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Sat 22 May, 2004 12:15 pm
Suspicians confirmed??????? This article is from the Liberal Boston Globe
CATHY YOUNG
Obscene gloating over US failures in Iraq
By Cathy Young | May 22, 2004
ARE SOME Americans, including journalists, rooting for the enemy while their country is at war? This question is coming up with increasing frequency as the troubles in Iraq continue.
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The May 15 issue of the British magazine The Spectator published an article by Daily Telegraph correspondent Tony Hamden, recounting a conversation he had with an unnamed "American magazine journalist of serious accomplishment and impeccable liberal credentials."
According to Hamden, "Not only had she `known' the Iraq war would fail, but she considered it essential that it did so because this would ensure that the `evil' George W. Bush would no longer be running her country. Her editors back on the East Coast were giggling, she said, over what a disaster Iraq had turned out to be. `Lots of us talk about how awful it would be if this worked out.' " Hamden goes on to say that when he asked the woman if "thousands more dead Iraqis would be a good thing," her answer was, essentially, yes.
If this story -- tailor-made to confirm every conservative's worst suspicions about the media establishment -- is true, it illustrates a repugnant mentality. But some of those criticizing such attitudes reveal a mindset that, in some ways, is equally misguided. On the widely read
Instapundit.com weblog, University of Tennessee law professor Glenn Reynolds writes, "To explain things in words of few syllables: It's wrong to root for your country's defeat." Reynolds adds that it's especially wrong "when that defeat would mean the death of innocents" and "when it's merely for domestic political advantage." It's hard to disagree with the last two statements. But what about the sweeping assertion that rooting for your country's defeat is wrong?
This view is hardly limited to Reynolds alone. The other day on the Fox News Channel news show "From the Heartland," while interviewing left-wing cartoonist Ted Rall, host and former congressman John Kasich expressed dismay and shock that anyone could root against their own country in a war.
Yet what if your country, or your government, is engaged in a war that is unjust and immoral? What if it's your country that is wantonly killing innocents, as well as sacrificing the lives of its own soldiers for no good reason?
I should point out that none of this, in my view, is true of the war in Iraq. History's final verdict on this war is still a long way from being in. Yet, it is an indisputable fact that, for good or bad reasons, we went to war against a brutal, sadistic regime in Iraq -- a regime that was the worst enemy of its own people. It is also a fact that, for the most part, the United States has gone to great lengths to avoid injury and death to civilians. Indeed, despite all the troubles, polls have shown that a majority of Iraqis still believe that the US-led war was right and that it has made their lives better.
I should also note that in this case, the gloating over our failures in Iraq can be downright obscene. Rall, who debated Kasich on war and patriotism on Fox News, has mocked former football player Pat Tillman, killed in action in Afghanistan, as a "sap" who joined the army after the Sept. 11 attacks because he wanted to "kill Arabs."
Michael Moore, the so-called documentary filmmaker, compares the Iraqi insurgents -- who indiscriminately kill their own compatriots -- to the fighters of the American revolution. He also states that US forces should stay in Iraq because we must pay with our blood for this war. None of these folks show much concern for the Iraqis victimized by Saddam Hussein and his minions, or by the terrorists today.
But "my country, right or wrong" is not an answer to these ideologues. Such an attitude is worthy of the Soviet Union (where, surely, it wasn't wrong for dissidents to root against their government during the war in Czechoslovakia in 1968 or in Afghanistan in the 1980s), not of a free country.
Ironically, the same conservatives who believe that no decent American can sympathize with the other side during a war also generally believe that our troops in Iraq deserve the support of the Iraqis because we liberated them from an evil regime. Yet, following their logic, patriotic Iraqis would have had to support a homegrown tyrant over foreign occupation.
The difference, of course, is that we're not a dictatorship. So let's not demand mindless, knee-jerk patriotism as if we were. I want to support my country because it's right, not just because it's mine.
Cathy Young is a contributing editor at Reason magazine. Her column appears regularly in the Globe.
© Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.
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perception- I have long suspected something like this. Apparently, whatever good is done in Iraq is downplayed by the media, while problems are blown way out of proportion.
Many media editors were against the war and took a very public stand------they don't want to be wrong and will apparently risk lives(except their own of course) to be vindicated.
I know an unnamed source that says conservatives gloat over liberal failures.
But not when we have troops on the ground in harm's way edgar. Anybody, I don't care who s/he is, who gloats over setbacks involving them gets no respect from me.
Foxfyre- I agree- It is one thing to gloat when the "loyal opposition" makes a mess of things. Both sides do it, and it's part of the game. It is quite another when American lives are at stake!
I think it's too bad Mr. Hamden didn't name the journalist in question. Then we could have asked who she meant when she said "Lots of us talk about how awful it would be if this worked out." I wonder if "lots of us" includes journalists at one specific magazine, or a broad cross-section of journalists across the country and throughout the world. I suspect it's the latter.
Phoenix32890 wrote:perception- I have long suspected something like this. Apparently, whatever good is done in Iraq is downplayed by the media, while problems are blown way out of proportion.
Yes - just as this obtains in the rest of the reporting about the rest of the world! Do you see much in the media about volcanoes that DON'T erupt? Rivers that DON'T flood? People who DON"T riot? Shopping trips in Israel that DON'T end in bloody death from a suicide bomber? Palestinian crowds going peacefully about their business and NOT eviscerating perceived enemies?
Honestly, I hate this
emoticon, and almost never use it - but here it is deserved!
Do you pro_Iraq people genuinely believe your media is running a campaign to get your soldiers killed?
Do you really believe that having soldiers "on the ground" (which you have almost all the time) is reason not to report the news and critique government policy?
After reading and reading and reading and reading what has been written about all this dlowan, I believe there is a bias of hatred among some in the liberal U.S. media that honestly does want the effort in Iraq to fail. It's the only way their own negative rhetoric can be vindicated even if their motive is not to bring down the current administration. And I think they don't care if they demoralize the troops or even if there are additional deaths as a result of it. And I think it is unpatriotic, unAmerican, and shameful.
You have to look at the value of the particular brand of dissent, IMO.
Saying the war is unnecessary-should be stopped-must be stopped- or declaring a candidate is better than Bush because he will end the war quicker----all these things are fine and valuable.
How is making fun of a particular serviceman (Tillman), or any of them a useful dissent? It's not. It's nothing more than cheap insult.
I don't think we need to protect or defend cheap insult. Rooting for the US to lose a war is rooting for US soldiers to die, and for one's own country to suffer a multitude of problems. If someone hates their own country this much, it seems they would want to relocate.
I think it's ridiculous to say the media or anyone else from America wants to see soldiers killed. It is not surprising if they smile to see Bush fail, since the blood of the soldiers, both Iraqi and American is on his hands.
The gloating person is not named. Why should we believe it is anyone worth paying attention to anyway?
I should also note that in this case, the gloating over our failures in Iraq can be downright obscene. Rall, who debated Kasich on war and patriotism on Fox News, has mocked former football player Pat Tillman, killed in action in Afghanistan, as a "sap" who joined the army after the Sept. 11 attacks because he wanted to "kill Arabs."
Michael Moore, the so-called documentary filmmaker, compares the Iraqi insurgents -- who indiscriminately kill their own compatriots -- to the fighters of the American revolution. He also states that US forces should stay in Iraq because we must pay with our blood for this war
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Ted Rall and Micheal Moore are two. And, there are other people with similar wishes for political expediency.
I don't know anything about Rall, but, if he mocked Tillman, he did wrong. I may disagree with Tillman for going over there, but he did what he believed was right. You people who support Bush have an unsettling way of wanting to blame all leftists for what some do.
I want to see Moore's work and judge for myself what he's doing.
Moore has a right to make any movie he pleases, IMO. I may see it--haven't decided...I was talking about his statement:
He also states that US forces should stay in Iraq because we must pay with our blood for this war
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That's horrible to me. I'm glad to hear your opinion about mocking Tillman. I never understand things like this. Even if Rall thought that--why hurt so many people (Tillman's family/ friends), and dishonor that young man by saying that in public? I just don't understand.
Moore's Fahrenheit 911 won the Palm d'Or at the Cannes film festival.
Did you believe it wouldn't?
I don't think any half way rational person with an ounce of moral value wants people to die. If they do they should dismissed out of hand even if they are a "leftist."
However, not all who report on the war and have realistic negative things to say about it are gloating but are merely telling it like it is.
What good is a new school if you can't go because your parents are afraid you will get bombed? That is the bottom line. It is for that reason all the good things might not get as much play in the media.
Bush failed to plan for aftermath of taking down Saddam's regime and now we are seeing the consequences. He thought everyone would be just be glad to get rid of Saddam Hussien they would greet us as liberators. He should not have relied so much on an unreliable source.
I am against the war to start with just on the premises, but I do wish the aftermath had turned out better just so that there would not be so many dying. Even though I don't think it is the US's place to set up other countries, I still don't like to see our troops and Iraqis and any other person dying because of this war or any other reason.
I don't think our troops should stay over there to be killed because we invaded another country for no reason. However, I do think the insurgents that are Iraqi's have a right to fight for their own country. I just don't want anyone to die on any side.
His film may be popular, but his comment sucks.
Our servicemen need to stay in Iraq so more of them can die to pay in blood? That's vile.
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