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War Hero Branded a Terrorist for Criticizing Draft-Dodging President

by jordan | April 9, 2007 at 09:25 am | 260 views | add comment | 0 recommendations

This sort of thing scares the you-know-what out of me. When dissent is considered a threat to security, then democracy has died, period.

Professor Walter F. Murphy, a Korean war hero and McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence (emeritus) at Princeton, was delayed while flying because he's on a "terrorist watch list." The check-in clerk told him that he was probably added because he gave a speech that was critical of the president (who dodged his military service).

"I presented my credentials from the Marine Corps to a very polite clerk for American Airlines. One of the two people to whom I talked asked a question and offered a frightening comment: "Have you been in any peace marches? We ban a lot of people from flying because of that." I explained that I had not so marched but had, in September, 2006, given a lecture at Princeton, televised and put on the Web, highly critical of George Bush for his many violations of the Constitution. "That'll do it," the man said. "