Politics of Misdirection, Rehashed 10/28

[zapp]

Politics of Misdirection, Rehashed

Some time ago, I wrote a piece called the politics of misdirection. This piece outlined how the current republican administration has used the media to misdirect as a way of controlling potentially damaging situations.
This week, the Kerry campaign has finally fought against the well-oiled deception machine, and in a way that Bush and his staff are grasping at straws to respond in kind.
There are 380 tons of missing high explosives in Iraq, and who knows how long they’ve been gone. The story apparently broke through the ABC News organization, which then held the story, though other news organizations picked up on it as well. Apparently 59 Minutes had created a segment- perhaps to create an October Surprise- to air on the Sunday preceding the election.
First of all, this supposedly happened in mid to late 2003, not yesterday. The fact that we are only finding out about this either speaks to the definite right-wing lean of the press, with obvious loyalty to the President, or to the incompetence of bureau chiefs who decide daily what is news and what isn’t.
I would think that the loss of 380 tons of very high explosives would be an item that would be on the top of the list. See, 380 tons is the same as 760,000 Pan Am Flight 103* bombings.
Only one pound of this explosive was used to bring that plane down, which resulted in the death of all of those aboard.
We see daily about the ‘car’ bombings that occur in Iraq. It is no wonder that they are doing that- they have enough explosives to have a daily car bomb for the next 2082 years. If you are now feeling a little overwhelmed about these numbers, remember this: an ABC News crew, embedded with the Army in the onslaught to Baghdad, filmed the actual bunkers- and the actual explosives- while using Al Qaqaa as a bivouac enroute to Baghdad.
Now, one might think that John Kerry had a slam dunk here, with regard to a perfect example of the mismanagement of the war effort. But, Karl Rove and Co. had other ideas. They trotted out Rudolph Guiliani to be Bush’s attack dog to fight off the accusations. The only thing that Rove didn’t count on was Rudy to cave and say that the soldiers should have done the securing of the explosives.
So, five days out from the election, the Bush team seems to be splitting from within. Guiliani- the supposed star player- abruptly broke from the party line, perhaps realizing that further association would ruin his further chances at political office.
Bush himself resigned his attacks to the ‘a president never wavers’ line, which barely got applause because it’s so tired that even republicans are thinking that Bush needs some new material.
So, it seems that in this daily war of words, Kerry got the upper hand- but not because he was more eloquent. Saying ‘Screw You’ eloquently is still “Screw You’. But, because of the developing story about the weapons, there is something for the Kerry campaign to tie Bush’s incompetence to- and Bush really can’t fight it.
How all this ties back to the politics of misdirection is that the following has happened since the story broke: (1) The Department of Defense has released photos of a truck supposedly loading canisters from a bunker. Truth: The Bunker was not one identified by the IAEA as one of the bunkers with the High Explosives.(The same folks that brought us photographic evidence of WMD, unveiled at the UN in Feb 03) (2) Bush immediately said that Kerry was ‘attacking the soldiers’, when in fact Kerry spoke to the failings of the president to plan for the eventual securing of Iraq. (3) Bush then sent someone out that most everyone appreciates for his leadership on 9/11/01 to discredit Kerry, which then ended up discrediting Bush.
For once, the attempt at misdirection failed.

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