July 24, 2004
Friday's Trash
Like a number of other interesting pieces of ‘inside politics’ one learns by watching NBC’s West Wing, there is the notion of the ‘Friday Trash’. The news cycle that begins on Friday leading into the weekend is the period when most folks are not paying attention to the news, reading newspaper, nor a time conducive to breaking stories. Therefore, inside the Beltway, it’s the preferred time to put out press releases or stories considered inconsequential – and, those desperately needed to be disregarded, as such.
Fortunately, for the boys at RoveVision, this week they got a two-fer, an extended ‘Friday Trash’ cycle. If it were not for the media dominance of the release of the 9/11 Commission Report, the press conference, followed by the cable news network pundit-fest, the Army's Report on the Prisoner Abuse Scandal would’ve gotten (and, more deserving of) the same out of proportion attention paid to Sandy Berger’s screw up.
At the hastily called hearing of the Senate Armed Service Committee, the blindsided Democrats were well within their rights to infer, if not outright accuse the Army and the Bush administration of a ‘whitewash’. Reaching this conclusion would only need as evidence, the stark contradiction of this report juxtaposed against the Army’s earlier investigation by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba. (In contrast, Taguba’s report was widely praised for its frank and straightforward assessment and recommendations.)
Then there’s the matter of the National Guard payroll records of George W. Bush from late 1972. I caution those here debating from the Right, to refrain from accusing us on the Left of purposely perpetuating this story, when the record keeping of the remaining documents on Bush’s stint in the reserves, appear to be in the hands of a Cpl. Max Klinger, and not a Cpl. ‘Radar’ O’Reilly. If it were not for the suit filed by the Associated Press seeking to have this information released by the Pentagon, the White House may have had an even more ideal opportunity of dropping this puppy in the middle of next week’s Dem love fest.
This past week at WatchBlog, the most heated debate (where the Red Column Editors were more than happy to actually engage in), centered on the Sandy Berger story. Through numerous Comment thread postings, the consensus of those of us from the Blue Column was this was nothing but a ‘fishing expedition’. House Speaker Dennis Hastert offered up one of the many conspiratorial theories as to Berger’s motive, which was quickly refuted, illustrating yet again the Conservatives aversion to fact checking.
In spite of the fact that it is now five full days, and the Berger incident has run the gamut thru the court of public punditry probing, Republicans still insist on an inquiry, and I agree. If the arguing roles were reversed, they charge, we Liberals would be demanding nothing less. Yet, with a glaring absence of a devious political motive on Berger’s part, can’t we, at least, move on to more pressing issues facing this nation?
More pressing issues, than the fact that the White House continues to parcel out documents (reluctantly, and now, only after legally forced) about Bush’s National Guard service, posing possibly new damaging questions. And, more pressing issues than calling for an inquiry into the possible chicanery behind a disputed Prisoner Abuse report, that contradicts every previous military investigation?
I went through the last three months of WatchBlog Blue Column archives, searching for an entry on the subject of the revisions to the State Dept.’s ‘2003 Patterns of Global Terrorism’ Report, issued April 29. I could find no such entry, nor a lengthy Comment thread debating the correction's suspicious nature. But, as I wrote recently, we on the Left took the word of the last credible member of the present adminstration, when Colin Powell insisted there was no scheme to ‘cook the number’, but instead, explained it as the fault of a simple clerical error. We did not call for an investigation or inquiry, although a clear motive would be to help the President claim tangible success in the most crucial of campaign issues.
Oh, but that would be more hateful, Liberal trash talking and Bush-bashing, and no concern of any Conservative debaters here.
But, did you hear what that Linda Ronstadt said?
Posted by Bert M. Caradine at July 24, 2004 08:13 PMThe Army’s report will get more attention here, I guarantee it. The testimony on Friday was just too contradictory and partisanly received and interpreted to not have an article of its own. Watch the 3rd Party column over the next couple days.
Posted by: David R. Remer at July 24, 2004 08:45 PMExcellent post, Bert.
Interesting how the press has now forgotten about Abu Ghraib, even though the news has only gotten worse.
I’m wondering is this fatigue or suppression. I have a Pakistani friend who I have occasionally talk about politics with. (Although we haven’t talked for several months). He and I have laughed about how Americans seem to think they get unbiased news rather than propoganda.
While the news is out there and I believe most watchbloggers are informed, most Americans seem to be blissfully unaware of what their government does.
Posted by: Greg at July 24, 2004 11:42 PMThe situation surrounding Bush’s military records has been beyond sureal. Back in the 2000 campaign Bush said that he would release all of his records, and I believe he had even promised this before during one of his campaigns for Governor of Texas. Despite years of promises, records and information are still trickling out and all of it points to the same conclusion: there is a large swath of time during which Bush simply disappeared. And despite all of this, our commander-in-chief’s clear abrogation of his duty doesn’t seem to be a story that the media is interested in conveying. Instead, when sought-after records are claimed to have been miraculously destroyed, or when those same records (after a lawsuit) later turn out not to have been destroyed, many people don’t begin to look askance. I find it hard to understand.
Posted by: Gaelen Burns at July 24, 2004 11:54 PMWHAAAAAA^T!
Let me get this straight, okay. Your saying that the network news we get in this country is chock full of pablem and idiotic filler! Whaaaaaaat!
YOU BLEW MY MIND!
:>@:)
Posted by: SB at July 25, 2004 12:58 AMGaelen, Bush isn’t withholding any records—he’s released all that he has the authority to release.
Contrast that to Kerry, who promised to release his records and and then never did so.
I know that some would like to manufacture a scandal over the fact that the Pentagon doesn’t keep perfect records of every detail of the service records everybody who served in the National Guard, but as more records trickle out as they’re found in remote Pentagon basements, the baselessness of this manufactured story becomes ever more obvious. Only blind, naked partisanship keeps this non-story going.
I gather, by the above comments, that the left believes it’s the media’s holy duty to talk about nothing but Abu Ghraib 24 hours a day, but we’ve had months of it already. And at the end of the day, it has nothing to do with Bush. Turn to Al Jazeera if that’s all you’re interested in—there are more important stories out there now for serious-minded people.
Posted by: Martin at July 25, 2004 01:36 AMHere you go, Martin,
www.johnkerry.com/about/service
And, to repeat:
I caution those here debating from the Right, to refrain from accusing us on the Left of purposely perpetuating this story, when the record keeping of the remaining documents on Bush’s stint in the reserves, appear to be in the hands of a Cpl. Max Klinger, and not a Cpl. ‘Radar’ O’Reilly.
Posted by: Bert M. Caradine at July 25, 2004 03:51 AMNo, Martin, there aren’t more important stories out there now, than the Abu Ghraib and 900+ other documented and alleged abuses across the Afghanistan - Guantanomo - Iraq divide. We gave the insurgents and terrorists reason for retribution - that is serious business when the rest of the world is looking on and examining our actions intently.
Posted by: David R. Remer at July 25, 2004 04:33 AMLook, the terrorist out there are cynical, dedicated enemies of our country, and in regards to our behavior, we have two choices: we can either feed them real things to get people angry about, or we can force them to do a lot of heavy reinterpretation of otherwise innocuous actions.
We would stand to benefit from the second, obviously, more than the first. It’s in our best interests not to vindicate the terrorists, but instead to behave in such a way that they have to sound like cranks and conspiracy theorists to their own people to badmouth us.
Bush unfortunately, just hands them the propaganda victories. All that’s going to do is line up people against us.
Posted by: Stephen Daugherty at July 25, 2004 09:33 AMAn al Qaeda spokesman, quoted on the Arabic news Web site www.elaph.com, said the organization hoped George Bush would win re-election, “because he acts with force rather than wisdom or shrewdness, and it is his religious fanaticism that will rouse our (Islamic) nation, as has been shown. Being targeted by an enemy is what will wake us from our slumber.”
Has anyone checked Bush’s Ranger and Pioneer list for Osama bin Laden’s name?
A. Pundit, I am going to pre-empt the right by stating that elaph.com is not speaking the truth. This is a feint, within a feint, within feint. They really don’t want Bush to win, so they are saying that they do want him to win, so all those Christian Americans who hate Arabs will not vote for him.
Pretty damn clever of them Arabs eh? Ooops! Not supposed to give the enemy any credit for anything, so scratch that last comment. The right would not have said that. Sorry.
Americans would do well to walk a mile in Arab shoes. If we were born and raised in an Arabic country, and the U.S. invaded a neighboring Arab state on pretenses that almost all turned out to not be true, would we not be suspicious. And if the net outcome of that invasion was that the U.S. had established a military presence in our region which holds a commodity the Americans desperately need, would we not be incredulous? And if the Americans declared their committment to keep their military might in our region indefinitely, would we not be concerned about our futures?
Americans would do well to consider anyone but Bush.
Posted by: David R. Remer at July 25, 2004 12:06 PMDavid:
Abu Ghraib is an important story, as you suggest. However, like all stories, there is more than just one side—-though our media only writes about one side.
What happened at Abu Ghraib was terrible. Some of it rose to the level of pure torture—other parts (sleep deprivation etc) did not. But lets agree that bad things happened at Abu Ghraib and it did give the enemy a reason to hate us. Not that they needed help in manufacturing reasons, but this one is actually somewhat legit.
The OTHER side of the story is how the Abu Ghraib scandal is being investigated. In Saddam’s Iraq, this type of thing was the norm. People are being prosecuted and held accountable for their actions. People will go to jail as a result.
It is difficult to prevent bad things from happening, because humans are flawed. And sometimes humans seem to like inflicting pain on their enemies.
The biggest story about Abu Ghraib is NOT that some Americans will do terrible things, but rather that America as a nation will hold them accountable for their actions.
We do not see mass Arab disdain for Zarqawi, who has gruesomely (allegedly) murdered people on camera. We do not see the call for proscecution.
America is great not because we are infallible, but rather because we hold to a higher level of conduct. And when we fail to meet that, we hold ourselves accountable.
Posted by: joebagodonuts at July 26, 2004 10:29 AMThe OTHER side of the story is how the Abu Ghraib scandal is being investigated.
I think you mean whitewashed. :)
We do not see mass Arab disdain for Zarqawi
Actually, I saw a lot of that here after Berg’s murder. The ‘Muslim on the street’ interviews here in SE Asia came up with the consensus that what Zarqawi did was bad; Muslims should not stoop to the level of the Americans.
