The Pundit "War"?
Howard Kurtz writes today about "the pundit war" -- an infelicitous praise, perhaps, given that most of the bickering is over the real war, that is, the Iraq/terror war.
In effect, as Kurtz points out, liberal pundits are seizing the opportunity to shriek "nanny nanny boo boo" at their conservative counterparts, now that the war in Iraq has hit some snags (as, it must be noted, all wars will).
I suppose that turn and turn about is fair play. Conservatives didn't hesitate to point it out when liberals who opposed the war from the beginning turned out to be wrong in arguing that (1) Saddam Hussein would use chemical or biological weapons against our troops if we attacked (hey, how come they're not being accused of having lied?!); (2) There would be door-to-door fighting in Baghdad that could result in massive casualties; (3) Saddam would light the oil fields on fire, precipitating a world-wide crisis; and (4) There would be a mass exodus of refugees from Iraq.
(Update: For other sources for the same assertions, check out today's Best of the Web).
So everyone gets his/her moment in the glorious sun of vindication. But, to me, there's an important difference between the war-haters and the war-supporters: For the former to be right, things have to go badly for their country -- and there's always the all-too-human temptation seize upon or spin news so that things sound worse than they are in order to support one's preconceived notions. That tendency can be particularly dangerous in a war where we know that the enemy is hoping/depending on American popular opinion to turn against the war as virtually the only way they can win.
That's not to say that everyone who opposes the war is either (1) a tool of America's enemies or (2) unpatriotic. Certainly not. It's just to say that they carry (or should carry) the extra burden of making sure that their criticisms are accurate and responsible -- and that they're not creating a political atmosphere so poisonous that admitting and/or correcting honest mistakes simply becomes cost-prohibitive for the Administration, at the expense of the country, as a whole.
In effect, as Kurtz points out, liberal pundits are seizing the opportunity to shriek "nanny nanny boo boo" at their conservative counterparts, now that the war in Iraq has hit some snags (as, it must be noted, all wars will).
I suppose that turn and turn about is fair play. Conservatives didn't hesitate to point it out when liberals who opposed the war from the beginning turned out to be wrong in arguing that (1) Saddam Hussein would use chemical or biological weapons against our troops if we attacked (hey, how come they're not being accused of having lied?!); (2) There would be door-to-door fighting in Baghdad that could result in massive casualties; (3) Saddam would light the oil fields on fire, precipitating a world-wide crisis; and (4) There would be a mass exodus of refugees from Iraq.
(Update: For other sources for the same assertions, check out today's Best of the Web).
So everyone gets his/her moment in the glorious sun of vindication. But, to me, there's an important difference between the war-haters and the war-supporters: For the former to be right, things have to go badly for their country -- and there's always the all-too-human temptation seize upon or spin news so that things sound worse than they are in order to support one's preconceived notions. That tendency can be particularly dangerous in a war where we know that the enemy is hoping/depending on American popular opinion to turn against the war as virtually the only way they can win.
That's not to say that everyone who opposes the war is either (1) a tool of America's enemies or (2) unpatriotic. Certainly not. It's just to say that they carry (or should carry) the extra burden of making sure that their criticisms are accurate and responsible -- and that they're not creating a political atmosphere so poisonous that admitting and/or correcting honest mistakes simply becomes cost-prohibitive for the Administration, at the expense of the country, as a whole.
posted by LadybugUSA at 9:40 AM
2 Comments:
Ah, "accurate and responsible criticisms," huh? That's what you're seeking these days?
How about taking a look in the GOP mirror, Carol? How do you feel about the words of the corpulent hoofed one, aka Rove, who claimed that Democrats wanted to offer our 9/11 attackers therapy, to name but one of the incendiary, divisive jabs that have contributed to the poisonous atmosphere you so sanctimoniously rue? As usual, there are no GOP fingerprints to be found anywhere, are there Carol?
I just thought I'd check in to see if you lit three little birthday candles on the hot steaming pile that is destined to be Bush's legacy and our decades-long curse.
(I see the numbers have dropped off a bit around here.)
Didn't take long for a little 'hot steaming pile' of incendiarism (...'corpulent hoofed one...') from a liberal flame thrower to prove Carol's point, did it?
Mr. Rove's statement, "Liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers." doesn't merit a tiny candle compared with the loony left's conflagration of comments about conservatives.
For example, "buSHITler," "ursurper," "arrogant cowboy," "smirking chimp," and "dunce" are some of the milder terms for the president from some liberal blogs. (So "stupid" is the president that his college GPA is higher than that flip-flopping, liberal, icon Sen. Kerry's.) "Liar" is another lefty epithet, yet this president has never been sanctioned for lying to a Grand Jury as was a former president.
Conservative bloggers, including Carol, are regularly called "hypocrite," "liar," and even "sanctimonious" by the loving left.
Michelle Malkin had to eliminate comments from her blog to stop the torrent of racist and obscene posts.
Laura Ingraham, after announcing she had been diagnosed with breast cancer, was told by loving leftists that they hoped she died.
Debbie Schlussel constantly receives anti-Semitic comments, and now carries a gun following threats on her life.
LaShawn Barber gets hate mail saying she is not "black enough."
Harry Bellafonte, that bananas guy from the 50s, has called former Secretary of State Colin Powell an "Uncle Tom," and Powell and Secretary of State Rice "house slaves." He spread the lovingness around a little by calling the president "Hitler."
Louis Farakhan said President Bush ordered the New Orleans levees to be blown up. (Of course, Farakhan also says there is a 'mother ship' orbiting behind the moon waiting to pick up true believers.)
Dem. Rep. Cynthia McKinney implied in a statement that the president knew about planes going to be hijacked before 9/11, but did nothing to stop them so his corporation buddies, whom he "was close" with, could benefit from defense contracts when military action was taken. (Subsequently, it was shown that Rep. McKinney had accepted campaign donations from A. Alamoudi, a terrorist sympathizer, and had written Middle East dictators about how the Palestinians were being abused by the Israelis. And in her '96 run for offfice, Rep. McKinney's Father labeled her opponent a "racist Jew." Yeah, it's always "the Jews" behind everything.)
From just these few available examples, Mr. Rove's description of liberals seems rather mild compared with what liberals were calling conservatives.
So -- was Mr. Rove's statement merely political rhetoric, or was it based on actual occurrences?
Fox News aired a tape of antiwar rallies that took place in Washington, D.C., San Francisco and several other cities. Protesters demanded a moderate, peaceful, non-military response to 9/11. (Emphasis added.) One protester held a sign that said, "To Stop Terrorism Stop Terrorizing." (Yep, it's our own fault 3000 people wre murdered by oppressed victims.)
Dem Rep. Kucinich (OH) and Dem. Rep. Lee (CA) (plus several others) came out against a military response, demanding peaceful negotiations. (Just tell them we mean them no harm and they'll leave us alone. Riiight.)
Moveon.org (certainly no conservative organization) was then circulating a petition urging "restraint" after the atrocities. (Translation: restrain yourself, you stupid, swaggering chimp.)
In the same time frame, many leftist columnists and pundits were blaming the United States, Israel, President Reagan -- everyone and everything except the terrorists -- for the 9/11 attacks.
I'd say Mr. Rove had adequate grounds for describing what liberals in various positions were calling for the United States to do.
Instead of coming to Carol's site with only one thing in mind, to attack anything she posted, it would have helped had the previous
commenter actually read her post. For in it she said, "I suppose that turn and turn about is fair play. Conservatives didn't hesitate to point it out when liberals who opposed the war from the beginning turned out to be wrong..." That sounds to me like she was saying there were, indeed, some "GOP fingerprints" in the matter.
Perhaps the non-reading commenter missed that section while wiping his keyboard of his own 'hot steaming pile'... of something?
(Apologies to Carol for using so much of her bandwidth.)
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