One of the
inherent problems in announcing a “Speech To The Nation” and requesting prime
time TV coverage, even if all you do is speak for less than 25 minutes and not
from the White House, is that all the major broadcast and print media gear up
to cover what you do and don’t say ad
nauseum. Bad timing for
a slacker speech. Next time he wants to bump up declining approval numbers he
should stick to the symbolic trappings of the Oval Office. They were still
talking two hours afterwards last night, and I’d lost interest watching it live
after 5 minutes. If all you do is repeat some familiar themes and make an ‘altar
call” asking for a public commitment/confession (evangelical terms) to not lose
heart (conviction) then you shouldn’t be surprised to find that most of the
response is going to be 1) a tepid defense from your ardent supporters and 2) a
growing credibility gap from those who don’t buy your message.
When it comes
down to it, this is Bush’s War, and the criticism that the opposition party and
critics should have a viable alternative does not hold water. The lack of
accountability in the administration for its mistakes, and the hypocrisy, much
less deception, do not bode well for us.
As for
timetables, candidate Bush in 1999 called on Pres. Clinton for a timetable on
withdrawal from Kosovo:
George W. Bush, 4/9/99: “Victory means exit strategy,
and it’s important for the president to explain to us what the exit strategy
is.”
George W. Bush, 6/5/99: “I think
it’s also important for the president to lay out a timetable as to how long
they will be involved and when they will be withdrawn.”
I think his words last night about timetables referred to the Iraqi Army’s
competence: “we will stand down when they can stand up”. That’s something to embroider on a
pillow, perhaps, but not exactly an exit strategy and certainly fails the test
considering the lack of prewar planning. A sound bite and a well-delivered sermon do not make good war
policy or convince a disheartened public to keep the faith. Even Rev. Billy
Graham’s revivals have lost their conversion power, most of the audience is
already converted, the unsaved are not attending as before. Bush & Co. should learn to pay
attention to those outside their circle of believers.
Here are a few
editorials I’ve picked up so far today, the political analysis and pundit
commentaries are too numerous to list but I’ve pasted one below that sums it up
well. In our reality-TV culture where a score card and vote on/off mechanisms
have reached saturation point, the Washington Post editorial gave Bush a ‘failure
to deliver’ judgment. Many of the smaller papers did not editorialize today,
leaving it to political reporters/commentary. I’ve not made my cyber rounds into the blogosphere, but it
surely will be Faustian. KwC
Chicago Trib ED Bush Speaks to Iraq’s Future http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0506290024jun29,0,3282337.story?coll=chi-newsopinion-hed
LAT ED Presidential
Disconnect http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/
NYT ED Pres.
Bush’s Speech About Iraq http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/29/opinion/29wed1.html?
WP ED Mr.
Bush on Iraq http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/28/AR2005062801525.html
As War Shifts, So Does The Message
Ronald Brownstein, LA Times, June 29, 2005
WASHINGTON —
President Bush on Tuesday retooled his original argument for the Iraq war, justifying the U.S. military presence there
as the solution to a problem that critics say the war itself caused.
More than two years ago, Bush argued that Saddam Hussein's control over Iraq
could make the nation a haven for terrorists. But in his nationally televised
speech, Bush asserted that the tumult that has followed Hussein's removal
created the same threat.
In the lead-up to the war, Bush presented the invasion of Iraq primarily as a
means of preventing the Iraqi dictator from providing nuclear, biological or
chemical weapons to terrorists. After coalition forces failed to find evidence
of such weapons, and several investigations did not uncover meaningful links
between Hussein and Al Qaeda, the president increasingly stressed the
possibility that creating a democracy in Iraq could encourage democratic reform
across the Middle East.
In his speech Tuesday before a crowd of soldiers at Ft. Bragg, N.C., Bush still
emphasized the cause of democracy. He also mixed optimism about conditions in
Iraq with sober assessments of the continuing challenge there. But mostly Bush defended the war as a means of preventing
another terrorist attack on the United States. The
most striking argument Bush offered for his policy in Iraq was that the Mideast
nation could become a sanctuary for terrorists if U.S. forces withdrew.
By completing "the mission," Bush declared, "we will prevent Al
Qaeda and other foreign terrorists from turning Iraq into what Afghanistan was
under the Taliban — a safe haven from which they could launch attacks on
America and our friends."
That argument drew instant scorn from some Democrats, who argued that Bush was
defending the continued military operations on the basis of a threat that did
not exist before the invasion. "Most Americans are aware that the hotbed of terrorism
never existed in Iraq until we got there and it has, in fact, grown
increasingly as we are there," Sen. John F. Kerry of
Massachusetts, Bush's Democratic opponent in the 2004 election, told CNN after
the speech.
Bush's heavy emphasis
on Sept. 11 in his address followed a speech last week in which Karl Rove, his
chief political advisor, dramatically raised the issue. Rove charged that while
conservatives "prepared for war" after the 2001 attacks, liberals
wanted "to offer therapy and understanding for our attackers."
Democrats see the twin speeches as signs that Bush, facing public anxiety about
the war in Iraq and some of the lowest approval ratings of his presidency, is
hoping to regain his footing by returning public attention to the terrorist
attacks that transformed his presidency.
Tad Devine, a veteran Democratic consultant, charged that the reason the
administration is emphasizing 9/11 again "is simple: It is a strategy of fear. But as the nation is further and
further removed from what happened on that day … I really think the sand is
going through the hourglass on this for the president."
Bush offered no new policies in his remarks. Instead, as he has in major
speeches before, he presented the war as a test of American
resolve, arguing
that to shift course would provide a victory to terrorists. His tone was optimistic, but he was
clearly much more cautious about the challenges remaining in Iraq than Vice
President Dick Cheney has been. Cheney recently said the insurgency was in its
"last throes."
The speech continued a public relations drive on the war that the White House
began last week when leading Pentagon officials appeared on Capitol Hill and
Bush met with Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim Jafari.
The effort reflects the conclusion in the White House that Bush, who had
focused primarily on domestic priorities since his reelection in November,
needs to make the case for the war more forcefully and consistently. "The
sound of silence is over," said one GOP strategist familiar
with White House thinking, who asked for anonymity in discussing administration
planning.
Still, many Republican strategists hold modest expectations for the ability of
any argument from Bush to lastingly shift public opinion, absent actual
improvement in Iraq. "Reality matters so much more than speeches at this
point," said Bill Kristol, the editor of the Weekly Standard
and a leading neoconservative advocate of the war.
Bush delivered the speech against a backdrop of rising political turbulence
over the war. In the last few weeks, Democrats from Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of
Delaware to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco have markedly
escalated their criticism of the war and accused the White House of
exaggerating progress. A few Republicans, such as Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel,
have expressed similar concerns.
On Tuesday, Kerry appeared on the Senate floor to deliver his most extensive
remarks on the war since the election. He urged Bush to accelerate training of
Iraqi security forces and give other nations a larger role in the effort;
pressure the Iraqi government to provide a larger role for minority Sunni
Muslims; and organize a multinational force to patrol Iraq's borders. For the first time, Kerry also urged Bush to renounce the
establishment of any permanent U.S. bases in Iraq.
But Kerry pointedly did not endorse the call from some Democratic liberals to
begin a process of withdrawal. Biden, in his speech last week, criticized that
idea, underscoring the divisions among Democrats.
Polls show that the
public, though discouraged about Iraq, seems uncertain and ambivalent about
what to do next. A
Washington Post/ABC News poll released Monday found that Bush had made small
but perceptible gains since early June on questions such as whether the war has
contributed to the nation's long-term security and was worth fighting, given
the costs.
Even so, 53% of those responding to the survey said the war did not justify the
costs, and, for the first time, a majority — 52% — said Bush had
"intentionally misled" the public in making his case for the war.
In a separate CNN/USA Today/Gallup survey released Monday, Bush tied his lowest
numbers on both his handling of Iraq (40%) and his overall job approval rating
(45%). Yet about two-thirds of
those polled by Gallup also said establishing a friendly and stable Iraqi
government was "important" to the U.S. Nearly three-fifths of those
polled in the Washington Post/ABC survey said the U.S. should keep its military
forces in Iraq "until civil order is restored there."
Taken together, these
numbers portray a public increasingly disillusioned with the decision to invade
and worried about the course of the war — but still unconvinced that the answer
is simply to withdraw. In that
sense, tolerance for the continued deployment of American troops may depend
less on faith in Bush's arguments than doubt that his critics have yet to outline
an alternative that would produce a more acceptable outcome.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-fg-assess29jun29,0,3801438.story?coll=la-home-headlines
Karen,
Well .... we've had the speech now and it was much the style that most expected
-- that is, without any sort of plan -- though the rhetoric was not as way-out
as it might have been. I suspect that Karl Rove wrote the speech
initially, and some of his usual jingoistic phrases were retained, but there
were some turns of phrase and a balance of sub-themes which suggests others had
a hand. Three things struck me about it:
1. A great deal of time was spent on how the Iraqi forces are shaping up. He implied
that there were 160,000 -- though that is plainly nonsense. In the minds of the
speechwriters, this figure was probably arrived at as 130,000 Americans +
30,000 Iraqis. But this exaggeration once again suggests to me that he's
preparing for some significant withdrawals fairly soon. (I am increasingly
convinced that some very serious talks are now going on with Sunni extremists
and Al Qaeda terrorists. The sticking point probably is that America will still
need to leave some secure bases there even if they never appear in the streets
again as an "occupation". But, as with the Wahhabis in Saudi Arabia
after the Gulf War, even totally quarantined bases will not be entertained by
the Sunnis in Iraq.);
2. In his peroration he is obviously recognising re-enlistment and recruitment
problems;
3. He used a phrase: "Setting an artificial timetable" which struck
me as being slightly odd. Now there's nothing artificial about a timetable.
It's either sensible or it isn't. What I think it meant was "It isn't
convenient yet to announce substantial troop withdrawals."
Altogether, the speech didn't strive too strenuously in an attempt to turn back
public opinion in his favour. Bush would obviously want that to happen and I
guess the speech will have a temporary effect but I think Bush and his script
writers can clearly see the writing on the wall and that something much more
radical will be required in the coming weeks or months if Bush's presidency is
not going to be wrecked completely by the decision to invade.
One huge lack of mention which I think is extremely significant. This is the
Kurdish region. One might expect Bush to have referred -- as signs of hope --
to the peaceful areas of Iraq, such as the Kurdish region or the Shia-dominated
south. But there was nary a mention and nor is there ever in White House press
releases. The reason is, I think, that they are both close to breaking away
from Baghdad -- the Kurdish region particularly.
Keith Hudson
