Dr. Spin-Love...( Or How I LEarned To Stop Worrying and Love The War.) One thing about the current political climate is that there is so much double talk and misdirection going on that it amazes me that anyone even pays attention any more...Or maybe they don't, and maybe that's the point. Now we have the latest...Bush's response to people attacking US troops in the Middle East: " Bring them on."... John Wayne reborn...of course, like Wayne, Bush ducked out when there was actual combat service to perform, but unlike Wayne, Bush doesn't know he's just pretending when he talks like Rambo revisited. So the spin is already on...'He wasn't talking to the terrorists,' even though he phrased the sentance as an answer to them, 'he was talking to the troops...It was sort of a pep rally'...etc. Why bother? I am asking seriously, is anyone really paying attention anymore? Does anyone listen to what this man says, and think to themselves that they have just heard the reasoned truth? Polls say that we support him...but we always do during war...but do people actually support him? Do they believe what he says? I ask in all honesty, because I can't tell. We have had more misrepresentation and spin doctoring going on in the past few months than in any period I can recall. Clinton's selective definition of sex and Reagan's memory loss would barely register a blip on the scale with all the crap flying through the air these days. Watergate wouldn't even get off the ground, because of the extended critical attention that was needed to make that case... It has gotten so ridiculous that I have even heard of war supporters on here claim that the fact that we haven't found any WMD proves that we should have gone in, because if we haven't found them then he must have given them to terrorists. There is no measure of reason required anymore...just say something long enough and loud enough and people will buy it. The 9-11 connections that most now believe despite no new evidence...The UN is now irrelevant because we say so...It's ok if we lied about the WMD, Saddam was a bad guy...etc. It's really baffling me, and I am worried about us, no joke. Have we grown so desensitized to political manipulation that we have essentially thrown in the towel, and are agreeing whith what the White house says because it's easier than dealing with the alternative; that we were wrong and the world was right? I am sick of being spun, I am sick of people getting so dizzy they cling to the first voice they hear...and I am afraid. I ask one last serious question...and this is directed towards those who support this administration: Do you have any doubt that if there is another 9-11 like attack, the administration will claim that that proves their point, that terrorism has to be attacked, but if there isn't another 9-11 like attack, the administration will claim that that proves that they were right, because what they have done worked? If you disagree that that is how it will play out, one way or another, what do you suggest will happen? Honestly.
I think if there is another terrorist attack on the US, Bush will say, "God how stupid it was for me to attack the terrorists. Look what I have brought down upon my country." In the event of no further attacks, it will be more like, "God, what a tremendous waste of resources all of this Homeland Security, Patriot Act, etc. has been. How could I and the Republican Party have been so stupid." Come on, JAG. You know as well as anyone else that a polictician (and pretty much most everyone) will try to paint themselves in the best light. Of course Bush will try to spin whatever happens to his advantage, but so would anyone else.
Agreed, but this doesn't qualify as any old 'whatever happens' scenario. This is pre and post-text for war, something any old politician doesn't get into everyday. He isn't just using spin to further his own career, but to propogate an almost unprecedented restriction on civil right, an aggressvie deviation from accepted military policy, and to start wars. As such, I think his wiggle room ought to be a little less liberal.
Excellent points, MacBeth. The next time a U.S. President takes responsibility for his mistakes will be the first.
I think if terrrorists attack, Bush will resign. And if terrorists don't attack, Bush will resign. Come on, what do you expect?
I don't see the incident which launched this post as spin. It was a cowboy challenge for sure. Spin is natural; sometimes we don't like it. MacBeth, did you know that the US sent a Twin Towers widow over to meet the troops in Iraq as part of the USO tour? She wrote a piece about her experience in Newsweek this week.
Chicken Little, The sky is not falling. This is not the first nor the last time people are not marching on washington because a President says something some people don't agree with. Its not the first sign of the apocalypse. To say Saddam was a bad guy is 100% true. It is premature and complete speculation to say 'we lied about WMDs,' so please don't 'say it so much people believe it.' Americans current reactions and opinions are not illogical or unfathomable, especially just because you don't happen to agree with them.
Yankee Doodle, We're not talking about saying something people don't agree with...we're talking about misrepresenting the facts in order to accomplish what you want, and more, inciting a war on false pretenses. I agree that you won't see the significance...but then you are all over the map with your support of aggressive American foreign policy...supporting it without question one day, only to turn around the next day and...support it without question. You don't think that this is dramatically bad news re: our foreign policy...so I ask you again, what in your lifetime have you seen as dramatically bad news re: our foreign policy? When do you think we have gone too far, or clearly looked out for our own interests at the expense of others to a serious degree? Or do you think that what the rest of the world thinks of us is completely unfounded, as their all a bunch of Chicken Littles too? And the saying it so much people believe it applies to several things...Can you explain the swing in belief of an Iraqi 9-11 connection...during a period when no new evidence was presented? You don't call that illogical? Ok...explain the logic to me...I honestly don't think that my problem with that phenomenen stems from my disagreement...Nor does my problem with Americans accepting being mislead...I think that those are legitimate concersn, whatever names you want to call me, and most of the world shares my irrational fear...
Curiously, everyone that MacBeth disagrees with "runs away" when anyone disagrees with them. For some odd reason, he is always the first person to notice this... (please note sarcasm) I find this a rather odd statement. A war has presumably been incited based upon false pretenses, and yet those pretenses have yet to be proven false, and the complaint here is about misrepresenting facts? Were we representing facts here accurately we would acknowledge that it has yet to be proven that the pretenses were false... But since when have we kept track of little details like that? The rest of the post was similar garbage, but I am not inclined (don't care enough to type any more) to comment on it right now. Have at it, Hayes.
1) Do you even know what you're talking about here? Seriously...does it make sense to you? What does running away have to do with the statement you quoted...or anything else, for that matter? Kee p your sarcasm, and make a point. 2) The pretense was that there was an imminent threat...including a nuclear program that was mere months away from achieving production...there were also many since proven false claims, like Uranium, tubes, drones, etc. which were cited by the administration as reasons why we should invade Iraq...In my book, that means false pretenses...I am not even going into the other pretenses, such as the tens of thousands of tons of chemical weapons, etc. which have yet to be disproven, but are looking less and less likely by the day...I know these don't qualify as factual to you tree, certainly not as factual as all the 'finds' you have hyped as 'proof', but to many of the rest of us, the fact that the administration themselves has admitted some of these things were false, combined with the fact that they were cited as reasons for going to war, equals false pretenses for going to war...weird, that... Oh...and re: garbage...you are probably second only to johnheath in terms of the frequency with which you fall back on insults...and I can honestly see why each of you feels the need to...Good work, keep it up...at least you are consistently classy...
Yes. Do you? I thought I explained it fairly clearly. Would you like me to rephrase it? No thanks. I'll make my point with the sarcasm, thank you very much. Bullsh*t. There were a number of pretenses, that being just one of them. And it was an *inevitable* threat, not an imminent one. But feel free to change the past as much as you want. Let's see, pretenses: 1) Iraq/Saddam was an inevitable threat because of his continually belligerent and noncooperative behavior. He was a threat to his neighbors and therefore to the global oil supply, and in turn the global economy. Check. 2) Iraq/Saddam had either active WMD programs or intentions to continue active WMD programs after inspections. All evidence points that way. See www.iraqwatch.com for details. 3) Saddam was a brutal dictator responsible for tens of thousands of deaths each year, averaging about 50,000 per year over his reign, and it was the moral thing to do to remove him and free his captive people. 4) Saddam was a known terrorism supporter. This was never in dispute, only who all he supported. 5) We wanted to remove our people from Saudi yet maintain a significant presence in the region. Check. 6) We wanted to send a message to other ****pot dictators in the region that opposing us and supporting our enemies was not a good idea. There are more, but those were the main ones. But simplify it to an issue that has yet to be resolved - the WMD issue - if that suits you. I have no problem with you decieving yourself, just not gonna stand by while you try to decieve everyone else. I don't know whether to take that as an insult or a compliment... Thanks. Seriously, though - keep up the good garbage. Gives me something to call garbage. And I like calling things garbage...
Misrepresenting facts? Like saying 'lied about WMD,' and then only when called on it saying 'looking less likely to be true?' Didn't you write that in 'order to accomplish what you want?' Which was to distort the picture just enough to make your argument seem more solid and factual that it actually is. I find it interesting you can declare as fact that the 'war was started on false pretenses' when out of the three arguments for war, the first (genocidal dictator) is disputed by NOONE, the second is still undetermined (WMD) and the third is the only one on shaky ground. I have given many many more examples of where I disagree with US foreign policy than you have of supporting it. Once again, I can point to WOD being bad, our global warming policy being misguided, some Cold War involvement with dictators being less productive than alternate choices. Can you say the same? The answer is NO, you cannot WWII and PGW1 are your only two examples and you simply fill those with enough caveats to negate them as positive US actions in your view. Sorry chum, but you are hardly objective. Saddam supported terrorists who are anti-american. Anti-American terrorists attacked us on 9-11. That is probably why the public believes it. It may be flawed logic but it is hardly unfathomable how they came to that conclusion. Add to that the fact that Saddam would have the motive to support such an attack, and the realization that most people in this poll are not foreign service officers, but truck drivers and waiters etc and it is not suprising that they would make such a conclusion. And it seems to be contradictory for you to claim BOTH that the administration has abandoned its claims about Iraq/Al Queda AND that the administration is misleading the people by going on about Iraq/Al Queda's connection. Actually most of the world would stay far far away from your conclusions (anyone should be able to have nukes, we should not stop genocide because we committed genocide 150 years ago). As for you being 'scared' and your doomsaying I will say this: most of those in opposition to intervention in Iraq would more than likely opposed such a move no matter the circumstances, many many more than you admit with your false claims of consensus supported the intervention, and finally, it IS irrational to fear US intervention because we are not annexing, and we cannot replace Saddam with worse than Saddam - so what's to worry about? Let me also add that I am not a Bush supporter. I would have greatly preferred Gore, and I doubt that Gore would either make the rhetorical mistakes Bush makes, or would he probably have intervened in Iraq. The Bush Administration can, however, make policy decisions that actually may work. Just as Reagan's Peace Through Strength message actually worked. Reagan, much like Bush, was no genius, he was just more polished. Then, just as now, there were those who chose to doomsay, but then, hopefully like now, they were wrong. It was Reagan's ideology that potential enemies feared and reacted to (release of the Iran Hostages, ending of the Cold War) in a manner that did achieve its desired results.
I do not think that it is premature to say that the Bush Admin manipulated the intell to support their political cause.
Hayes Bush did lie about WMD. It's not anything looking less likely to be true. He flat out lied. Bush claimed that he had a report from IAEA from '98 that said Iraq was within months of having a nuke. The IAEA revealed that no such report existed. Then the Bush team claimed that the President mispoke and that it was '91 report. Then IAEA came out and said that such a report never existed from '91 either. In their third effort to cover the story, the Bush team claimed it was IISS report. The only problem there is the IISS report wasn't released until AFTER Bush initially made the claim about IRaq being months away from a nuke. In that instance there was no misleading intel, nothing less likely to be true. Bush flatout LIED. The proof is there.
Personally I write this off as Bush speaking off the cuff and being wrong about the source of the estimate. I believe he is not smart enough to know the difference and am actually suprised he got IAEA out of his mouth... "He's referring to 1991 there," said Deputy Press Secretary Scott McClellan. "In '91, there was a report saying that after the war they found out they were about six months away..." To clear up the confusion, Mr. McClellan cited two news articles from 1991 — a July 16 story in the London Times by Michael Evans and a July 18 story in the New York Times by Paul Lewis...The article by Mr. Evans says: "Jay Davis, an American expert working for the U.N. special commission charged with removing Iraq's nuclear capability, said Iraq was only six months away from the large-scale production of enriched uranium at two plants inspected by UN officials."
It seems sooo long ago that the Nation was bombarded with reports that a President lied about getting a BJ. And to think that said President was actually impeached because of this. Nowadays, the President would have to be caught on video killing a man with his bare hands before the press would dare say anything bad about him. But, of course, they would just say that Bush found a terrorist and was taking matters into his own hands. This is all really becoming sickening. Man, this administration is scary.
1) HS...While I think we did, I never said we lied about WMDs in here, let alone backed down when called on it. Read the quote again...I was expressing frustration with the attitude which seems to suggest that we are ok with being lied to because Saddam was a bad guy. Remember the poll that showed that we wouldn't be upset if we were lied to? That's the exact point to which I was refering...Read it again, if you will. So, as ususal, you misrepresent my argument in order to make your own, and then accuse me of doing likewise. Like, for example, the nuke argument. You have since expanded my stance to suggest that I say that everyone ought to have them, when that is not at all what i have said. What I have said is this: A) It is not the prerogative of the United States, the possesors of the world's biggest nuclear arsenal, and the only state in history to use the damed things to decide who can and who can't have them. I personally would prefer if no one had them. Now I know that in your book saying that it's not up to the US to say who can and can't have them equates with saying that everyone can have them, but there are points of view which don't see the United States as the ultimate arbitor in global affairs, as odd as that mnust sound to you. B) Our judgement about who should and who should not have them has hardly proven to be excellent. We forecast doom whgen the Soviets got them...but an outside perspective would probably conclude that them getting them was probably the best thing for the planet, as it curbed our previously demonstrated willingness to use them. We have thought that many nations who currently have them shouldn't, yet to date we are still the only nation on the planet to actually use them. and C) It's really like trying to plug a dyke with your finger, from a practical point of view. We unleashed the genie from the bottle, now it is virtually inevitable that people we don't want to have them will have them. So for you to construe that I want 'rogue' nations to have nukes from what I said is innacurate. 2) The three arguments you mention are not the three used to support the war, and certainly not in that order. But you honestly don't think that the WMD argument is on 'shaky ground'!?!?!? By your argument it is still undetermined. Of course we will never disprove a negative, so it will, by your reasoning, remain undetermined forever short of bring proven right. Excellent reasoning. 3) You think that you're record is more objective than mine? Hmmm...Well, the issue at hand was, I believe, 'pro-active' involvment in foreign affairs. During my lifetime, or at least while I was old enough to have an opinion, there have been three wars, and a few limited military interactions. Of the three wars, I supported one, semi-supported another, and don't support this one. You have, I would guess, supported all of them. How are you more objective again? Because you agree that our supporting murderous dictators before you were old enough to agree with it was a less productive alternative!?!?!? I ask again...same question...what US military interactions in your lifetime ( ie during the time you were old enough to have you own opinion) have you not supported? I am guessing that your record will be a lot more consistent than mine. There are US foreign policies I agree with...several in fact. I think that the Marshall Plan was America's greatest moment in terms of foreign policy, for example, however clouded our motives. I think that things like Live Aid reflect an international sympathy probably largely absent in past superpowers with the exception of the U.K. I could go on and on, but it is, like your responses, nothing to do with the issue. Once again...and you can tell me about global warming all you want, but it's not an answer...when has the US gotten 'pro-active' during your adult lifetime, and you've stood against it? I am neither Liberal nor Conservative. I am neither Republican nor Democrat. I supported Bush originally, but have changed my opinion, not because of his party, his nationality, or his liberal/conservative slant, but because of his actions.. I like Powell above every other political figure. I am both a US citizen, and a citizen of another nation. I have been for and against US involvment in wars both during and before my lifetime. You, I suppose, are more objective? 4) Unfathomable and unreasonable are not the same thing. Are you saying that the reasoning you gave for the public's faith in Bush's stance on 9-11 and Iraq is reasonable? I can 'fathom' why the Germans believed Hitler's arguments about the Jews...doesn't mean they were reasonable. 5) Re: Reagon, Gore, and Bush. Interesting argument. I partly see your point. I did, however, agree with RR's stance. And I think that he had more going on for him than just polish that Bush doesn't. I agree that neither was a candidate for Mensa, but Reagan was smarter, had much more successfull experience prior to the Presidency, and his policies were nowhere near as dangerous. His only really questionable move, although I saw the reasoning at the time, was increasing the arms race in the face of the USSR...but he saw that as the only goal, and advocated disarmament when that was dealt with. Bush is now advocating ratcheting up the arms race with no USSR, and that is only one of several questionable moves he's making. I have more to say, but I'm tired right now.
Hayes, I agree that he didn't know what he was talking about, and that most of the stuff is written for him anway. But since he's still the president, and still made the claim, and never retracted it, then I would say it definitely qualifies as a lie. He bears the responsibility for what comes out of his mouth. He's the one who appointed the people who write for him, and work for him.
