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Title: !YROTCIV in Iraq
Source:
SLATE
URL Source: http://www.slate.com/id/2150162/tap2/
Published: Sep 27, 2006
Author: Michael Kinsley
Post Date: 2006-09-27 10:09:18 by bluedogtxn
Keywords: None
Views: 323
Comments: 6
Yrotciv in Iraq Bush's backpedaling on the war. By Michael Kinsley Posted Friday, Sept. 22, 2006, at 7:38 AM ET Harold Pinter wrote a play a while back called Betrayal. (Rent the movie: It's terrific.) The plot was a fairly mundane story about an adulterous affair among affluent London literati. What gives the tale its haunting magic is that Pinter tells it in reverse: starting with the couple breaking up and ending with that first, ambiguous flirtation.
Others have tried this device. Martin Amis used it in a novel called Time's Arrow to make some point or other about the dangers of nuclear war. There is a Stephen Sondheim musical called Merrily We Roll Along, which starts with the hero as an unattractive middle-aged Hollywood power player and ends with him as an idealistic youth gazing toward "the hills of tomorrow." A clever movie several years ago called Memento used the time-backward trick as a way to imitate for the audience the effect of amnesia.
So, it's been used by some of the masters. And it's a good trick: disorienting, as modern art is supposed to be, and with built-in poignance. But that doesn't mean that anyone can pull it off. Frankly, I would have pegged George W. Bush—whose awareness of his own weaknesses is one of his more attractive traits—as just about the last person in the world who would try this literary jujitsu. But in his own narrative of his own war (the one in Iraq), he has done it. If you trace the concept of "victory" in his remarks on Iraq, and those of subordinates, you discover a war that was won three and a half years ago, and today has barely started.
Return with me, if you will, to May 1, 2003. That was the day Bush landed on the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln, and—under a banner declaring "Mission Accomplished"—declared that "major combat operations in Iraq have ended" and "the United States and our allies have prevailed. (Applause.)" (This is from the official White House transcript.) The White House claimed that the banner was somebody else's idea and that Bush didn't declare victory in so many words. But Bush did use the word "victory," saying that Iraq was "one victory in a war on terror ... " And as I recall, the occasion was pretty triumphal. Perhaps you remember differently. And in his radio address two days later, Bush used the term "victory" unabashedly.
Soon, however, the concept of "victory" became more fluid. There is not just one victory, but many. Or, as then-press secretary Scott McClellan put it in August 2004, "Every progress made in Iraq since the collapse of Saddam's regime is a victory against the terrorists and enemies of Iraq." And there was a subtle shift from declaring how wonderful victory was to emphasizing how wonderful it will be. "The rise of democracy in Iraq will be an essential victory in the war on terror," the vice president said in April 2004.
During his 2004 presidential campaign, Bush said repeatedly that one reason to vote for him over Sen. John Kerry was that he, Bush, had "a strategy that will lead to victory. And that strategy has four commitments." By October 2005, these four "commitments" had been honed down to three "prongs." Then they metastasized into four "categories for victory. And they're clear, and our command structure and our diplomats in Iraq understand the definition of victory." It's nice that someone does.
It was during the 2004 campaign that Bush offered his most imaginative explanation for why victory in Iraq looked so much like failure. "Because we achieved such a rapid victory"—note that it is once more, briefly, a victory—"more of the Saddam loyalists were [still] around."
On May 1, 2006, the third anniversary of "mission accomplished," White House press secretary Scott McClellan was asked whether "victory" had been achieved in Iraq. He said, "We're making real progress on our plan for victory. ... We are on the path to victory. We are winning in Iraq. But there is more work to do." Democrats should shut up because their criticism of the president "does nothing to help advance our goal of achieving victory in Iraq." (Once victory is achieved, presumably, it will be OK for Democrats to criticize.) And make no mistake: "[W]hen the job in Iraq is done, it will be a major victory."
On Aug. 28, criticizing "self-defeating pessimism," Vice President Cheney said there are "only two options in Iraq—victory or defeat." On Aug. 31, Bush said that "victory in Iraq will be difficult and it will require more sacrifice." He predicted that "victory in Iraq will be a crushing defeat for our enemies"—which, as a tautology, is a safe bet.
Which brings us to last week, and Bush's television speech on the fifth anniversary of Sept. 11, 2001. "Bush Says Iraq Victory Is Vital" was the Washington Post's accurate headline. And Bush was eloquent. "Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more … " Well, maybe not that eloquent. But his point was the same as Henry V's: Don't give up now! "Mistakes have been made in Iraq," he conceded. He even conceded that "Saddam Hussein was not responsible for the 9/11 attacks." But let us not, for mercy's sake, learn anything from five years of experience. Instead, let's just pretend it all never happened. After all, we won this war back in 2003.
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#1. To: bluedogtxn (#0)
Very funny! "If there’s another 9/11 or a major war in the Middle-East involving a U.S. attack on Iran, I have no doubt that there will be, the day after or within days an equivalent of a Reichstag fire decree that will involve massive detentions in this country." - Daniel Ellsberg Author, Pentagon Papers Nice find and post. How does the media let Bush get away with constantly re-defining victory?
Not just clever: great! If you consider one of the perks of your criminal trial practice to be the vicarious thrill of hearing and investigating outrageous stories from the seamy underworld, you will appreciate Memento.
Well, it's interesting. I think the media have gotten oversensitive to the idea that they are "liberal" or "unpatriotic" or whatever. I really don't see a liberal bias in the media at large, what I see instead is this kind of servile bending over backward to give the appearance of neutrality. No matter how servile they become, however, the Bushistas continue to go after them for their "bias"; which means they bend even further backward and the truth and critical thinking get lost. Plus there is this "attention span" thing out there, where a detailed analysis would take hours to cover, and the average news story had better be shorter than five minutes or you are going to lose viewers to COPs reruns or whatever. News has become about ratings, not offending anyone and preserving appearances, at the cost of really looking for the truth. Then there are the alternative media, such as am radio, who are cheerful cheerleaders for anything the Bushies do, and who lambast the regular guys with tabloid like immunity. If you want to see how truly far we've fallen as a country from the truth, listen to an hour of Limbaugh. When the farts that come out of his mouth pass for wisdom in America, you know we've lost any semblance of greatness or of thought in this country.
the law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal bread.
Yes; the media should have laughed Bush right out of the nomination in 2000.
insane leader bump
#2. To: bluedogtxn (#0)
Frankly, I would have pegged George W. Bush—whose awareness of his own weaknesses is one of his more attractive traits—as just about the last person in the world who would try this literary jujitsu.
#3. To: bluedogtxn (#0)
Soon, however, the concept of "victory" became more fluid.
#4. To: bluedogtxn (#0)
clever movie several years ago called Memento
#5. To: leveller (#3)
How does the media let Bush get away with constantly re-defining victory?
#6. To: bluedogtxn (#5)
servile bending over backward to give the appearance of neutrality.
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