(Yes, as EK asks, why haven’t we been reading Greenwald. See this of Time’s behavior vis a vis Joke Klien’s “journalism”. – promoted by Armando)
Why haven’t I been reading more Glenn Greenwald?
He hits another one out of the park today with his blistering dissection of Fred Hiatt’s September 5th WaPo editorial, Rogue Regulator, and the other neocon chicken hawk cheerleaders and conspirators like John Bolten who have been smearing Elbaradi for years so they can get their war on.
Our serious foreign policy geniuses strike again
Glenn Greenwald, Salon.com
Tuesday December 4, 2007 03:59 EST
How far does the rot go? To very core of our policy and media establishment-
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Somehow, it was decided in our political establishment that being completely wrong about the worst strategic disaster in our country’s history — the invasion of Iraq — is not a cause for any diminished credibility at all (and having been right is no cause for enhanced credibility). Even after the invasion of Iraq, our Hiatt-modeled political establishment even proceeded to smear and target those such as Mohamed ElBardei who were clearly proven right, as though being right was a crime.
Glenn goes on to catalog the usual suspects, the cast of characters that has been oh so very wrong about this as in so much else-
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These are truly the lie-fueled rantings of “crazy” people, just as ElBaradei said that they were. In a minimally rational society, the Fred Hiatts and John Boltons and Norm Podhoretzs and Rudy Giulianis and Joe Liebermans would be considered laughingstocks. In light of this track record, what rational person would trust a single thing they say?
Yet as always in our political culture, those hungry for American wars — both old and new — are, by definition, Serious and Respectable, and those who try to stop such wars (such as ElBaredei) are losers and “apologists” whose judgment and allegiances are equally suspect. Just compare the Very Serious Fred Hiatt’s fact-free, war-pursuing attacks on Mohamed ElBaradei in both 2002 and 2007 with the fact that ElBaradei — both times — was absolutely right on the most vital matters of the day, and one finds all one needs to know about how sad and broken our political establishment is.
For you Joke Line fans he points out a particularly egregious piece of dialog from This Week recorded by digby, but he saves particular scorn for Norman Podhoretzs of the rapidly imploding Giuliani campaign, devoting a whole update to him that I just can’t help sharing-
UPDATE: Norman Podhoretz, horrified and petrified that the consensus of our intelligence agencies “just dealt a serious blow” for his desire for a new war, unloads what he aptly calls his “dark suspicions” that this is all just a ruse by our dishonest intelligence community “to head off the possibility that the President may order air strikes on the Iranian nuclear installations” (h/t Zack). Did I mention that this is the Senior Foreign Policy advisor to Rudy Giuliani? Does Giuliani harbor similar “dark suspicions” about the allegiances of our intelligence officials?
Podhoretz’s predictable attack also underscores one of the most dishonest maneuvers one has seen in some time. It was, of course, Podhoretz, Cheney and their friends who incessantly pressured and manipulated the intelligence community to conclude that Saddam had WMD so that they could start the war they desperately wanted for so long. And now, they use the false conclusions which they foisted on the intelligence community to cast doubt on the credibility of intelligence officials with regard to Iran — as though neoconservative warmongers were the victims of the pre-war intelligence failures rather than the perpetrators. Their dishonesty in the service of new wars knows no bounds.
As we have recently seen also in Karl Rove’s transparent and pathetic attempts to re-write the history of who started this disaster.
The worst foreign policy failure in the history of the United States.
Where are my legions Varus?
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I think it’s all well worth the read.
is one of the handful of true must-read bloggers.
Are the warmongers in it for the money, the politics, or are they deaf and dumb? This proves that many Americans are the latter, with an assist to the msm.
well-framed ek
is that the media still pay attention to dangerous hacks like Norman Podhoretz.
Are those who do listen to the likes of Podhoretz gullible? Or stupid? Perhaps lazy? Or are they, too, dangerous hacks? Or some combination thereof?
Can I ask any more questions?
No rational person would. But Hiatt and the rest of the psychos aren’t too concerned, as long as they can keep the 24 percenters horny for more fireworks on their TV screens, and find some way to suck in another 25 percent again.
Ahhhhh, the noble lies and pious frauds of Leo Strauss. Where would the Hiatt’s and the Podhoretz’s and Bush’s and Cheney’s of the world be without them:
But China and Russia have already drawn a line in the sand, and the rest of the world must be laughing their heads off at peasants who would happily turn their country over to fascists and cause the fall of their own empire.
consistent, persistent ongoing and shameless threat to the world. Why aren’t Rove, Cheney and the Pod-man in jail? How long must we wait until they are?
in every single one of their “judgments,” and they have lost all credibility in every corner of the known universe, save for the remaining dark recesses of their own delusional psyches.
They now have been knocked to the mat by reality during their fevered march toward attacking Iran. Let’s keep them there. Mock them. Humiliate them. Shout them down the next time they utter another lie and invent another “existential” bogeyman. Raise a ruckus at their public speeches. Challenge them during their wingnut radio interviews. Erase their influence on the planet.
Send them to history’s dumping ground, where they can rest amongst the rubble of other failed ideologies and obscure, misguided cults.
Oh, and kudos to the Intelligence Community, which has apparently drawn a useful lesson from its craven caving in to Cheney and his neoconderthal staffers (Scooter Libby and David Addington) before the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
We still have some people with integrity at the working levels in our government.