From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: June 8, 2007 7:35:45 PM PDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Fwd: GOP/Media Rewrite Iraq War History
At the June 5 Republican debate, co-sponsored by CNN, Romney
defended George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq in March 2003 on the
grounds that Saddam Hussein refused to let United Nations weapons
inspectors in to search for W.M.D.
If Saddam "had opened up his country to I.A.E.A. inspectors, and
they'd come in and they'd found that there were no weapons of mass
destruction," the war might have been averted, the former
Massachusetts governor said.
But the historical fact is that Saddam Hussein DID open up his
country in 2002~03, giving Hans Blix and his U.N. inspection team
free rein to check out suspected W.M.D. sites. It was BUSH who
FORCED U.N. inspectors TO GET OUT in March 2003 so that his
invasion could proceed.
Why didn't CNN or the press corps object to Romney's bogus
account? American journalists have accepted the neocons'
revisionist history because they must treat all Bush's lies as
gospel truth.
See what's free at AOL.com.
From: "Jim S." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: June 8, 2007 6:23:06 PM PDT
Subject: G.O.P./Media Rewrite Iraq War History
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/060807.html *G.O.P./Media
Rewrite Iraq War History*
By Robert Parry
June 8, 2007
New York Times columnist Paul Krugman and radio personality Jay
Diamond
are right to wonder why Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney
got
away with rewriting a key chapter of the Iraq War history without
political reporters raising a peep.
At the June 5 Republican debate, co-sponsored by CNN, Romney defended
George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq in March 2003 on the grounds that
Saddam Hussein refused to let United Nations weapons inspectors in to
search for W.M.D.
If Saddam "had opened up his country to I.A.E.A. inspectors, and
they'd
come in and they'd found that there were no weapons of mass
destruction," the war might have been averted, the former
Massachusetts
governor said.
But the reality is that Hussein did open up his country through the
fall
and winter of 2002~03, giving Hans Blix and his U.N. inspection team
free rein to check out suspected W.M.D. sites. It was President Bush
who forced the U.N. inspectors out in March 2003 so his invasion could
proceed.
The answer to the media question of why the U.S. press corps didn?t
object to Romney's bogus account is that Washington journalists have
accepted this revisionist history since Bush began lying about the
facts
in July 2003.
On July 14, 2003, as the U.S.-led W.M.D. search was coming up empty
and
only four months after Bush pushed the U.N. inspectors out of Iraq, he
began asserting that Hussein had never let the inspectors in. Bush
told
reporters:
"We gave him [Saddam Hussein] a chance to allow the inspectors in, and
he wouldn't let them in. And, therefore, after a reasonable
request, we
decided to remove him from power."
Facing no contradiction from the White House press corps, Bush
continued
repeating this lie in varied forms over the next four years as part of
his public litany for defending the invasion.
On Jan. 27, 2004, for example, Bush said, "We went to the United
Nations, of course, and got an overwhelming resolution -- 1441 --
unanimous resolution, that said to Saddam, you must disclose and
destroy
your weapons programs, which obviously meant the world felt he had
such
programs. He chose defiance. It was his choice to make, and he
did not
let us in."
Color of Truth
As the months and years went by, Bush's lie and its unchallenged
retelling took on the color of truth.
At a March 21, 2006, news conference, Bush again blamed the war on
Hussein?s defiance of U.N. demands for unfettered inspections.
"I was hoping to solve this [Iraq] problem diplomatically," Bush said.
"The world said, 'Disarm, disclose or face serious consequences.' ? We
worked to make sure that Saddam Hussein heard the message of the
world.
And when he chose to deny the inspectors, when he chose not to
disclose, then I had the difficult decision to make to remove him.
And
we did."
Only two weeks ago, at a press conference on May 24, 2007, Bush
offered
a short-hand version, even inviting the journalists to remember the
invented history.
"As you might remember back then, we tried the diplomatic route: [U.N.
Resolution] 1441 was a unanimous vote in the Security Council that
said
disclose, disarm, or face serious consequences. So, the choice was
his
[Hussein?s] to make. And he made a choice that has subsequently
caused
him to lose his life."
In the frequent repetition of this claim, Bush never acknowledges the
fact that Hussein did comply with Resolution 1441 by declaring
accurately that he had disposed of his W.M.D. stockpiles and by
permitting U.N. inspectors to examine any site of their choosing.
[For
more on Bush's Iraq War deceptions, see Consortiumnews.com's "Bush's
Killer Talking Points":
http://www.consortiumnews.com./2007/052907.html ]
Prominent Washington journalists have even repeated Bush's lie as
their
own. For instance, in a July 2004 interview, ABC's veteran newsman
Ted
Koppel used it to explain why he -- Koppel -- thought the invasion of
Iraq was justified.
"It did not make logical sense that Saddam Hussein, whose armies had
been defeated once before by the United States and the Coalition,
would
be prepared to lose control over his country if all he had to do was
say, 'All right, U.N., come on in, check it out'," Koppel told Amy
Goodman, host of "Democracy Now!"
Of course, Hussein did tell the U.N. to "come on in, check it
out." But
he did so in the real history, not in the faux reality that now
governs
Washington.
'Big Lie'
This strategy of repeating a "big lie" often enough to make it sound
true was famously described in the writings of Nazi propagandist
Joseph
Goebbels during World War II. However, given the relatively free U.S.
press, many Americans felt they were protected from "big lie"
techniques, counting on journalists to call lying politicians to
account.
But that clearly is no longer the case -- and hasn?t been for some
time.
Facing career pressure from well-organized right-wing attack groups,
American journalists act more like triangulating politicians,
fearful of
accusations of "liberal bias" or unpatriotic behavior or softness on
terrorism.
To have challenged George W. Bush in July 2003 -- when he was near the
height of his popularity and to do so in a way that might be
interpreted
as defending Saddam Hussein -- would have looked like career
suicide to
many American reporters.
So, discretion -- or in this case the acceptance of a lie as truth --
was the better part of valor. And once the lie was repeated
enough, it
would have sounded odd to suddenly start challenging what had
become the
official version of reality. It was the smarter choice to stay silent
and avoid certain punishment from Bush's defenders.
Clever journalists know that it's much safer to bash someone like,
say,
Al Gore. There's virtually no career downside to do that. [See
Consortiumnews.com's "The New Assault on Al Gore": http://
www.consortiumnews.com./2007/060507.html ]
Now, the bogus history of Saddam Hussein barring the U.N.
inspectors has
been passed down to a new political generation and surely is
believed by
millions of Americans who will be called on to evaluate this latest
cast
of aspiring presidential hopefuls.
To state the obvious, this is not the way a healthy democracy
should work.
~~~
[Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories in the 1980s
for the
Associated Press and Newsweek. His latest book, "Secrecy & Privilege:
Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq," can be ordered at:
secrecyandprivilege.com
It's also available at Amazon.com, as is his 1999 book, "Lost History:
Contras, Cocaine, the Press, & 'Project Truth'."]
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