Monday, November 28, 2005
ONLY REPORTING THE BAD STUFF
James Q. Wilson crafts the speech George W. Bush should deliver:
My fellow Americans: We are winning, and winning decisively, in Iraq and the Middle East. We defeated Saddam Hussein’s army in just a few weeks. None of the disasters that many feared would follow our invasion occurred. Our troops did not have to fight door to door to take Baghdad. The Iraqi oil fields were not set on fire. There was no civil war between the Sunnis and the Shiites. There was no grave humanitarian crisis.
Saddam Hussein was captured and is awaiting trial. His two murderous sons are dead. Most of the leading members of Saddam’s regime have been captured or killed. After our easy military victory, we found ourselves inadequately prepared to defeat the terrorist insurgents, but now we are prevailing.
U.S. Navy construction apprentice Nick Fotoples might second that view:
He supports the war declaring Iraqi freedom, and said the media is distorting events to carry out an agenda. He described a situation where Iraqis working in the PX appear happy to have freedom for the first time, water for those who wouldn’t otherwise have it and 16 new schools as examples of what the U.S. military has accomplished in the country ...
He said he hears the war is in vain, and he disagrees. He emphasized the point by recounting the rape and murder of an Iraqi family. The terrorists raped the wife in front of the husband, then killed him and his child. The wife survived at the mercy of the terrorists only so she could tell the story.
“If that happened in the states, we’d be all over it, but if it happens somewhere else it’s OK. That’s bullshit in my book,” Nick said.
Fotoples’ father doesn’t support the war, which he believes was based on lies; nevertheless, he’s with his son so far as the press is concerned:
“He’s surrounded by military guys, and he’s hearing a lot about the liberal media. They’re real sore about the successes that they’re having over there not being told,” Bob said. “My mom and my sister tell me this all the time; they say the media isn’t reporting the good stuff; they’re only reporting the bad stuff.”