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Originally Posted by Iowa_Flames_Fan
As usual, the truth is somewhere between "no-one could have foreseen this" and "the Bush administration lied about WMDs." It's pretty clear that they over-reached and exaggerated--not an uncommon thing in politics. (Ironically, the knock on Al Gore in 2000 was his tendency to exaggerate...) They also worked hard to suppress dissenting voices in the administration, at least once breaking the law in order to do so. What's the payoff? Easy.
People sometimes forget that in early 2001, Bush's presidency was beginning to look like it might be in trouble. He'd had very little discernible "honeymoon" effect, and his poll numbers were starting to dip into the low 50s, very unusual for a president in his first year in office. What really saved his presidency, at least in the public eye, was the fact that he was later able to redefine himself as a war president. In the aftermath of 9/11, he had a lot of support both domestically and abroad, and after that enacted a pretty sweeping foreign agenda, which included the invasion of Iraq as a way of defining the U.S.' new foreign policy, justified by global terrorism, but also very clearly an attempt to extend U.S. military power more forcefully into the world.
Does this mean Bush "lied." Not really--this is just how politics works. I have no doubt that he genuinely believed Iraq would work out better--and if it had, I submit that we wouldn't even be talking about the marketing of the war. Because it's a disaster, we're now asking the tough questions about how we got where we are in the first place.
Which leads me to the complex question of the media--who in hindsight were ALL guilty of the worst kind of yellow journalism. CNN, CBS, NBC, Fox, etc. etc.--all were equally guilty of just jumping on the bandwagon and going along with a lead up to a war that in hindsight looks a bit foolish.
Fox's problem has been that since then they've STILL failed to ask the questions that other media outlets are beginning to ask--and as the Bush admin's talking points begin to seem ever more distant from reality, Fox looks even sillier for continually repeating them as if they came from a credible source. They're still on the bandwagon, still spouting that same yellow journalism--and it's getting embarrassing, whatever your political stripe may be.
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Pretty much bang on with what I believe.
I don't watch Fox anymore...outside of the occasional O'Rielly. Is that because of what Fox is like, or because of what the mainstream media is like these days? For me, its more of the latter.
My news usually comes from Google News...or the Drudge Report. Both link articles from numerous different sites...although I do admit the Drudge Report has the obvious right-wing slant. Doesn't bother me, as I try to stay away from politics as much as possible these days. Everything that has to do with Washington annoys the hell outta me.