Opinion
Lawrence Journal-World l LJWorld.com l Wednesday, December 14, 2016
EDITORIALS
Noise is not progress The tactics of a local Black Lives Matter group detract from a very serious message.
T
he techniques employed by activists associated with Black Lives Matter in Lawrence threaten to undermine the group’s credibility to the point that it cannot be taken seriously on the serious matters of justice and equality. The profanity-laced tirade at Monday’s Lawrence school board meeting is the latest in a series of unproductive incidents that do the group’s mission more harm than good. Caleb Stephens and Trinity Carpenter, self-described leaders of the local Black Lives Matter movement, were part of a takeover of Monday night’s meeting. The school board’s pleas to respect the board’s processes and follow the protocol for public comment were shouted down. Instead, one member of the group, Tasha Neal, informed the board, “we’re running this meeting right now,” and told board members not to interrupt. Neal and others accosted board members with an approach that was threatening and aggressive, to the point that police were contacted. After listening for about 10 minutes, school board members voted to adjourn the meeting while the activists continued to yell at them. As board members got up to leave, Neal shouted, “We closed this mother(expletive) down.” Spectacles like Monday’s have become too common in the past year. The Lawrence City Commission and the University of Kansas have experienced similar meetings, in which individuals affiliated with Black Lives Matter seize control of the meetings, shout down any efforts at civil discourse and insist on respect, while refusing to demonstrate any respect toward the institutions and individuals that they are targeting. And government isn’t the only target. Dozens of Lawrence businesses, churches and nonprofit organizations have been asked to write letters professing their solidarity with Black Lives Matter. Refusal to do so lands the business or organization on a boycott list maintained on the Lawrence Black Lives Matter Facebook page. Nationally, Black Lives Matter is a movement born out of frustration with the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin in 2012. In five years, the movement has expanded to tackle a broad array of social issues affecting black Americans including poverty, the criminal justice system, gender bias and discrimination based on sexual orientation. It’s important to note that few cities have demonstrated a greater willingness to tackle such topics than Lawrence, a community founded by abolitionists on the principle that black lives do matter. One hundred fifty years later, Lawrence remains a community known for its pursuit of equality for all. Perhaps for that reason, local officials have, for the most part, provided Black Lives Matter members with multiple forums to air their grievances. But enough is enough. The time has come for the City Commission, school board and other public bodies to stop allowing local Black Lives Matter activists to hijack public meetings. Maybe then, Black Lives Matter leaders will stop behaving like bullies and start advocating for equality and fairness.
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Trump’s dangerous spy game Washington — Intelligence officers like to distinguish between knowable secrets that spies can steal and fuzzier mysteries that have to be assessed without final, definitive proof. The intent of Russia’s covert meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election is probably somewhere between the two. But after conversations with a half-dozen knowledgeable sources, here are two simple judgments: Russia’s secret hacking against Democratic Party officials threatened the integrity of
David Ignatius
davidignatius@washpost.com
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Perhaps the trickiest task will fall to Rep. Mike Pompeo, Trump’s nominee to head the CIA.”
the U.S. political system. And President-elect Donald Trump shouldn’t have criticized the CIA after its analysts told Congress about the Kremlin’s efforts. Trump, unbelievably, seemed to be taking a potential adversary’s side against his own nation’s intelligence professionals. The Russian hacking scandal went into overdrive last weekend after CIA analysts warned Congress Thursday that the goal of Russian hackers hadn’t simply been to destabilize our political system, as previously thought, but to boost Trump and undermine his opponent, Hillary Clinton. That stronger judgment, first reported by The Washington Post, is said to have been based on an evolving analysis, rather than a “smoking gun.” President Obama had been notified earlier, in his daily intelligence brief and other documents, of this tougher evaluation. Early last week, he ordered Director of National
Intelligence James Clapper, a 50-year veteran of the spy business, to conduct an assessment of the evidence that could be completed by Jan. 20 and presented to Trump, as a set of “lessons learned” about foreign political meddling, including China’s cyberattacks in the 2008 election as well as Russia’s actions. The evidence that led CIA analysts to conclude that Moscow’s aim in 2016 was to help Trump — rather than simply spread confusion — was based on a variety of sources. One indication was that the Russians didn’t disseminate information from their snooping into Republican files, as they had with the product of hacking against Democrats; the Russians also didn’t disseminate material after Trump’s victory. The CIA had other, more sensitive evidence that officials won’t discuss. An administration official wouldn’t comment on whether Obama had shared with Trump the intelligence assessment and plan for wider review. But it’s unlikely such an important decision wouldn’t have been conveyed to his transition team, which makes Trump’s Twitter blasts at the CIA last weekend all the more puzzling and disturbing. Obama’s somewhat cautious response to Russia’s covert intervention angers some Democrats. Rep.
Adam Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said in an interview Tuesday that he had been urging the White House since August to identify Russian hackers, talk with allies about imposing sanctions and take clandestine steps to deter Russia from further meddling. “Had the administration begun months ago, we would now be much further along,” Schiff said. “Failure to push back against Russia was seen by them as an open door. ... There need to be costs or they will do it again.” Schiff said he had no doubt the Russians wanted to hurt Clinton and help Trump. In Russian eyes, he said, Clinton had sought to undermine President Vladimir Putin after the 2011 parliamentary elections and to foment “color revolutions” in areas of Russian influence. Trump, by contrast, had lauded Putin, suggested lifting sanctions and belittled NATO. Schiff said Obama had initially resisted calls to “name and shame” Russia for its hacking because the president feared it would “sow doubt about the elections” and “play into Russia’s hands by acknowledging what they were doing.” Obama eventually agreed to an Oct. 7 public statement that “Russia’s senior-most officials” had authorized actions “intended to interfere
with the U.S. election process.” According to Schiff, the administration didn’t take further public steps after Oct. 7 because Obama feared it could “risk escalation, including dumping of forged documents,” in ways that would have further destabilized the election. There’s no question the White House worried, right up to Election Day, that Russian hackers might ignite what was already a toxic, combustible political environment. Trump’s bogus claims that the election was rigged and that he might not accept the outcome added to Obama’s concerns. Obama has another five weeks left to shape the transition and deter Russian actions. The administration doesn’t rule out the possibility of taking covert action in retaliation, which officials privately said hadn’t been done before the election. The rubric now is simply that the administration will respond at a time and place of its choosing. Perhaps the trickiest task will fall to Rep. Mike Pompeo, Trump’s nominee to head the CIA. He must reassure a battered agency workforce that the next administration values its own intelligence officers and is vigilant against machinations by foreign spies. — David Ignatius is a columnist for Washington Post Writers Group.
A perfect holiday gift: Subscribe to the news If you’re stressing over what to give friends and loved ones during this holiday season, I’m here to help. Consider giving them print or digital subscriptions — or both — to news organizations you regularly count on to provide strong journalism. That includes national newspapers and magazines, as well as regional papers that anchor your communities. Keep in mind public radio and television stations, too, which always need more financial support. Now, I understand how you might see this request as self-serving on my part. I am a journalist, to state the obvious; worse, to state the god-awful for some, I am a columnist paid to give my opinion. Surely, I have a vested interest in the survival of my profession. The thing is, so do you. Regardless of whom we supported for president, it should concern all of us that we are about to enter a period of alarming uncertainty regarding media access to the White House and to the coming administration. So far, we have no reason to believe that Donald Trump will not continue his campaign practice of abuse and avoidance. Democracy cannot thrive without journalists who hold accountable those elected to protect it. No recent president has been fond of the media, but
Connie Schultz President-elect Trump has taken this wariness to new lows. He has made clear, repeatedly and loudly, that he hates us and sees no reason even to speak to us. Days after his election, he accused the media of “inciting” protests against him. This was a lie. During his campaign, he banned a growing list of reporters and repeatedly mocked the journalists standing in front of him. He also encouraged supporters at his rallies to taunt the media and call them names. One photo at a rally showed a Trump supporter wearing a T-shirt promoting lynching of journalists. Do I think Trump supports that? No, but it’s troubling that once the photo went viral, he didn’t denounce this. It’s indisputable that his behavior inspired it. Journalists and the news organizations that employ them are not about to cave. For all the complaints about media coverage, many of them justified, a large number of journalists, mostly for print organizations, brought
close and relentless scrutiny to Trump’s campaign. In this era of increasingly influential “fake news” sites, they are now doubling down on efforts to provide sound reporting that will still include the fact-checks that Trump so loathes. How he loves his Twitter account. Never stops bragging about the freedom to push out whatever misinformation and outright lies that catch his fancy. He thinks he can get around the media by tweeting, with no apparent concern for the potential harm to Americans and countries around the world. Even if you find his addiction to Twitter entertaining or dismiss it as a mere distraction, please ask yourself this: Why doesn’t the next president of the United States think he should have to answer any questions that don’t come from a family member or a sycophant? What is he hiding? What does he not want you to know? Doesn’t it make you feel a little bit better to know that journalists will keep trying? Wouldn’t you rather have all the information and decide for yourself what matters? If you’re holding a newspaper right now to read my column, it’s possible that I’m the only liberal on this page. Many editorial pages skew more conservative, yet here I am. Think what that says about newspapers and the
people deciding what goes on their opinion pages. They may not agree with me, but they publish my opinions anyway because they value the wild tumble of ideas over an echo chamber. I am grateful, of course, to these newspapers and every online site that runs my column. Keeps me writing for a living. But you, too, are the beneficiary of this policy that trusts you to keep an open mind. This is democracy in action — and isn’t it nice to be so respected? Less than an hour ago, I finished up my last journalism class for this semester as a professional in residence at Kent State University. It is impossible to be cynical in the company of these millennials. They care about journalism and their future in it, and they care about our country, too. Many of my journalism students were alarmed by the outcome of the presidential race, but they have quickly rallied. They understand their role in keeping our country free, and they are eager to join the profession. I take heart in knowing that soon enough, they’ll be out there. Let’s support them, shall we? Let’s invest in the future of journalism, while we still can. — Connie Schultz is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and professional in residence at Kent State University’s school of journalism.