--- In [email protected], Sebastian Alexandru
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Inteleg d-le Iliescu anume ca stiti tot si inca ceva
> in plus :)
Raspund pentru ca vreau sa il informez pe dl. Alexandru, nu pentru a
comenta mesajul dumnealui.
Recunosc ca nu am citit mesajele d-lui Iliescu, dar as supune
atentiei si alte opinii, mai ales de cand constat ca pe lista apar
constant pro-americani din Romania care imi pare ca devin stridenti
in incercarile de a deveni mai americani decat americanii insisi,
care se "aprind" de la expresii ca "invazia din Iraq", sau se intrec
in epitete necunoscand cum CHIAR in US exista milioane de americani
("get-beget", cum se spune), care vorbesc in EXACT aceiasi termeni.
Iata un exemplu:
http://www.laweekly.com/ink/04/02/news-corn.php
Is the President a Pathological Liar?
Bush's unhealthy relationship with reality
by David Corn
It was a set-up question. Conservative radio talk-show host Michael
Medved was trying to bait me, to push me into saying something so
out of whack about the commander in chief that I would destroy my
own credibility before the audience of his nationally syndicated
show. It was a ruse I've become quite familiar with in recent weeks,
since I published a book demurely titled The Lies of George W. Bush:
Mastering the Politics of Deception. In scores of media interviews,
right-wing hosts have pressed me to pronounce Bush the all-time
biggest SOB-of-a-liar in the White House and essentially accuse him
of being a psycho. I have resisted the invitations, choosing to
stick to my just-the-facts case that Bush has misled the public on a
host of issues � the war in Iraq, his tax cuts, global warming,
Social Security, his own past and more. The goal of these
interlocutors is to dismiss any harsh critique of Bush as nothing
more than angry-left name-calling. I obviously believe Bush has lied
often and consistently about grave matters, but I have shied away
from labeling Bush "pathological" and the like.
Now I wonder about that.
What forced this reconsideration was a speech Bush delivered in late
November to several thousand troops at Butts Army Air Field in Fort
Carson, Colorado. On this occasion, Bush served up the usual rah-rah
about the war on terrorism. But as he was hailing the U.S. military,
he remarked, "Working with a fine coalition, our military went to
Afghanistan, destroyed the training camps of al Qaeda and put the
Taliban out of business forever."
Out of business forever?
That was a false statement. Days before Bush's speech, a U.S.
helicopter crashed near Kabul, and five American soldiers were
killed. These troops were hunting Taliban remnants. Two days before
the speech, a rocket was fired at the Intercontinental Hotel in
Kabul; Taliban insurgents were the prime suspects. On November 16, a
U.N. aid worker was assassinated, apparently by the Taliban. In
Kandahar, the Taliban was threatening to harm Afghans who
participated in local elections.
None of this has been secret, even if events in Afghanistan receive
less media coverage than the Laci Peterson case. In recent weeks, a
stream of news reports has noted that the Taliban is on the rise and
mounting an increasing number of attacks. These assaults have
impeded much-needed reconstruction projects. In mid-November, a U.N.
mission reported that the Taliban attacks were endangering democracy
in Afghanistan.
What then could account for Bush's truth-defying assertion about the
Taliban? After all, it was a statement ridiculously easy to
disprove. (The Bush bashers of Moveon.org immediately sent out a
mass e-mail citing this remark as further evidence that Bush is a
misleader.) Was Bush really trying to hornswoggle the troops and the
American people? In a way. I assume that had he bothered to think
about this line, he probably would have realized that it was
inaccurate and that there was no reason to claim the Taliban was
stone-cold dead when he could have truthfully declared that the U.S.
military (under his command) and its Afghan allies had routed the
Taliban. It was not as if Bush said to himself, Aha! I know what
I'll do. I will boast that I eliminated the Taliban � even though
anyone who follows this stuff knows a Taliban resurgence is under
way � and fool people into believing I am winning the war on
terrorism.
Bush was more likely engaged in the deceit of triumphalism �
ignoring facts and saying whatever sounds good to juice up the
public. It was hype, extreme rhetoric, utterly divorced from events
on the ground. This statement was a report from Planet Bush, not the
world as it exists � a demonstration of Bush's penchant to embrace
(and peddle) self-serving fantasy over the obvious truth.
The dishonesty underlying the Taliban line was transparent. In the
same speech, Bush also practiced (yet again) a more nuanced form of
dissembling. He told the crowd that the war on terrorism began with
9/11, and that "we will not rest until we bring these committed
killers to justice. These terrorists will not be stopped by
negotiations, or by appeals to reason, or by the least hint of
conscience . . . We must, and we will continue to, take the fight to
the enemy." So far so good: The terrorists who mounted the 9/11
attacks are bad and must be defeated. Then Bush distorted the
picture: "Terrorists need places to hide, to plot and to train, so
we're holding their allies, the allies of terror, to account." And
he cited Afghanistan and Iraq.
The implication was that somehow Iraq had afforded direct assistance
to the people who attacked the United States on September 11, 2001.
But there has been no proof that the mass-murdering perps of 9/11
used Iraq to hide, plot or train. Even though Bush conceded in
September that there was "no evidence" tying Hussein to 9/11, he
still endeavors to draw a straight line from the 9/11 evildoers to
Iraq.
He displayed a similar disingenuousness during his surprise, 150-
minute-long Thanksgiving Day visit to the American troops at the Bob
Hope mess hall at the Baghdad airport. "You are," he told the
GIs, "defeating the terrorists here in Iraq, so that we don't have
to face them in our own country." That comment � which Bush had said
previously � sure seemed designed to create the impression that the
war in Iraq is about beating back al Qaeda, the only terrorists
Americans have had to face in their "own country." In the weeks
after Baghdad fell, reports out of Iraq raised the possibility that
anti-American jihadists linked to or motivated by al Qaeda were
pouring into Iraq to do battle with the United States. But a week
before Bush told the troops they were battling "terrorists" in Iraq
who might otherwise be gunning for their loved ones on the streets
of America, two of Bush's top commanders in Iraq � Major General
Charles Swannack Jr. and Major General David Petraeus � said that
they had seen little sign that a significant number of al Qaeda
loyalists or wannabes had flocked to Iraq. The enemy they are
facing, the pair asserted, were mainly Baathist remnants. And there
is no reason to believe these murderous thugs would be planning
raids on domestic U.S. targets if the U.S. military were not chasing
after them in Iraq.
So Bush tells us the ongoing war in Iraq is a strike against the
forces that hit America on 9/11 and would do so again (were it not
for the invasion of Iraq), and he proclaims the Taliban extinct.
None of this is supported by the readily available information
provided by the media or Bush's own military. Making such
melodramatic and misleading claims may or may not be pathological,
but it certainly isn't a sign that Bush has a healthy relationship
with reality.
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