"Fahrenheit 451"... For Real

In the "best" fascist and totalitarian traditions, the U.S. government has burned close to 10,000 copies of a book published by a former Lt. Col. in the U.S. Army about the war in Afghanistan, claiming that it contained sensitive information that would endanger "national security."  The author claims that he has consulted with the Army and had even deleted certain parts of his book, to make sure that there was nothing objectionable.  Apparently, that wasn't enough to satisfy the increasingly-secretive American government.

I would bet that the book does contain embarrassing information to the U.S. government, and the "national security" issue is just a convenient excuse to censor it.  The more information that comes out of that war, the more it shows that there is very little heroism and a lot of criminal activity on the part of U.S. troops over there.  That and the corruption of private contractors paints a not very pretty picture.  So, book-burning is the tried and true practice in cases like this one.

Isn't it funny how democracies are quick to put in practice the very things that they condemn in totalitarian regimes, when it suits their purposes?

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