CNN today posted an article on their website that really makes me wonder whether we’re getting the REAL story from Iraq. It seems that after a car-bombing on July 13, the Army released a statement that included the following quote:
“‘The terrorists are attacking the infrastructure, the children and all of Iraq,’ said one Iraqi man who preferred not to be identified. ‘They are enemies of humanity without religion or any sort of ethics. They have attacked my community today and I will now take the fight to the terrorists.’”
On Sunday, following another horrible car-bombing, this quote was released:
“‘The terrorists are attacking the infrastructure, the ISF and all of Iraq. They are enemies of humanity without religion or any sort of ethics. They have attacked my community today and I will now take the fight to the terrorists,’ said one Iraqi man who preferred not to be identified.”
A friend of mine, LSButts, runs a site called Justice E.R. (Justice Emergency Room). Over the past couple of months, he has been posting about Propaganda. One of the things that is interesting about propaganda in wartime is that when you control the message, you control the people’s support for your side. Of course, that is not the case 100% of the time, but it works for the most part.
The Sunday press release about the latest suicide bombing has me shaking my head. While we all know that Iraq, and specifically Baghdad, is a dangerous place, these two seemingly identical news releases call into question whether we are getting the whole story or not. Of course, repeating the same canned quotes from “unidentified” Iraqis would not be needed had the American people been given the straight scoop from their President before invading. In fact, an invasion wouldn’t have been needed at all had Bush and company not been fixing the intelligence around the policy. There wouldn’t be 1800 or so US deaths nor the thousands of wounded troops or Iraqi civilians. But I digress.
As most lefty bloggers know, yesterday was the 3rd anniversary of the release of the first Downing Street Memo. The Downing Street Memos, the scandal being called PlameGate or TreasonGate, and now these two quotes seem to paint a real nice picture that is unforgiving of our President and his advisers. You see, the intelligence WAS being fixed around the policy and anyone who dared to speak the truth (Joe Wilson), was being branded a partisan, lying bastard. These identical quotes are just one more way for the Bush Administration to try and paint a rosy picture that Iraqis are joining together with us to help them create a wonderful democracy over there–as soon as we can kick the “terrorists” out. I just wonder what’s next in their bag of tricks–an Arab Disneyland?
