Letters to the Editor
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Glenn
Perhaps I am overly sensitive to the one dimensional perception tossed about with seeming abandon, sorry. Even characterizations of "overton windows" seem pretty shallow.
I agree with your article that there seems a conspiracy on the part of media to present a "window" populated with whomever the media directs/is directed to present. Our perceptions of where society is or is not seems to come from that "window", which, IMHO, seems to be mostly wrong. I don't know enough about the mechanics of the "overton window" so probably should have kept my mouth shut. :-)
Just to understand, to borrow a one dimensional concept, there are "dirty hippies" on the "right" working against authoritarian rule, even in the Pentagon.
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Don't forget...
...about all of the security analysts and regional experts who were against this thing from the beginning, including many who have never been on the left. Although it is true that crazy ultranationalist right-wing views are ably represented and nobody to the left of centrist liberals like Bill Moyers or Phil Donahue is allowed a microphone (and theirs are sometimes taken away), it is also true that a huge swath of foreign policy realists and other conservatives are also frozen out. A voice like Andrew Bacevich's--a veteran and international relations prof who opposed this venture from day one and who lost his son in Iraq last year--would in any sane republic be far more prominent than the op-ed and think-tank know-nothings who continue to infantilize the discussion; see last fall's analysis of Petraeus's testimony, http://www.amconmag.com/2007/2007_09_24/article2.html
Little has been written about what it means for the separation of powers that while Congressional Democrats and Republicans get together to condemn MoveOn ads, or engage in disgusting banter about the need for Iraqis to "take responsibility for themselves," or enable the administration with resolutions on Iran, it was up to people in the most secretive parts of the government to stage a coup with the latest Iran NIE.
I think you're right that our media bear a huge responsibility for this state of affairs, and that the oversight you're doing is invaluable for that reason alone. But the problem, as I think you know, goes well beyond freezing out the left--it goes to disallowing any thoughtful discussion whatsoever that doesn't embrace ridiculous premises (that's why the NYU prof on the Rose show you clipped has to spend so much time questioning Charlie's questions).
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Too Quick to Give Rose Credit
It should be noted that, in terms of presenting a complete view of the Iraq debate to the American public, Charlie Rose is actually much better than the standard establishment media outlet. To his credit, prior to the invasion, he actually interviewed genuine war opponents (and did so respectfully, not in order to deride them as objects of freakish wonderment). He conducted meaningful interviews with people like Amy Goodman and Noam Chomsky -- figures whom the establishment media (which gives endless airtime to the likes of Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh and Bill Kristol) would never get anywhere near because they are too far "on the Left" -- far too anti-war -- and thus too far outside of the mainstream to be heard from...
I wouldn't be so quick to give Rose "credit" for this. If Rose really wanted to give a balanced picture, why didn't he interview any of the HUGE numbers of more mainstream politicians, activists, or interest-group-leaders (or, for that matter, military personnel) who opposed the war from day one? Why couldn't he have interviewed people like Pat Buchanan or Ron Paul, who opposed the war from the right? Rose's pretense of "fairness" just reinforced the impression that only isolated "old-left" types like Chomsky opposed the war.
Other than that important quibble, I really respect your efforts to debunk the lies that have been bringing disgrace on our country for all these years.
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@GC
I feel far "on the left" -- and far too anti-war... today.
I'm with you. Today has many bad portents on the horizon. al Sadr's militia appears to be coming back into action. Petraeus is blaming Iran for the Green Zone attack. The Pentagon shipped missile parts instead of helicopter batteries to Taiwan just when China is quashing Tibet protests?
I need a break. I'm going to go outside and shovel some real horse poo. Take care and let those quacks do their jobs when they need to. No fevers!
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A majority of Congressional Democrats opposed the war
It's not hard to find people opposed from the start, so why does the broadcast media turn away from over a hundred million Americans who got it right?
Probably because Republicans give them massive tax breaks, unlike those granted to most Americans.
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Those pugnacious ponytailed Pentagon hippies?
They have a hard time hiding the tattoo too.
When Lindsey G. goes to the DOD Gates pool.
He shows his 'Mom" Tattoo to a Dachau survivor.
I remember visiting Dachau post-Nam and Wow!
The Pentagon are automatons marching to death.
If ya's aren't a Polly Cracker yes, yes, yes, you booted.
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Opposing viewpoints
They now denounce the current strategy, which is to stay until it's stable enough for us to leave. Instead, they favor our leaving, but at a pace and in numbers dictated by the stability of the situation on the ground.
Don't they sound so reasonable though? That's the hook they want you to bite on.
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update
Nice clarification on the update, and use of Walt. One of the weirdest premises of the neocon fantasy has always been that more Middle East democracy=more pro-Americanism and less anti-Zionism, when anyone who knows anything about the history would assume the opposite (note that this is not an argument against Middle East democracy).
I recently heard the granddaddy of neo-realism, Kenneth Waltz, call the U.S. a "rogue state"--Bush has brought "Right" and "Left" together, making us all remember our liberal democratic fundamentals, which hopefully aren't relics of a bygone, pre-Coulter/Limbaugh age....
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Brookings on the right?
Glenn Greenwald... This also illustrates the difficulty of using the terms "Right" and "Left" with any clear meaning. Unadorned war opponents (as distinct from Friedman-esqe tactical quibblers) included those on the Left, non-interventionists on the Right, and Iraq-specific war opponents from the "realist" school. At least as I use the terms with regard to foreign policy, the "Right" has come to mean the Kristol/Limbaugh/Fox News/Brookings faction of endless war, while the "Left" generally designates those opposed to the fundamental premises of America's imperial and war-making foreign policy. Those in the former group can never go too far to be out of the mainstream, while those in the latter group almost presumptively are.
Do you mean the same Brookings Institute that Nixon wanted to firebomb?
Then again, Nixon was almost a socialist according to Milton Friedman