Barbaro

Bob Englehart writes of his cartoon (in part):

Veterinarians went to extraordinary lengths to save Barbaro. If he'd broken his leg in any other race where there weren't so many people watching, they would've put him down that day.

It's very rare that a horse can overcome a broken leg. I don't know of any that have. This whole episode should be a teaching moment for people who think otherwise. It was sad to see Barbaro hobbled with misshapen legs, crippled for life. A horse like Barbaro only wants to do one thing. Run.

Englehart's View

Kissing Up Brought Us Down

Tim Rutten on Cheney, Inc.

The Tipping Points from Cheney's staff, and a useful press, a review of the Trial of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby:

. . . . Vice President Dick Cheney and some of his former aides gave the rest of us a rather instructive seminar in the symbiotic contempt that links the Bush administration and self-serving members of the Washington press corps.

. . . . sort of cynical media manipulation described this week when the vice president's former communications director, Catherine J. Martin, testified in Libby's trial. She described how Cheney was obsessed with Wilson's criticism, particularly after publication of an op-ed piece in the New York Times and how the vice president ordered a counteroffensive in parts of the press deemed receptive to whatever the administration wanted to dish out concerning the former diplomat.

One of the options she recommended to Cheney was an appearance on NBC's "Meet the Press," because the program's host, Tim Russert, would allow the vice president to "control the message."

. . . . . She also told the court that she suggested that the vice president's office "leak" information that seemed to undercut Wilson's credibility to carefully selected reporters at the New York Times and Washington Post, arranged a lunch for Cheney with right-wing commentators and advised him to avoid the New York Times' Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Nicholas Kristof because he had "attacked the administration fairly regularly." Other witnesses this week testified that Libby had been assigned to contact selected reporters deemed receptive to information that might discredit Wilson as a critic and to plant with them anonymously sourced stories.

Martin called the word "leak," which appeared in her notes as a "term of art" and testified, "If you give it to one reporter, they're likelier to write the story."

She has that about right, though the "art" she has in mind is deception.

The Washington Post's Dana Milbank had the best summation of Martin's testimony:

The trial has already pulled back the curtain on the White House's PR techniques and confirmed some of the darkest suspicions of the reporters upon whom they are used. Relatively junior White House aides run roughshod over members of the president's Cabinet. Bush aides charged with speaking to the public and the media are kept out of the loop on some of the most important issues. And bad news is dumped before the weekend for the sole purpose of burying it.

It's such an amateurish approach to news management, in fact, that you have to wonder how the Bush administration and, particularly, Cheney's office, got away with it for as long as they did. If you recall that there always are a certain number of high-level Washington journalists willing to play ball with any form of transparently self-interested deceit for the sake of a Page 1 byline or a few minutes of prime airtime, you don't have to wonder very long.

. . . . This week, the nonpartisan Pew Research Center reported that "just 37% [of Americans] believe that America's security from terrorist attacks depends on our success in Iraq — a fundamental part of President Bush's case for the additional troops" he now wishes to send to Baghdad. Pew also found that 51% of Americans now believe that the decision to go to war in Iraq was wrong.

Cheney's demonstrated proclivity for rhetorical bullying aside, dismissing legitimate questions growing out of such views in the fashion aired by CNN this week is an expression of contempt for public opinion itself.

There's no particular reason why malfeasant members of the press or those who merely are incompetent shouldn't be held in contempt. The news media, after all, are like every American institution, home to its share of idiots, poseurs, slothful time-markers and self-interested time servers. The problem is that Cheney and his former aides aren't simply contemptuous of the individual reporters or even of the press itself. They're contemptuous of the principle under which the free press operates — which is the American people's right to have a reasonable account of what the government does in their name.

The lesson to take away from this week's unintended seminar in contemporary journalism is that the vice president and his staff, acting on behalf of the Bush administration, believe that truth is a malleable adjunct to their ambitions and that they have a well-founded confidence that some members of the Washington press corps will cynically accommodate that belief for the sake of their careers.

It's a sick little arrangement in which the parties clearly have one thing in common: a profound indifference to both the common good and to their obligation to act in its service.

Those Ingrate Iraqis

Rosa Brooks says:

President Bush is right:
Americans deserve gratitude for
cutting Iraqis' energy consumption and tackling their overpopulation problem.

Shakespeare's King Lear complained,'

How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child!

But Lear didn't know from ingratitude. Think it stings to have a thankless child? Just try the sting of a thankless occupied nation!

President Bush on Sunday shared his lamentations on "60 Minutes," the modern equivalent of the storm-swept heath. Assuming the time-honored role of Fool, CBS' Scott Pelley asked the president, "Do you think you owe the Iraqi people an apology for not doing a better job?"

Bush retorted: "That we didn't do a better job, or they didn't do a better job?…. We liberated that country from a tyrant. I think the Iraqi people owe the American people a huge debt of gratitude…. We've endured great sacrifice to help them…. [Americans] wonder whether or not there is a gratitude level that's significant enough in Iraq."

Well, yes. I have wondered about that. Frankly — I'm talking to you, Iraqis! — a few flowers and ticker-tape parades wouldn't be amiss, even at this late stage. Remember, we got rid of Saddam Hussein for you — with a little help from his executioners, to be sure, who sent him to his death amid enthusiastic chants in praise of Shiite militia leader Muqtada Sadr. But that's just a detail.

Anyway, that's not all we've done for Iraq. We also introduced the Iraqis to basic principles of energy conservation. Before the U.S. invasion, the feckless residents of Baghdad used 16 to 24 hours of electricity each day. Today, thanks to us, they thriftily make do with about six hours of electricity a day. Under our tutelage, the Iraqis are also conserving fossil fuels: Oil production is still well below prewar levels! And — recognizing that auto emissions are a major contributor to global warming — a symbolically important number of Iraqis has gone from driving their cars to detonating their cars. Now that's dedication.

We've also helped the Iraqis address the problem of urban overcrowding. With 34,452 Iraqi civilians killed in 2006 alone, according to the United Nations, and another 2 million opting to leave the country, the war has reduced the Iraqi population by nearly 10%!

OK. But you're probably still wondering: What constitutes the "great sacrifice" we Americans have made to give these gifts to the Iraqis? After all, despite those U.S. troops who've lost lives and limbs in Iraq (3,024 dead and 47,657 wounded, so far), it's not like the rest of us are being drafted, right? Don't be so modest. They also serve who only stand and watch TV!

When Jim Lehrer of PBS' "NewsHour" suggested to Bush that "the volunteer military … and their families [are] the only people who are actually sacrificing anything at this point," the president demurred. "A lot of people are in this fight," he insisted. "I mean, they sacrifice peace of mind when they see the terrible images of violence on TV every night." Too true! I've given up so much of my peace of mind for this war — yet no Iraqi has ever so much as sent me a thank you note.

In addition to that, I've heeded the president's call to fight terrorism through my "continued participation and confidence in the American economy." When my president calls on me to "go shopping more," I hop to it! I've walked the malls until my boots were as worn as those of any Marine after a hard slog through the Iraqi desert.

Anyway, when he spoke of the great sacrifices we Americans have made for Iraq, the president didn't say the half of it. Modest soul that he is, he didn't even mention the $200-billion annual price tag of the war in Iraq.

If we weren't spending $200 billion a year to help the Iraqi people, we could — for instance — be funding universal healthcare (at an estimated $100 billion a year, according to a New York Times analysis) and a universal preschool program ($35 billion a year). With the $65 billion we'd have left over after that, we could create a comprehensive national service program for young Americans, or more than triple the foreign aid we provide to developing countries.

That's not all. By focusing on Iraq to the near exclusion of all other issues, we're also sacrificing our own national security interests. We're virtually ignoring the resurgence of the Taliban in Afghanistan, Russia's slide toward repression, expanding regional conflicts in Africa and — ahem — the ongoing activities of Osama bin Laden.

So don't be shy, my fellow Americans: Give yourselves some credit for the sacrifices you're making for Iraq. Just as a soldier hit by an IED may at first be too stunned to feel pain, it will take time for you to truly feel the depth of your sacrifice. Rest assured: Though it may not hurt now, it will soon.

The Los Angeles Times