Newsweek/Alter: The Price Of Loyalty

[kskiska]

Nov. 7, 2005 issue - The posthumous purple heart rested near the folded American flag on the modest dining-room table of his parents' home in Cleveland. Edward (Augie) Schroeder, a Boy Scout turned Marine, was killed along with 13 other soldiers on their fifth trip into Al Hadithah, Iraq, to clean out insurgents. Their fifth trip. "When you do something over and over again expecting a different result," Augie's grieving father, Paul, told me, "that is the definition of insanity." As the death toll of American soldiers in Iraq reached 2,000 last week, Paul Schroeder concluded that the military had not sent enough troops to Iraq to do the job properly and that the president was incompetent: "My son's life was thrown away, his death was a waste." Then, noting that he shared a birthday with his boy, he broke down and said he would not be able to celebrate his own birthday anymore.

The Schroeders were on my mind as I watched Patrick Fitzgerald's skillful press conference. He laid out the seriousness of blowing the cover of CIA operatives. He explained clearly why Scooter Libby had been indicted. He even struck a blow against rogue prosecutors (like Kenneth Starr, though he didn't mention him) whose staffs routinely leak to the media in violation of the law. But Fitzgerald was wrong on one count, at least metaphorically. "This indictment is not about the war," he said. Oh, yes, it is.

According to Fitzgerald, Libby had conversations with at least seven other government officials about Joseph and Valerie Wilson that he did not disclose to the grand jury. Why were top White House officials and Vice President Cheney so concerned about an obscure former diplomat like Wilson? Because he had the temerity to offer public dissent. By showing how evidence of Saddam's WMDs had been cooked, Wilson undermined the very reason Augie Schroeder and the rest of the U.S. military went to war. He was more than "fair game," as Karl Rove called him. He was a mortal threat.

This has been the Bush pattern. Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill presciently says a second tax cut is unaffordable if we want to fight in Iraq—he's fired. Bush's economic adviser Larry Lindsey presciently says the war will cost between $100 billion and $200 billion (an underestimate)—he's fired. Army Gen. Eric Shinseki presciently says that winning in Iraq will require several hundred thousand troops—he's sent into early retirement. By contrast, CIA Director George Tenet, who presided over two of the greatest intelligence lapses in American history (9/11 and WMD in Iraq) and apparently helped spread "oppo ammo" to discredit the husband of a woman who had devoted her life to his agency, receives the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

more…
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9865068/site/newsweek/

[Erika]

2. Bush has screwed us.

But then that was what he was (s)elected to do. Bush is a corporate globalist, period. He's rewarded them beautifully. Now, he's cutting school lunches for our needy kids. What a (not) president.

He's hurting our kids while bragging about aiding Iraqi kids. What a guy.

[babylonsister]

3. Bring all these articles on! The dimson is a piece of shit

and now the truth of that is getting out. Wait til his disciples find out they've been duped!

[Straight Shooter]

4. I believe there is an inaccuracy in this article.

Rove referred to Wilson's wife as "fair game," not Joe Wilson.

Otherwise, very sad article indeed. How proud Paul Schroeder must have been, how joyful his heart, when his son was born on his own birthday. Then to have your son die for a pack of lies spewed by a pack of hyenas ... the grief may never end.

Ha, look at Cheney's pic on this article. They're gunning for him.

[BrklynLiberal]

8. I believe you are correct. It was his wife that Rove said was fair game.

[Daphne08]

5. Excellent article!

Alter writes, "Four years after September 11, we're beginning to get our democracy back."

Thank God.

[faithnotgreed]

6. that is a staggering sentence

is it not

we shall have to see if alter is also "prescient" in his statement

[BrklynLiberal]

7. Very sad, but excellent article. Why were so many of us able to see the

truth so long ago...and yet there are many that are just beginning to be able to see thru the fog? So many lives could have been saved.

[shraby]

1. Because the media didn't allow anyone to see

through the fog. It's about time they blew the fog away and let the clear skies show.

[Erika]

9. I was against the Iraq war from day 1

There was no hint of WMD's. None at all. I heard in Desert Storm about all these advanced bunkers, when there were only holes with sheet metal over them. It must be a Bush family thing. I have NO respect for the Bush family or their Bushbots followers.

[I hate liars]

11. Shraby is right...

The logic is inescapable that our bought-and-sold media are responsible for the inability of most Americans to see through the lies much earlier.

DUers might take pride in knowing and understanding what's really happening before most others are aware, but it's not because we get out in the field and find the answers ourselves. It's because we're realists about the forces that drive our nation, have 25 years of experience as BS detectors (I mark Reagan's election as the watershed point), and take pains to read and consider alternative sources.

The tragedy is that many journalists share the same traits, but corporate media has ceased to be about investigating the truth. Money and moneyed interests now drive our media's reporting agendas, and that change in focus and business model (aided by the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine and regulations that encourage media monopolies) is the main reason our country is at war, deeply in debt, and under the control of the biggest organized crime network in history.

[NMDemDist2]

13. well said I hate liars, and welcome to DU!

:hi:

[BrklynLiberal]

14. I second AZDem's emotions. Welcome..and correct assessment.

I never trusted anything Bush the First said, and sure as hell never trusted the son.
Reagan's election WAS the watershed moment. His puppet regime was the beginning of the end of all things good for the middle class, labor, the disadvantaged of any ilk, the elderly, minorities. If you were not a millionare or a corporation, you were not on the radar.

[glitch]

16. You are absolutely correct, it has been 25 years. And very welcome to DU!

"DUers might take pride in knowing and understanding what's really happening before most others are aware, but it's not because we get out in the field and find the answers ourselves. It's because we're realists about the forces that drive our nation, have 25 years of experience as BS detectors (I mark Reagan's election as the watershed point), and take pains to read and consider alternative sources."

[cassiepriam]

12. Half the country functions like adults, the other half like children.

The child half has no critical thinking skills, no moral compass, and not able to process consequences. They want immediate gratification and are motivated by greed, racism and fear. Very easily manipulated. The question is why? Why so many Americans developmentally stuck in childhood?

[grasswire]

10. Alter's always been one of the good guys

From election night 2000 when he came to the studio and walked on the set unbidden, in order to bring some semblance of rationality to the blatherings of Russert and others until now. He's smart and objective.

[Cha]

15. Ya think?

"The good news about the president's bad week is that even his conservative backers are no longer willing to keep quiet when they think he's wrong. And Fitzgerald was so impressive that the normal White House response—to savage the critic—was not an option this time. So Karl Rove survives, but the fear he stoked is easing. Four years after September 11, we're beginning to get our democracy back."

Uncurious george is getting quite the reputation in a national magazine.