Public Relations

Oliver "Like Kryptonite to Batman" Willis says:

Bush's response towards the mistakes of Iraq is yet another PR offensive. Expect him and his minions to continue pretending that everything is going exactly according to plan, while making the "transition" and subsequent pullout from Iraq that makes the situation in the region remain status quo -- or even worse.

What is this, besides further proof that the liberals should be required to pass a foreign-policy literacy test before being allowed to comment?

A complete whiff of the point. The President is launching a PR campaign, because the biggest problem the Administration has in Iraq right now, from any meaningful military or civil-governance perspective, is...

...wait for it...

...public relations. The President is facing down a media that is invincibly ignorant about military matters, implacable in their desire to see John Kerry (or anyone) in the White House, and utterly, completely yellow.

To wit: Robin Wright of the WaPo.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A48487-2004May22.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A48487-2004May22.html

Wright is perhaps the most insufferable member of the Sunday Morning Gasbag Gang. And her piece in yesterday's WaPo is perhaps a perfect encapsulation of the current wave of bad reporting (if I felt a little more cynical, I'd call them "Goebbelsian Big Lies") on which the media has staked their hopes for November.

The diplomatic campaign is a response to serious reversals over the past two months and to growing turmoil. Last week alone, the U.S.-appointed president of the Iraqi Governing Council was assassinated and a cabinet official was almost killed in a suicide bombing; in a disputed episode, more than 40 people were killed by U.S. troops at what Iraqis said was a wedding party; and 16 arrest warrants were issued for aides or associates of Ahmed Chalabi, a longtime Pentagon favorite to help lead postwar Iraq, on charges related to financial issues, leading him to sever ties with the U.S.-led coalition.

Now, look over these events (and, perhaps the one that is mentioned only obliquely in Wright's article, Abu Ghraib - a crisis whose anti-Bush legs would seem to have worn out); the assassination was a tragedy and a setback, but that's what war is like - it hasn't derailed anything. Chalabi - well, go figure, a corrupt figure in Middle Eastern Politics. Shut my mouth - it's not like he was on the take from the Oil for Influence program, now, is it? And, let's not forget, he was caught. Furthermore, why is the media (and the howling bats of the blogging left) acting like Chalabi was current news even before the allegations were brought? The Adminstration had pretty much negated Chalabi as a serious player in Iraq long before the investigation and allegations became public.

So let's recap:

• The press reports the frictional attrition of war - always tragic, eternally capricious - as if it's a unique liability to the Bush Administration.
• The press continues to spin Abu Ghraib - a crime committed by undertrained flunkies - as the direct reponsiblity of the Administration
• The press covers Chalabi - who is so 2002 - as if they've uncovered Kim Philby in the Pentagon

So why would the Administration need to work on Public Relations?

Posted by Mitch at May 23, 2004 09:04 PM