Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Glenn Greenwald spoke to RT’s Chris Hedges about the eerie similarities between the US government’s legally excessive actions after the 9/11 terror attacks and the Capitol riot earlier this year.
Those who “questioned” measures taken in the name of combating terrorism were treated as terrorist sympathizers in the months following the 9/11, Greenwald told Hedges during an appearance on RT’s ‘On Contact’, and the same argument is being made now by the media and Congress against anyone questioning the government’s response to January 6.
“Exactly the same thing is happening now,” the investigative journalist said, noting that the Justice Department’s targeting of “mostly poor and impoverished and lawyerless people” is similar to what was experienced by many Muslims who faced accusations or ended up in Guantanamo Bay, with few legal options.
Those accused of terrorism struggled to find representation, as numerous accused Capitol rioters have, with Congress and the media essentially making them “radioactive.”
“What they’re doing here is essentially running a parallel investigation to the Justice Department because they’re angry that the Justice Department hasn’t indicted anybody on these grandiose claims,” Greenwald said of the House committee investigating the riot, calling the actual investigation a “spectacle” to feed a “hungry liberal mob.”
A federal grand jury released an indictment for former Donald Trump advisor Steve Bannon for failing to answer a subpoena to testify in front of the committee earlier this week.
Congress’ involvement helps to “vilify” those accused as a “supplement” to the Justice Department’s already questionable treatment, Greenwald argued.
Greenwald has referred to this as the “second war on terror” due to the similarities in government action.
Numerous Capitol rioters taken into custody have been denied bail and reportedly faced harsh conditions in prison, similar to the treatment of those accused of terrorism in the months following 9/11.
People being investigated in connection with January 6 are often not even aware, Greenwald added, thanks to third-party subpoenas provided to phone companies, email servers, etc. that request the person in question not be informed.
The lack of oversight and safeguards makes it “almost knowingly and deliberately illegal,” the journalist, who is famous for publishing materials on mass US government surveillance exposed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, said.
Another striking similarity, Greenwald told Hedges, is reports of the FBI’s involvement with the acts in question.
Many domestic terror plots foiled by officials in the months following 9/11 involved numerous FBI agents and informants, Greenwald recalled, and the same could be true for January 6, as reports have indicated FBI informants were in contact with some at the protest.
“To what extent did the FBI have advanced knowledge?”
Greenwald asked, noting many of the “ringleaders” encouraging violence on January 6 have not been charged, while numerous nonviolent offenders have.
On the show, Chris Hedges discusses the second war on terror with the journalist, Glenn Greenwald.
The liberal and Democratic Party elites have seized on the January 6 mob assault on the U.S. Capital as the domestic equivalent of the attacks of 9/11.
Joe Biden calls the storming of the Capital “the worst attack on our democracy since the Civil War.”
Rep. Liz Cheney, a right-wing Republican whose animus towards Donald Trump has seen her join forces with the Democratic Party leadership, said that the forces behind January 6 represent “a threat America has never seen before.”
The enabling resolution that created the Select Committee that is investigating the events of January 6 calls the mob assault as “one of the darkest days of our democracy.”
The hyperventilating about the incursion into the capital, often described by its critics as an attempted insurrection and coup, has effectively shut down questions about whether proposed responses for dealing with the January 6 mob incursion into the U.S. Capital.
There is a collective chant by the Democratic Party leadership and many in the media for the censoring and criminalizing of those that embrace the right-wing ideology and its conspiracy theories. The Biden administration is pushing a bill authored by Rep.
Adam Schiff, a member of the Select Committee on January 6, to open a second war on terror against domestic enemies.
The rhetoric, and the rush to push through legislation that will severely circumscribe our ability to dissent, echoes what we heard in the immediate aftermath of the attacks of 9/11.
Those, such as Glenn Greenwald, who warn that such overreach is excessive, unconstitutional, and dangerously weakens of our already anemic civil liberties are excoriated as closet sympathizers with the right-wing.
Greenwald, a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter, who is also an attorney, was one of the first and most important voices to decry the draconian provisions instituted under the Patriot Act and the anti-terrorism laws passed in the wake of 9/11.
He sees a similar lack of proportionality or legality in the government actions being carried out after the January incursion with, perhaps, even more dire consequences.
Produced by Rt.com
Republished by The 21st Century
The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of 21cir.