The Discerning Texan

Now that the TNR source has been revealed, the questions can now be asked of him and TNR - should he face charges for participating in alleged massacres and sociopathic behavior, for witnessing this kind of behavior without reporting it up the chain of command, or are the things he 'reported' merely exaggerations or at worst outright lies?

Probably more of A and B than C.

These questions have been raised at prominent milblogs by those who've served and who called out this TNR source.

And predictably (in typical leftist fashion), Scott Thomas is calling everyone questioning the veracity and factual accuracy of his highly suspect 'reporting' a "chickenhawk." That's right. The milbloggers, many of whom have served in Iraq and others that are career military men, are "chickenhawks."

Funny how the definition of chickenhawk, as defined by the left, morphs from "never served yet supports the fight against terrorism" to "is serving in Iraq/Afghanistan or has served and doesn't agree with the Democrat Party." Pathetic.

Not that it has bearing on this case, but it should also be noted that Scott Thomas was a lefty blogger and an antiwarbot before his stint in Iraq. By moonbat logic, that makes him a shill for the DemCong.

Let him flail - to me, the "chickenhawk" crap is a smokescreen and an indication that he wants the attention focused on him and not on what he 'reported' that caused the controversy in the first place.

TNR owes everyone an explanation as to why they appear to be complicit in this individual's behavior, up to and including multiple violations of the UCMJ. They only want readers, and this is a really disgraceful way to go about getting them.

Man up, TNR. Time to pay the piper.

UPDATE Dean Barnett adds:

Lest you think I’m going all mushy on you in terms of appraising Beauchamp, let’s be clear – Scott Thomas Beauchamp went to war with the specific goal of ridiculing and belittling the war effort. Yes, he wore the uniform. In virtually all cases, that’s praiseworthy. But in Beauchamp’s case, he wore the uniform as a means by which to make his artistic bones; he knew that in making those artistic bones, he would undermine the efforts of his brothers in arms. In short, he went to war with the specific purpose of weakening the war effort. I doubt he ever thought it through to that extent. In spite of his pretensions to the contrary, he doesn’t seem like a deep thinker who gets off on serious introspection. Nevertheless, there are words that describe his intentions in going to war – very serious words.

These are the acts of not only a pathetic individual, but a morally obtuse one as well. I don’t need to perform a semiotics-based analysis to predict with some confidence that Scott Thomas Beauchamp will turn out to be a sorry figure, albeit an unsympathetic one.

THE REAL VILLAIN OF THE PIECE so far is The New Republic. We still don’t know how TNR and Beauchamp hooked up, but we do know that TNR enabled Beauchamp’s descent into highly publicized pathos. The stuff TNR published will greatly complicate Beauchamp’s immediate future; they’ll probably detrimentally affect the rest of his life. TNR’s role here as regards Beauchamp could be compared to a full-grown adult giving a gun to suicidal grad student.

As for what happens with TNR from this point forward, there are two possible scenarios:

1) Beauchamp’s tales are proven; or

2) Beauchamp’s tales are disproven.

Either way, as I’ve been saying all along, TNR’s conduct here is reprehensible. As regards the potential veracity of Beauchamp’s Diarists, the people at TNR knew that they had a not-particularly-reliable narrator working for them in Baghdad. Or given their rigorous fact checking procedures, they should have known. The fact that they ran his stories with minimal if any corroboration, especially in light of TNR’s recent history with stories that were too delicious to check, can’t be chalked up as a coincidence.

TNR employed as its Baghdad correspondent a guy who was there specifically to mock the war effort while he hopefully advanced his own career as a writer by doing so. Beauchamp’s champions (not that I’m aware of any) have the potential defense that he was a young man who didn’t know any better. TNR’s editors do not. They gravitated to Scott Thomas Beauchamp because he would have the “moral authority” necessary to slander the troops with impunity, a moral authority that Franklin Foer and company of course lack.

One other note: Scott Thomas Beauchamp’s life will be a smoldering ruin when this affair has run its course. His partners in crime at The New Republic will still have jobs and careers. Will they see Scott Beauchamp in their nightmares? And will they see the 160,000 honorable and noble troops that together they conspired to malign?

UPDATE: Jeff Emanuel provides an excellent summary of what has transpired to date, and the implications of Beauchamp's crimes.

Labels: Media Bias, Media War, The Left