Absurdities, Atrocities, and Karl Rove

I readily confess that I see Karl Rove's fingerprints almost everywhere I look these days--but that doesn’t mean they aren’t there. (Just because you're paranoid...)

Duncan Hunter's recent rant on treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo is one of the more blatant examples: "The inmates in Guantanamo have never eaten better, they've never been treated better and they've never been more comfortable in their lives."

I'm sure that's true--now that the jig's up on what happened before. Listen closely to his speech (available here)and you'll note that everything he says about conditions at Guantanamo is framed in present tense. This is graduate level lying--misleading and telling "the truth" at the same time.

---

Dick Cheney's comments were similar: "My own personal view of it is that those who are most urgently advocating that we shut down Guantanamo probably don't agree with our policies anyway,"

Also both true and false. No doubt that is Cheney's personal view of it. And most folks who advocate shutting the prison down probably don't agree with this administration's policies.

That doesn't make the administration's policies right, and it doesn't mean Gitmo shouldn't be shut down.

---

We find a subtler form of Rovewellianism in Jim Hoagland's column from Sunday's Washington Post titled "Losing the War of Opinion." Hoagland castigates the administration for damaging the government's credibility by being so reluctant to reveal information, but he skips over the real problem--the administration is reluctant to reveal information because it has so much to hide.

And nested among Hoagland's criticism are subliminal pro-administration messages.

"...It is American morality," he writes, "not Saddam Hussein's demonstrated lack thereof--that is becoming a defining issue now, however unfair that may seem."

It doesn’t seem unfair to me at all, Paul. You're offering Team Bush refuge behind the "moral equivalence" argument. We know Saddam Hussein was a bad man. That doesn't make the bad things our government has done okay. I've said this before, but I think it bears repeating: if Saddam Hussein and his like are the Bush administration's moral benchmarks, America is in big trouble.

What's more, "American morality" is not the defining issue. The defining issue is George W. Bush's morality.

Hoagland's article contains several other subtle Bush-propping blurbs, but the most objectionable is this:

"But the White House is too quick to find comfort in the ignorant partisanship of some foes and the partisan ignorance of others -- and in the reality that patience is required in all wars and particularly in one as amorphous and demanding as this struggle has become."

Holy manipulation, Paul! Opposing the White House doesn't necessarily make one partisan, and it certainly doesn't make one ignorant (in fact, it makes one just the opposite). And the "reality" is that patience is not a virtue in any war, particularly in one as sinister and dismally managed as this one has been from the beginning.

---

One last glimpse into Rove Land:

Tucker Carlson and other right wing pundits assert that the continuing revelations of the Downing Street Memoswon't have much impact because the memos don't tell us anything we didn't already know.

True again: they don't tell us anything we didn't already know. But I'm hoping Carlson and his likes are wrong about lack of impact.

It's not too late to sign John Conyers' letter to President Bush demanding a full investigation of the Downing allegations. If you're of a mind to, stop by Congressman Conyers' web site and show your support.

---

I leave you with a favorite quote from Voltaire:

"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."

Peace,

JLH