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2007-09-10 Home Front: Politix

Media Matters: On Fox News Sunday, Hume falsely asserted that Al Qaeda in Iraq 'was there before we got there'

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Posted by Fred 2007-09-10 00:00|| || Front Page|| [8 views ] Top
File under: al-Qaeda in Iraq

#1 I also think y'all are getting too caught up in trying to distinguish between different front organizations for the Moslem Brotherhood.

In the everything-I-ever-learned-I-learned-from-webcomics file, there's this strip from the Order of the Stick on the problems of shell games. Sometimes the only way to win is not to play.

Posted by Abdominal Snowman 2007-09-10 00:10|| 2007-09-10 00:10|| Front Page Top

#2 Is that you, Sea? I was going to send this on to Hume until you decorated it...

Posted by KBK 2007-09-10 00:17|| 2007-09-10 00:17|| Front Page Top

#3 To KBK, yes, that was my decoration. I can take it out if you feel that Mr. Hume would prefer it undecorated...

Posted by Seafarious">Seafarious 2007-09-10 00:28|| 2007-09-10 00:28|| Front Page Top

#4 Again, the administration bears the blame for utter failure in communicating, correcting, educating, and smacking-down.

Remember way back when, in the early 80s, the Reagan Pentagon started producing those slick and very interesting "Soviet Military Power" pamphlets? Those and kindred items - and the aggressive public affairs campaign of which they were a part and which was persistent - helped reduce the idiocy of the "debate" in the country on related matters.

Here you have these lightweights chanting their mantras - but they're only able to do so because the administration is utterly, bizarrely, inexplicably silent on almost everything. (My favorite, baseless mantra: "no collaborative operational relationship" - let's see, did the 9/11 Commission farce find any evidence that Iraq had a lunar base? How about any evidence that Iraq was behind the Kennedy assasination? Iraqi complicity in the Manson gang slayings? No? Oh - that's right, no one claimed any such things)

Sadly, even Brit's not playing up to potential here, because if he were, he'd say something more like "Juan, there is no disputing extensive contact between Saddam's regime and AQ, there is good reason to believe some limited coordination or mutual assistance was agreed and even implemented, there was ample reason to deem Saddam's regime an intolerable threat and remove it before its WMD potential was wedded to AQ's global ambitions, and since many of Iraq's Sunnis have made common cause with AQ since our invasion there is no surprise AQ is making what it calls an important stand against the US in Iraq. It is a GLOBAL war on terrorists, and they'll appear anywhere they can where we are engaged in efforts that directly or indirectly destroy them, weaken them, or limit their options."

And since when have any purported pre-war links been "debunked"??

But why should the country and the western world be waiting for proxies in media or Congress to educate the public, clarify the confusion, and emphasize the common sense ideas supported by available information? To the additional shame of both institutions, this hasn't happened at all (leaving aside some pre-war help from the likes of Sen. Bayh and others who have since disappeared). But WTF with the US Government absent from the debate in which it is the primary participant?

It seems beyond hope that we could ever have an administration with the guts and vision to do the right and hard things, but also explain them and ruthlessly police the distortion and idiocy that are now the norm in media, academia, and "international opinion". One wonders if any of those with access to the candidates for '08 even realize this is among the biggest problems they will inherit if they're victorious ....

Posted by Verlaine 2007-09-10 00:58|| 2007-09-10 00:58|| Front Page Top

#5 Sea, in my opinion it detracts from an excellent fisking applied by Fred. But that's just me....

Posted by KBK 2007-09-10 02:53|| 2007-09-10 02:53|| Front Page Top

#6 I say leave it in. Brit might like to know that there are those out who see things his way and are paying attention to what he says. Fred's stuff is full of all kinds of good facts to support his argument, and Sea's comments contrast Fred's lucid fact-based logicical arguments with the shallow, hysterical, naive, susceptible, and all-too-coordinated moonbat counter-"arguments" that come from reading KOS with your BS filters disabled (not that there's anything wrong with it, of course).

It'll also keep Brit on his toes knowing there are those out there who can teach him a thing or two. :-)

Love the scrawl on the bottom of the graphic!

Posted by gorb 2007-09-10 03:48|| 2007-09-10 03:48|| Front Page Top

#7 Yesterday I watched a good documentary on the Muslim Brotherhood on the History Channel. One of the experts said the MB is the originator of all the Sunni terrorist groups.

Posted by moody blues 2007-09-10 07:34|| 2007-09-10 07:34|| Front Page Top

#8 Sea's Plame comment reminded me - I watched the move 'Breach' - the Robert Hannsen arrest story - this weekend. Thought it was pretty well done.

Posted by Glenmore">Glenmore 2007-09-10 07:39|| 2007-09-10 07:39|| Front Page Top

#9 Well, most of the people that Media Matters caters too believe that Osama and AQ are CIA controlled and are being used by Bush to seize all the oil anyway.

Posted by DarthVader">DarthVader 2007-09-10 10:00|| 2007-09-10 10:00|| Front Page Top

#10 My only complaint is that Sea forgot to add "Iä! Iä! Cthulhu Fhtagn!"

Posted by Angie Schultz 2007-09-10 12:13|| 2007-09-10 12:13|| Front Page Top

#11 The go to line for those who believe there was never any connection between AQ and Iraq prior to the invasion in 2003 always refer to this:

"...the 9-11 Commission found 'no evidence' that contacts between Saddam Hussein's Iraq and Al Qaeda 'developed into a collaborative operational relationship' before the Iraq invasion."

Ok, I'm willing to grant as much. However, this is in now way to me a definitive statement. Just because there is no evidence of an "operational relationship" does not mean there was no relationship at all. What, exactly, delineates between an operational and non-operational relationship? Could there have possibly been a non-operational relationship, one based on the sharing of intent, aims, information and goals? A relationship that intentionally sought to remain non-operational for the obvious reasons (plausible deniability, operational security, etc.)?

It's just amazing to me that despite all of Saddam's atrocities and his known relationship with terrorists, people still would rather give him the benefit of the doubt over the POTUS. It boggles the mind!

Posted by eltoroverde 2007-09-10 14:18|| 2007-09-10 14:18|| Front Page Top

#12 There, there, Seafarious dear. Sit down with me, and I'll make you a nice cup of chamomile tea with extra valerian. Channelling the other side of the argument can be so draining.

Posted by trailing wife 2007-09-10 14:53|| 2007-09-10 14:53|| Front Page Top

#13 Here you have these lightweights chanting their mantras - but they're only able to do so because the administration is utterly, bizarrely, inexplicably silent on almost everything.

If there is one single thing that qualifies as Bush planting the seeds of his own destruction, this is it. The administration's thundering silence while being smeared with every distortion and fabrication imaginable reveals an almost fatal degree of incompetence.

Second only to its own violent acts, terrorism is utterly reliant upon propaganda. Added to this is how high context Muslim societies are heavily swayed by influential speakers, even if those speakers are pathological liars. Baghdad Bob and Nasrallah are superb examples of this. As relatively well-educated Westerners, it seems preposterous to us that such transparent lies can be swallowed whole without even a hiccup.

Much of the war on terrorism continues to rely upon educating the public regarding Islam's threat. Due to overly cozy relations with Saudi Arabia, Bush simply cannot bring himself to out the Saudis as the number one financiers of global terrorism. Not only has this allowed our military role in the MME (Muslim Middle East) to be called into question, it has also engendered significant, justifiable doubtno matter how misplaced it may beas to this administration's motives and America's ability to combat global terrorism.

This is a massive failing and one that will taint Bush's historical legacy.

Posted by Zenster">Zenster 2007-09-10 21:15|| 2007-09-10 21:15|| Front Page Top

#14 This is a massive failing and one that will taint Bush's historical legacy.

Crazy rarely survives historial scrutiny.

My money's on Bush's legacy.

Posted by badanov 2007-09-10 23:24|| http://www.freefirezone.org]">[http://www.freefirezone.org] 2007-09-10 23:24|| Front Page Top

23:24 badanov
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