Max Boot: Why Ilhan Omar’s botched interrogation of Elliott Abrams got just about everything wrong

[TomSea]

Excerpt:

Why Ilhan Omar’s botched interrogation of Elliott Abrams got just about everything wrong
By Max Boot
Columnist
February 14

...

Reading haltingly from a sheet of paper, Omar seemed confused initially by the identity of the witness, referring to him as “Mr. Adams.” She accurately noted that, in 1991, Abrams had pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor counts of deceiving Congress about the Iran-contra affair. “I fail to understand why members of this committee or the American people should find any testimony that you give today to be truthful,” she said. When Abrams tried to defend himself, she cut him off, saying with a smirk, “That’s not a question.” You can think Abrams was wrong to do what he did — and I do — but her bullying was nevertheless unsavory. As Abrams said, “It is not right that members of this committee can attack a witness who is not permitted to reply.”

Omar then proceeded to raise the El Mozote massacre committed by the El Salvadoran army in 1981, while Abrams was serving as assistant secretary of state for labor, democracy and human rights. In common with other Reagan administration officials, Abrams had wrongly cast doubt on the reporting about the massacre. Years later, he called U.S. policy toward El Salvador a “fabulous achievement.” Arguably it was: The Reagan administration backed the election in 1984 of moderate president José Napoleon Duarte, who reduced human-rights abuses by the army and right-wing “death squads,” and beat back the Communist Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) insurgency. This made possible the negotiated end of the conflict in 1992.

But Omar disingenuously made it sound as though Abrams had characterized the El Mozote massacre as a “fabulous achievement.” “Yes or no,” she demanded. “Do you think that massacre was a fabulous achievement that happened under our watch?” “That is a ridiculous question, and — no!," Abrams replied. “I will take that as a yes," Omar said.

See article at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/02/14/why-ilhan-omars-botched-interrogation-elliott-abrams-got-just-about-everything-wrong/?utm_term=.e5a33ef981e0

Good article.... that yesterday, for me, was really a bit disheartening.  And need I repeat, Max Boot is disappointing to me about 80% of the time but this sounds okay... that said, I guess, he's part of CFR and so has been Abrams.

[TomSea]

This is also in the article:

The Reagan administration helped to topple Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier in Haiti, Augusto Pinochet in Chile, Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines, and Chun Doo-hwan in South Korea.

See. I'm not even sure if this is true..... there's so much about foreign affairs, world events, that's hard to say "Oh, yeah, that happened", I didn't know we helped overthrow Pinochet as for Marcos, well, I do remember that, that Aquino fellow got off the plane in the Phlippines and was immediately killed. That seemed real hokey. Can't have allies doing that stuff.  Benigno Aquino (spelling?).

[goatprairie]

This is also in the article:

See. I'm not even sure if this is true..... there's so much about foreign affairs, world events, that's hard to say "Oh, yeah, that happened", I didn't know we helped overthrow Pinochet as for Marcos, well, I do remember that, that Aquino fellow got off the plane in the Phlippines and was immediately killed. That seemed real hokey. Can't have allies doing that stuff.  Benigno Aquino (spelling?).

I certainly don't trust any leftist source. That does not mean massacres did not occur, but I seriously doubt anybody in the chain of U.S. command approved of the Salvadoran army slaughtering civilians.
That kind of stuff has been going on for countless centuries without our help. To blame the U.S. is ridiculous. 

[TomSea]

Max Boot is CFR, Elliot Abrams is CFR.  Max's column is syndicated and actually, if voices not found to be your usual conservative voices are defending Eliot Abrams, that's a good thing. WaPo and NYT aren't too bad for international reporting all the same.

Back in the '80s, we wanted to keep Communism out, now, we want to keep refugees in great numbers out, generally speaking.  It does matter what we do.

We've made apologies even to Guatemal 2 different times.

https://www.nytimes.com/1999/03/11/world/clinton-offers-his-apologies-to-guatemala.html

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/americas/10/01/us.guatemala.apology/index.html

World leaders, free countries should be able to acknowledge wrongs done.... now, I"m not so sure about the 1999 apology but the 2010 one sounds warranted.

If mistakes were made or if they were not made, we need to know the record. Also wrongful acts could cause refugees to leave and other similar types of problems. I mean, I would think everyone wants Christians to be in fair shape in the Middle East.