Allum Bokhari: Meet Michael Hayden, Deep State Spy Chief Turned Media Blacklister | Video | RealClearPolitics
ALLUM BOKHARI: Michael Hayden has been in the news lately after he called for Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville to be “removed from the human race,” a comment the senator condemned as a call for assassination. This wasn’t the first partisan outburst from Hayden. He’s also compared Trump supporters to the Taliban, called the Trump movement “more dangerous than al Qaeda,” and even said that unvaxxed MAGA supporters should be given a “one-way ticket to Afghanistan.”
But who is Michael Hayden and why should we care? Hayden is currently an advisor to NewsGuard, an organization that claims to offer nonpartisan assessments on the trustworthiness of news outlets. More on them later.
First, let’s take a look at the man who wants Americans to disappear for their political beliefs. This is a former four-star general who was at the pinnacle of the U.S. intelligence community. He served under three presidents, going from one top spy role to the next. He was director of the NSA under Clinton and Bush, at a time when its domestic surveillance of Americans went into overdrive. He was deputy director of national intelligence again under Bush, and he was director of the CIA under Bush and Obama.
Throughout this long career as a spy chief, Hayden was accused of brazenly lying to Congress and the American people about everything from the surveillance of Americans to torture programs in the war on terror. Before Hayden became a professional anti-MAGA pundit, the liberal media was happy to report on his long record of lies and half-truths.
What’s this former propaganda master doing now, you ask? He’s on the board of advisors of NewsGuard. That’s right, this ex-spook, who stands accused of lying to Congress and the American people for decades, is now working with an organization that claims to be an authority on truth and falsehood. It’s actually not that surprising. NewsGuard’s stated purpose is to blacklist certain media outlets, trying to discredit them and starve them of advertising revenue.
Sounds like a nice guy. Have him over to dinner some night to meet the missus. Just don’t get on his bad side or you might end up at a CIA black site.