He should hire that prison's publicist

Lakhdar Brahimi, meet Lizzie Grubman

If you had begun to wonder how well things were (or weren't) going in our efforts to establish full Iraqi sovereignty before the Bush administration's June 30th deadline, consider the subliminal grammatical clues put forth by reporters covering the matter for the New York Times. Specifically, for this one exercise, we'll look at Christine Hauser's "Top Candidate to Lead Iraq's Interim Government Says He Doesn't Want the Job", May 27, 2004:

Dr. Shahristani, a Shiite, had established his credentials by breaking with Saddam Hussein over his plans to develop an atomic bomb and spent several years in Abu Ghraib as a result. He escaped to the West in 1991, during the Persian Gulf war, and led an exile group from London in the intervening years.

[...]

A spokesman for Lakhdar Brahimi, the United Nations envoy who has been leading the effort to build a new government, said Wednesday afternoon that Dr. Shahristani had "clarified that he would prefer to serve his country in other ways."

That's right, one of those newsworthy figures received a qualifying clause while the other did not. In other words, it's assumed that we already know who or what "Abu Ghraib" is, while we need to be reminded who or what this "Lakhdar Brahimi" is or signifies.

Sadly "abuse" will beat "reconstruction efforts" everytime, although in childhood, the opposite always held true: "paper" beats "rock", right? (This was how the game was played, correct? I honestly don't recall there being a comparable schoolyard triptych for "mask/women's underwear/dogs".)

The low culture Subtext Finder, Vol. 2

"Seriously, vote for Bush. I'm fucking serious."

Yesterday, Attorney general John Ashcroft and Robert Mueller, director of the FBI, held a news briefing/press conference/photo-show-and-tell to alert the American public of the possibilty that al Qaeda, our arch-nemesis in the War on Terror™, may be planning summertime attacks on the U.S.

While perhaps a few jitney riders and resort-goers may experience some inconvenience due to these quasi-anticipated attacks, rest assured, dear nervous Americans, that the motives of our Great Enemy transcend mere discomfiture.

From the transcript of Ashcroft's briefing to the press:

"After the March 11th attack in Madrid, Spain, an Al Qaida spokesman announced that 90 percent of the arrangements for an attack in the United States were complete.

The Madrid railway bombings were perceived by Osama bin Laden and Al Qaida to have advanced their cause. Al Qaida may perceive that a large-scale attack in the United States this summer or fall would lead to similar consequences."

Perhaps a translation is in order:

"After al Qaeda attacked hundreds of Spanish commuters shortly before an election, the voting populace in Spain suprised us all by electing an opponent of the U.S.-led war on terror into national office, thereby replacing an official who had stood by President Bush's side during his unpopular invasion of Iraq. Thus, al Qaeda 'won'. Furthermore, this means that they shall 'win' again if you, the American public, were to elect John Kerry this fall, since he, too, has at times spoken out against the way in which Bush has been embarking on this particular war on terror. But then again, if the attacks take place before the election, do we stop them, and hope that, as with the Spanish example, 'no attack' means the re-election of the pro-war candidate? Or do we let the attacks happen and make Spain an example in 'what not to do'? Fuck. Bush/Cheney 2004!"

Of course, that's just one reading of the material presented at the press briefing. And it's not like anyone else has a similar take on yesterday's event.

Pete and Repete were in a boat and Pete jumped out. Who was left?

The third in a series of posts delicately pointing out the mindless repetition inherent to the political 'stump speech'. This week's target, Vice President Dick Cheney. (EARLIER: George W. Bush, John Kerry)

Remarks by the Vice President at a Reception for 2004 State Victory Committee, Little Rock, Arkansas, May 24, 2004:

And some of you may know that my only job as Vice President is to preside over the United States Senate. When they wrote the Constitution, they created the post of Vice President, but they got down to the end of the convention, and they remembered suddenly they hadn't given him anything to do. (Laughter.) So they made him the President of the Senate, the presiding officer.

It's not quite as exciting as it used to be. My predecessor John Adams actually had floor privileges. He could go down in the well and engage in the debate. And then he did a couple of times, and they withdrew his floor privileges. (Laughter.) They've never been restored.

Remarks by the Vice President at the Diamond Casting and Machine Tool Company, Hollis, New Hampshire, May 10, 2004:

My only real job as Vice President is as President of the Senate. When they wrote the Constitution, they got down to the end of the convention, they'd created this post called Vice President, but they hadn't given the guy anything to do. (Laughter.) So they made him the presiding officer of the United States Senate.

And my predecessor John Adams, our first Vice President, also had floor privileges. He could actually go down into the floor of the Senate and participate in the debate. And then he did a couple of times, and they withdrew his floor privileges. (Laughter.) And they've never been restored.

Remarks by the Vice President at a Reception for Gubernatorial Candidate Mitch Daniels, Indianapolis, Indiana, April 23, 2004:

My only real job as Vice President is to preside over the United States Senate. When they wrote the Constitution and created the post of Vice President, they got down to the end of the Constitutional Convention and suddenly realized they hadn't given the Vice President any job. He didn't have anything to do. So they made him the President of the Senate, said, you get to preside over the Senate, cast tie-breaking votes.

And my predecessor John Adams, our first Vice President, also had floor privileges. He was allowed to go down into the well and actually engage in the debate of the day. And then he did a couple of times, and they withdrew his floor privileges. (Laughter.) They've never been restored.

Remarks by the Vice President at a Luncheon for Congressional Candidate Sam Graves, Kansas City, Missouri, April 23, 2004:

My only official duty as Vice President is to preside over the Senate. When they wrote the Constitution, they created the post of Vice President, and they got down to the end of the Constitutional Convention, they figured out they hadn't given him anything to do. (Laughter.) So they made him the President of the Senate to allow the Vice President to preside over the Senate, also cast that tie-breaking vote when the Senate is 50-50 on a proposition.

My predecessor John Adams, our first Vice President, also had floor privileges. He could go down into the well of the Senate and actually join in the debate and argue the issues of the day. And then he did a couple of times, and they withdrew his floor privileges. (Laughter.) They've never been restored.

Remarks by the Vice President at a Luncheon for Congressional Candidate Kevin Triplett, Roanoke, Virginia, April 19, 2004:

My only official duty is as President of the Senate. When they wrote the Constitution, they created the post of Vice President. But they got down to the end of the Constitutional Convention, they realized they had not given him anything to do. (Laughter.) So they made him the President of the Senate, the presiding officer. And you get to preside over the United States Senate, cast tie-breaking votes when the Senate is tied.

And my predecessor John Adams, our first Vice President, also had floor privileges. He could actually go into the well and engage in debate and talk about the issues of the day. And then he did a couple of times, and they withdrew his floor privileges. (Laughter.)

Remarks by the Vice President at An Event for Congressman Jon Porter, Las Vegas, Nevada, January 15, 2004:

Most people don't realize that my only real job is as the President of the Senate. When they wrote the Constitution, they created the post of Vice President, and then they got down to the end of the Constitutional Convention and realized that they hadn't given anything to do. (Laughter.) So at the least minute they cobbled together this job called the President of the Senate, and made it possible for the Vice President to actually be called the President of the Senate -- I actually get paid by the Senate; that's where my paycheck comes from -- to preside as the presiding officer of the Senate, cast tie-breaking votes when the Senate is deadlocked.

And my predecessor, John Adams, our first Vice President also had floor privileges. He could go down into the well of the Senate and engage in the debate of the day, and actually participate in the exciting debate on the major issues of the day in the Senate, itself. And then he did a couple of times, and they withdrew his floor privileges. (Laughter.) And they've never been reinstated.

Sadly, the Vice President hasn't quite perfected his delivery and comic timing when addressing an international audience. Here he is speaking to a crowd of students at China's Fudan University:

Remarks by the Vice President at Fudan University Followed by Student Body Q&A, Shanghai, China, April 15, 2004:

The role of the Vice President has evolved over the years. When our Constitution was written in Philadelphia at our Constitutional Convention, they created the position of Vice President. But when they got to the end of the convention, they decided that they hadn't given him anything to do. He had no work. So they made him the President of the Senate, that is the presiding officer over our upper house of our Congress and gave him the ability to cast tie-breaking votes.

Media scorecard: Old news is new news

Ah, Newsweek. You've got the Ahmed Chalabi story on your cover this week, as might be expected of any arbiter of mainstream journalism. It's quite a tale you've got, there...except, much like last summer's Joseph Wilson/Robert Novak story, the lowest-common-denominator media is playing catchup once again. And, as before, a few-too-many months after the fact.

From "The Rise and Fall of Chalabi: Bush's Mr. Wrong", Newsweek, May 31, 2004:

Much of Chalabi's dubious intelligence was funneled to the DIA through top Pentagon civilians. Under Secretary Feith himself signed a long and detailed summary of the intelligence linking Saddam to terrorists and WMD. The Feith memo, stamped secret, submitted to Congress and leaked to the conservative Weekly Standard magazine last summer, reads like a conspiracy theorist's greatest hits. Interviewed last week by NEWSWEEK, Feith was a little defensive about his relationship with Chalabi. "The press stories would have him as my brother. I met him a few times. He was very smart, very articulate," Feith said. Feith allowed he has always been drawn to the stories of exiles who come back to save their countries. But he rejected the idea that he had been Chalabi's tool or dupe.

From "Blind Into Baghdad", by James Fallows, The Atlantic Monthly, January/February 2004:

On a Friday afternoon last November, I met Douglas Feith in his office at the Pentagon to discuss what has happened in Iraq. Feith's title is undersecretary of defense for policy, which places him, along with several other undersecretaries, just below Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary Paul Wolfowitz in the Pentagon's hierarchy. Informally he is seen in Washington as "Wolfowitz's Wolfowitz"—that is, as a deputy who has a wide range of responsibilities but is clearly identified with one particular policy. That policy is bringing regime change to Iraq—a goal that both Wolfowitz and Feith strongly advocated through the 1990s.

[...]

"This is an important point," he said, "because of this issue of What did we believe? ... The common line is, nobody planned for security because Ahmed Chalabi told us that everything was going to be swell." Chalabi, the exiled leader of the Iraqi National Congress, has often been blamed for making rosy predictions about the ease of governing postwar Iraq. "So we predicted that everything was going to be swell, and we didn't plan for things not being swell." Here Feith paused for a few seconds, raised his hands with both palms up, and put on a "Can you believe it?" expression. "I mean—one would really have to be a simpleton. And whatever people think of me, how can anybody think that Don Rumsfeld is that dumb? He's so evidently not that dumb, that how can people write things like that?" He sounded amazed rather than angry.

What's cooking for the major weeklies, the national dailies, and the cable news networks in the coming months? Judging by the fleet of alt-weekly trendspotters with whom we consulted, odds are in favor that we'll see a scandalous news cycle or two about President Bush's alliance with the Christian right.

The tongue-in-cheek Times

From "C.I.A. Bid to Keep Some Detainees Off Abu Ghraib Roll Worries Officials", the New York Times, May 25, 2004:

The Central Intelligence Agency's practice of keeping some detainees in Abu Ghraib prison off the official rosters so concerned a top Army officer and a civilian official there that they reached a written agreement early this year to stop.

An undated copy of the memorandum was obtained by The New York Times. It was described as an agreement between the Army intelligence unit assigned to the prison and "external agencies," a euphemism for the C.I.A., to halt practices that bypassed both military rules and international standards.

[...]

The memorandum criticizing the practice of keeping prisoners off the roster was signed by Col. Thomas M. Pappas, commander of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, and a James Bond, who is identified as "SOS, Agent in Charge." Military and intelligence officials said that they did not know of a Mr. Bond who had been assigned to Abu Ghraib, and that it was possible that the name was an alias.

Gosh, you think so?

On a tangential note, it's slightly amusing to imagine the sense of identification various male government officials seem to have with Agent 007. Not only international-oriented figures, as with the CIA instance cited above, but domestically, as well, as this pose by the FBI's top cop suggests. Although what Johnny would do with all those mysterious temptresses, we have no idea...though he's got the gun thing down pat.

Dubya: the endorsements keep coming in

(With thanks to Jeff)

Rumsfeld's Rules: Donald's Photoblog, Vol. 2

After having prepared Volume 1 not too long ago, it's rather upsetting that there's even a need for a second round, but, alas, more Abu Ghraib prison torture photos and video clips have been released, courtesy of the Washington Post.

And a handful of these, sadly (though containing less of the jubilant thumbs-up mentality which we've seen in other leaked photos), are even more dehumanizing than the images with which most of us have become familiar by now. One caption which the Post has sensitively given to one of the photos (which you'll see below) reads simply, "A baton-wielding U.S. soldier appears to be ordering a naked detainee covered in a brown substance to walk a straight line with his ankles handcuffed." A brown substance, indeed. Why, that must be mud from the banks of the River Euphrates, right?

Again, as before, all captions come from Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's notorious leadership tract of January 29, 2001, "Rumsfeld's Rules: Advice on government, business and life," which appeared in the Wall Street Journal when Rumsfeld initially took office three years ago. Captions continue below...

"Don't accept the post or stay unless you have an understanding with the president that you're free to tell him what you think “with the bark off' and you have the courage to do it."

"Control your time. If you're working off your in-box, you're working off the priorities of others. Be sure the staff is working on what you move to them from the president, or the president will be reacting, not leading."

"Don't let the complexity of a large company mask the need for performance. Bureaucracy is a conspiracy to bring down the big. And it can. You may need to be large to compete in the world stage, but you need to find ways to avoid allowing that size to mask poor performance."

"Prune -- prune businesses, products, activities, people. Do it annually."

"Don't be a bottleneck. If a matter is not a decision for the president or you, delegate it. Force responsibility down and out. Find problem areas, add structure, and delegate. The pressure is to do the reverse. Resist it."

"Walk around. If you are invisible, the mystique of the president's office may perpetuate inaccurate impressions about you or the president, to his detriment. After all, you may not be as bad as they're saying."

And, finally, in Donald's own words:

"Don't do or say things you would not like to see on the front page of the Washington Post." That, and "Be able to resign. It will improve your value to the president and do wonders for your performance."

Lose 15lbs. by June 30th!

Total duration of President Bush's public address to the media on matters pertaining to the situation in Iraq, Palestinian deaths in Rafah, and domestic energy concerns, after his Cabinet Meeting on May 19, 2004 (from "President Discusses Iraq, Economy, Gas Prices in Cabinet Meeting", whitehouse.gov):

7 minutes, 12:04 - 12:11 PM EDT

From "Physicians report Bush in 'unbelievable' condition", USA TODAY, August 6, 2002:

Bush's good health is no accident. The president, a teetotaler since age 40 and a non-smoker — except for an occasional cigar — jogs 3 miles, mostly on a treadmill, at least four times a week. He works out with free weights for 45 minutes at least twice a week.

And to think some left-wingers consider this guy an out-of-touch fat cat.

Inappropriate (and very, very decontextualized) "gallows humor"

From "Pentagon Finds More Prison Abuse Photos", Associated Press, May 20, 2004:

Photos of two American soldiers posing with thumbs up near a body packed in ice at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison were shown on ABC-TV.

The photos showed Army Sgt. Charles A. Graner Jr. and Spc. Sabrina Harman, both of whom have already been charged in the prisoner abuse scandal.

The detainee, whose badly bruised corpse was in a body bag packed with ice, died in the prison's showers while being interrogated by the CIA or other civilian agents, ABC reported Wednesday. It said the Justice Department is investigating the death.

[...]

[Graner's lawyer, Guy Womack of Houston,] told ABC News the photo of his client represented inappropriate "gallows humor."

Ohhhh, I get it. Let me give it a try, too! (But below the fold, I mean, cos it is "inappropriate.")

Unintentionally Hilarious Photo of the Moment, vol. 20