GOTTA READ BETWEEN THE LINES OF THOSE "LEAKED MEMOS"

While Democrats have advocated beginning troop withdrawals as a means of putting pressure on Mr. Maliki, the memo suggests that such tactics may backfire by stirring up opposition against a politically vulnerable leader.

"Pushing Maliki to take these steps without augmenting his capabilities could force him to failure--if the Parliament removes him from office with a majority vote or if action against the Mahdi militia (JAM) causes elements of the Iraqi Security forces to fracture and leads to major Shia disturbances in southern Iraq," the memo says.
--"Bush Advisor's Memo Cites Doubts About Iraqi Leader," Michael R. Gordon, New York Times, November 29, 2006


Television news, by its very nature, is driven by the scoop. Even when the scoop is provided by the print media, TV news rushes to package it into wham-bam soundbites for Americans to snack on just before dinner.

Naturally, that soundbite gets more attention if it highlights controversy of some kind, and so, taking its cue from the NY Times headline, the news media made a big deal about the fact that a notoriously locked-down White House somehow "leaked" a top-secret memo from Bush's National Security Advisor that cast doubt on Maliki's ability to hold the crumbling Iraqi government together.

But that's not the story. Ya gotta read between the lines.

Remember Judith Miller?

She was another crackerjack NY Times journalist who, like Michael Gordon, had won the Pulitzer Prize and wrote about the war. Her seduction by the inner ring of the White House, masterminded by Scooter Libby and Dick Cheney, was a lesson in truly brilliant media manipulation.

The White House knew that the Times was, arguably, the most powerful newspaper in the country and they feared what they perceived as a liberal bias, so as they made their plans to invade Iraq, they knew they'd have trouble getting the rest of the country to get onboard the wartrain, so they set about to seduce one of the country's top foreign affairs journalists.

The seduction works like this: Offer access. Offer exclusivity. Offer secrecy. Stroke their egos while, at the same time, giving them the chance to break big stories before anybody else in the country. Let them do their own imagining of more Pulitzers.

Then, leak whatever lies, distortions, misinformation, or propaganda you want, only do it in a highly secretive, official way.

Offer access. Offer exclusivity. Offer secrecy.

And wait for the headlines.

It worked. The New York Times surprised everybody with its pro-war stance, and made all kinds of history with its leaked documents and inside-access.

It made Judith Miller a star.

Remember Bob Woodward? The most powerful and successful Washington Post reporter on the masthead. And he wanted to write a book about the war.

Offer access. Offer exclusivity. Offer secrecy.

His first two books about the war were chock-full of interviews with the very highest echelons of the Bush White House, from Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld on down. He was given complete cooperation.

His first two books, consequently, were highly flattering of the Bush White House and their handling of the war.


This, I suppose, is a terrible thing to suggest: that Woodward might have been overly attentive to the president's soaring approval ratings, and to what was then considered the likelihood that we'd get out of this Iraq war with some efficiency; that he might have seen a picture of illogic and disarray in the White House (the picture, based at least in part on reporting he did while writing the previous book, that he is painting now), but instead rendered a picture of conviction and even occasional sagacity, because THAT WAS THE CANNY AND COMMERCIAL WAY TO TELL A STORY, AND BECAUSE THESE WERE THE TERMS ON WHICH HE GOT HIS INTIMATE ACCESS. But now, suddenly, like everybody else, including his great cast of highly placed characters, he sees it all going south, and smells the blood…hmmm. (emphasis mine)
--"Survivor: the White House Edition," Michael Wolff, Vanity Fair, December, 2006 issue


In other words, Wolff outright lays it on the line in this month's Vanity Fair that Bob Woodward might have actually KNOWN how bad things were months and months before he said anything, but told the story the way the White House wanted it told because they offered access, exclusivity, and secrecy.

AND IT SOLD BOOKS. MILLIONS OF THEM.

Remember Michael Gordon? He is currently the New York Times's chief war correspondent, and co-author of the groundbreaking, bestselling book: Cobra II: the Inside Story of the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq.

His was one of the first books to expose just how badly botched this invasion was, just how egotistical and arrogant were the top Pentagon officials and the ranking general who managed the invasion.

He sold millions of books and continues to write for the Times.

I respect Michael Gordon enormously. He didn't just interview generals for his book; he talked to the troops on the ground and put himself in harm's way many times with the soldiers and Marines.

He was one of the first ranking journalists to speak truth to power.

So, now we've got all this feeding frenzy over the Iraq Study Group and over the Democratic take-over of Congress and the Senate, and this White House feels its back up against the wall to start pulling out of Iraq.

Bush keeps saying he's going to stay the course until the mission is accomplished (his words not mine), but nobody seems to be listening to him.

They do, however, listen to Michael Gordon.

Offer access. Offer exclusivity. Offer secrecy.

If you read carefully the most recent articles by Michael Gordon, every single one of them seems to spell out the same theme: We can't get out of Iraq. To pull out now would be chaos. We need more troops, not less.

Remember Lyndon Johnson? Remember how, when this country was torn apart over the Vietnam war, his response was to escalate and send thousands more troops to Vietnam?

THE WAR DRAGGED ON FOR SIX MORE YEARS AND TENS OF THOUSANDS MORE DIED.

Remember Richard Nixon? Remember how he got himself elected president by promising a "secret plan to end the war"?

And how the war dragged on THREE MORE YEARS, UNTIL JUST BEFORE THE NEXT ELECTIONS?

The big news of the "leaked memos" coming out of the White House, being written up by Michael Gordon/Judith Miller/Bob Woodward, et al, all really say the same thing: We must stay the course. We must accomplish the mission.

And they're all coming out just in time to act as counterparts to the Iraq Study Group recommendations, which will ask for a troop "pullout" of FIFTEEN combat brigades.

This, while the White House is planning to deploy FOUR MORE BATTALIONS to Iraq.

I'm not sure the Vanity Fair columnist was right that a journalist of Bob Woodward's stature could actually be compromised by access, exclusivity and secrecy, to the point that he deliberately misrepresented what was really happening in order to stay on the good side of his gravy train.

I just don't know.

And I do think that Michael Gordon cares a great deal for the troops and this terrible mess.

But when you are talking about access to the highest rings of power in a time of great historic turmoil, and you, and you alone, can break the story…Who can say how long you can remain objective?

Judith Miller flat-out crossed over the line. Who knows how many other ranking journalists with intimate White House access have? But I will give the final dose of REAL reality that comes from Thomas Friedman, the foreign affairs columnist for the New York Times. He writes opinion, and he doesn't ask for White House access to do it. He bases his opinion on many years of experience with, travels to, and education about the Middle East.

This is the truth.

And it didn't come from a White House memo.

This is what the American people have GOT to realize, RIGHT NOW, no matter how many memos leak from a White House struggling to maintain its own course while paddling upstream against a tsunami of events on the ground and public outrage:

Here is the simple truth about Iraq today: This country is so broken it can't even have a proper civil war…Iraq is in so many pieces now, divided among warlords, foreign terrorists, gangs, militias, parties, the police, and the army, that nobody seems able to deliver anybody. Iraq has entered a stage beyond civil war--it's gone from breaking apart to breaking down. This is not the Arab Yugoslavia anymore. It's Hobbes's jungle.

Given this, we need to face our real choices in Iraq, which are: TEN MONTHS OR TEN YEARS. Either we just get out of Iraq in a phased withdrawal over ten months, and try to stabilize it some other way, or we accept the fact that the only way it will not be a failed state is if WE START OVER AND REBUILD IT FROM THE GROUND UP, WHICH COULD TAKE TEN YEARS. THIS WOULD REQUIRE REINVADING IRAQ, WITH AT LEAST 150,000 MORE TROOPS, CRUSHING THE SUNNI AND SHIITE MILITIAS, CONTROLLING THE BORDERS, AND BUILDING IRAQ'S INSTITUTIONS AND POLITICAL CULTURE FROM SCRATCH.

Anyone who tells you that we can just train a few more Iraqi troops and police officers and then slip out in two or three years is either lying or a fool…

This has left us with two impossible choices. If we're not ready to do what is necessary to crush the dark forces in Iraq and properly rebuild it, then we need to leave--BECAUSE TO JUST KEEP STUMBLING ALONG AS WE HAVE BEEN MAKES NO SENSE. IT WILL ONLY MEAN THROWING MORE GOOD LIVES AFTER GOOD LIVES INTO A DEEPER AND DEEPER HOLE FILLED WITH MORE AND MORE BROKEN PIECES. (emphasis mine)
--"Ten Months or Ten Years," Thomas Friedman, New York Times, November 29, 2006