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The Media, 9/11 and George W. Bush

In an outstanding post that is must reading, Digby discusses the role of the Media in enabling the incompetence and dishonesty of the current Administration and the price we pay for their abject failure:

What mattered, by default, was the President's "instinct" to guide America across the fresh, post-9/11 terrain�a style of leadership that could be rendered within tiny, confidential circles. America, unbound, was duly led by a President, unbound.
I blame the media for this. After 9/11 they lost their minds and became unthinking hagiographers and adminstration cheerleaders to an absurd extent. The man's halting, incoherent first press conference after 9/11 scared me more than the attacks and yet the press corps behaved as if they were in the presence of a God whose stuttering, meandering gibberish were words uttered from on high. He was called a genius and compared to Winston Churchill. Paeans to his greatness were turned into best sellers. His "gut" was infallible. It was patently obvious that he was in over his head and yet this bizarre, almost hallucinogenic image of the man emerged in the media that actually made me question my sanity at times. It took years for this trance to wear off with a majority of the public and even longer in the media. It was one of the strangest phenomenons I've ever observed.

And this genuflection to the "character" of George W. Bush continued until Katrina, the unquestionable turning point. Digby's point highlights why it is so important that the Media be the watchdog and skeptic for our nation even if Bill O'Reilly accuses you of treason. That a Bill O'Reilly is treated as a respectable person by the Media is a disgrace of course but beside the point. The Media MUST do its job.

The reason is that the American People will rally round the flag in times of crisis, they will suspend disbelief and hope for the best from their leaders. I know I did after 9/11. As Digby writes, in the days immediately after 9/11, President Bush seemed alarmingly inept. It was frightening. But when Bush gave his great address to a joint sesion of Congress on September 20, 2001, I wanted to believe and suspended my own disbelief. I wanted to believe he was up to the job. It was the inexplicable drive to invade Iraq that awoke me from my slumber. Before that, I took the one piece of evidence that could indicate that Bush was up to the job and ignored everything else.

But the Bush who spoke that night was never present again:

In the normal course of events, Presidents come to this chamber to report on the state of the Union. Tonight, no such report is needed. It has already been delivered by the American people.

. . . We have seen the state of our Union in the endurance of rescuers, working past exhaustion. We have seen the unfurling of flags, the lighting of candles, the giving of blood, the saying of prayers -- in English, Hebrew, and Arabic. We have seen the decency of a loving and giving people who have made the grief of strangers their own.

My fellow citizens, for the last nine days, the entire world has seen for itself the state of our Union -- and it is strong. (Applause.)

Tonight we are a country awakened to danger and called to defend freedom. Our grief has turned to anger, and anger to resolution. Whether we bring our enemies to justice, or bring justice to our enemies, justice will be done. (Applause.)

. . . And on behalf of the American people, I thank the world for its outpouring of support. America will never forget the sounds of our National Anthem playing at Buckingham Palace, on the streets of Paris, and at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate.

We will not forget South Korean children gathering to pray outside our embassy in Seoul, or the prayers of sympathy offered at a mosque in Cairo. We will not forget moments of silence and days of mourning in Australia and Africa and Latin America.

Nor will we forget the citizens of 80 other nations who died with our own: dozens of Pakistanis; more than 130 Israelis; more than 250 citizens of India; men and women from El Salvador, Iran, Mexico and Japan; and hundreds of British citizens. America has no truer friend than Great Britain. (Applause.) Once again, we are joined together in a great cause -- so honored the British Prime Minister has crossed an ocean to show his unity of purpose with America. Thank you for coming, friend. (Applause.)

. . . Americans have many questions tonight. Americans are asking: Who attacked our country? The evidence we have gathered all points to a collection of loosely affiliated terrorist organizations known as al Qaeda. They are the same murderers indicted for bombing American embassies in Tanzania and Kenya, and responsible for bombing the USS Cole.

Al Qaeda is to terror what the mafia is to crime. But its goal is not making money; its goal is remaking the world -- and imposing its radical beliefs on people everywhere.

The terrorists practice a fringe form of Islamic extremism that has been rejected by Muslim scholars and the vast majority of Muslim clerics -- a fringe movement that perverts the peaceful teachings of Islam. The terrorists' directive commands them to kill Christians and Jews, to kill all Americans, and make no distinction among military and civilians, including women and children.

The leadership of al Qaeda has great influence in Afghanistan and supports the Taliban regime in controlling most of that country. In Afghanistan, we see al Qaeda's vision for the world.

. . . And tonight, the United States of America makes the following demands on the Taliban: Deliver to United States authorities all the leaders of al Qaeda who hide in your land. (Applause.) Release all foreign nationals, including American citizens, you have unjustly imprisoned. Protect foreign journalists, diplomats and aid workers in your country. Close immediately and permanently every terrorist training camp in Afghanistan, and hand over every terrorist, and every person in their support structure, to appropriate authorities. (Applause.) Give the United States full access to terrorist training camps, so we can make sure they are no longer operating.

These demands are not open to negotiation or discussion. (Applause.) The Taliban must act, and act immediately. They will hand over the terrorists, or they will share in their fate.

I also want to speak tonight directly to Muslims throughout the world. We respect your faith. It's practiced freely by many millions of Americans, and by millions more in countries that America counts as friends. Its teachings are good and peaceful, and those who commit evil in the name of Allah blaspheme the name of Allah. (Applause.) The terrorists are traitors to their own faith, trying, in effect, to hijack Islam itself. The enemy of America is not our many Muslim friends; it is not our many Arab friends. Our enemy is a radical network of terrorists, and every government that supports them. (Applause.)

Our war on terror begins with al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated. (Applause.)

. . . Americans are asking: How will we fight and win this war? We will direct every resource at our command -- every means of diplomacy, every tool of intelligence, every instrument of law enforcement, every financial influence, and every necessary weapon of war -- to the disruption and to the defeat of the global terror network.

This war will not be like the war against Iraq a decade ago, with a decisive liberation of territory and a swift conclusion. It will not look like the air war above Kosovo two years ago, where no ground troops were used and not a single American was lost in combat.

Our response involves far more than instant retaliation and isolated strikes. Americans should not expect one battle, but a lengthy campaign, unlike any other we have ever seen. It may include dramatic strikes, visible on TV, and covert operations, secret even in success. We will starve terrorists of funding, turn them one against another, drive them from place to place, until there is no refuge or no rest. And we will pursue nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism. . . .

This is not, however, just America's fight. And what is at stake is not just America's freedom. This is the world's fight. This is civilization's fight. This is the fight of all who believe in progress and pluralism, tolerance and freedom.

We ask every nation to join us. We will ask, and we will need, the help of police forces, intelligence services, and banking systems around the world. The United States is grateful that many nations and many international organizations have already responded -- with sympathy and with support. Nations from Latin America, to Asia, to Africa, to Europe, to the Islamic world. Perhaps the NATO Charter reflects best the attitude of the world: An attack on one is an attack on all.

The civilized world is rallying to America's side. They understand that if this terror goes unpunished, their own cities, their own citizens may be next. Terror, unanswered, can not only bring down buildings, it can threaten the stability of legitimate governments. And you know what -- we're not going to allow it. (Applause.)

Americans are asking: What is expected of us? I ask you to live your lives, and hug your children. I know many citizens have fears tonight, and I ask you to be calm and resolute, even in the face of a continuing threat.

I ask you to uphold the values of America, and remember why so many have come here. We are in a fight for our principles, and our first responsibility is to live by them. No one should be singled out for unfair treatment or unkind words because of their ethnic background or religious faith. (Applause.)

. . . Tonight I thank my fellow Americans for what you have already done and for what you will do. And ladies and gentlemen of the Congress, I thank you, their representatives, for what you have already done and for what we will do together.

. . . Fellow citizens, we'll meet violence with patient justice -- assured of the rightness of our cause, and confident of the victories to come. In all that lies before us, may God grant us wisdom, and may He watch over the United States of America.

A wonderful speech in my opinion and Bush delivered it well. I wanted to believe. And yet one reads the speech now and realizes that President Bush failed in almost every way to live up to the promise of that speech. And obviously so.

And yet the Media slumbered through it all. When history considers how the last five years could have possibly happened without someone crying out, it will record the Media's abject failure in a time when we need them the most. In a time when we need objectivity and skepticism.

We have learned to distrust our Media, and in large respect, the blog explosion is the direct consequence. It is not at all clear that we will ever trust them again. And that has harmed our country. But as the country can no longer trust President Bush and never will again, so too the Media will not be trusted. Mark Halperin worries about Hugh Hewitt and such. He should have been worried about the vast majority of the American People. Because he and the Media worry about Hugh Hewitt, the nation has no confidence in them. We muddle through now.

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  • Display: Sort:
    Fear & Celebrity... (5.00 / 1) (#1)
    by Dadler on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 12:01:21 PM EST
    ...are not the makings of a good free press.  Or even a decent one.  The pathetic nature of political debate in the media is inexcusable for a supposedly free country.  9/11 only magnified the problem.

    Seriously though... (5.00 / 1) (#4)
    by Ernesto Del Mundo on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 06:01:35 PM EST
    How could anyone think that the clueless idiot we knew before 9/11 would be any different after 9/11?

    And how could anyone who knows anything about our foreign policy think that 9/11 wouldn't be used as an excuse to rape and pillage the world? Right after 9/11 I started sending copies of William Blum's books to those I knew who were under any illusions, along with links to the PNAC plan and Operation Northwoods documents, which had coincidentally been recently declassified.

    clueless idiot? (5.00 / 2) (#5)
    by squeaky on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 07:54:54 PM EST
    How could anyone think that the clueless idiot we knew before 9/11 would be any different after 9/11?

    For a clueless idiot he has managed to accomplish quite a bit. All of it evil and horrific, nevertheless not something an idiot could pull off.

    Where we see failure and disaster Bush & Co. just hears the cash register ringing.

    No accident.

    Parent

    Exactly. (none / 0) (#6)
    by Edger on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 08:10:44 PM EST
    Future classes in American History... (none / 0) (#2)
    by Bill Arnett on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 12:38:57 PM EST
    ...will someday look back on these times as a return to the Dark Ages, where goodwill was squandered, America fell into disrepute, and more world citizens came to believe that America under bush, aided by a complicit and sycophantic press, became the greatest threat to world peace, not radical Islamic "terrorists".

    I just hope those classes will not be taught in Chinese.

    Operation Comeback (none / 0) (#3)
    by Edger on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 04:23:53 PM EST
    America will never forget the sounds of our National Anthem playing at Buckingham Palace, on the streets of Paris, and at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate.

    This can happen again someday, once the country throws off the trance completely and real accountable leadership emerges and collective responsibility is assumed.

    Now the trumpet summons us again -- not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need -- not as a call to battle, though embattled we are -- but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle, year in and year out, "rejoicing in hope; patient in tribulation," a struggle against the common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself.
    --JFK