Howard Kurtz, An Untidy Aftermath washingtonpost.com
[ Kurtz' media roundup from a few days back (4/14) tracking the evolving line on looting. From "well deserved fun" to "oops", I don't know if he quite gets up to the current "sinister forces" line. Or whatever other line Rummy is pedaling these days, it certainly couldn't be the responsibility of the occupying army to deal with stuff like this. Referenced articles are linked in the original. ]
So much for the notion that the looting was kind of charming.
The media, not to mention the military, initially took a kind of bemused approach to the sight of fed-up Iraqis carrying off chairs and televisions and fistfuls of nearly-worthless dinars.
But when the good citizens began stealing beds and CAT scans from hospitals, ransacking homes and setting fires, and emptying out the museums, and rifle-toting shopkeepers began firing back, things quickly spiralled out of control. Not only were the images terrible, but ordinary Iraqis naturally wondered how the liberators could be allowing such chaos. And U.S. military leaders reversed their earlier stance that they couldn't be bothered with petty looting.
We don't blame the soldiers – they had their hands full with continued enemy resistance – but the idea that we could just wait a couple of weeks until a police force got deputized was fairly dumb. And it sounded a tad insensitive for Rummy to dismiss it as merely "untidy."
Before we get off the subject, why do reporters keep asking administration officials whether Saddam is dead or alive when they obviously don't have a clue?
Inevitably, the swiftness of the American victory is providing a boost for the president, who stayed the course despite plenty of carping from some Democrats, some commentators and a bunch of retired generals. (John McCain wonders where all these four-stars came from, asking: "Is there some retirement home out there where they go down and blow a bugle when the war starts?")
Unless the situation in Iraq somehow collapses, we suspect that the combination of Afghanistan and Iraq has given Bush nearly unassailable stature on national security matters. And this Washington Post poll shows the short-term benefit.
"Three in four Americans approve of the job that Bush is doing as president, his best rating since June. Eight in 10 support Bush's decision to go to war, and nearly two-thirds say the war is going 'very well' for the United States – up 19 percentage points in less than a week."
Now every political reporter old enough to remember '92 will question whether Dubya can translate his wartime strength into a domestic agenda – whether, in short, he can avoid his father's fate. In fact, you'll read that comparison so many times in the coming months it will make you tear your hair out.
The Philadelphia Inquirer is out of the gate early.
"President Bush pushed his war with Iraq past the doubters at the United Nations and everywhere else, and the cheers of the Iraqi people at Saddam Hussein's downfall seem to vindicate his resolve.
"But while Bush now appears as a colossus on the world stage, his prospects for reelection at home remain an open question.
"Even as fighting continues in Iraq, Bush's advisers are looking for ways to exploit his wartime popularity for legislative and political gain. Plans call for Bush to push hard for tax cuts and changes in Medicare, while jump-starting a reelection campaign that was put on hold for the war.
"Bush and his supporters want to make sure that he avoids the fate of his father, whose popularity after the Persian Gulf War collapsed under the weight of economic hard times. And they are mindful, too, that even victory in World War II did not spare Winston Churchill from being voted out of office by a British public weary of war and eager for different domestic policies."
The Wall Street Journal strikes the same theme:
"President Bush now sits at the very political crossroads his father occupied more than a decade ago.
"Military victory in Iraq seems assured, but the domestic U.S. economy is deteriorating. How Mr. Bush handles it between now and November 2004 is likely to determine whether he wins re-election or is voted out after one term, as his father was. Just hours after watching Iraqis clamber on a fallen statue of Saddam Hussein, Mr. Bush brainstormed Wednesday with Chief of Staff Andrew Card and legislative liaison David Hobbs to figure out a way to salvage his $725 billion tax-cut package, under siege on Capitol Hill. . . .
"The president and his Republican Party clearly have reason to celebrate. The administration's war plan appears to have succeeded without triggering bloody and protracted urban warfare, a spike in oil prices or use of weapons of mass destruction. If history is any guide, Mr. Bush will see a boost in public-opinion polls that will lengthen his advantage over prospective 2004 opponents. . . .
"But most critical for Mr. Bush's political success will be his ability to harness momentum from the seizure of Baghdad to his advantage on domestic problems. That's the very pivot that his father failed to make after the success of Operation Desert Storm in early 1991."
Well, Bush can always threaten air strikes against the opposition.
USA Today's Walter Shapiro says 30 seconds is all it will take.
"Here is a fail-safe political prediction: We will see the stirring footage of the crowds in Baghdad and the toppling statues of Saddam Hussein replayed endlessly next year in TV ads for George W. Bush's re-election campaign. The allure of this week's imagery will be irresistible for those entrusted with reminding voters of the president's wartime leadership. . . .
"The biggest question for the leading Democratic contenders who had questioned the war against Iraq was whether they would modify their positions in response to the news from Baghdad. Not a chance. There were no dramatic conversions by the war critics nor was there any burst of I-told-you triumphalism by the supporters of military action. If anything, the twin Democratic events underscored a cardinal rule of politics: Unswerving consistency is safer than opportunistic repositioning. . . .
"The only off-key note came in the form of two extra words uttered by former Vermont governor Howard Dean during the Children's Defense Fund forum. Reiterating his opposition to the war, Dean said, 'We need to contain Saddam, we should have contained Saddam. We got rid of him. I suppose that's a good thing.' The flicker of doubt conveyed by the words, 'I suppose,' was a bit odd. Even Democrats who doubt the strategic wisdom of the war have to agree that Saddam's ouster was unquestionably a good thing."
We suppose that's pretty obvious.
Ron Brownstein of the Los Angeles Times tries to project the shape of the Democratic race:
"Dean has gained great mileage from denouncing the war. But with Saddam Hussein's regime ousted at a remarkably modest cost in American lives, Dean may be vulnerable to a counterattack later from more hawkish Democrats, such as Sens. Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut and John Edwards of North Carolina.
"And privately, the hawks (who also include Rep. Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri) are itching to join Dean in accusing Sen. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, who has blown hot and cold on the war, of trying to have it both ways. An aide to one Democratic hawk predicts that opponents will eventually accuse Kerry of trying to straddle tough choices – using his swings on the war as Point 1."
Is the worst of the looting and pillaging over?
"The chaos that turned Baghdad into a place of nightmarish lawlessness over the past five days began today to give way to tentative signs of a city determined to begin the long climb back toward order," says the New York Times.
"The change came almost a week after American troops broke into the heart of Baghdad and uprooted the government of Saddam Hussein, setting loose the demons of popular revenge. Almost everywhere, from the revival of some bus service in the city center to squads of Iraqi volunteers venturing out into what had been free-fire zones to recover the putrefying bodies of the dead, there were signs that the 4.5 million people of Baghdad were beginning to reclaim the edges of a normal life."
Maybe there's nothing left worth stealing.
The rationales are interesting, though, as with this man questioned by the Chicago Tribune.
"'I am not coming here to steal,' Hythem Ali said as he hoisted a sack of sugar over his shoulder. 'I am coming here to steal just enough for my family. Now we can take things because there is no government.'"
Andrew Sullivan fears the fallout from all those pictures of Iraqis helping themselves to free merchandise.
"The coming spin: You can see it now. Chaos. Looting. Disorder. Losing the peace. It's not that there won't be some truth to these stories; and real cause for concern. The pent-up fury, frustration and sheer anger of three decades is a powerful thing, probably impossible to stop immediately without too much force. And the last thing we want is fire-power directed toward the celebrating masses. The trouble is that they could become the narrative of the story, especially among the usual media suspects, and erode the impact and power of April 9. . . . You-know-who will probably have a front-page 'news analysis' that will describe the joy of liberation being transformed into the nightmare of a Hobbesian quicksand of ever-looming cliches."
Does the end of the war mean the end of the protests? Apparently not, says USA Today.
"Anti-war groups, uncertain whether they can still muster large demonstrations, have no plans to close up shop now that Saddam Hussein's regime has fallen. Just as they opposed what they called an 'illegal and unjust' war, activists say they will oppose a U.S. military occupation of Iraq.
"Today, in a preview of what may be the anti-war movement's new emphasis, Direct Action to Stop the War will try to shut down ChevronTexaco's headquarters in San Ramon, Calif. The group says ChevronTexaco stands to gain by tapping Iraq's oil reserves. . . .
"Activists say they are pleased Saddam is out and the war is drawing to a close because that means the killing will stop. But they fear that the administration's broader foreign policy goals will draw America into conflicts with Syria, Iran or North Korea."
So they will protest wars that haven't yet been launched?
For an assessment of how the media have done in this war – and a very controversial admission by CNN's news chief – check out our Monday column in The Washington Post.
Paul Krugman in the New York Times comes up with a unified theory of Bush sins.
One has to admit that the Bush people are very good at conquest, military and political. They focus all their attention on an issue; they pull out all the stops; they don't worry about breaking the rules. This technique brought them victory in the Florida recount battle, the passage of the 2001 tax cut, the fall of Kabul, victory in the midterm elections, and the fall of Baghdad. But after the triumph, when it comes time to take care of what they've won, their attention wanders, and things go to pot."
Salon's Gary Kamiya, an antiwar journalist, makes a stunning admission.
"I have a confession: I have at times, as the war has unfolded, secretly wished for things to go wrong. Wished for the Iraqis to be more nationalistic, to resist longer. Wished for the Arab world to rise up in rage. Wished for all the things we feared would happen. I'm not alone: A number of serious, intelligent, morally sensitive people who oppose the war have told me they have had identical feelings.
"Some of this is merely the result of pettiness – ignoble resentment, partisan hackdom, the desire to be proved right and to prove the likes of Rumsfeld wrong, irritation with the sanitizing, myth-making American media. That part of it I feel guilty about, and disavow. But some of it is something trickier: It's a kind of moral bet-hedging, based on a pessimism not easy to discount, in which one's head and one's heart are at odds. . . .
"What if you are convinced that an easy victory will ultimately result in a larger moral negative – four more years of Bush, for example, with attendant disastrous policies, or the betrayal of the Palestinians to eternal occupation, or more imperialist meddling in the Middle East or elsewhere?"
Yes, but our guys were fighting and dying for that "easy" victory.
Los Angeles Times critic Howard Rosenberg says Fox's coverage is way over the top.
"When Fox reporter Simon Marks suggested from Amman, Jordan, that Arabs 'on the street' may still regard Americans as invaders who manipulated these images, not as liberators, [Fox News Channel anchor David] Asman snapped: 'There is a certain ridiculousness to that point of view.'
"Whether he was right or wrong, the day's symbolism was historic on a level unrelated to politics or nationalism. When the statue of Hussein fell, an era of TV news appeared to topple with it.
"There was a time, years ago, when even a network news anchor's raised eyebrow was correctly denounced as commentary. How quaint and musty that code of objectivity now seems as the war in Iraq winds down. And viewers face Fox's swirling sands of spin. . . .
"Where should journalists draw a line separating news from opinion? Throughout much of Fox, the question never arises. Although its field reporters play it mostly down the middle – and that's significant – its New York anchor-interviewers are notorious for injecting their own views, nearly always conservative and supportive of the Bush administration. What's more, at times they press field reporters to agree."
Salon's King Kaufman barbecues former Reagan aide Dale Petroskey, now with baseball's Hall of Fame, for canceling a "Bull Durham" ceremony because he's mad at star Tim Robbins for criticizing the war in Iraq:
"How dare Dale Petroskey hijack his caretaker role in our national game and use it not just for political grandstanding, but for political grandstanding that seeks to stifle debate, that brands debate as unpatriotic. I don't know what could be more unpatriotic than Petroskey's view that dissent is bad for America. Perhaps he would have felt more at home in Saddam's Iraq, where no one ever engaged in 'very public criticism' of the president. . . .
"Patriotic baseball fans should demand regime change in Cooperstown as well."
Dan Kennedy bostonphoenix.com gets in his licks too:
"Well, so much for the weapons-grade plutonium. The Fox News Channel – which yesterday was breathlessly hyping a report that US Marines may have found 'weapons-grade plutonium' in a facility south of Baghdad – is now running an AP report on its website that puts the matter in a very different light.
"It appears that the Americans, with Homer Simpson-like regard for the hazards of nuclear material, may have broken the seal on a cache of low-grade uranium that was already known to the UN weapons inspectors.
"Fox News's source yesterday was Carl Prine, an embedded reporter for Richard Mellon Scaife's Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. Here's his story, which seems to be a measured and responsible account of the situation.
"As far as I've been able to tell, Fox News is the only major news outlet to hype this inflammatory piece of non-news. Is this fair and balanced reporting?"
As long as we're on a Fox jag, Bill O'Reilly says the Orange County Register dropped his column because he supported the war. But the OC Weekly quotes the paper's editorial director, Cathy Taylor, as noting that she dumped him eight months before the war started.
"'We published a number of his columns throughout the fall and into the spring,' said Taylor. 'Then we started to notice something. The columns were more and more about Bill O'Reilly and Bill O'Reilly's television show and what happened to Bill O'Reilly on Bill O'Reilly's television show."
Finally, it's not all stiff-upper-lip stuff at 10 Downing Street, says Reuters.
"British Prime Minister Tony Blair put aside his concerns about Iraq for a few minutes to star as an animated version of himself in an episode of cult TV cartoon 'The Simpsons,' a Downing Street spokesman said. Blair, a longtime fan of the show, spent a short time on Friday recording a few lines of dialogue for a special edition of the hit series in which the dysfunctional yellow cartoon family come to Britain for a holiday."
D'oh! |
