As the editors at the NY Times continue to pluck petals off a daisy, they manage to execute a 180 degree turn from the Saturday Editorial (Show Us the Proof) to the Sunday Week in Review on the question of whether the Bush Administration linked Saddam to the 9/11 attacks.
Saturday:
Mr. Bush said the 9/11 panel had actually confirmed his contention that there were "ties" between Iraq and Al Qaeda. He said his administration had never connected Saddam Hussein to 9/11. Both statements are wrong.
Sunday (see pop-up titled "What The Bush Administration Said":
Critics of the Bush Administration argue that it falsely created a link between Saddam Hussein and the 9/11 attacks to help justify the war. Last week, the administration countered that it had never made such an assertion - only that there were ties, however murky, between Iraq and Al Qaeda. A survey of past public comments seems to bear that out - although whether there was a deliberate campaign to create guilt by association is difficult to say.
Is this a rowback, or just a complete collapse into schizophrenia? I can hardly wait for Monday's installment - perhaps the Times can introduce an alien abduction theory.
The NY Times is running a series of promotional advertisements in my television market. Part of the pitch shows some earnest chap extolling the Times for (paraphrasing) "really surrounding a story - they give me so many ways to understand it". Maybe this is what he had in mind.
"although whether there was a deliberate campaign to create guilt by association is difficult to say."
Don't know why you're in any doubt here. It's not a turn-around, it's a continuation of the distortion and innaccuracy while laying down a smoke-screen for escape (though at some point the inability to report a simple fact straight raises questions of intelligence, the verbal kind). Re-read that passage, of which I've excerpted the final, slimy, outrageous innuendo.
These people are hilariously inept and dim. Everyone recall "imminent threat"? When busted on that, same b.s. ensued .... "uh, OK, our facts were wrong ... uh, but ... uh ... that's it! They IMPLIED it!"
I note that today many wire service accounts of 9/11 Comm. figures' TV appearances are showing great resilience and initiative in continuing to lie to the public. In one, Kean/Hamilton are portrayed as "avoiding" the issue of whether the staff report contradicts the admin. position, with supporting smoke-screen provided by their comments that Iran & Pakistan were more involved with AQ. This, after both have repeatedly, explicitly dismissed the MEDIA's position that the report contradicts the administration. In another, it is claimed that Cheney linked AQ to 9/11.
"Journalism" is a whole lot easier when you can just make stuff up!
Posted by: IceCold | June 20, 2004 at 05:47 PM
The goalposts seem to be swaying with this Times lead, also from Saturday:
WASHINGTON, June 18 — The leaders of the Sept. 11 commission called on Vice President Dick Cheney on Friday to turn over any intelligence reports that would support the White House's insistence that there was a close relationship between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda.
"Close relationship" versus no relationship versue no collaborative relationship versus no cooperative efforts against the US - jeepers.
Posted by: TM | June 20, 2004 at 06:13 PM
"Imminent threat"
"Niger" in the SOTU.
The straw man has long been a staple of fallacious and sneaky argumentation. But as the basis for "reporting" major national/international issues? Wow.
To the above list, add a wire-service story blandly stating that Cheney had claimed Iraqi involvement in 9/11. I think somebody might want to drop by and start banging their head, this is becoming insane ....
To relate two good "goal-post" comments, both in relation to Iraq war matters (approximate, from memory):
"The goal-posts haven't just been moved again -- they've left the stadium for the parking lot, and were last seen on the on-ramp to the interstate" (Jonah Goldberg, I think)
"Moving goal-posts? I can't even find the goal-posts anymore" (another blogger, can't remember who, recently linked by InstaPundit)
Posted by: IceCold | June 21, 2004 at 12:28 AM
Those Times ads have been running forever. The people on those ads are about the smuggest looking people they could have found, each of them oozing self-satisfaction with the fact that they subscribe to the New York Times.
The contrast to the Wall Street Journal ads is funny, since the WSJ ads are all about how you subscribe to the paper and it will help you make money.
Posted by: Crank | June 21, 2004 at 09:36 AM
I vote for "deliberate campaign". I think the Times and others are counting on people who won't bother to read beyond the headline. I had a conversation with a few people who consider themselves liberals, and I asked does anybody know who Jamie Gorelick is. 0 for 4. A welome stat if we're talking about Derek Jeter (Red Sox fan here), but discouraging in its own context.
Posted by: Tom Bowler | June 21, 2004 at 10:07 AM
If al Quaeda and Saddam agreed (as a tactical matter) to NOT coordinate efforts against the US, thereby furthering both of their strategic goals, would you say they had a 'close relationship' ? I would .
NYT confuses stategy and tactics (among many, many other things)..
Posted by: JonofAtlanta | June 21, 2004 at 02:03 PM