freedom that is not the grant of any government or document but is our endowment from God. -- "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." As God's gift, our freedom is not license to behave in anyway we choose. It is the ability to make choices with the understanding that what we choose has real consequences. We may be free to choose to act for good or for evil, but our's is not a freedom from consequence. Our choices will have consequences for good or evil. For those who embrace a biblical understanding of creation, the difference between freedom and license echoes down the corridors of time in two voices, first heard in the Garden of Eden. The first voice -- the voice of evil disguised as freedom -- whispers: just do it, it won't make a difference. The second voice, the voice of God, states plainly: make your choices but make them carefully because you make all the difference. -- [Deuteronomy 30:19 "I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and they seed may live."] The voice of evil, posing as freedom, tells us that we are free to ignore the difference between life and death, and between blessing and cursing. But when you are told that your choices are without consequences you are not told that you are free, you are told that you are meaningless. It is this freedom that is at the basis of the rule of law in America. Our system of government respects our freedom to make choices, to accept the consequences and to maximize the potential that God has placed within us. The purpose of our system of justice is not to crush that freedom or to override that freedom but to respect it, to nurture it and through it, to unleash the potential of every human being. Terrorists have a different understanding of choices. Because they fear that people with freedom will reject their ideas, terrorists seek to deny us our freedom. They distrust personal choice because they have abandoned every value except their own lust for power. In a universe of choices -- a marketplace of ideas -- their way offers us nothing. Our fight against terrorism, then, is a defense of our freedom in the most profound sense: It is the defense of our right to make moral choices -- to seek fellowship with God that is chosen, not commanded. This freedom is respected and nurtured in our society of laws. It is respected in our right to choose how or if we worship God. It is nurtured in our fundamental belief of equality before the law. By attacking us, terrorists attack not just the system of government that supports this freedom, but freedom itself. The conflict that confronts us is not Christian versus Muslim, or Muslim versus Jew. Even as we seek justice in Afghanistan for those who attacked us on September 11, we extend our hands in aid and comfort to a war-torn people. As we pursue justice, we respect life. As we seek to reprimand the guilty, we also seek to give assistance to the innocent. This is not a conflict based in religion. It is a conflict between those who believe that God grants us choice and those who seek to impose their choices on us. It is a conflict between inspiration and imposition; the way of peace and the way of destruction and chaos. It is a conflict between good and evil. And as President Bush has reminded us, we know that God is not neutral between the two. Nor is our system of government neutral between good and evil. We are blessed to live in a nation that respects our freedom to live in a context of choice. The founders of our nation understood religion's role in promoting the virtues necessary for self government. George Washington warned in his Farewell Address that our young republic would not survive if Americans indulged in the "supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. " "Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity," said Washington, "religion and morality are indispensable supports." Our Constitution does not call for the establishment of religion in the public square. Just as important, it does not call for the abolition of religion in the public square. It calls for the respect of religion in its indispensable role in forming a just and moral citizenry. Today our freedom and this heritage is under assault from those who fear its capacity to unleash the potential that God has placed in each and every one of us. Our enemies hope that by portraying this as a religious conflict, they can disguise their own betrayal of religion. They hope that by calling America the aggressor, they can conceal their own lust for power. They hope that by denying America's tolerance and humanity, they can convince the world that they, not we, are the tolerant and the humane. We must call these things what they are: lies -- lies designed to exploit differences among us. Lies designed to inspire hatred and to deny choice. Lies meant to extinguish freedom. True faith is not built on a foundation of lies, nor is it supported by a framework of hatred. True faith unites us against evil. It calls on us to put aside small differences to pursue great virtues. -- [Isaiah 1:18 "Come now, let us reason together," says the Lord. "Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool."] By striking at our heart, our enemies hope to destroy the virtues we value and the freedom we cherish. But they underestimate our strength and our national unity. We are strong, and we are united. You can see our national unity in places that are unanticipated. -- [homeless flag story] Today Americans are coming together, united against a common enemy. For people of all faiths -- be they Christians, Jews or Muslims -- it is impossible not to see the stark difference between the way of God and the way of the terrorists. It is the difference between a hero and a murderer, a fireman and a suicide bomber, a culture of life and a culture of death. It is the difference between those who would die to save the innocent and those who would die to destroy the innocent. In a nation united, there can be no doubting which path we will choose. And in a world of freedom, there is no doubt which view will prevail. Thank you very much. God bless you and God bless America. (end text) (Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
Date: Tue, 19 Feb 2002 22:35:57 -0500
From: JR
To: jya@pipeline.com
Subject: "freedom is terrorism" remarks
Your choice of nomenclature for the Ashcroft speech given before a group of relgious broadcasters, posted on the cryptome.org website, is so far off the mark that it discredits you. I have visited your site faithfully for quite a while now and have always appreciated the depth of the news you post, but your disposition toward Mr. Ashcroft has yet to be justified by facts or any appreciable reality that may be construed from his own words, much less his reputation as merely a God-fearing, public-serving Attorney General.
You titled the article "Freedom is Terrorism" on the hyperlink to the page with his speech, the speech in which he counsels fellow believers about his personal and professional beliefs on justice, terror, and the place God has and does not have for America. Then you quote the entire speech verbatim. Interesting. Could you please tell me, or anyone for that matter, where such a title would fit in? Maybe this was some postmodern way of getting people's attention (by lying about or sensationalizing the actual content), but I suspect it is something far less intelligent: your own bias against Ashcroft and the faith and/or political constituency that he represents.
That dissent and disdain is of course tolerable; this is America. But everytime you write something like that (witness your titling of "DoJ Hiding Secret Reports to Attorney General" article), you lessen your own credibility as a source of information to those who would read your articles from a different perspective, like myself. You align yourself with the pretentious group of people that thinks everything is tolerable except what it finds intolerable, most often, "conservative" Christianity.
I just wanted to let you know this since it's been on my mind for quite some time, but today's little gem finally compelled me to do something about it.
I'd be pleased to hear your response.
-JR, graduate student
--
Date: Wed, 20 Feb 2002 07:55:01 -0800
To: JR
From: John Young <jya@pipeline.com>
Subject: Re: "freedom is terrorism" remarks
Your remarks are appreciated, and your objection to the headline is noted.
To be sure, the audience being addressed affected the content of the speech, but Ashcroft upped the fire and brimstone to invoke terrorism for domestic political gain, hence the fire and brimstone title.
Ashcroft garbled, seemingly deliberately, the several ways he supported and objected to freedom, depending on whose freedom he was defending and/or attacking.
As he and others have done on matters of freedom, personal and political, to me he was talking out of both sides of his mouth to defend the freedom of those on his side and attack that of his opponents -- and "terrorist" was invoked as a euphemism for a slew of people whose personal beliefs and politics he doesn't like.
So the speech read as a barely veiled political attack on (and threat to) his domestic political enemies, which is okay for a politician but repugnant in an Attorney General.
Regards,
John
From: l
To: jya@pipeline.com
Date: Wed, 20 Feb 2002 17:14:34 -0500
Subject: Re: The last paragraph
You are correct, it is repugnant. And may I add offensive.
Date: Wed, 20 Feb 2002 17:43:14 -0800
From: LA
To: <jya@pipeline.com>
Subject: freedom is terrorism
For those in doubt a proper question is:
"Is it a terrorist act to dump tea in the Boston Harbor?"
From: MC
To: jya@pipeline.com
Subject: "freedom is terrorism" remarks
Date: Wed, 20 Feb 2002 20:58:17 +0000
Understanding the fact that cryptome.org is owned and operated by you, I accept that you are, of course, entitled to post stories in the fashion of your choosing. I have admired in the past, however, that stories posted on cryptome.org tended to speak for themselves, being more objective than subjective. Relying on their own merit rather than "Enquirer-esque" titles for appeal.
You may have a predisposition against Mr. Ashcroft, which is your option. You are entitled to your own opinion. However, sir, you are not entitled to your own facts.
Your statement regarding Ashcroft's speech,"'terrorist' was invoked as a euphemism for a slew of people whose personal beliefs and politics he doesn't like" remains to be proven.
Your claim that his speech was to be read as, "a barely veiled political attack on (and threat to) his domestic political enemies" reminds me of the accusations of Sen. Joe McCarthy. You are certain of that which you posted or it is just your interpretation?
It is the responsibility of every newsbringer to present information as untainted as possible from personal bias. I have always trusted that cryptome presented information in as raw a form as possible such that the reader could decide for him/herself. For that reason, stories such as this are disappointing.
Date: Wed, 20 Feb 2002 22:56:31 -0800
Subject: Re: "freedom is terrorism" remarks
From: JM
To: jya@pipeline.com
I'm not sure what your point was. Perhaps you could expand a little.
> To be sure, the audience being addressed affected the content of the
> speech, but Ashcroft upped the fire and brimstone to invoke terrorism
for
> domestic political gain, hence the fire and brimstone title.
Excuse me?!? "Invoked terrorism for domestic political gain". You think this is just about political gain? Are you a moron or what? Thousand dead and it's just about politics? Sorry John you couldn't be more clueless on that one. This is about preventing people that want to kill us from killing us. Self-defense.
> Ashcroft garbled, seemingly deliberately, the several ways he supported
and
> objected to freedom, depending on whose freedom he was defending and/or
attacking.
"Objected to freedom"? Huh? Could you point that out explicitly. I missed it. But yeah I object to Muslims using Mosques to train terrorists to kill us. I object big time to that.
> As he and others have done on matters of freedom, personal and
political,
> to me he was talking out of both sides of his mouth to defend the
freedom
> of those on his side and attack that of his opponents -- and
"terrorist"
> was invoked as a euphemism for a slew of people whose personal beliefs
and
> politics he doesn't like.
You're completely off your rocker man. Terrorists are those idiots that fly planes into buildings or put bombs in their shoes. That's what he's talking about.
> So the speech read as a barely veiled political attack on (and threat
to)
> his domestic political enemies, which is okay for a politician but
> repugnant in an Attorney General.
Get help. You really are paranoid.
But in defense of attacking domestic enemies, yes, those people that pose a security threat to us all need to be stopped. People can advocate we surrender to bin Laden if they want to. They're free to advocate idiotic things, but they are not free from criticism nor investigation if such positions are harmful to the rest of us. The Constitution is not a suicide pact nor a tool for the insane to use to get us all killed.
From: G
Date: Fri, 22 Feb 2002 00:41:22 +0000
To: jya@pipeline.com
Subject: The "Freedom is Terrorism" saga
I read Ashcroft's address a number of days ago, and only just caught up with the further comments posted regarding your labelling and accused bias. Whilst I must agree with the notion that all media coverage should ne unbiased coverage, the comments "JM" have made thus far prompt response. And so, while I fear that this is a relatively futile mail covering ground that has been thrown around like a soggy potato for the last 5 months, I post it anyway...
JYA wrote:
>> To be sure, the audience being addressed affected the content of
the
>> speech, but Ashcroft upped the fire and brimstone to invoke terrorism
>> for domestic political gain, hence the fire and brimstone title.
JM wrote:
> Excuse me?!? "Invoke[d] terrorism for domestic political gain". You
> think this is just about political gain?
[snippity]
> This is about preventing people that want to kill us from killing us.
So this newfound "war on terrorism" resolves itself down to a single, infinitessimal point, the axis of which is that this is all a global act of Revenge[tm]? Or, at least, to quote Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, "The best, and in some cases the only, defence is a good offence." (Although the ability to offend is, IMHO, much of the problem at hand.)
Of course it's about politics. Not "just" politics - I presume that economics, the related oil industry and the afore-mentioned desire for an eye for an eye all enter into the equation somehow, for a start. But yes, politics. Win the race for politics, and you win the race for media, history and control.
> Terrorists are those idiots that fly planes into buildings or put
> bombs in their shoes.
A gross, narrow simplification. Terrorists are those that use fear, or the threat of fear to control or intimidate the way that societies or cultures behave. Of course, under this definition, much of modern Western society would have to be classified as terrorist. Scientists are afaid to publish their work due to the threat of anti-security arrest. Journalists self-censor their own work that is critical of the culture around them in fear of being branded unpatriotic. The "freedom" that Ashcroft refers to is certainly "more free" than much of the despotic styles advocated by some over-restrictive governments elsewhere in the world, however, it is a far, Utopian cry from the reality he seeks to defend.
It is far too easy to obliterate anyone who disagrees with you in the name of self-defence, without stopping to consider the reasons as to why you must defend yourself in the first place.
Thanks, keep up the good work. Maybe you could include an extra column in your index page for partial sub-headlines ;o)
Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2002 17:59:33 -0500
From: J
To: jya@pipeline.com (John Young)
Subject: RE: Re: "freedom is terrorism" remarks
Thank you for your respectful reply. I appreciate, again, the depth of your consideration, though I may disagree with the final result. Keep up the investigative work.
New York Times, 22 February 2002
Mr. Bush held up the United States as an example of a "nation guided by faith." Mr. Bush repeatedly pressed his theme that religious and political freedom would not lead to chaos, using words that were both a forceful projection of his own religious faith and a subtle criticism of what he sees as the oppressiveness of President Jiang Zemin's regime. "Life in America shows that liberty, paired with law, is not to be feared," Mr. Bush said. "In a free society, diversity is not disorder. Debate is not strife. And dissent is not revolution. A free society trusts its citizens to seek greatness in themselves and their country."