License to Lie

It was an idea so outrageous that only an administration drunk on arrogance would spawn it. Against the backdrop of President Bush in China, extolling the joys of a free democracy, and the death of a Wall Street Journal reporter accused of spying, the Pentagon recently announced plans for a new agency that would disseminate disinformation.

The new Office of Strategic Influence, itself, wouldn’t lie, but would use independent agents — contract liars, posing as journalists — to spread falsehoods abroad.

Wrong, wrong, wrong, barked nearly every government watchdog. Not only would this undermine the flow of good information on which democracy depends, it would endanger the lives of every journalist working abroad.

Official lies fed the Killing Fields of Cambodia.