On Drudge: The Daily Brew
The Daily Brew
© February 18, 2004
Same As The Old Boss
I won’t bother with Matt Drudge’s foray into John Kerry’s sex life,
except to say that that by now it should be obvious that Drudge’s true
function in the GOP media ecosystem is as the liar of last resort. The
everyday lies, the ones that can be dressed up as jokes, opinions, or
exaggerations, come from a million sources. But when the polls numbers
are crashing, and the GOP really needs a hard-edged smear to change the
subject, Drudge is the go-to-guy. His willingness to make the over the
top accusation is critical, because without someone willing to take the
fall, the rest of them can’t repeat the lie without tarnishing their
own credibility, such as it is. So Limbaugh, Fox, The Wall Street
Journal, the National Review and the whole cast of print pundits and
media talking heads who form the Republican spin machine need a
designated stooge. Drudge fills that role.
Far more insidious than the Drudge-type lies, however, are the ones
that fit into the GOP’s preferred meta-narrative. These are dangerous
because they bear a passing semblance to the truth, and they get
repeated in the mainstream press. The worst one I see on the radar
right now was repeated by staff writer John M. Glionna in the Los
Angeles Times yesterday. As told by Glionna, when John Kerry testified
before Congress in 1971 he “accused fellow servicemen of committing
wartime atrocities against civilians.” What Kerry actually said was
that he was present when his fellow servicemen had testified about war
crimes they themselves had committed. There is a big difference between
these two versions of the event. In the GOP-preferred version, Kerry is
stabbing his fellow vets in the back, accusing them of crimes. In the
real world, Kerry wasn’t accusing anyone of anything. He was simply
repeating stories told by his fellow vets and bringing them to the
attention of the Congress. But don’t take my word for it. Read Kerry’s
testimony and decide for yourself.
richmond.edu
The reason that this particular lie is so insidious is because it fits
so tightly with the emerging GOP narrative. Judging by the poll
numbers, figuring out how to beat Kerry is proving a tough nut to
crack. But Karl Rove has the focus groups are working overtime, and we
are starting to see the rough outline of what is coming. Bush’s
overarching theme is shaping up to go something like this:
“George Bush is a strong, war-time leader who puts the safety of the
American public first. John Kerry is a blame-America-firster who puts
our troops and our nation at risk by criticizing our government while
our troops are in the field. He did so by leading protests against
Vietnam, he did so during his Senate career with his votes against
funding our military and intelligence services, and he is doing so
today with his criticism of our efforts in Iraq.”
Allow me to offer a rebuttal of this narrative for use by my fellow
“Anybody But Bush” patriots and the Kerry campaign.
On the first point, I would suggest that Kerry get out front and battle
the lies being spread by writers and pundits like Mr. Glionna head on.
The “Hanoi Jane” tag is getting so much repetition that it threatens to
become the “invented the internet” myth of the 2004 campaign. Gore let
his real legislative accomplishments on the internet and Love Canal be
used against him by not providing an early and forceful rebuttal of
Karl Rove’s twisting of the truth, and Kerry is making the same mistake
with his principled stand against the Vietnam war. Kerry’s testimony
helped end that war, and there would be more names on the wall, not
fewer, if he hadn’t spoken out.
On the second point, I would suggest that the best defense is a good
offense. George Bush’s record includes the biggest terrorist attack in
our history, which happened just after he had completed a month long
vacation. Prior to the attack, he had ignored warnings from the
outgoing Clinton administration about the threat posed by al Qaeda, and
he had disregarded the detailed and bi-partisan Hart-Rudman plan that
had been constructed at great expense to fight it. Instead of focusing
our resources on terrorism, Bush was pursuing initiatives in missile
defense and in the process breaching international treaties that had
stood for decades. He has fought an independent investigation into his
failure of leadership ever since. In contrast, Kerry’s record in the
Senate reflects the thinking of a man who was and is in front of the
curve. Our national defense would have been far better served if the
money that was spent on weapons systems and intelligence technologies
targeting threats from the Soviet Union and favored by Bush’s far right
base had been spent on human intelligence and a force structure geared
towards combating terrorism.
On the final point, I would suggest that the enemies of freedom in Iraq
are given far more aid and comfort by the fact that our American troops
in Iraq are essentially fighting the war alone than they are by protest
groups back home. Protest groups, by the way, who are being infiltrated
by law enforcement agencies in what has to be the worst misallocation
of homeland security resources since the search for the Texas state
legislators. Conscientious Americans exercising their first amendment
rights didn’t put our troops in harm’s way by rushing into this war as
a first resort; George Bush did.
When the Democratic primary winds to its inevitable conclusion in early
March, the Republican war chest is going to be put to use in full force
pushing this narrative. Theresa Heinz-Kerry, whose $650 million
inheritance is more than enough to meet the Bush Ranger’s juggernaut
dollar for dollar, has intimated that she would use her fortune if the
Republican’s attacked Mr. Kerry’s character. My advice to Mrs.
Heinz-Kerry, who I met a few weeks ago when she visited a Mexican
restaurant in my small, GOP dominated corner of Washington State, is
that these attacks have already begun, as is made plain by Mr.
Glionna’s sleight of hand with respect to Mr. Kerry’s 1971 testimony.
It will be infinitely less expensive to fight them now than it will be
to wait until the ink has dried on the media’s script.
_________________________________________________________
This edition of The Daily Brew was sent to you at your request
If you would like, you should feel free to pass it along.
If your friends would like to receive The Daily Brew regularly,
they can sign up for a free lifetime subscription at
thedailybrew.com |
