Blowing Off the PR Pixie Dust While Waiting for Petraeus
The White House is giving Gen. David Petraeus the most over-the-top PR push since the Segway’s inventor predicted, “It’s going to change the world.”
The constant sprinkling of pixie dust is meant to render Petraeus’ coming September report unassailable — the political equivalent of basketball advice from John Wooden or a sex assessment by Jenna Jameson.
For months now, I’ve been trying to blow some of that pixie dust off Petraeus so that, come September, his vaunted report will be seen for what it inevitably will be: one more stall tactic designed to deny reality and delay the inevitable.
Does anyone doubt that when Mr. Petraeus Goes to Washington after Labor Day he will deliver a glass half-full assessment that “acknowledges some challenges” but concludes that “the surge is working” (don’t forget those soccer fields!) and “just needs more time”?
Indeed, we already know Petraeus’ thinking on the matter. The New York Times recently uncovered a classified plan that calls for U.S. troops to be in Iraq at least until the middle of 2009, and probably beyond. The co-author of that plan: Gen. David Petraeus.
Despite the White House’s attempts at glorification — by the Washington Post’s count, the president has publicly mentioned Petraeus’ name over 150 times since announcing the surge in January — others in the media have recently joined the chorus of voices warning, Don’t believe the hype!
In his latest column, Frank Rich took a chisel to the notion that Petraeus is the second coming of Grant, Patton, MacArthur, and Schwarzkopf all rolled into one Ivy League package.
Turns out that Petraeus’ purported infallibility is as much a shimmering desert mirage as the Iraqi throngs who were going to greet us as liberators, throwing flowers at our soldiers’ feet.
Rich lays it out chapter and verse: Petraeus was wrong about Mosul, he was wrong about the competency of newly-trained Iraqi troops, he was wrong about what he wishfully referred to as “the astonishing signs of normalcy” in Baghdad.
And he has also shown a special gift for thunderingly misguided comparisons, likening the political standoff in the Iraqi Parliament to disputes among our Founding Fathers, and straining to make the case that the civil war raging in Iraq is akin to the struggles Britain faced with the IRA in Northern Ireland. There are many problems with this last comparison, not the least of which is the fact that the IRA was never more than a thousand strong, and never embraced suicide bombing.
In April, I wondered whether, given all the hype, the General had “walked across the Potomac” on a recent visit to Capitol Hill. James Fallows has taken the metaphor another step, pointing out last week that Petraeus is Bush’s New Jesus:
The New Jesus is the guy the boss has just brought in to solve the problems that the slackers and idiots already on the staff cannot handle. Of course sooner or later the New Jesus himself turns into a slacker or idiot, and the search for the next Jesus begins.[…]
Petraeus is a serious man, but the expectations being heaped on him are simply laughable…
But for now, according to the White House script, Petraeus is The One Who is Going to Save Iraq.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki apparently has a different name for him: The One Who Must Leave Iraq. According to reports over the weekend, Maliki made a direct appeal to President Bush to remove Petraeus from his position.
Part of the Prime Minister’s displeasure with Petraeus is the General’s strategy of arming Sunni militias — including forces that were at one time part of the insurgency. Though Bush was able to temporarily placate al-Maliki — word is that during a satellite chat he told the PM to “calm down” — it’s unclear when al-Maliki will grow tired enough of Petraeus to remind Bush about that “transfer of full sovereignty” stuff from 2004. (”Hey, Mr. President… ‘Let Freedom Reign,’ remember?”)
In the meantime, Bush continues to pretend to be taking a hands-off approach to Iraq, claiming: “I’m going to wait to see what David has to say.” But, as we’ve seen, Bush cherry-picks the military commanders he listens to just as diligently as he cherry-picked pre-war intel.
The same administration that didn’t know the difference between Sunni and Shia before the war — and doesn’t know the difference between Al Qaeda and Al Qaeda in Iraq now — has somehow been incredibly effective at weeding out “insurgent” thought in the Pentagon. The “clear, hold and build” strategy wasn’t so successful in Baghdad, but it’s been a smashing success in Washington.
The question isn’t what will happen in September. The question is what will happen when the New Jesus eventually proves to be just as powerless to change the laws of reality as his predecessors were.
With the past as prologue, my guess is that Bush will ultimately announce a major change in course. Sadly, this will not entail a new war policy, but rather the arrival of a new New Jesus.
Arianna Huffington is the editor of The Huffington Post and the author of many books, including her most recent, On ‘Becoming Fearless….in Love, Work and Life‘.
© 2007 The Huffington Post
I belive this war is only a diversion intended to keep the public focussed only on it and not the dismantling of the Constitution. Oh, and, the longer it goes the already rich get even richer. How much do these people need? Why do they kill for money and power? Are they human even?
When the false flag of 9/11 happened Cheney says “time for the dark side”. What if we had taken all this money that’s been thrown down the Halliburton shithole and used it to help all the world’s poor, but especially Muslim men who could find peaceful work instead of becoming suicide bombers. The words Bush uses when he describes the “terrorists” describe himself and his administration.
Petraeus is a toady who knows his lines.
Persons who kill for a living tend to be a wee bit biased about how to resolve conflict. When you’re the hammer, problems become nails. Ya wanna work? Killers ‘r US.
It’s unlikely that any but retired generals will risk speaking out against a paying war gig, that elusive opportunity for professional advancement. So why expect an objective opinion come September from the guy in charge of the killing? Might he confess he’s performed poorly?
Right. When pigs fly. We have a better chance at an objective opinion from a used car dealer: there *are* honest used car dealers.
As to why we aren’t making better progress over there, one should consider the strong-arm tactics in the poison-pill Iraq Oil Revenue Sharing Agreement being forced on the “sovereign” Iraqi government. Made in America, by Americans, where we know what’s best for us… err, them.
It’s pathetic that there are a few Americans today who believe that the Iraqi Genocide, mainly perpretrated by Republican Fundamentalist Christans - it was ultimately their idea - is a morally positive act. These people will ultimately cost the USA close to one-trillion dollars, through THEIR idea! Think about that. These belief before rationality demons on Earth have the ridiculous notion that financially poor Americans will pay for their decisons. I seem to recall what these wastes of space troublemakers’ response to those who warned them precisely of the consequences currently unfolding? Unamerican and Unpatriotic, as if these Israeli sympathizing Americans want to be the Nazis - minus the hating jews, genuine pride, and sensible justification for action parts of course. There needs to be a political cleansing in the USA of the greatest domestic threat to them, Republican Christian fundamentalists, but that is a different topic.
General Petraeus will more than likely say that everything is fine and good in Iraq, that there is “progress,” and will beg the Congress to stay there longer. Petraeus all too predictable speech to USA Congress may earn him sympathy but he will have to define specifically what is meant by terms such as “win,” “victory,” “progress,” etcetera and the modus operandi behind USA policy because clearly it is not making much sense - as the goals and objects of the war have been changing every few months. So is this senseless conduct and changing priorities the American Way or how Governance is done in Texas?
It’s pathetic that there are a few Americans today who believe that the Iraqi Genocide, mainly perpretrated by Republican Fundamentalist Christans - it was ultimately their idea - is a morally positive act. These people will ultimately cost the USA close to one-trillion dollars, through THEIR idea! Think about that. These belief before rationality demons on Earth have the ridiculous notion that financially poor Americans will pay for their decisons. I seem to recall what these wastes of space troublemakers’ response to those who warned them precisely of the consequences currently unfolding? Unamerican and Unpatriotic, as if these Israeli sympathizing Americans want to be the Nazis - minus the hating jews, genuine pride, and sensible justification for action parts of course. There needs to be a political cleansing in the USA of the greatest domestic threat to them, Republican Christian fundamentalists, but that is a different topic.
General Petraeus will more than likely say that everything is fine and good in Iraq, that there is “progress,” and will beg the Congress to stay there longer. Petraeus all too predictable speech to USA Congress may earn him sympathy but he will have to define specifically what is meant by terms such as “win,” “victory,” “progress,” etcetera and the modus operandi behind USA policy because clearly it is not making much sense - as the goals and objects of the war have been changing every few months. So is this senseless conduct and changing priorities the American Way or how Governance is done in Texas?
Just delay tactics… Waiting for GODOT, and as others have mentioned, a means to an ends which of course involves oil, holding up the now almost worthless US dollar, gutting US civil liberties, and creating a ONE party STATE rule without pesky rights for citizens, workers, or a sustainable ecology. The call for Armageddon is an ingenious if diabolical illusion in that it negates any NEED for accountability. So long as 50 million believe End Times Myths (and they ARE Bush’s idiot supporters), they will continue to support and fuel their own (and potentially our) destruction. Here is “What happened in Kansas” taken to the nth degree!
The fact that Petraeus (a good old Romaneque name) rhymes with Betray us leads me to wonder if I am the only who finds this disturbing.
Our corporate-owned MSM “report” what they are told to report in exchange for the keys to the castle. Those working for said MSM are fully aware of this, yet apparently job security and a paycheck trump conscience, which explains why mass numbers of MSM employees have not quit in protest. And that’s why it appears that they missed the part about “only loyalbushies need apply” when acting as if Gen. David is the one non-loyalbushie allowed into the halls of dicktatorship.
Petraeus is a loyalbushie, not a loyal American.
Petraeus is just another toad in the line of murderous cowards willing to spit out the party line for another paycheck, another promotion.
I do hope no one thinks that the September report is anything but a delaying tactic. Petraeus will report enough “progress” that the war will continue until the next “report.”
A useful measure of any commentators worth: did she ever claim that the continuing U. S. presence in Iraq was contingent on Petraeus’s evaluation? If yes, she needs to hand in her credentials and get a real job.
From a psychological perspective, the Bush administration promoted the misguided and destructive war in Iraq by targeting five core concerns that often govern our lives–concerns about vulnerability, injustice, distrust, superiority, and helplessness. Looking ahead to September and beyond, the continuing occupation of Iraq–or an attack on Iran–will likely be sold to us in much the same way. I examine these warmongering appeals–and how to counter them–in a 10-minute YouTube video entitled “Resisting the Drums of War” available for viewing at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81UKnb5zJbM
Betrayus is just another Bushist ROTC (Run Out The Clock) recruit.
The surge is working. Just about every so-called news report yesterday told us so, even NPR and PBS. By the end of September, every Democrat in congress will be clamoring to be the first to vote in favor of more funding for the war. Clinton will praise Bush and his policies. The polls will make a dramatic reversal. We’ll be dancing in the streets.
I think mopping up the blood of the new butcher of Baghdad is more like it. The Pentagon lied about reality on the ground in Vietnam and thus the surge will be depicted in surreal terms of success that would shock the imagination of Goya of Dali. War crimes will be depicted as a Norman Rockwell painting. But all rhetoric aside, war profiteering is the with public debt for private profit via the military industrial corporate congressional media complex. Every day they drag it out more money is stolen. To get to the bottom of Iraq policy someone needs to accurately document the cash flow in Washington between public officials and Big Oil and the military corporate complex, including private war contractors. This accounting should not only cover campaign donations but also be an audit of any investments public officials hold that are linked to defense related industries or defense contractors as well as the oil industry. Benefits that result from associations prior to serving in office as well as following public office should also be tracked. This must include the White House, Congress and the Pentagon. We might be surprised at how many rats we find by following the paper trial.
I think mopping up the blood spilled by the new butcher of Baghdad is more like it. The Pentagon lied about reality on the ground in Vietnam and thus the surge will be depicted in surreal terms of success that would shock the imagination of Goya of Dali. War crimes will be depicted as a Norman Rockwell painting. But all rhetoric aside, war profiteering, and the possibility of oil profits, is the game with public debt for private profit via the military industrial corporate congressional media complex.
Every day they drag it out more money is stolen. To get to the bottom of Iraq policy someone needs to accurately document the cash flow in Washington between public officials and Big Oil and the military corporate complex, including private war contractors. This accounting should not only cover campaign donations but also be an audit of any investments public officials hold that are linked to defense related industries or defense contractors as well as the oil industry. Benefits that result from associations prior to serving in office as well as following public office should also be tracked. This must include the White House, Congress and the Pentagon. We might be surprised at how many rats we find by following the paper trial.