Our Troops Must StayAmerica can't abandon 27 million Iraqis to 10,000 terrorists.BY JOE LIEBERMANTuesday, November 29, 2005 12:01 a.m.I have just returned from my fourth trip to Iraq in the past 17 months and can report real progress there. More work needs to be done, of course, but the Iraqi people are in reach of a watershed transformation from the primitive, killing tyranny of Saddam to modern, self-governing, self-securing nationhood--unless the great American military that has given them and us this unexpected opportunity is prematurely withdrawn.
Progress is visible and practical. In the Kurdish North, there is continuing security and growing prosperity. The primarily Shiite South remains largely free of terrorism, receives much more electric power and other public services than it did under Saddam, and is experiencing greater economic activity. The Sunni triangle, geographically defined by Baghdad to the east, Tikrit to the north and Ramadi to the west, is where most of the terrorist enemy attacks occur. And yet here, too, there is progress.
There are many more cars on the streets, satellite television dishes on the roofs, and literally millions more cell phones in Iraqi hands than before. All of that says the Iraqi economy is growing. And Sunni candidates are actively campaigning for seats in the National Assembly. People are working their way toward a functioning society and economy in the midst of a very brutal, inhumane, sustained terrorist war against the civilian population and the Iraqi and American military there to protect it.
It is a war between 27 million and 10,000; 27 million Iraqis who want to live lives of freedom, opportunity and prosperity and roughly 10,000 terrorists who are either Saddam revanchists, Iraqi Islamic extremists or al Qaeda foreign fighters who know their wretched causes will be set back if Iraq becomes free and modern. The terrorists are intent on stopping this by instigating a civil war to produce the chaos that will allow Iraq to replace Afghanistan as the base for their fanatical war-making. We are fighting on the side of the 27 million because the outcome of this war is critically important to the security and freedom of America. If the terrorists win, they will be emboldened to strike us directly again and to further undermine the growing stability and progress in the Middle East, which has long been a major American national and economic security priority.
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Before going to Iraq last week, I visited Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Israel has been the only genuine democracy in the region, but it is now getting some welcome company from the Iraqis and Palestinians who are in the midst of robust national legislative election campaigns, the Lebanese who have risen up in proud self-determination after the Hariri assassination to eject their Syrian occupiers (the Syrian- and Iranian-backed Hezbollah militias should be next), and the Kuwaitis, Egyptians and Saudis who have taken steps to open up their governments more broadly to their people. In my meeting with the thoughtful prime minister of Iraq, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, he declared with justifiable pride that his country now has the most open, democratic political system in the Arab world. He is right.
In the face of terrorist threats and escalating violence, eight million Iraqis voted for their interim national government in January, almost 10 million participated in the referendum on their new constitution in October, and even more than that are expected to vote in the elections for a full-term government on Dec. 15. Every time the 27 million Iraqis have been given the chance since Saddam was overthrown, they have voted for self-government and hope over the violence and hatred the 10,000 terrorists offer them. Most encouraging has been the behavior of the Sunni community, which, when disappointed by the proposed constitution, registered to vote and went to the polls instead of taking up arms and going to the streets. Last week, I was thrilled to see a vigorous political campaign, and a large number of independent television stations and newspapers covering it.
None of these remarkable changes would have happened without the coalition forces led by the U.S. And, I am convinced, almost all of the progress in Iraq and throughout the Middle East will be lost if those forces are withdrawn faster than the Iraqi military is capable of securing the country.
The leaders of Iraq's duly elected government understand this, and they asked me for reassurance about America's commitment. The question is whether the American people and enough of their representatives in Congress from both parties understand this. I am disappointed by Democrats who are more focused on how President Bush took America into the war in Iraq almost three years ago, and by Republicans who are more worried about whether the war will bring them down in next November's elections, than they are concerned about how we continue the progress in Iraq in the months and years ahead.
Here is an ironic finding I brought back from Iraq. While U.S. public opinion polls show serious declines in support for the war and increasing pessimism about how it will end, polls conducted by Iraqis for Iraqi universities show increasing optimism. Two-thirds say they are better off than they were under Saddam, and a resounding 82% are confident their lives in Iraq will be better a year from now than they are today. What a colossal mistake it would be for America's bipartisan political leadership to choose this moment in history to lose its will and, in the famous phrase, to seize defeat from the jaws of the coming victory.
The leaders of America's military and diplomatic forces in Iraq, Gen. George Casey and Ambassador Zal Khalilzad, have a clear and compelling vision of our mission there. It is to create the environment in which Iraqi democracy, security and prosperity can take hold and the Iraqis themselves can defend their political progress against those 10,000 terrorists who would take it from them.
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Does America have a good plan for doing this, a strategy for victory in Iraq? Yes we do. And it is important to make it clear to the American people that the plan has not remained stubbornly still but has changed over the years. Mistakes, some of them big, were made after Saddam was removed, and no one who supports the war should hesitate to admit that; but we have learned from those mistakes and, in characteristic American fashion, from what has worked and not worked on the ground. The administration's recent use of the banner "clear, hold and build" accurately describes the strategy as I saw it being implemented last week.
We are now embedding a core of coalition forces in every Iraqi fighting unit, which makes each unit more effective and acts as a multiplier of our forces. Progress in "clearing" and "holding" is being made. The Sixth Infantry Division of the Iraqi Security Forces now controls and polices more than one-third of Baghdad on its own. Coalition and Iraqi forces have together cleared the previously terrorist-controlled cities of Fallujah, Mosul and Tal Afar, and most of the border with Syria. Those areas are now being "held" secure by the Iraqi military themselves. Iraqi and coalition forces are jointly carrying out a mission to clear Ramadi, now the most dangerous city in Al-Anbar province at the west end of the Sunni Triangle.
Nationwide, American military leaders estimate that about one-third of the approximately 100,000 members of the Iraqi military are able to "lead the fight" themselves with logistical support from the U.S., and that that number should double by next year. If that happens, American military forces could begin a drawdown in numbers proportional to the increasing self-sufficiency of the Iraqi forces in 2006. If all goes well, I believe we can have a much smaller American military presence there by the end of 2006 or in 2007, but it is also likely that our presence will need to be significant in Iraq or nearby for years to come.
The economic reconstruction of Iraq has gone slower than it should have, and too much money has been wasted or stolen. Ambassador Khalilzad is now implementing reform that has worked in Afghanistan--Provincial Reconstruction Teams, composed of American economic and political experts, working in partnership in each of Iraq's 18 provinces with its elected leadership, civil service and the private sector. That is the "build" part of the "clear, hold and build" strategy, and so is the work American and international teams are doing to professionalize national and provincial governmental agencies in Iraq.
These are new ideas that are working and changing the reality on the ground, which is undoubtedly why the Iraqi people are optimistic about their future--and why the American people should be, too.
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I cannot say enough about the U.S. Army and Marines who are carrying most of the fight for us in Iraq. They are courageous, smart, effective, innovative, very honorable and very proud. After a Thanksgiving meal with a great group of Marines at Camp Fallujah in western Iraq, I asked their commander whether the morale of his troops had been hurt by the growing public dissent in America over the war in Iraq. His answer was insightful, instructive and inspirational: "I would guess that if the opposition and division at home go on a lot longer and get a lot deeper it might have some effect, but, Senator, my Marines are motivated by their devotion to each other and the cause, not by political debates."
Thank you, General. That is a powerful, needed message for the rest of America and its political leadership at this critical moment in our nation's history. Semper Fi.
Mr. Lieberman is a Democratic senator from Connecticut.
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Tuesday, November 29, 2005
Thursday, November 03, 2005
"Investigate the CIA"
Today's Wall Street Journal provides yet another instance of a journalistic outsider -- Washington attorney Victoria Toensing -- pursuing the relevant facts in the underlying story: "Investigate the CIA" (subscription may be necessary for access to this column). Ms. Toensing puts me in mind of the little boy who pointed out that the emperor had no clothes. Toensing outlines the facts hiding in plain sight that point to the real scandal the lamestream media have declined to cover or pursue:
• First: The CIA sent her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, to Niger on a sensitive mission regarding WMD. He was to determine whether Iraq had attempted to purchase yellowcake, an essential ingredient for nonconventional weapons. However, it was Ms. Plame, not Mr. Wilson, who was the WMD expert. Moreover, Mr. Wilson had no intelligence background, was never a senior person in Niger when he was in the State Department, and was opposed to the administration's Iraq policy. The assignment was given, according to the Senate Intelligence Committee, at Ms. Plame's suggestion.• Second: Mr. Wilson was not required to sign a confidentiality agreement, a mandatory act for the rest of us who either carry out any similar CIA assignment or who represent CIA clients.• Third: When he returned from Niger, Mr. Wilson was not required to write a report, but rather merely to provide an oral briefing. That information was not sent to the White House. If this mission to Niger were so important, wouldn't a competent intelligence agency want a thoughtful written assessment from the "missionary," if for no other reason than to establish a record to refute any subsequent misrepresentation of that assessment? Because it was the vice president who initially inquired about Niger and the yellowcake (although he had nothing to do with Mr. Wilson being sent), it is curious that neither his office nor the president's were privy to the fruits of Mr. Wilson's oral report.• Fourth: Although Mr. Wilson did not have to write even one word for the agency that sent him on the mission at taxpayer's expense, over a year later he was permitted to tell all about this sensitive assignment in the New York Times. For the rest of us, writing about such an assignment would mean we'd have to bring our proposed op-ed before the CIA's Prepublication Review Board and spend countless hours arguing over every word to be published. Congressional oversight committees should want to know who at the CIA permitted the publication of the article, which, it has been reported, did not jibe with the thrust of Mr. Wilson's oral briefing. For starters, if the piece had been properly vetted at the CIA, someone should have known that the agency never briefed the vice president on the trip, as claimed by Mr. Wilson in his op-ed.• Fifth: More important than the inaccuracies is the fact that, if the CIA truly, truly, truly had wanted Ms. Plame's identity to be secret, it never would have permitted her spouse to write the op-ed. Did no one at Langley think that her identity could be compromised if her spouse wrote a piece discussing a foreign mission about a volatile political issue that focused on her expertise? The obvious question a sophisticated journalist such as Mr. Novak asked after "Why did the CIA send Wilson?" was "Who is Wilson?" After being told by a still-unnamed administration source that Mr. Wilson's "wife" suggested him for the assignment, Mr. Novak went to Who's Who, which reveals "Valerie Plame" as Mr. Wilson's spouse.• Sixth: CIA incompetence did not end there. When Mr. Novak called the agency to verify Ms. Plame's employment, it not only did so, but failed to go beyond the perfunctory request not to publish. Every experienced Washington journalist knows that when the CIA really does not want something public, there are serious requests from the top, usually the director. Only the press office talked to Mr. Novak.• Seventh: Although high-ranking Justice Department officials are prohibited from political activity, the CIA had no problem permitting its deep cover or classified employee from making political contributions under the name "Wilson, Valerie E.," information publicly available at the FEC.
Toensing concludes:
The CIA conduct in this matter is either a brilliant covert action against the White House or inept intelligence tradecraft. It is up to Congress to decide which.
• First: The CIA sent her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, to Niger on a sensitive mission regarding WMD. He was to determine whether Iraq had attempted to purchase yellowcake, an essential ingredient for nonconventional weapons. However, it was Ms. Plame, not Mr. Wilson, who was the WMD expert. Moreover, Mr. Wilson had no intelligence background, was never a senior person in Niger when he was in the State Department, and was opposed to the administration's Iraq policy. The assignment was given, according to the Senate Intelligence Committee, at Ms. Plame's suggestion.• Second: Mr. Wilson was not required to sign a confidentiality agreement, a mandatory act for the rest of us who either carry out any similar CIA assignment or who represent CIA clients.• Third: When he returned from Niger, Mr. Wilson was not required to write a report, but rather merely to provide an oral briefing. That information was not sent to the White House. If this mission to Niger were so important, wouldn't a competent intelligence agency want a thoughtful written assessment from the "missionary," if for no other reason than to establish a record to refute any subsequent misrepresentation of that assessment? Because it was the vice president who initially inquired about Niger and the yellowcake (although he had nothing to do with Mr. Wilson being sent), it is curious that neither his office nor the president's were privy to the fruits of Mr. Wilson's oral report.• Fourth: Although Mr. Wilson did not have to write even one word for the agency that sent him on the mission at taxpayer's expense, over a year later he was permitted to tell all about this sensitive assignment in the New York Times. For the rest of us, writing about such an assignment would mean we'd have to bring our proposed op-ed before the CIA's Prepublication Review Board and spend countless hours arguing over every word to be published. Congressional oversight committees should want to know who at the CIA permitted the publication of the article, which, it has been reported, did not jibe with the thrust of Mr. Wilson's oral briefing. For starters, if the piece had been properly vetted at the CIA, someone should have known that the agency never briefed the vice president on the trip, as claimed by Mr. Wilson in his op-ed.• Fifth: More important than the inaccuracies is the fact that, if the CIA truly, truly, truly had wanted Ms. Plame's identity to be secret, it never would have permitted her spouse to write the op-ed. Did no one at Langley think that her identity could be compromised if her spouse wrote a piece discussing a foreign mission about a volatile political issue that focused on her expertise? The obvious question a sophisticated journalist such as Mr. Novak asked after "Why did the CIA send Wilson?" was "Who is Wilson?" After being told by a still-unnamed administration source that Mr. Wilson's "wife" suggested him for the assignment, Mr. Novak went to Who's Who, which reveals "Valerie Plame" as Mr. Wilson's spouse.• Sixth: CIA incompetence did not end there. When Mr. Novak called the agency to verify Ms. Plame's employment, it not only did so, but failed to go beyond the perfunctory request not to publish. Every experienced Washington journalist knows that when the CIA really does not want something public, there are serious requests from the top, usually the director. Only the press office talked to Mr. Novak.• Seventh: Although high-ranking Justice Department officials are prohibited from political activity, the CIA had no problem permitting its deep cover or classified employee from making political contributions under the name "Wilson, Valerie E.," information publicly available at the FEC.
Toensing concludes:
The CIA conduct in this matter is either a brilliant covert action against the White House or inept intelligence tradecraft. It is up to Congress to decide which.
Not A Good Thing – from Investor’s Business Daily
Not A Good Thing – from Investor’s Business Daily
(image placeholder)Posted 11/2/2005
Politics: If stealing and destroying secret documents, stuffing them into your pants and then lying about it isn't a crime worthy of jail time, why is having a different recollection of events than Tim Russert?
If the charges swirling around Scooter Libby — that he deceived those investigating a crime for which he was not charged — seem familiar, they should. Not long ago Martha Stewart was indicted and convicted, not of insider trading in a suspiciously timed stock sale, but of deceiving investigators into a crime for which she was not charged.
In both cases, is justice being served? Or are the prosecutors just trying to justify the time and money spent failing to prove that those charged committed the alleged crime?
In the Libby case, we now have a new Kafkaesque standard of justice: Merely ask someone who gets hundreds of calls a day to remember conversations with reporters years prior. Then, if they disagree with the reporter's notes — voila! — perjury and obstruction.
Lost in the reporting of Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald's Oct. 28 press conference was this telling admission: "We have not made any allegation that Mr. Libby knowingly, intentionally outed a covert agent." Nor could he.
"Knowingly" is the operative word. The 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act requires the offender to knowingly reveal the name of a covert agent. The law was written after a former CIA employee named Philip Agee revealed the name of Richard Welch, CIA station chief in Greece, and others. Welch was subsequently murdered on Dec. 23, 1975, by a Greek terrorist organization.
There was no outrage or demand for a special prosecutor in 1995, when then-Rep. Robert Torricelli exposed a paid CIA informant, Guatemalan Col. Julio Roberto Alpirez, in a letter to President Clinton, a copy of which Torricelli gave to The New York Times.
A real undercover agent, Fulton Armstrong, was outed by Sen. John Kerry in this year's confirmation hearings of U.N. Ambassador John Bolton. Kerry mentioned Armstrong's name during questioning even after the CIA asked that his identity be kept secret.
Depends on whose ox is being gored, we guess.
Just as Caspar Weinberger's bogus indictment five days before the 1992 election was an attempt to criminalize political differences over the Reagan administration's anti-communist policies in Central America, it's reasonable to suggest the Libby indictment is a similar attempt to criminalize differences over Iraq.
Just how is national security jeopardized by having a different recollection of events than NBC Washington Bureau Chief Tim Russert? Like witnesses to a traffic accident, people see things from different perspectives. Memories fade. What you learned, where you learned it and whom you told tend to blur.
One charge against Libby stems from his testimony under oath that Russert asked him if he knew Joe Wilson's wife worked at the CIA. In fact, the indictment alleges, Russert never asked him that, and Libby already knew that. Maybe somebody else asked him. Maybe he already knew. Who cares? This is worth 30 years in jail?
Contrast the Libby charges with the slap on the wrist given Sandy Berger. He engaged in a real cover-up when he took classified documents useful to the 9-11 commission, destroyed some of them and then lied to the National Archives about it. No jail time, just a small fine. What was he hiding? Whom was he protecting?
Libby now joins Weinberger, Newt Gingrich, Tom DeLay and others who are guilty of nothing more than being loyal and effective servants of their party and president. Like the "Borking" of judicial nominees, the ongoing criminalization of political differences will only make it harder to attract good public servants if they can go to jail for merely talking to a reporter.
In the end, Libby may be able to echo the immortal words of Ray Donovan, Ronald Reagan's labor secretary. After being acquitted in 1987 of corruption charges in a similar trial by media, he wondered: "Where do I go to get my reputation back?"
(image placeholder)Posted 11/2/2005
Politics: If stealing and destroying secret documents, stuffing them into your pants and then lying about it isn't a crime worthy of jail time, why is having a different recollection of events than Tim Russert?
If the charges swirling around Scooter Libby — that he deceived those investigating a crime for which he was not charged — seem familiar, they should. Not long ago Martha Stewart was indicted and convicted, not of insider trading in a suspiciously timed stock sale, but of deceiving investigators into a crime for which she was not charged.
In both cases, is justice being served? Or are the prosecutors just trying to justify the time and money spent failing to prove that those charged committed the alleged crime?
In the Libby case, we now have a new Kafkaesque standard of justice: Merely ask someone who gets hundreds of calls a day to remember conversations with reporters years prior. Then, if they disagree with the reporter's notes — voila! — perjury and obstruction.
Lost in the reporting of Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald's Oct. 28 press conference was this telling admission: "We have not made any allegation that Mr. Libby knowingly, intentionally outed a covert agent." Nor could he.
"Knowingly" is the operative word. The 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act requires the offender to knowingly reveal the name of a covert agent. The law was written after a former CIA employee named Philip Agee revealed the name of Richard Welch, CIA station chief in Greece, and others. Welch was subsequently murdered on Dec. 23, 1975, by a Greek terrorist organization.
There was no outrage or demand for a special prosecutor in 1995, when then-Rep. Robert Torricelli exposed a paid CIA informant, Guatemalan Col. Julio Roberto Alpirez, in a letter to President Clinton, a copy of which Torricelli gave to The New York Times.
A real undercover agent, Fulton Armstrong, was outed by Sen. John Kerry in this year's confirmation hearings of U.N. Ambassador John Bolton. Kerry mentioned Armstrong's name during questioning even after the CIA asked that his identity be kept secret.
Depends on whose ox is being gored, we guess.
Just as Caspar Weinberger's bogus indictment five days before the 1992 election was an attempt to criminalize political differences over the Reagan administration's anti-communist policies in Central America, it's reasonable to suggest the Libby indictment is a similar attempt to criminalize differences over Iraq.
Just how is national security jeopardized by having a different recollection of events than NBC Washington Bureau Chief Tim Russert? Like witnesses to a traffic accident, people see things from different perspectives. Memories fade. What you learned, where you learned it and whom you told tend to blur.
One charge against Libby stems from his testimony under oath that Russert asked him if he knew Joe Wilson's wife worked at the CIA. In fact, the indictment alleges, Russert never asked him that, and Libby already knew that. Maybe somebody else asked him. Maybe he already knew. Who cares? This is worth 30 years in jail?
Contrast the Libby charges with the slap on the wrist given Sandy Berger. He engaged in a real cover-up when he took classified documents useful to the 9-11 commission, destroyed some of them and then lied to the National Archives about it. No jail time, just a small fine. What was he hiding? Whom was he protecting?
Libby now joins Weinberger, Newt Gingrich, Tom DeLay and others who are guilty of nothing more than being loyal and effective servants of their party and president. Like the "Borking" of judicial nominees, the ongoing criminalization of political differences will only make it harder to attract good public servants if they can go to jail for merely talking to a reporter.
In the end, Libby may be able to echo the immortal words of Ray Donovan, Ronald Reagan's labor secretary. After being acquitted in 1987 of corruption charges in a similar trial by media, he wondered: "Where do I go to get my reputation back?"
Wednesday, November 02, 2005
The good news from Iraq is not fit to print
JEFF JACOBY
The good news from Iraq is not fit to print
By Jeff Jacoby, Globe Columnist | November 2, 2005
WHAT WAS the most important news out of Iraq last week?
That depends on what you consider ''important." Do you see the war against radical Islam and Ba'athist fascism as the most urgent conflict of our time? Do you believe that replacing tyranny with democratic self-government is ultimately the only antidote to the poison that has made the Middle East so dangerous and violent? If so, you'll have no trouble identifying the most significant development in Iraq last week: the landslide victory of the new Iraqi Constitution.
The announcement on Oct. 25 that the first genuinely democratic national charter in Arab history had been approved by 79 percent of Iraqis was a major piece of good news. It confirmed the courage of Iraq's people and their hunger for freedom and decent governance. It advanced the US campaign to democratize a country that for 25 years had been misruled by a mass-murdering sociopath. It underscored the decision by Iraq's Sunnis, who had boycotted the parliamentary elections in January, to pursue their goals through ballots, not bullets. And it dealt a humiliating blow to the bombers and beheaders -- to the likes of Islamist butcher Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who earlier this year declared ''a fierce war on this evil principle of democracy" and threatened to kill anyone who took part in the elections.
No question: If you think that defeating Islamofascism, extending liberty, and transforming the Middle East are important, it's safe to say you saw the ratification of the new constitution as the Iraqi news story of the week.
But that isn't how the mainstream media saw it.
Consider The Washington Post. On the morning after the results of the Iraqi referendum were announced, the Post's front page was dominated by a photograph, stretched across four columns, of three daughters at the funeral of their father, Lieutenant Colonel Leon James II, who had died from injuries suffered during a Sept. 26 bombing in Baghdad. Two accompanying stories, both above the fold, were headlined ''Military Has Lost 2,000 in Iraq" and ''Bigger, Stronger, Homemade Bombs Now to Blame for Half of US Deaths." A nearby graphic -- ''The Toll" -- divided the 2,000 deaths by type of military service -- active duty, National Guard, and Reserves.
From Page 1, the stories jumped to a two-page spread inside, where they were illustrated with more photographs, a series of drawings depicting roadside attacks, and a large US map showing where each fallen soldier was from. On a third inside page, meanwhile, another story was headlined ''2,000th Death Marked by Silence and a Vow." It began: ''Washington marked the 2,000th American fatality of the Iraq war with a moment of silence in the Senate, the reading of the names of the fallen from the House floor, new protests, and a solemn vow from President Bush not to 'rest or tire until the war on terror is won.' " Two photos appeared alongside, one of Bush and another of antiwar protester Cindy Sheehan. And to give the body count a local focus, there was yet another story (''War's Toll Leaves Baltimore in Mourning") plus four pictures of troops killed in Iraq.
The Post didn't ignore the Iraqi election results. A story appeared on Page A13 (''Sunnis Failed to Defeat Iraq Constitution"), along with a map breaking down the vote by province. But like other leading newspapers, including The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and the Los Angeles Times, it devoted vastly more attention to the 2,000-death ''milestone," a statistic with no unique significance apart from the fact that it ends in round numbers.
Every death in Iraq is heartbreaking. The 2,000th fatality was neither more nor less meaningful than the 1,999 that preceded it. But if anything makes the death toll remarkable, it is how historically low it is. Considering what the war has accomplished so far -- the destruction of the region's bloodiest dictatorship, the liberation of 25 million Iraqis, the emergence of democratic politics, the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon, the abandonment by Libya of its nuclear weapons program -- it is hard to disagree with Norman Podhoretz, who notes in the current Commentary that these achievements have been ''purchased at an astonishingly low cost in American blood when measured by the standards of every other war we have ever fought."
But that isn't a message Big Media cares to emphasize. Hostile to the war and to the administration conducting it, the nation's leading news outlets harp on the negative and pessimistic, consistently underplaying all that is going right in Iraq. Their fixation on the number of troops who have died outweighs their interest in the cause for which those fallen heroes fought -- a cause that advanced with the ratification of the new constitution.
Poll after poll confirms the public's low level of confidence in mainstream media news. Gallup recently measured that confidence at 28 percent, an all-time low. Why such mistrust? The media's slanted coverage of Iraq provides a pretty good clue.
Jeff Jacoby's e-mail address is jacoby@globe.com. (image placeholder)
The good news from Iraq is not fit to print
By Jeff Jacoby, Globe Columnist | November 2, 2005
WHAT WAS the most important news out of Iraq last week?
That depends on what you consider ''important." Do you see the war against radical Islam and Ba'athist fascism as the most urgent conflict of our time? Do you believe that replacing tyranny with democratic self-government is ultimately the only antidote to the poison that has made the Middle East so dangerous and violent? If so, you'll have no trouble identifying the most significant development in Iraq last week: the landslide victory of the new Iraqi Constitution.
The announcement on Oct. 25 that the first genuinely democratic national charter in Arab history had been approved by 79 percent of Iraqis was a major piece of good news. It confirmed the courage of Iraq's people and their hunger for freedom and decent governance. It advanced the US campaign to democratize a country that for 25 years had been misruled by a mass-murdering sociopath. It underscored the decision by Iraq's Sunnis, who had boycotted the parliamentary elections in January, to pursue their goals through ballots, not bullets. And it dealt a humiliating blow to the bombers and beheaders -- to the likes of Islamist butcher Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who earlier this year declared ''a fierce war on this evil principle of democracy" and threatened to kill anyone who took part in the elections.
No question: If you think that defeating Islamofascism, extending liberty, and transforming the Middle East are important, it's safe to say you saw the ratification of the new constitution as the Iraqi news story of the week.
But that isn't how the mainstream media saw it.
Consider The Washington Post. On the morning after the results of the Iraqi referendum were announced, the Post's front page was dominated by a photograph, stretched across four columns, of three daughters at the funeral of their father, Lieutenant Colonel Leon James II, who had died from injuries suffered during a Sept. 26 bombing in Baghdad. Two accompanying stories, both above the fold, were headlined ''Military Has Lost 2,000 in Iraq" and ''Bigger, Stronger, Homemade Bombs Now to Blame for Half of US Deaths." A nearby graphic -- ''The Toll" -- divided the 2,000 deaths by type of military service -- active duty, National Guard, and Reserves.
From Page 1, the stories jumped to a two-page spread inside, where they were illustrated with more photographs, a series of drawings depicting roadside attacks, and a large US map showing where each fallen soldier was from. On a third inside page, meanwhile, another story was headlined ''2,000th Death Marked by Silence and a Vow." It began: ''Washington marked the 2,000th American fatality of the Iraq war with a moment of silence in the Senate, the reading of the names of the fallen from the House floor, new protests, and a solemn vow from President Bush not to 'rest or tire until the war on terror is won.' " Two photos appeared alongside, one of Bush and another of antiwar protester Cindy Sheehan. And to give the body count a local focus, there was yet another story (''War's Toll Leaves Baltimore in Mourning") plus four pictures of troops killed in Iraq.
The Post didn't ignore the Iraqi election results. A story appeared on Page A13 (''Sunnis Failed to Defeat Iraq Constitution"), along with a map breaking down the vote by province. But like other leading newspapers, including The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and the Los Angeles Times, it devoted vastly more attention to the 2,000-death ''milestone," a statistic with no unique significance apart from the fact that it ends in round numbers.
Every death in Iraq is heartbreaking. The 2,000th fatality was neither more nor less meaningful than the 1,999 that preceded it. But if anything makes the death toll remarkable, it is how historically low it is. Considering what the war has accomplished so far -- the destruction of the region's bloodiest dictatorship, the liberation of 25 million Iraqis, the emergence of democratic politics, the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon, the abandonment by Libya of its nuclear weapons program -- it is hard to disagree with Norman Podhoretz, who notes in the current Commentary that these achievements have been ''purchased at an astonishingly low cost in American blood when measured by the standards of every other war we have ever fought."
But that isn't a message Big Media cares to emphasize. Hostile to the war and to the administration conducting it, the nation's leading news outlets harp on the negative and pessimistic, consistently underplaying all that is going right in Iraq. Their fixation on the number of troops who have died outweighs their interest in the cause for which those fallen heroes fought -- a cause that advanced with the ratification of the new constitution.
Poll after poll confirms the public's low level of confidence in mainstream media news. Gallup recently measured that confidence at 28 percent, an all-time low. Why such mistrust? The media's slanted coverage of Iraq provides a pretty good clue.
Jeff Jacoby's e-mail address is jacoby@globe.com. (image placeholder)
WMDs make Harry Reid's head explode
WMDs make Harry Reid's head explode
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9892090/#051101
by Glenn Reynolds
November 1, 2005 | 10:51 PM ET
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid can't stand it. He was hoping that special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald would bring down the Bush Administration for him, but all he got was a lame indictment of Scooter Libby.
He showed his pique today by taking the Senate into closed session and demanding an investigation of prewar intelligence.
Well, okay -- but then the investigation needs to go way back before the war, to 1998, when a Democratic President and a Democratic Congress passed the Iraq Liberation Act, which provided that:
(1) On September 22, 1980, Iraq invaded Iran, starting an 8 year war in which Iraq employed chemical weapons against Iranian troops and ballistic missiles against Iranian cities.
(2) In February 1988, Iraq forcibly relocated Kurdish civilians from their home villages in the Anfal campaign, killing an estimated 50,000 to 180,000 Kurds.
(3) On March 16, 1988, Iraq used chemical weapons against Iraqi Kurdish civilian opponents in the town of Halabja, killing an estimated 5,000 Kurds and causing numerous birth defects that affect the town today.
...
(9) Since March 1996, Iraq has systematically sought to deny weapons inspectors from the United Nations Special Commission on Iraq (UNSCOM) access to key facilities and documents, has on several occasions endangered the safe operation of UNSCOM helicopters transporting UNSCOM personnel in Iraq, and has persisted in a pattern of deception and concealment regarding the history of its weapons of mass destruction programs.
(10) On August 5, 1998, Iraq ceased all cooperation with UNSCOM, and subsequently threatened to end long-term monitoring activities by the International Atomic Energy Agency and UNSCOM.
(11) On August 14, 1998, President Clinton signed Public Law 105-235, which declared that `the Government of Iraq is in material and unacceptable breach of its international obligations' and urged the President `to take appropriate action, in accordance with the Constitution and relevant laws of the United States, to bring Iraq into compliance with its international obligations.'
...
It is the sense of the Congress that once the Saddam Hussein regime is removed from power in Iraq, the United States should support Iraq's transition to democracy by providing immediate and substantial humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people, by providing democracy transition assistance to Iraqi parties and movements with democratic goals, and by convening Iraq's foreign creditors to develop a multilateral response to Iraq's foreign debt incurred by Saddam Hussein's regime.
Then there are statements like these:
"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line." - President Bill Clinton, February 4, 1998
"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program." - President Bill Clinton, February 17, 1998
"We must stop Saddam from ever again jeopardizing the stability and security of his neighbors with weapons of mass destruction." - Madeline Albright, February 1, 1998
"He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983." - Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, February 18, 1998
"[W]e urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs." Letter to President Clinton. - (D) Senators Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, John Kerry, others, October 9, 1998
"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process." - Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), December 16, 1998
"Hussein has ... chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies." - Madeline Albright, Clinton's Secretary of State, November 10, 1999
The anti-war fundraising base of the Democrats -- as exemplified by organizations like MoveOn.org -- is powerful enough to require Democratic politicians like Harry Reid to pretend that all the WMD stuff began with President Bush. That is, not to put too fine a point on it, a gross and partisan lie.
Reid owes the President an apology. He owes another to the Democratic Party, whose credibility he is destroying, day by day.
UPDATE: Perhaps Reid should look at this Senate Intelligence Committee report on Iraqi WMD, which found that errors in intelligence on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction didn't stem from White House pressure, but from groupthink and systematic failure within the Intelligence Community:
The Committee found significant short-comings in almost every aspect of the Intelligence Community's human intelligence collection efforts against Iraq's weapons of mass destruction activities, in particular that the Community had no sources collecting against weapons of mass destruction in Iraq after 1998. Most, if not all, of these problems, stem from a broken corporate culture and poor management, and will not be solved by additional funding and personnel.
1998. Was Bush President then?
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9892090/#051101
by Glenn Reynolds
November 1, 2005 | 10:51 PM ET
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid can't stand it. He was hoping that special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald would bring down the Bush Administration for him, but all he got was a lame indictment of Scooter Libby.
He showed his pique today by taking the Senate into closed session and demanding an investigation of prewar intelligence.
Well, okay -- but then the investigation needs to go way back before the war, to 1998, when a Democratic President and a Democratic Congress passed the Iraq Liberation Act, which provided that:
(1) On September 22, 1980, Iraq invaded Iran, starting an 8 year war in which Iraq employed chemical weapons against Iranian troops and ballistic missiles against Iranian cities.
(2) In February 1988, Iraq forcibly relocated Kurdish civilians from their home villages in the Anfal campaign, killing an estimated 50,000 to 180,000 Kurds.
(3) On March 16, 1988, Iraq used chemical weapons against Iraqi Kurdish civilian opponents in the town of Halabja, killing an estimated 5,000 Kurds and causing numerous birth defects that affect the town today.
...
(9) Since March 1996, Iraq has systematically sought to deny weapons inspectors from the United Nations Special Commission on Iraq (UNSCOM) access to key facilities and documents, has on several occasions endangered the safe operation of UNSCOM helicopters transporting UNSCOM personnel in Iraq, and has persisted in a pattern of deception and concealment regarding the history of its weapons of mass destruction programs.
(10) On August 5, 1998, Iraq ceased all cooperation with UNSCOM, and subsequently threatened to end long-term monitoring activities by the International Atomic Energy Agency and UNSCOM.
(11) On August 14, 1998, President Clinton signed Public Law 105-235, which declared that `the Government of Iraq is in material and unacceptable breach of its international obligations' and urged the President `to take appropriate action, in accordance with the Constitution and relevant laws of the United States, to bring Iraq into compliance with its international obligations.'
...
It is the sense of the Congress that once the Saddam Hussein regime is removed from power in Iraq, the United States should support Iraq's transition to democracy by providing immediate and substantial humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people, by providing democracy transition assistance to Iraqi parties and movements with democratic goals, and by convening Iraq's foreign creditors to develop a multilateral response to Iraq's foreign debt incurred by Saddam Hussein's regime.
Then there are statements like these:
"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line." - President Bill Clinton, February 4, 1998
"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program." - President Bill Clinton, February 17, 1998
"We must stop Saddam from ever again jeopardizing the stability and security of his neighbors with weapons of mass destruction." - Madeline Albright, February 1, 1998
"He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983." - Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, February 18, 1998
"[W]e urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs." Letter to President Clinton. - (D) Senators Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, John Kerry, others, October 9, 1998
"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process." - Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), December 16, 1998
"Hussein has ... chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies." - Madeline Albright, Clinton's Secretary of State, November 10, 1999
The anti-war fundraising base of the Democrats -- as exemplified by organizations like MoveOn.org -- is powerful enough to require Democratic politicians like Harry Reid to pretend that all the WMD stuff began with President Bush. That is, not to put too fine a point on it, a gross and partisan lie.
Reid owes the President an apology. He owes another to the Democratic Party, whose credibility he is destroying, day by day.
UPDATE: Perhaps Reid should look at this Senate Intelligence Committee report on Iraqi WMD, which found that errors in intelligence on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction didn't stem from White House pressure, but from groupthink and systematic failure within the Intelligence Community:
The Committee found significant short-comings in almost every aspect of the Intelligence Community's human intelligence collection efforts against Iraq's weapons of mass destruction activities, in particular that the Community had no sources collecting against weapons of mass destruction in Iraq after 1998. Most, if not all, of these problems, stem from a broken corporate culture and poor management, and will not be solved by additional funding and personnel.
1998. Was Bush President then?