The president is evading federal law on the use of the military by having the now-paramilitary CIA kill people in foreign countries with drones and disrupt a foreign population with a cyber-war. And he is violating the Constitution and federal law by starting wars on his own. But the loudest and most sanctimonious of politicians are not demanding that the president follow the Constitution and the laws he has sworn to uphold. Rather, they are demanding to know who told the media about the president’s war making.

Which is ultimately more harmful to freedom: that the president on his own kills and maims and destroys, or that some people in our own government who have greater fidelity to the Constitution than loyalty to an out-of-control presidency—and who are protected by law when they reveal government crimes—tell us what the president is up to? What kind of politicians complain about truthful revelations of unconstitutional behavior by the government, but not about death and destruction, and, let’s face it, criminal abuse of power by the president? Only cynical power-hungry politicians who have disdain for the Constitution they have sworn to uphold could do this with a straight face.

The president’s use of drones and cyber-warfare to kill people and to destabilize a foreign population, without a formal declaration of war, is the moral equivalent of an illegal war. When President Nixon started a war on his own in Cambodia, Congress enacted legislation over his veto to prevent that from happening again. Yet, the members of Congress who are demanding to know who told the truth to the media about President Obama’s war making apparently agree with his unlawful use of the war-making power he has stolen from them.

How base our culture has become when the hunt for truth tellers is more compelling than the cessation of unlawful government killing. If the president can fight private wars and start public ones on his own, and the public is induced to focus on those who have told us what he is doing and not on his misdeeds themselves, and Congress remains a potted plant or willing dupe, the president can get away with anything.

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