Perry: Bush’s Top 40 Lies
Steve Perry has this interesting round-up: Bring ’em on: The Bush administration’s top 40 lies about war and terrorism.
It’s a one-sided account, to be sure. Perry withholds the benefit of the doubt from Bush and his people at every turn, while extending it to any critical-of-Bush claim quoted in a major news outlet.
For myself, I’m satisfied that most, if not all, of these “top 40 lies” are, in fact, cases where Bush and his handlers were intentionally misleading people. But in counterspinning the Bush team’s own spin, Perry actually ends up losing me.
The truth is out there, but it’s delicate. It’s a snowflake; breathe on it and it melts. It’s a butterfly; catch it in a net, and its fragile body is torn apart. It’s a reflection in a still pool; lean too close and you break the surface, shattering the image with ripples.
Once you start applying your own spin, you can pretty much forget about knowing reality. True, the resulting illusions will be your illusions, and there’s a definite comfort in that, especially for those sick of having illusions fed to them by others.
And the alternative is, frankly, terrifying. How many people are willing to face up to how little they really know? Reality is a scary thing. What if the world actually makes no sense whatsoever? What if Bush is neither the capable, forthright leader, nor the bumbling, mean-spirited, serial failure? What if he’s just some guy, surrounded by a bunch of other guys, doing their honest best, but hampered by their own human failings and by a world that no one, really, can control?
Welcome to reality.
July 30th, 2003 at 9:35 am
I accept that counterspin sometimes is as bad as spin. But liberals have been so capitulating for so long, that’s where we’ve lost ground. We’re so willing to say, well, maybe they have a point, it’s all shades of grey, maybe he’s a good guy at heart, etc., that people lose interest. This is unfortunate but true.
Strength is what matters in American politics today. There need to be strong voices on our side; then at least people have the tools to decide where they personally stand.
July 30th, 2003 at 12:27 pm
The problem is not whether they, (the people who are in charge), are inherently good guys or bad guys, neither if they have good or bad intentions. They should be held accountable for their policies and actions, not only in the present but also in the past, that’s what it should count.
August 1st, 2003 at 12:54 pm
So the paranoia continues. The problem with lines of thought like those above is that they assume that there are no well intentioned mistakes. Everything has to be a plot.
Of course, the real truth is obvious:
1. Saddam is a great guy would would have used his enormous oil weath to feed the poor and develop new medicines. The mass graves in Iraq were actually faked by the Americans to discredit him.
2. Bush is the root of all evil and has a secret plan to dominate the world.
3. If we just would have lifted the sanctions everything would have been OK and Saddam could have used his oil wealth to do good things for Iraq and the world.