ARNETT AND TREASON TALK



A letter from today's Wall Street Journal (click here to subscribe):

A Career of Anti-American Journalism



Peter Arnett's appearance on Iraqi TV has moved him out of the world of journalism and into the murky waters of sedition and treason. His televised conduct gave aid and comfort to the outlaw regime of Saddam Hussein, endangered the coalition mission by emboldening the enemy leadership, and placed at unnecessary further risk the lives of coalition fighting forces in the theater of operations. What he has perpetrated is all the more heinous given that he is an American citizen.



Having been swiftly and properly terminated by his employers, National Geographic, NBC and MSNBC, it now remains for the U.S. Justice Department to take a long, hard look at what he has done, perhaps by presenting the facts to a federal grand jury, so that a public determination can be made as to those laws he may have broken with his perfidious conduct.



There is no excuse, no justification, when America is engaged in a military conflict, for one of its own to actively undermine the successful prosecution of that effort. He must not be rewarded for this treachery, but rather punished by public censure and if appropriate, by the government to the fullest extent of our laws.



Martin W. Schwartz

Former Assistant District Attorney

Bronx County, NYC

Former Special Agent, U.S. Customs

Nanuet, N.Y.

I tend to agree with Mr. Schwartz's take on this. Peter Arnett is a naturalized US citizen. It is hard to understand how his actions can be justified during a time of war.