Spreading Democracy, One Lie at a Time
Karen Hughes, friend and advisor to Preznit Treason (and the type of woman that my wife would refer to as a "See You Next Tuesday"), has been tasked these past few months with spreading American goodwill around the Muslim world, and she is apparently doing a bang-up job. Just like all BushCo appointees do a bang-up job. Right, Brownie?
What's interesting and rather amusing to me is that she is finding her audiences away from the hand-picked Potemkin crowds of loyal, unquestioning Republicans that slaver and worship at the feet of her boss here in the US are a much harder sell for her particular brand of propaganda, disingenuousness and outright lies. For instance, the Washington Post reported yesterday on her getting caught in front of an Indonesian audience in a lie that has worked so well for so long in America that she probably even believes it herself. She made the claim that the war in Iraq was justified because Saddam Hussein "had murdered hundreds of thousands of his own people using poison gas." This line has been repeated for so long here -- and gone unquestioned by anyone in the lapdog, Judith Miller-personified media -- that it's accepted as gospel among millions of Moron-Americans and wingnuts (but I repeat myself). Only it isn't true. Leaving aside the small, inconvenient matter that when Hussein gassed the Kurds in 1982, he did so with the full knowledge and backing of the American government, the numbers just don't bear out the claim. Officials acknowledge that there were perhaps 5,000 people gassed -- a horrible and significant number, yes, but hardly the "hundreds of thousands" of which Hughes spoke.
Challenged more than once to back up her allegation, Hughes simply repeated the number, saying, "It's something that our U.S. government has said a number of times in the past. It's information that was used very widely after his attack on the Kurds. I believe it was close to 300,000... That's something I said every day in the course of the campaign. That's information that we talked about a great deal in America."
I have no doubt that the Bush maladministration made that claim, and I have no doubt that Hughes repeated that number every day during the campaign. Which only illustrates once again that the Republican Big Lie strategy is alive and well. Keep repeating something, no matter how specious, and it becomes a fact. The entire Republican oeuvre of the last twenty years or more is built largely upon simply Making Shit Up, it seems. And Hughes is obviously a graduate, summa cum laude, of MSU.
Perhaps if the corporate press had been doing its job here in the so-called Land of the Free, someone, somewhere would have challenged Ms. Hughes a few times when she made that claim "every day in the course of the campaign." But of course that sort of thing just doesn't happen here any more; that sort of challenge just doesn't fit the script dictated by Rupert Murdoch and the rest of his media-controlling pals. So Hughes was mystified then when it was disputed by audience members who are more knowledgeable of history, current events and politics than she'll ever be. That sort of thing is unheard of when she addresses the True Believers here in America.
And today the Post reports that Hughes may be on the short list of people who will be called upon to step a little closer to Preznit Heckuva Job when and if Rove and Libby and possibly even Cheney (I hope I hope I hope) are soon forced to step aside. Well, she's certainly qualified for the job by BushCo standards.
What's interesting and rather amusing to me is that she is finding her audiences away from the hand-picked Potemkin crowds of loyal, unquestioning Republicans that slaver and worship at the feet of her boss here in the US are a much harder sell for her particular brand of propaganda, disingenuousness and outright lies. For instance, the Washington Post reported yesterday on her getting caught in front of an Indonesian audience in a lie that has worked so well for so long in America that she probably even believes it herself. She made the claim that the war in Iraq was justified because Saddam Hussein "had murdered hundreds of thousands of his own people using poison gas." This line has been repeated for so long here -- and gone unquestioned by anyone in the lapdog, Judith Miller-personified media -- that it's accepted as gospel among millions of Moron-Americans and wingnuts (but I repeat myself). Only it isn't true. Leaving aside the small, inconvenient matter that when Hussein gassed the Kurds in 1982, he did so with the full knowledge and backing of the American government, the numbers just don't bear out the claim. Officials acknowledge that there were perhaps 5,000 people gassed -- a horrible and significant number, yes, but hardly the "hundreds of thousands" of which Hughes spoke.
Challenged more than once to back up her allegation, Hughes simply repeated the number, saying, "It's something that our U.S. government has said a number of times in the past. It's information that was used very widely after his attack on the Kurds. I believe it was close to 300,000... That's something I said every day in the course of the campaign. That's information that we talked about a great deal in America."
I have no doubt that the Bush maladministration made that claim, and I have no doubt that Hughes repeated that number every day during the campaign. Which only illustrates once again that the Republican Big Lie strategy is alive and well. Keep repeating something, no matter how specious, and it becomes a fact. The entire Republican oeuvre of the last twenty years or more is built largely upon simply Making Shit Up, it seems. And Hughes is obviously a graduate, summa cum laude, of MSU.
Perhaps if the corporate press had been doing its job here in the so-called Land of the Free, someone, somewhere would have challenged Ms. Hughes a few times when she made that claim "every day in the course of the campaign." But of course that sort of thing just doesn't happen here any more; that sort of challenge just doesn't fit the script dictated by Rupert Murdoch and the rest of his media-controlling pals. So Hughes was mystified then when it was disputed by audience members who are more knowledgeable of history, current events and politics than she'll ever be. That sort of thing is unheard of when she addresses the True Believers here in America.
And today the Post reports that Hughes may be on the short list of people who will be called upon to step a little closer to Preznit Heckuva Job when and if Rove and Libby and possibly even Cheney (I hope I hope I hope) are soon forced to step aside. Well, she's certainly qualified for the job by BushCo standards.
posted by Generik at 10:10 AM
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