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Thursday, October 07, 2004
EVERYTHING IS BROKEN. Paging
through the headlines this morning, it struck me that, as never
before, everything is falling apart for George W. Bush, and it's
happening in a very ugly, public way. That doesn't mean he's going to
lose - he should, of course, although we all know that's not how
things necessarily work. But it seems that all at once, nearly four
years of lies, exaggerations, and bullying are finally catching up
with him.
Just look around. His chief weapons
inspector, Charles Duelfer, now acknowledges
that Saddam Hussein had dismantled his WMD programs in the early
1990s. Loyalist that he is, Duelfer prattled on yesterday about how
Saddam really, really wanted weapons of mass destruction, as though
that were something we didn't know. Guess what? So does Burma, I'm
sure.
Earlier this week, as we know,
Bush's former guy in Iraq, Paul Bremer, said in a speech that the
White House had never sent enough troops to Iraq to keep the peace.
Again, this is another Bush loyalist, a man who immediately tried to
distance himself from his own remarks as soon as he realized they
were not off the record, as he had presumed. Looks like he can forget
about being secretary
of state if Bush is elected
to a second term.
Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld has been spinning
all week to dissociate
himself from remarks that he'd seen no "strong, hard evidence" that
Saddam Hussein had ties to Al Qaeda. Again, as with Duelfer and
Bremer: not a critic, but rather someone so loyal to Bush that he's
clearly mortified over his momentary outburst of candor.
At Tuesday night's vice-presidential
debate, moderator Gwen
Ifill asked John Edwards if Saddam would still be in power if he and
John Kerry had been in office. Edwards, sensing trouble, evaded the
question. That was probably smart.
But Edwards certainly wouldn't have
harmed himself with Media Log if he had spelled out explicitly the
clear implications of Kerry's approach to Iraq:
You know, Gwen, maybe
Saddam would be still in power. At the time that Bush went to war
with Iraq, there were UN weapons inspectors on the ground, and
Saddam was boxed in by economic sanctions and no-fly zones in the
north and south of his country. If the inspectors had found
weapons, or had presented convincing evidence that Saddam was
trying to hide something, then I'm confident we could have built a
real alliance and gone to war to overthrow him. But if not, then
yes, Saddam Hussein would probably still be in power today. What
of it?
An impolitic answer? Sure. But 1066
Americans would still be alive today (this
count is as of Tuesday),
not to mention other coalition forces and many thousands of Iraqis.
And the United States would be not one bit less safe.
Meanwhile, Bush is getting
desperate. Read how the
White House hoodwinked CNN
and MSNBC into televising his latest attack speech yesterday, under
the guise of its being a major presidential address.
NEW IN THIS WEEK'S
PHOENIX. The latest
on WBUR Radio (90.9 FM) and
its embattled general manager, Jane Christo, whose possible departure
is now the subject of speculation. Also, unpacking those pro-Bush
Gallup polls, and liberal radio comes (almost) to Boston.
posted at 9:35 AM |
2 comments
|
link
2 Comments:
Re. WBUR/NPR
Will WBUR/NPR, a recipient of Federal funds from multiple directions, thus required to comply with Federal law, such as the First Amendment, be reporting on Ms. Christo's "problems," and how overpayed she and others at the station are?
Or will WBUR/NPR suppress the story in violation of those requirements?
Joseph J. Nagarya, Legal Professional
Boston, MA
Of course, the second I heard Gwen's question, I heard the snippy Bush follow-up (even though he wasn't in the room at the time): what about Saddam's human rights abuses?
I say, what about our own? But I'm a blame-America-first liberal.
MEDIA LOG ARCHIVES
Dan Kennedy is senior writer and media critic for the Boston Phoenix.
