Henry Kissinger had a bad day at the Senate Armed Services Committee meeting this morning. In addition to a parade of aged dignitaries including former Secretaries of State Madeline Albright and George Schultz, the meeting was attended by our friends from the anti-war, social justice group Code Pink. Their target was Kissinger, who has the distinction of even outranking Dick Cheney in terms of the sheer amount of innocent blood on his hands.
Kissinger had been scheduled to appear earlier that day in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for a session titled "The National Interest: Articulating the Case for American Leadership in the World." When he appeared before Armed Services, however, Code Pink gave him an unwanted glimpse into the fruits of that "leadership"--from Cambodia, to Laos, to Chile--that likely departed from his prepared notes:
Protesters from the group CodePink swarmed behind Kissinger as he arrived alongside two other former Secretaries of State, Madeleine Albright and George Shultz, for a hearing on U.S. national security strategy.
They held up signs calling Kissinger a criminal and chanted “arrest Henry Kissinger for war crimes” -- citing some of his more controversial decisions during the Nixon and Ford administrations
The Committee Chair, who owes his career to being shot down while dropping bombs on the Vietnamese, was understandably not pleased:
“I’ve been a member of this committee for many years, and I have never seen anything as disgraceful and outrageous and despicable as the last demonstration that just took place,” McCain said, which led to shout-backs from the protesters.
“You know, you’re going to have to shut up, or I’m going to have you arrested. If we can’t get the Capital Hill Police in here immediately… Get out of here, you low-life scum.”
Evidently being 91 years old gives you
a pass for War Crimes in John McCain's book:
“Dr. Kissinger, I hope on behalf of all of the members of this committee on both sides of the aisle -- in fact, from all of my colleagues, I'd like to apologize for allowing such disgraceful behavior towards a man who served his country with the greatest distinction,” McCain said. “I apologize profusely.”
Whether or not you agree with Code Pink's deliberately disruptive tactics, the prospect of a U.S. Senator publicly labeling Americans as "low-life scum" for exercising their right to protest our destructive past meddling in other countries says far more about McCain and Kissinger than it does about the protesters.