Politics and Press

The interaction of the press and politics; public diplomacy, and daily absurdities.

Jeff

N. Korea’s “Threat”

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This just in from our Oceania Bureau Chief who watches Asia, Australia and Oceania for us. We asked for his thoughts on what is going on in North Korea; are they continuing to try to get Bush to negotiate one-on-one?

“I think they want to indirectly pressure the US by scaring its “allies” and want to give China a reason/need to return to the US with pressure for 1 on 1 talks. But I see the test threat as sort of reassuring in that they wouldn’t say they were going to test if they could test and were planning to do so imminently. Pakistan and India have not tested since the late 90’s. I think they can’t yet test but are feeling hungry going into winter and desperate as Iraq, Darfur, Iran and Mid-east seem to be the world’s focus. It isn’t beyond Kim Jong Il — the Michael Jackson of geopolitics– to act up now just to rain on S. Korea’s UN Sect.Gen parade. That really may play into the timing. Hell, they chose the 4th of July to shoot 6 missiles over Japan. Director Kim watches the calendar and the camera.”

Martin Amis Reflects on Extreme Islamism

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Our intrepid Kiwi correspondent has referred me to a powerful critique of extreme Islamism by Martin Amis carried in the Guardian’s Observer. In it Amis says what I believe many are thinking but backing away from actually saying, probably out of obeisance to political correctness. It is a lengthy piece, published in three parts and is introduced thusly:

“…On the eve of the fifth anniversary of 9/11, one of Britain’s most celebrated and original writers analyses – and abhors – the rise of extreme Islamism. In a penetrating and wide-ranging essay he offers a trenchant critique of the grotesque creed and questions the West’s faltering response to this eruption of evil…”

Part one, with links to parts two and three can be read here.

The Press and Rep. Foley

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There has been much breast beating on the Congressman Foley-Senate page scandal.  Certainly if revenge is best served cold, the Democrats have their due with this one.  The party of the moral majority, the party of family values, the party committed to erasing the horror of the Lewinsky affair in the Oval Office has within it people of shabby morals.  Shocking??  Of course not.  The issue in all of this is not that there are sinners (or at least one sinner) in the GOP.  The issue is the utter hypocrisy of the likes of Foley, and House Speaker Hastert and the gullibility of voters who believe in living saints who are self-beatified.

As for the press, it is pretty predictable. The Wall Street Journal – which went apoplectic about the Oval Office affair  – commented that, ” in today’s  politically correct culture, it’s easy to  understand how senior Republicans might well have decided they had no grounds doubt Mr. Foley merely because he was gay and a little too friendly in emails”  Is that bizarre or what?

Much of the mainstream press reports it in terms of its relationship to the coming elections, while at least one Dumbbell Radio loony compared Foley’s misuse of words with the Pope’s recent comments on Islam.

So we have this bizarre firestorm over a serious misdemeanor of a whacked out Congressman while thousands die in the War Without End in Iraq, Afghanistan has its largest poppy crop in history, a leading Republican Senator recommends inviting the Taliban into the Afghan government, Hezbollah continues to grow in strength in Lebanon, the U.S. middle class is disappearing downward, not upward, hope for peace in the Middle East has largely disappeared, and Bush et al just might be plotting an idiotic military adventure in Iran.  And oh yeah, North Korea – that’s the country that actually HAS nuclear weapons, is preparing to test one. President Bush (aka Skippy) is touring the country raising money so we can re-elect the buffoons who have put us where we are. In Stupidistan.

Condi’s Incompetence

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According to the new Woodward book, verified today by White House sources, Secretary Rice has conveniently misplaced or misfiled in her mind a meeting with George Tenet in July 2001 in which he urgently warned of an impending attack by Al Qaeda.

In an administration overloaded with incompetence, Rice is a particularly fatuous figure. Warned about an Al Qaeda attack she never flinched – just ignored it. As head of the National Security Agency she supported the invasion of Iraq based on phony evidence.  Either she knew it was phony and ignored it or did not know when she should have. As Secretary of State she supported a misguided bombing campaign of Lebanon by Israel despite Lebanon being one of our few friends in the region. She followed that up by refusing to support a ceasefire, which would have spared Lebanon a portion of the violence visited on it. She has consistently presented the view that we cannot negotiate directly with North Korea or Iran without appearing weak. North Korea is now about to test a nuclear device; Iran continues to move – albeit slowly – toward development of nuclear weapons.

Is there a single positive accomplishment in her nearly 6 years in positions of influence?

The Americanization of Canadian Media

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The role of the Canadian press in the Maher Arar fiasco presents some interesting parallels to the Judith Miller run-up to Iraq reporting fiasco. Miller, at the time a NY Times correspondent, was used by anonymous administration sources to publish deceptive information intended to aid in the selling of the Iraq War. While it was never clear how much she actually believed of what she wrote the consequences are obvious and the damage has been done.

The Arar fiasco, as reported in today’s NY Times business section, included CTV’s (Canada’s largest private TV network) main nightly news show broadcasting that information from ”senior government officials in various departments” showed that Mr. Arar had given Syrian officials information about Al Qaeda and terrorist cells in Canada.

Juliet O’Neill published a 1,500-word, front-page article in The Ottawa Citizen under the headline ”Canada’s Dossier on Maher Arar.”  Her article cited leaked documents and a ”security source.” They revealed, the report said, that the Canadian police had ”caught Mr. Arar in their sights while investigating the activities of members of an alleged Al Qaeda logistical support group in Ottawa.”

The NY Times reports that ”although the leaks have now been shown to be completely false, Scott Anderson, The Citizen’s editor in chief, said last week that he had no regrets about publishing the report. ”Just the opposite. The story stands up completely,” he said.”

Anderson’s response is absurd.  The issue here is the laziness of reporters who will run with anyone’s garbage for a front-page scoop and the weakness of editors who refuse to push their reporters to do the hard work of serious journalism. Leaks from anonymous sources may be a necessary journalist tool but their use requires the hard work needed to verify them before destroying someone’s reputation or helping to start a war.

Press and Politics: A Synergy of Sorts

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A friend from New Zealand with considerable experience in American politics and a very good analytical sense points out to me that the Bush response to the NY Times and Washington Post reports on the National Intelligence Estimate is an indication of the power of the press in the best sense. Bush was forced to respond and respond he – sort of – did. Bush and his gang have managed the press for over five years and the press is finally and belatedly finding some courage and integrity. I don’t mean Fox News or the ilk, but serious press. No more Judith Miller; no more weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, no more sexed-up intelligence shoved on the American people by a complacent press to support a war based on bullshit. One can hope…

So what we have is Bush being forced to declassify “portions” of the NIE – that is, those portions that might provide some slim support for his theses on the war in Iraq. Obviously the best thing would be to release the entire report – he will not do that – too much political damage. End of the day I have to ask – Is there a room in the Smithsonian for the last supporter of the Iraq Fiasco? An exhibit with Rummy holding hands with General Westmoreland — Bush on his knees praying to the God of hopeless causes– Cheney swimming in Halliburton’s dough. Scenes from our American hell.

Brain Dead at the White House

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Ok– the NY Times and Washington Post have reported on the NIE report that our Iraq fiasco has increased the terrorist threat; the President’s response is a typical moronic babble to the effect that we should not have been provided this information and that he would release – selectively – further information that would make it plain as can be that our Iraq fiasco was a wonderful adventure – as long as your kid wasn’t one of the ones giving it up for a pile of Texas bullshit. I understand that the press thinks it needs to treat this crap seriously – I just wonder why?

Skippy has consistently lied about everything connected to Iraq and the press was complicit in this (see Judith Miller et alia) It is actually not clear why he did it – was it his Daddy’s failure in 1991 to finish it off and a Freudian need to one-up him? Was it the Israel lobby that moved him? The direct voices from God? Wolfkowitz’s nutty obsession with Iraq? Cheney’s desire to set up a profit machine for Halliburton?

There is really no good reason for it and the puzzle remains because Skippy seems to actually believe what his speechwriters have written. What seems clear is that we have a president who does not enjoy good mental health. He avoids reality, believes he speaks personally with God, sends young Americans to death on a series of known lies, has destroyed the reputation of Colin Powell a former American hero, supports the most incompetent Defense Secretary in the country’s history, and has the audacity to go on TV and claim that everyone around him is naive. If only we knew what he knows. It is past time for America to embrace sanity.

Unpaid Political Ads on Cable TV

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There are a lot of ways to reduce the costs of presenting the news. One way on cable news channels is to broadcast a political speech and call it news – even “breaking news”. NECN (New England Cable News) has just finished broadcasting a speech by Massachusetts Governor in Absentia Mitt Romney in defense of his Lt. Governor Kerry Healey. She was embarrassed in a debate last night and Mitt decided to come to her rescue (no need to comment on a female candidate for Governor needing help from her alpha male mentor). And NECN carried it as news when it was clearly a political bag job.

Clown School on the Hill

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The following quotes are from retired military testifying to an Iraq forum organized by Senate Democrats and boycotted by Republican Senators due to their fear of learning something.

“I believe that Secretary Rumsfeld and others in the administration did not tell the American people the truth for fear of losing support for the war in Iraq,” retired Army Maj. Gen. John Batiste. Batiste, who commanded the Army’s 1st Infantry Division in Iraq, said Rumsfeld at one point had threatened to fire the next person who mentioned the need for a postwar plan. Batiste also said Congress had failed to ask “the tough questions.”

Retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton assessed Rumsfeld as “incompetent strategically, operationally and tactically….”Mr. Rumsfeld and his immediate team must be replaced or we will see two more years of extraordinarily bad decision making.”

Comments from two senior Republican Senators are evidence that some clowns are simply not educable.

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, a member of the Armed Services Committee, called Monday’s event “an election-year smoke screen aimed at obscuring the Democrats’ dismal record on national security.”

Said Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.: “Today’s stunt may rile up the liberal base, but it won’t kill a single terrorist or prevent a single attack.”

The Clowns on the Hill

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Senators McCain, Warner and Graham, made a half-hearted attempt to salvage habeas corpus from the administration’s Constitution wreckers. Sen. Spector, having caved once already this month, on the wire-tapping bill, has re-discovered his spine and called for hearings on the bill, called by Rolling Stone’s Tom Dickinson the “Abu Ghraib Authorization and Whitewash Act of 2006”.
Is the Senate really ready to throw the U.S. Constitution under the train to further the political interests of the loonies in the Bush administration? Probably.

Senator Spector was likely driven by the embarrassment of a bill removing the precious Constitutional protection of habeas corpus heading for the Senate floor with no hearings in his Judiciary Committee.  But given his having collaborated with Vice President Cheney on the wiretap whitewash there is no reason not to believe that the American people will once again be sold down the river.