Media Criticism

Anyone that watched the lies and fabrications of Colin Powell as he presented the case for intervention in Iraq in 2003 is concerned with Western rhetoric about Iran. The Iranian Revolutionary Guard and other elements of conservatism in Iran have been accused of developing nuclear capabilities, consorting with Syria to intervene in Iraq and plotting the destruction of Israel. All three of these have truth to them, in particular the anti-Semitism of the Iranian elites but every decision regarding Iran will be colored with the brush of Iraq’s failures.

As a student editorial writer in college, I devoted several articles to my opposition to the war in Iraq in the winter of 2003. I think that a war with Iran would be better justified than the war in Iraq but we are already over-committed in Iraq and under-committed in Afghanistan. We have cast our lot in the Middle East by attempting to nation build in Iraq where the military threat was minimal. It is impossible now to fight in Iran without making a choice: push the nation into mandatory service to mobilize soldiers for Iran or pull everything out of Iraq to deal with Iran. Neither option is palatable but don’t worry, the Bush administration will find a way to make a choice that will please no one

While the geopolitical issues inherent in an Iranian war are obvious, there is something more basic that lies at the bottom of the conversation about war. Rep. Dennis Kucinich has been sounding the call for the House and the Senate to cut funds to the war in a demonstration of Congressional power. His rhetoric is more about promoting peace through one of the most powerful countries (for now) in the world. The Bush Administration is countering with a tired continuation of an amorphous war on terror that claims to have protected America from a 9/11-style attack in the last seven years. There is no reason for terrorists to attack us again because they have already gotten what they wanted. American involvement in the Middle East creates chaos, allows petty dictators to rise in the region and ensures a future filled with conflict over one of the world’s scarcest resources.

In the end, I see America going to war with Iran. Hillary Clinton is a poor person’s Republican trying to win the Democratic nomination to get the right label. Conservatives will disagree with me on Clinton’s conservatism but she certainly speaks like a hawk that is concerned with the same issues at Giuliani and Romney. I will never vote for Hillary Clinton for this reason but millions will. I just hope Americans know what they are getting into with either of the front runners in this race. I will cast my lot with someone concerned with the Constitution and the even division of powers in our government whoever that may be.

The confrontation between Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and George W. Bush on Tuesday was something that battle rappers and high school debate teams should watch in equal measure. Both presidents gave speeches several hours apart and Bush attended meetings in order to get out of seeing Ahmadinejad’s speech. Bush spoke about the authoritarian and dictatorial governments throughout the world including Cuba, Zimbabwe and a nation that starts with I and ends with ran.

Ahmadinejad was slightly more subtle than George W. Bush which proves that he is a bit of a buffoon in his own right. Anyone should be more subtle than Bush and Ahmadinejad’s speech was something to behold. He describes an occupying force that does not admit defeat, allows thousands of deaths and devalues the independence of other nations. I wonder which occupying force in the Middle East he could be referring to?

The United Nations offers a distinct opportunity for tyrants and democrats alike to speak to a global audience. America has always been hostile to the United Nations because a) it has no muscle and b) arguments going back to Woodrow Wilson’s League of Nations indicate a hint of racism underneath political arguments. Americans do not have a right to tell the world who they can hear speak in the United Nations because it is not OUR organization. People can protest all they want but Ahmadinejad spoke, the Cubans left after Bush’s rhetorical attack and representatives from brutal dictatorships took these attacks in stride. While the arguments between Bush and Ahmadinejad were superficial and full of bile, they do show the value of open debate. You can take what you will from that statement but if we want to spread democracy to the world (like Wilson), we need to be prepared for the bruises, cuts and psychological damage associated.

There are few things I dislike more than when President Bush tries to make an historical analogy and fails miserably. Bush gave a speech yesterday at the VFW annual convention in Kansas City where he compared the push for withdrawal in Iraq to a similar push at the end of America’s involvement in Vietnam. He made a similarly strained comparison between the Iraq War and the American Revolution after Fourth of July 2007. I cannot wait for the president to compare Iraq and the Mexican-American War or the French-Indian War.

While the analogy sounds great and draws applause from some conservatives, most reasonable people know that it rings hollow. I heard numerous programs on Wisconsin Public Radio (I live in Milwaukee) where the experts were trying to hide their bile for such a poorly constructed argument. Cheney, Bush and their group of spokespeople have denounced this comparison for years now because it denotes failure. I am convinced that the orchestration of this turn by the Bush Administration was the swan song of former puppeteer Karl Rove. The dynamics of surrounding nations was different in Vietnam as it is in Iraq even though war supporters have tried to cast the former as a defeat to communism and the latter as a failure against terrorism. Bush’s speech exposed his fatal flaw which is his inability to see the gray between black and white.

Alright, this is a bit conspiracy-theorist and I don’t completely believe that. I am having an issue, however, with the way Bush’s speech at the VFW was framed all week. Every time you saw an article on Hillary Clinton speaking at the event, it would indicate that President Bush would sweep in at the end of the week as a conservative salve for veterans. While the speech was recognized as a mixed blessing by most accounts, media outlets all over the country have subconsciously helped set up Bush’s effort to recast the war as a mission of American promise. As a nation, we need to look back the faux intellectualism that is inherent in making a comparison between past and present events to keep Republicans and war Democrats honest.

Bill Moyers, one of my favorite journailsts and commentators on TV, returns to PBS after some time away with a tough look at how our nation’s media helped lead America to a stupid, pointless, illegal, and ill-conceived war.

An excerpt from a recent release:

NEW YORK, April 20 /PRNewswire/ — Veteran Journalist Bill Moyers returns to PBS with the new weekly series Bill Moyers Journal, airing Friday nights at 9 on PBS (check local listings). The series premieres at a special time on Wednesday, April 25 at 9 p.m. with “Buying the War,” a 90-minute documentary that explores the role of the press in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq. Two days later on Friday, April 27 at 9 p.m., Bill Moyers Journal features interviews with two influential voices from outside the beltway-The Daily Show host Jon Stewart and political blogger Josh Marshall of talkingpointsmemo.com.

“We follow up Wednesday’s documentary, which is chock full of mainstream mea culpa from inside the beltway, with two guys who have been skeptical of the official line coming out of Washington, albeit in different ways.” says Moyers. “The popularity of Jon Stewart and Josh Marshall demonstrates an appetite for alternative voices for authentic information and analysis and a turn away from the uncritical thinking on much of the cable and network news.”

Related websites and video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hl3zs7069UQ and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5Kngf803dQ

Cross posted from TV Bloggin.

Bill Moyers, Bill Moyers Journal, Josh Marshall, Jon Stewart, Iraq War, Iraq Civil War, PBS, talkingpointsmemo.com, Talking Points Memo, The Daily Show