George, Tom, and Ben et al Were Not Birthing a Nation of Fools

There is a truly depressing sound that resembles drumbeating off in the distance, evoking memories of 2002 and early 2003. This was a time when a significant minority of Americans - generally those actually alert, paying attention, and possibly even aggressively foraging for news - were highly skeptical of the claims of the warmongers in the white house and elsewhere - disgustingly parroted by owned or unthinking major media - that a preemptive invasion of Iraq was justified, never mind sensible.

Well, glory be, that minority has now swelled to the point where it seems plausible there are a majority of citizens who have realized for one reason or another that the Bush War is an absolute freaking disaster. It is obvious the outcome of the uncalled for invasion is chaos of the first order, and equally obvious it was purposely sold in bad faith with faked, forged, and corrupt attempted justifications. It is a disaster on almost every level as a mere military/political operation in isolation from the rest of the world, but of course that is just the start of it.

If you are in the school actively managing your own get-the-news-instead-of-the-glitz program these days (e.g., via FireDogLake's fantastic Libby Trial coverage - I strongly recommend no less than daily check-ins), you are getting all the confirmation a thinker (activist?!?) needs that this administration is even more aggressive and criminal in operation than was Dirty Dick's operation in invoking secrecy and taking no prisoners when it comes to their sleazy crimes being revealed. It needs to be said again and again that "national security" and "executive privilege" are terms used by this administration almost exclusively to cover their own criminality. They have far less interest in actually pursuing terrorism or "keeping the country safe" than in planting fake news, mongering fear, and otherwise milking the sad state of mainstream media to goose the unthinking in-denial now-minority into being unwilling to question whether they have something going on there.

It's not working like it once did.

Besides the white house-managed war-crimes program that made the invasion happen, of course, the total incompetence of the Rumsfeld/Cheney apparatchik in focusing everything on the glorious floral displays and love-fest that would inevitably be showered on the Mother of All Invaders was absolutely key to the bush debacle. The idea that the planning would emphasize maximizing PR exploitation of this re-creation of the Summer of Love in the Tigris-Euphrates region (no doubt missed in the original and everlastingly regretted by Don, Dick, and George, et al) rather than any meaningful program for managing the aftermath is still flabbergasting. I predict this will become one of the textbook examples of Accountability Denial.

This is Anti-Woodstock times a thousand (or more). That contrast just came to me and may deserve more pondered attention, but here and now, recall that Woodstock involved hundreds of thousands of folks. They descended on a fully cooperative farmer's field. Traffic and security planning could definitely have been better. Weather was flat-out uncooperative. Supplies, transportation, health care, and equipment were not always available in adequate quantity or quality (e.g., recall outhouse limitations, rumors about "brown acid" not being so good, etc.). Many if not most of the neighbors were hostile - and that resonated with the media and citizenry, a bit horrified at this chaotic "thing" that was evolving in unpredictable fashion and possibly even attracting their offspring.

But that event is now a cultural watershed; we'll never have even a minor good memory, individually or as a nation, of Bush's War. Time will not heal, never mind erase Bush's War. This war has permanently sullied and scarred us collectively, both to ourselves and in the view of the world, and there is nothing we, never mind he can do to alter that.

The Bush War will obviously also be central in the now inevitably pathetic dual george bush legacies. That's right - corrupt, cynical, and anti-American as underking george the first's lifestory truly was, there seemed a chance those still rapturously licking the smegma of Reagan (another draft-dodging chickenhawk faker!) would have been able to cobble together a Stalinesque bio for him. It will now be written far more darkly as a result of his failure to exert any positive influence on his evil spawn. Why oh why were you so slow to learn of the possibilities of birth control, Barb (and George I)? Why were you too good for abstinence when it would so clearly have been the single truly Patriotic act of your weasily little existences? (Actually, fyi, a public acknowledgement of that misguided binge involving unprotected lapse of abstinence - and flicker of affection? - might help offset the destruction of what little positive rep you have left at this point - think on it. No - on further thought even I am too squeamish to want any potential for images of the mingling haunting me.)

Another scary thing here, given the above, is that were george II to pull his head out of whatever orifice it has been in he might conclude he truly has nothing to lose. What a state of mind for a supposed chief of state! Especially one with an egomaniacal streak and on increasingly strong evidence actually more or less a puppet to a truly demented self-appointed VP.

That is the sabers a-rattle context for the intro here.

I direct your attention to Dan Froomkin at his secondary venue (Nieman Watch). He is appropriately lecturing the mainstream media in this post. It iw well established now that these folks unquestioningly printed flat-out administration propaganda and rarely asked critical questions or offered opinions that might be considered to contradict (or offend, heaven forbid!) the administration in the shared admininstration/corporate-owned-media charade runup to the Iraq invasion. You're probably well aware if you are reading this that our mainstream media failed us.

Froomkin imho should have been more scathing - even the NY Times and WA Post, never mind the obviously sycophantic WSJ and truly obsequious WA Times, NY Post, and Fox "news" are probably reasonable candidates for lawsuits or at least loss of credentials for their pathetic warmongering in particular, but also the cowardly subservience and near-forfeiture of any semblance of consistent truly independent journalistic outlook. They have all become mouthpieces for criminals, to varying degrees. Alas, poor Gray Lady for the company you have been keeping.

Lessons we thought had been learned from Vietnam were forgotten in the rush to invade Iraq. And now, as we cover President Bush’s ratcheting up of the rhetoric against Iran, it’s looking like the lessons we should have learned from Iraq may not have been learned at all. So at the risk of stating the obvious, here are some thoughts about what those lessons were. (Feel free to add more in comments.)

You Can’t Be Too Skeptical of Authority

Don’t assume anything administration officials tell you is true. In fact, you are probably better off assuming anything they tell you is a lie.

Demand proof for their every assertion. Assume the proof is a lie. Demand that they prove that their proof is accurate.

Just because they say it, doesn’t mean it should be make the headlines. The absence of supporting evidence for their assertion -- or a preponderance of evidence that contradicts the assertion -- may be more newsworthy than the assertion itself.

Don’t print anonymous assertions. Demand that sources make themselves accountable for what they insist is true.

Provocation Alone Does Not Justify War

War is so serious that even proving the existence of a casus belli isn’t enough. Make officials prove to the public that going to war will make things better.

Demand to know what happens if the war (or tactical strike) doesn’t go as planned?

Demand to know what happens if it does? What happens after “victory”?

Ask them: Isn’t it possible this will make things worse, rather than better?

Be Particularly Skeptical of Secrecy

Don’t assume that these officials, with their access to secret intelligence, know more than you do.

Alternately, assume that they do indeed know more than you do – and are trying to keep intelligence that would undermine their arguments secret.

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