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Scott Shane delivers another Times' encomium to discredited U.S. diplomat turned anti-war activist Joseph Wilson in Sunday's "Ex-Diplomat's Surprise Volley on Iraq Drove White House Into Political Warfare Mode." Purporting to provide a tick-tock account of the Wilson-Valerie Plame controversy, Shane pumps up Wilson's importance. After all, it was in the Times that Wilson's infamous July 2003 op-ed accusing the Bush White House of ignoring his findings about Saddam Hussein's attempt to acquire uranium from Africa. "If believed, Mr. Wilson's accusations were poised to add an insider's authority to the cloud of doubt beginning to grow around the Iraq enterprise, as the resistance was proving far more stubborn than anticipated and the search for Saddam Hussein's weapons was coming up empty. Ten weeks had passed since Mr. Bush's speech aboard an aircraft carrier, before a banner declaring 'Mission Accomplished.' And the president was being criticized by Democrats as taunting Iraqi insurgents a few days earlier by using the phrase 'Bring 'em on.'….But in the enthusiasm of the campaign to discredit Mr. Wilson, someone would expose the real job of the diplomat's wife, Valerie, a C.I.A. officer who had worked under cover for two decades, hiding her position from even close friends and relatives. Whether thoughtless or deliberate, the shattering of Valerie Wilson's cover would prompt the C.I.A. to seek a criminal investigation into the leak. And the investigation would be turned over to a special counsel with a reputation for relentlessly pursuing his quarry." Shane pushed the idea of the private Plame earlier this month, but it backfired when Plame's photo appeared in the next issue of that samizdat rag known as Vanity Fair. Shane continues to picture a vindictive, then beleaguered White House whose "offensive" against Wilson backfired: "What had begun as an offensive against a critic would backfire for the White House, setting off a legal and political imbroglio that two years later has engulfed the president's advisers. The leak question has become a cudgel for the president's critics, who have wielded it to attack the credibility of the White House on the fundamental question of why the nation is at war." More pro-Wilson slant follows: "After a 10-day trip to Niger, Mr. Wilson concluded that there was 'nothing to the story' of the uranium sales, as he later told Senate Intelligence Committee investigators. Two C.I.A. officers interviewed him on March 5 after his return home. Nine months later, by Mr. Wilson's account, he was surprised to hear President Bush's assertion in the State of the Union speech that 'the British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.'…The president's staff moved swiftly to counter Mr. Wilson's media trifecta, which threatened to undermine Mr. Bush's record as a war leader just 15 months before the election." Again, reporter Shane ignores the long litany of Wilson's fibs, whoppers that are wrapped up neatly in the latest edition of The Weekly Standard, which points out:
Shane acknowledges none of these blows to Wilson's credibility, and hews to the erstwhile diplomat's side of the story: "The introduction of Ms. Wilson into the story was politically useful to the White House, implying that the Niger trip was a nepotistic sideshow. But it was legally hazardous, as events would soon reveal: a 1982 law criminalized the disclosure of the identity of a C.I.A. officer working under cover. Though Ms. Wilson had worked at C.I.A. headquarters since 1997, with occasional trips abroad, she had previously worked overseas for many years, posing as a diplomat and as an energy consultant. C.I.A. officials referred the breach to the Justice Department, which eventually turned the matter over to Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special counsel." To read the rest of Shane's article, click here.
Sunday's "Military Memo" from Thom Shanker, "All Quiet on the Home Front, and Some Soldiers Are Asking Why," seems to criticize the government for not rationing gas, World War II style. Shanker questions whether Americans are suffering enough for the war effort. The text box reads: "Suggesting that 'support our troops' means little without shared sacrifices." Shanker writes: "From bases in Iraq and across the United States to the Pentagon and the military's war colleges, officers and enlisted personnel quietly raise a question for political leaders: if America is truly on a war footing, why is so little sacrifice asked of the nation at large? There is no serious talk of a draft to share the burden of fighting across the broad citizenry, and neither Republicans nor Democrats are pressing for a tax increase to force Americans to cover the $5 billion a month in costs from Iraq, Afghanistan and new counterterrorism missions. There are not even concerted efforts like the savings-bond drives or gasoline rationing that helped to unite the country behind its fighting forces in wars past." What those would accomplish for the troops Shanker keeps silent about. Despite the assumption made in that paragraph, none of the military members Shanker quotes actually demand such World War II-era measures as gas rationing (a theme strengthened in the story with archived photos of old propaganda posters). Shanker explains: "Members of the military who discussed their sense of frustration did so only when promised anonymity, as comments viewed as critical of the civilian leadership could end their careers. The sentiments were expressed in more than two dozen interviews and casual conversations with enlisted personnel, noncommissioned officers, midlevel officers, and general or flag officers in Iraq and in the United States." He also gets a quote from one David Hendrickson, "a scholar on foreign policy and the presidency at Colorado College, who said: "Bush understands that the support of the public for war -- especially the war in Iraq -- is conditioned on demanding little of the public….The public wants very much to support the troops. but it doesn't really believe in the mission. Most consider it a war of choice, and a majority -- although a thin one -- thinks it was the wrong choice." What Shanker doesn't say: Hendrickson has also signed a letter protesting that "American foreign policy is moving in a dangerous direction toward empire." For more from Shanker, click here.
Dexter Filkins and David Cloud have a rather defeatist-sounding story for Sunday's A1, "Defying U.S. Efforts, Guerillas In Iraq Refocus and Strengthen." It opens: "They just keep getting stronger. Despite months of assurances that their forces were on the wane, the guerrillas and terrorists battling the American-backed enterprise here appear to be growing more violent, more resilient and more sophisticated than ever." The text box reads: "Masked assassins on the streets, with smart P.R. on the web." "American commanders say the number of attacks against American and Iraqi forces has held steady over the last year, averaging about 65 a day. But the Americans concede the growing sophistication of insurgent attacks and the insurgents' ability to replenish their ranks as fast as they are killed. 'We are capturing or killing a lot of insurgents,' said a senior Army intelligence officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to make his assessments public. 'But they're being replaced quicker than we can interdict their operations. There is always another insurgent ready to step up and take charge.'" Filkins and Cloud note the "resiliency" of the "shrewd" "insurgents" ("insurgents" an odd word choice to describe people who set off suicide bombs in markets and mosques to kill civilian adults and children): "Still, part of the explanation for the insurgents' resiliency stems from their own shrewdness. American commanders believe that the rash of diplomat kidnappings came after the Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi formed a cell in Baghdad specifically for abducting diplomats. One other recent development in the insurgency -- and a possible explanation of its ability to bring in recruits from around the Arab world -- is the reach and sophistication of its public relations. Most of the main insurgent groups -- like Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and Ansar al Sunna -- regularly post updates of their exploits on the Web. Scarcely a day passes when one of the groups has not announced another attack with either video or printed notice." More of Filkins and Cloud click here.
Chief political reporter Adam Nagourney gets Page One of the Week in Review to set the table for the hearings into Supreme Court nominee Judge John Roberts, "Onstage: Judge's Past, Politicians' Future." Nagourney piles his plate with his usual labeling bias. While the left-wing group MoveOn.org and left-wing Sen. Ted Kennedy are not labeled liberal, Sen. Orrin Hatch and Sen. Sam Brownback are both explicitly called "conservative," as are legal scholar Steven Calabresi and opponents of Sen. Arlen Specter and Sen. John McCain. In all, there are nine references to conservatives. Meanwhile, it's admitted that Sen. Hillary Clinton has "repeatedly defied the liberal orthodoxy of her party (and, some critics might argue, her own past)." Nagourney also notes that Sen. John Kerry "has been racing to the left since his loss in November." Overall, that's a 9-2 labeling disparity. Yet even the two liberal labels are indirect ones that leave both Clinton and Kerry some wiggle room by not actually terming them liberal. For the rest of Nagourney click here.
London-based Alan Cowell jumps on the tragedy of the Brazilian man gunned down in the London subway to see a backlash against Muslims in Saturday's "5 Shots in a Train Car Leave Londoners Shaken -- Little known of Dead Man, but Muslims See a Backlash." "It was around 10 a.m. on a sunny, summery Friday when London crossed a once-unthinkable line in its unfolding war on terror. In a city where most police officers do not carry guns, the shock from the shooting death of a man in a subway car was palpable. It raised questions about police firearms practices, kindled uncertainty among Muslims and deepened the anxiety of a city that looks, these days, under siege." On Sunday Cowell and Don Van Natta Jr filed a follow-up and saw more "alarmed" Muslims: "The admission by the police that it had killed a man not involved in the investigation revived and fueled an already tense debate over the arming of British police officers. It also came after a series of police misstatements since July 7 when the first bombers struck. The shooting shocked many of the country's 1.6 million Muslims, already alarmed by a publicly acknowledged shoot-to-kill policy directed against suspected suicide bombers. And it has dealt a major setback to the police inquiry into suspected terrorist cells in London." As if Muslims are the only people alarmed in a city hit by two terror attacks in two weeks. A story from Hassan Fattah on Saturday, "New Incidents Heighten Tensions Among British Muslims," furthers the theme of Muslims under siege in England: "A Muslim-owned store in a Leeds suburb was set ablaze Friday night in what witnesses called a racially motivated crime. The attack heightened tensions among Muslims already jittery about a fatal shooting by the London police that the force linked to its investigation of the subway bombing attempts the previous day….No one was wounded in the bombing attempts on Thursday. But they raised fears that a much wider antiterrorism campaign was in the offing, and that the heaviest price would probably be paid by Muslims, many here said. Muslim leaders have been especially concerned that anti-immigrant groups may try to rile young Muslims. Last week eight people were arrested on disorderly conduct charges at the Broadway Pub in Beeston, not far from a heavily Muslim neighborhood, in what is believed to have been an attempt at agitation. In recent days, Muslim leaders said, the far-right British National Party has tried to organize meetings in town to call for new laws against immigrants." For the rest of Fattah click here. Cowell on Saturday click here. Cowell on Sunday click here.
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NYT: The Joe Wilson Appreciation Society
