In just the last month, the “liberal” media has studiously ignored two revelations of extreme malfeasance by the Bush administration: First, that George Bush admitted that he and his most senior advisers willfully violated U.S. and international laws by drafting torture guidelines for CIA interrogators, and, second, that retired senior military officials hired as on-air “analysts” for television news organizations during the run-up to the invasion of Iraq knowingly made false statements during news broadcasts in order to bolster the administration’s bogus pretexts for war.
Now, in new book set for release next week, the former commander of U.S. forces in Iraq has accused the administration of the most serious possible charges short of treason in its handling of the occupation: gross incompetence and dereliction of duty. Unfortunately, if the past month is an indicator, there is no chance this dire allegation will lead the news on cable for even a single hour, or that it will be mentioned, even in passing, on the Sunday political shows this weekend.
In his new memoir, “Wiser in Battle,” which hits the shelves on May 6, retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez offers this blistering assessment of the Bush administration’s handling of its misbegotten occupation of Iraq:
“Hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars were unnecessarily spent, and worse yet, too many of our most precious military resource, our American soldiers, were unnecessarily wounded, maimed, and killed as a result. In my mind, this action by the Bush administration amounts to gross incompetence and dereliction of duty.”
The quote comes from an excerpt from the book published in Time Magazine. And here is a clue of what’s (not) to come: Raw Story points out that Time has chosen not to highlight the accusation, which was buried three pages into the story.
The fact is, “gross incompetence and dereliction of duty” are apt descriptions of everything the Bush administration has undertaken since it took office — from its horrendous response to Hurricane Katrina to its bungling of the U.S. economy, its ham-fisted international diplomacy, its blockheaded approach to domestic politics and on and on.
In fact, as cynical as it sounds, the truth is that the Bush team’s only real competence is in lying about its activities and smearing its opponents. That’s why, in the unlikely event this story were to find legs, we can expect loyal Bushies to flood the airwaves to remind viewers that Gen. Sanchez was their fall guy for the early failures in Iraq and, especially, the torture regime at Abu Grahib prison.
Right now, the White House political shop is undoubtedly working up a rigorous smear campaign against Sanchez. Luckily for him, the corporate media is bored with the Bush administration and the odds this story will get any notice lies somewhere between slim and none.
Someone please make them listen to this general. The media cannot fail to make this a larger story than the Reverend Wright one or we will know the sorry truth of our 4th estate. I must go to take a blood pressure pill. Sharon Heldenbrand
Bush Gross Incompetence
Well aren’t we a bitter little pill, carving out minute slivers to parade your Bush hate syndrome. The good general also called the ACLU a bunch of liars, and what General Sanchez specifically said about you puss filled weasels was “The death knell of your ethics has been enabled by your parent organizations who have chosen to align themselves with political agendas. What is clear to me is that you are perpetuating the corrosive partisan politics that is destroying our country and killing our servicemen who are at war”, thus laying the blame fully on you, the drive by media. We all know you are fully invested in defeat and you exhibit this every day in your pathetic attempts at blogging. Just move along dot org okay?
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Typical, Red. Name calling, a thesaurus’ worth of vituperation but nothing in response to the central point of the article: the media is ignoring Bush’s admission he authorized drafting torture guidelines, the Pentagon’s deployment of propaganda stooges to cheerlead the public into supporting Bush’s misguided invasion of Iraq and now Sanchez’ characterization of the performance of Bush, Cheney and Rummy as gross incompetence and dereliction of duty.
You can’t provide a counter-argument because there isn’t one, so you ooze slime, desperately hoping it covers the bankruptcy of your position.
No wonder you’re losing.
Why does this always turn into a personal attack? We attack our leaders and the media and then we turn around and attack each other.
Look, I do not hate Bush. How could I hate him when I do not even know him? I do, though, hate war. No sane person would “like” war or “want” war. Do you? Bush has the power to stop this war. He is, after all, the President of the most powerful nation on Earth. This makes me mad.
I do not hate Bush but I do hate incompetence. Again, who here “likes” incompetence? Do you?
We’re in two wars, a Recession, our dollar is almost worthless, oil and food have nearly doubled in price, the Gulf Coast was destroyed by a hurricane and not rebuilt, tax cuts to the rich, water-boarding, bailouts to high risk investors, a terror “watch list” with more than 1 million names and the list goes on and on.
You might argue with me about some of the items on the above list but you can argue your way out of all of them. Gross incompetence at the highest levels of government brought this on. Again, I don’t hate the people but I do hate their actions.
Making this election out to be nothing more than a horse race while baiting one another with taunts more appropriate to a playground wont help us in any way. Our leaders have led us astray and we should be talking about how were going to get back on track.