Politics and Press

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

Iraq

Former State Department official leaves Bush Ranch

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Richard Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations previews in the Financial Times an essay on the troubled future of the Middle East, which will be published in the November-December issue of Foreign Affairs. The Op Ed in the Financial Times indicates a switch for Haass who was something of an administration cheerleader for the effort to bring democracy in Iraq. (see W. Post editorial, Dec. 29, 2002) who left the State Department in mid -2003.

Haass’s movement away from the Bush Administration on its Middle East policies seems to be peaking as he writes in the FT: “It is just more than two centuries since Napoleon’s arrival in Egypt heralded the advent of a modern Middle East; but now – some 80 years after the demise of the Ottoman Empire, 50 years after the end of colonialism and less than 20 years after the end of the cold war – the American era in the region has ended. Visions of a new Europe-like Middle East that is peaceful, prosperous and democratic will not be realised….No one should count on the emergence of democracy to pacify the region….”

Iraqi Death Count and the Press

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The editor of Editor and Publisher, Greg Mitchell, considers the recently reported estimate of 600,000 civilian deaths in Iraq since the invasion in 2003 in the magazine’s current issue.  He is particularly interested in the issue of the press’s failure to adequately look at and do the hard work to adequately account for Iraq’s civilian deaths.

He considers the credibility of the estimate of 600,000 that came from work carried out by the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins, compares it to the credibility of President Bush’s response, looks at the different ways the press dealt with the report, from the AP’s immediate “can’t be right” response to the Washington Post’s more thoughtful consideration, provides some data speculating on what would be comparable numbers in the U.S. and leaves the reader numbed with the reality of what we have created in Iraq. President Bush’s response in a press conference was:

“I am, you know, amazed that this is a society which so wants to be free that they’re willing to — you know, that there’s a level of violence that they tolerate.”

Read the article at the Editor and Publisher website.

Christine Amanpour:The Press in War in 2006

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A recent interview with Christine Amanpour describes the challenges of reporting in Iraq in 2006. The challenges come from two directions: the Bush administration constantly calling reality into question and the insurgents threatening death on reporters. The interview appeared on the website for Campus Progress and was carried out at Harvard. An interesting discussion by one of our best journalists.

David Frum’s Axis of Ego

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On today’s NY Times Op Ed page David Frum gives us a terrific example of the nuttiness that gave us the Iraq War. Frum is the former White House speechwriter who helped to coin the phrase “Axis of Evil” a phrase that nicely captures the areas where the Bush foreign policy strategy has so miserably failed. No need to remind anyone of the Iraq fiasco, but Iran and North Korea remain to be totally screwed up and Frum is the right guy to advise on just how to continue doing that.

In a typically dishonest maneuver Frum comments in his opening paragraph that over the past dozen years of American policy Pakistan and North Korea have developed nuclear weapons. That would put the timeframe solidly in the Clinton years while N. Korea’s nuclear plans reached its current level entirely during Bush Junior’s tenure. Pakistan developed its program beginning in the mid 1970’s and in October 1990, then-President Bush (senior) announced that he could no longer provide Congress with Pressler Amendment certification that Pakistan did not possess a nuclear weapon. Also on today’s Times Op Ed page Nicholas Kristof reminds us that N. Korea obtained zero plutonium during Clinton’s presidency while under the current administration they obtained “…enough plutonium for about eight nuclear weapons”. For background information on the development of weapons of mass destruction around the world see the Federation of American Scientists website.
Frum’s recommendations avoid placing any responsibility for the current state with the Bush administration and outlines a series of “four swift” actions for the U.S. to take that are uniformly unrealistic.

One: “Step up the development and deployment of existing missile defense systems”. He admits that these systems “are not perfect – but they are something.” What they are is unreliable.

Two: “End humanitarian aid to N. Korea and pressure S. Korea to do the same.” Frum says that this would serve to punish both N. Korea and China and perhaps he is right. But S. Korea is highly unlikely to “swiftly” agree to move away from its “sunshine” policy simply because we tell them to do so. End of the day S. Korea is the country most immediately at risk and China, after all, can return any favor of punishment we might choose to give to them via its economic clout.

Three: “Invite Japan, S. Korea, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore to join NATO…” I am hoping that our Kiwi correspondent will comment on the likelihood of New Zealand running to join NATO. I will simply comment that anyone thinking that NATO would do that “swiftly” lives on a different planet.

Four: “Encourage Japan to renounce the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and create its own nuclear deterrent.” He likes this idea partially because it would also punish those evil Chinese. (who would not respond in any way, like cashing in their U.S. debt chips, for instance).

There is much that is striking in Frum’s piece but perhaps most striking is its resolute inability to place any responsibility on the administration within which he once served. The Bush administration has resolutely refused to negotiate directly with N. Korea or Iran so Frum’s comment to the effect that diplomacy has not worked ignores the fact that real diplomacy has not been tried. A very good piece on the lack of a coherent U.S. policy towards N. Korea by Stephen Bosworth and Morton Abramowitz, published in the Financial Times in February 2005, is available on Bosworth’s website.

What seems apparent is that the world has become significantly more dangerious on the watch of Mr. Frum’s former employers.

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?

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.

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.”

Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Worsens Terrorism Threat

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In a solid piece of reporting, Mark Mazzetti writes in today’s online NY Times: “A stark assessment of terrorism trends by American intelligence agencies has found that the American invasion and occupation of Iraq has helped spawn a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the Sept. 11 attacks.

The classified National Intelligence Estimate attributes a more direct role to the Iraq war in fueling radicalism than that presented either in recent White House documents or in a report released Wednesday by the House Intelligence Committee, according to several officials in Washington involved in preparing the assessment or who have read the final document.

The intelligence estimate, completed in April, is the first formal appraisal of global terrorism by United States intelligence agencies since the Iraq war began, and represents a consensus view of the 16 disparate spy services inside government. Titled “Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States,’’ it asserts that Islamic radicalism, rather than being in retreat, has metastasized and spread across the globe.

An opening section of the report, “Indicators of the Spread of the Global Jihadist Movement,” cites the Iraq war as a reason for the diffusion of jihad ideology.

The report “says that the Iraq war has made the overall terrorism problem worse,” said one American intelligence official…”

No further comment.

Rummy’s Offensive Defense

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In a new low for even this administration, Donald Rumsfeld has determined that critics of his incomprehensibly incompetent leadership of the so-called war on terror, are to be compared with appeasers of Hitler. Speaking at the American Legion’s national convention (as low-risk an audience as he could possibly find) in Salt Lake City Rumsfeld attacked the media and other critics of the administration, saying “Any kind of moral and intellectual confusion about who and what is right or wrong can severely weaken the ability of free societies to persevere.” His comments were seconded by Secretary of State Rice who commented that “we cannot fall prey to pessimism about how this will all come out,” adding that “the really devastating problem for the world would be if America loses its will.” (source – Washington Post)

Having consistently lied about why we invaded Iraq – no weapons of mass destruction found, no connection of Saddam to Al Qaeda found – the administration is reduced to fear-mongering and slander. The administration’s criticism of its critics ends up being aimed at the majority of Americans who have (finally) determined that we have a bankrupt policy which has failed in every way to do what it was set out to do.