You could call it “Treason Central,” or “al Qaeda West,” but no matter what you call it, the building housing the once-august New York Times at 229 West 43rd St. in New York City is a beehive of anti-American hostility, where selling out the nation’s secrets has become the newspaper’s stock in trade.

This latest episode of the Times revealing information vital to the government’s ability to protect the American people from new 9/11s is just another example of the Times’ contempt for the security of the people of the United States of America in a time of war.

To say that they have no shame fails to indicate the depths of infamy to which the Times has sunk. What they have done is sheer and outright treason, and it’s the third time the Times has adopted Benedict Arnold as its role model, having blabbed about the monitoring of international phone call records and, prior to that, having told our enemies that their communications with their agents in the U.S. were being listened to by intelligence agencies.

What makes my blood boil is the arrogance of the Times’ editor Bill Keller, and his fellow editors, in flatly refusing the requests of the administration, the two former heads of the 9/11 Commission and even Rep. John Murtha - hardly a friend of the Bush Administration - that the newspaper refrain from publishing the details of the program tracking the international flow of terrorist money, a vital weapon in the war on terrorism, and a weapon they have now very probably disarmed.

Just who do these people think they are? What makes them think they have the right to endanger the security of the people of the United States of America? By their actions they have repeatedly shown they have no shame and have not a shred of concern for the safety of their readers.

Rep. Peter King, R-NY, Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, has said that “the real question here is the conduct of The New York Times by disclosing this in time of war, they have compromised America’s anti-terrorist policies. This is a very effective policy. They have compromised it. This is the second time The New York Times has done this. And to me, no one elected The New York Times to do anything. And The New York Times is putting its own arrogant elitist left-wing agenda before the interests of the American people.”

Rep. King told Fox News anchor Chris Wallace that the NYT reporters, editors, and publishers responsible for that story should be charged under the Espionage Act, which is punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

A lot of my listeners have called with the suggestion that Americans boycott the Times’ advertisers while others agree with Rep. King that the Times’ editors should be hauled before a judge to account for their treasonous activities. Aside from the fact that boycotts of this nature seldom work, and the idea of indicting the Times for treason won’t fly because they have a right to publish whatever they want, what this case demands is that they be shamed – to be made pariahs and held up before the nation and exposed for all to see as the traitors they are. And Americans should never be allowed to forget this.

The Times claims that under the First Amendment they have a right to publish anything they want. That’s true, but they don’t have the right to engage in what amounts to treason, to giving aid and comfort to an enemy that wants to kill us all.

Keller defends his publishing of material damaging to the national security on the grounds that the public has the right to know. What he’s really saying is that al Qaeda has the right to know, and he’s going to do his darnedest to see that they do know all America’s secrets.

From now on, we should treat the Times as we would treat any skunk – hold our nose whenever we see it. After all, that odor we sense is the odor of treason.

©2006 Mike Reagan. If you’re not a paying subscriber to our service, you must contact us to print or web post this column. Mike’s column is distributed exclusively by: Cagle Cartoons, Inc. Cari Dawson Bartley email [email protected], (800) 696-7561.