Newsweek Apologizes to Poppy Bush for Calling Him a ‘Wimp’ in 1988

[Octafish]

The man who said “We have more will than wallet” in his inaugural address and then found money to bail out the nations looted Savings & Loans and lied America into wars against Panama, Iraq and who knows where else, was the subject of a kiss-kiss piece in this week’s Newsweek magazine.

A Wimp He Wasn’t

A daring showdown with gun-toting rebels. The truth behind the Berlin Wall’s fall—and other secrets of George H.W. Bush. As the honors pile up, a new, truer view of him is emerging.

He’s 86 now, his eyebrows silver and his legs weakened by Parkinsonism, a vascular disorder akin to Parkinson’s disease. But as George Herbert Walker Bush approaches his twilight years, he is beginning to get his due.

President Obama last month awarded him the Medal of Freedom. On March 21, Bush will be feted—by Bill Clinton, no less—at a major Kennedy Center event in Washington honoring his contribution to volunteerism through the Points of Light Foundation. Qualities once branded as vices—his civil tone, willingness to reach across the aisle, even his sway with Mideast strongmen—suddenly seem more like virtues in a world weary of attack politics and confronting a cascading series of global crises.

Reliving History: October 19, 1987
Reliving History: October 19, 1987

Stigmas that once dogged him—Iran-contra, the “wimp factor,” “read my lips,” and Dana Carvey’s deadpan caricature—have faded in the public memory, only to be replaced by a fresh view, aided by newly released documents and longtime aides’ loosening tongues—that 41 may have been a more swashbuckling and politically selfless figure than Americans appreciated during his Washington tenure.

“At the time, didn’t seem to be leadership qualities to the public. Some even saw it as weakness,” says Roman Popadiuk, a national-security spokesman in the Bush White House who today heads his presidential-library foundation.

“But now people are looking back at how he treated people and how Washington is now. And they’re appreciating how he harkened back to an era in which people were treated with respect and in which politics had some civility,” Popadiuk says. “The mutually cooperative way he tried to address things, the calm way he handled things in crisis. People see it today as a strength.”

CONTINUED…

http://www.newsweek.com/2011/03/20/a-wimp-he-wasn-t.html

CLASSY SIDEBAR:

Fighting Words

The Bush family was furious about this NEWSWEEK profile, which ran the week George H.W. Bush announced his candidacy for president. And who could blame them? The cover line suggested that the then–vice president was a wimp—a strange charge about a man who narrowly escaped a strafed Navy bomber in World War II and took a daring little-noticed trip to meet with gun-toting Salvadoran military commanders during the Reagan years. Barbara Bush placed a furious call to her son, future president George W., who had vetted journalist Margaret Garrard Warner. “Have you seen NEWSWEEK?” Barbara Bush growled, according to her son’s recent memoir, Decision Points. “I quickly tracked down a copy and was greeted by the screaming headline: ‘Fighting the Wimp Factor,’ ” Bush 43 wrote. “I was red hot. I got Margaret on the phone. I . . . told her I thought it was part of a political ambush. She muttered something about her editors being responsible for the cover. I did not mutter. I railed about editors and hung up. From then on, I was suspicious of political journalists and their unseen editors.” A year later, owner Katharine Graham made peace with the Bushes, although “the issue never really died down,” Graham wrote in her book Personal History.

SOURCE w links:

http://www.newsweek.com/photo/2011/03/20/reliving-history-october-19-1987.html

John Solomon, the author of the Newsweek article, worked as executive editor at
Poppy’s favorite newspaper, The Washington Times.

Who owns The Washington Times? Rev. Sun Myung Moon.

Solomon, FWIW, also is now executive editor at the Center for Public Integrity, a Washington, D.C.-based not-for-profit promoting “investigative journalism in the public interest.” Nice work, for the pusillanimous ink-stained scribe class.



I believe Mr. Investigative Reporter Solomon left a LOT out of the story.

Does anyone agree? What are your thoughts?

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

1. He's more of a jerkoff and mafia don I guess. nt

[Octafish]

3. Scion of the Military Industrial Complex

"War Profiteer" sounds so...harsh.

[CBGLuthier]

2. More weasel than wimp. Wimp was his cover.

Fucking monster that looks like a man. If the truth ever comes out will make Nixon look like a god-damned boy scout.

[Octafish]

4. 'An American Caligula.'

So very right: Poppy’s CIA warned about terror plots and did not stop them

[blm]

18. EXACTLY!! He cultivated that benign image as cover for his brutal charge toward global fascism.

.

[Octafish]

5. A kick for a dirty and dangerous secret world kick to the First Amendment kick.

"We live in a dirty and dangerous world. There are some things the general public does not need to know, and shouldn't. I believe democracy flourishes when the government can take legitimate steps to keep its secrets and when the press can decide whether to print what it knows." - Katherine Graham, speech to the CIA, 1988.

[Octafish]

10. Anyone bothered by Rev Moon's editor now working in an influential Think Tank kick...

Why this matters:

Know your BFEE: 1984 Death of Outstanding Congressional Staffer Buried Poppy-Moon Relationship

[blm]

22. Unfortunate that so many REFUSE to see Poppy Bush as he is, even here.

To accept the truth about Poppy Bush and his cronies, they would have to accept the truth that those thugs were protected throughout the 90s by some of the same Dems they see as heros.

[gratuitous]

6. All that ink spilled on behalf of Poppy

And somehow they always neglect to mention the pardons issued in the dead of night on Christmas Eve 1992, when a lame duck George HW Bush, resoundingly defeated by the young former governor of Arkansas just eight weeks earlier, issued pardons to end the Iran/contra affair, just as Lawrence Walsh was about to bring Caspar Weinberger to trial. The trial was widely rumored to put the lie to Bush's famous dictum that he was "out of the loop" on Iran/contra.

Motherfuckers gotta motherfuck.

[Octafish]

8. ho Gave Bush His Teflon Coat in the Iran-Contra Scam?

Guy signed off on trading Hawk SAMs to the terrorists who blew up the Marines barracks in Beirut. Business.

Who Gave Bush His Teflon Coat in the Iran-Contra Scam?

November 04, 1988|JONATHAN KWITNY |

Jonathan Kwitny is the host and managing editor of "The Kwitny Report," which will debut on PBS television in January. His latest book is "The Crimes of Patriots: a True Tale of Dope, Dirty Money and the CIA" (Simon & Schuster, 1988).

I grind no party ax. Four years ago I was writing about a Democratic candidate's coziness with organized-crime figures. I am glad that I and other reporters brought out Geraldine Ferraro's unsavory history before that election. This year I simply find Michael Dukakis unappealing.

But the way George Bush has been let off the hook sickens me--as does the notion that he could be an acceptable candidate for the presidency, let alone leading the polls, less than two years after the Iran-Contra scandal broke.

The Bush-Reagan team rode to office on the issue of terrorism, pledging to halt it by never negotiating with terrorists and stopping others from doing so. For much of their Administration, federal law prohibited waging war on Nicaragua. Yet Bush attended dozens of meetings at which were discussed either our active role in starting and sustaining the Contra war or the secret supply of arms to Iran, which in public he called a leading terrorist state. Bush's assertion now that he didn't know of these activities is preposterous. An aide's minutes show him being briefed on arms shipments to Iran as they were in progress. He says that he misunderstood; he thought that the sales were Israeli. If so, he was muddleheaded on this linchpin issue and lacked leadership, considering our influence over Israel. Alternatively, he is simply lying; records show that he had been told earlier that Israel was acting as our front in the transactions.

In fact, Bob Woodward has reported, and Bush hasn't (to my knowledge) denied, that Bush was with Reagan when the President signed the Bible that was delivered as a gift to the "terrorist" ayatollah along with a planeload of missiles and other arms.

CONTINUED...

http://articles.latimes.com/1988-11-04/local/me-984_1_contra-arms

Business.

[blm]

15. 'resoundingly defeated' exactly as needed...Poppy needed to lose because he expected to be impeached

after the Dec 1992 release of the BCCI report. You really think Poppy and Jackson Stephens didn't know what they were doing when Stephens bankrolled Clinton's primary campaign? You really think Clinton deepsixed BCCI's outstanding matters throughout the 90s for the good of the country?

[CanSocDem]

7. Sounds like a 'deathbed confession'...

...from a dying publication. Isn't NEWSWEEK going out of business? And it would be foolish to think the BushFamily doesn't hold grudges.

.

[Octafish]

9. Like dead men: Dead rags tell no tales.

And do they hold grudges.

Remember Danny Casolaro?

[gratuitous]

11. I read John Connolly's article on Danny Casolaro

Gosh, was that Spy magazine all those years ago? I think Connolly was acquainted with Casolaro, though not a close personal friend. He talked to a lot of Casolaro's associates and friends, and had a good recitation of what he'd been working on up until he was found dead. Interesting stuff, but I suspect it's one of those "little" things that we'll never know for sure.

[sad sally]

12. Newspeak?

"But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother."

[Octafish]

20. Every time I read those words, it hurts and hurts and hurts. Because they are true.

"If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face — forever." -- George Orwell



"I will never apologize for the United States of America." -- George Herbert Walker Bush

[Cell Whitman]

13. imo...Solomon is a propaganda peddler

Solomon has a well earned reputation for his deceptive reports - littered with half truths. He's a propagandist who can rationalize what he does, otherwise I doubt Moon would have hired him. He went on c-span after he got the job working for Moon and as the calls came in questioning the papers ties to Moon, he pushed most every deception the Moon org has promoted about the paper's ties to Moon. http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/TheWashing (Moon btw, brags about using the paper as an intelligence gatherer and to "influence" America.) Moon has had as much to do with the new right's direction the last 30 years as anyone.

The end of last year it was reported that Solomon was working on a book exposing Moon's "secret influence" and his "intelligence gathering." I have not seen anything more about that, but based on this article and his history, I suspect it will be more BS.

If you watch this panel with former editors of Moon's media, you will hear them explain what the paper is about and Micheal Warder explains not only that Moon uses his media as an intel operation but he also explains how someone could work for the paper and not know they were part of Moon's overall operation.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9008719207533458404#

Solomon now has a new platform for his BS.
http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowldc/center-for-public-integrity-solomon-to-launch-iwatch_b34125

When Solomon was on c-span he went on and on about how he didn't want anyone to think any of his reporters at TWT did not give the full story - yet that is exactly his MO.

check out this list
http://mediamatters.org/search/tag/john_solomon

[Octafish]

17. 1984 Death of Outstanding Congressional Staffer Buried Poppy-Moon Relationship

Infinite thanks for the information! I look forward to going through each of those, in detail, later this evening.

I almost choked upon seeing the article in Newsweek. As I read on, waves of nausea overcame me. It was like lying America into war with Iraq and Panama, the Iran Contra treason, the Savings and Loan scam, and all the rest of the BFEE were forgotten -- and, of course, forgiven. The piece was the calling card of a master propagandist -- of which the right has many. To see that John Solomon now has a leading gig with the Center for Public Integrity is professionally galling.

If you have a moment, there's an old post of mine with some very important information on the subject of Robert B. Boettcher, a congressional investigator who followed up on Moon's influence back during the Korean CIA spy affair. Mr. Boettcher died after he fell from a parking garage.

Know your BFEE: 1984 Death of Outstanding Congressional Staffer Buried Poppy-Moon Relationship

Thank you for giving a damn. I am most gratified that your saw this, Cell Whitman.

[Cell Whitman]

25. I had seen that post also

I don't always comment but I am familiar with your excellent posts on the subject. In fact, a couple of the photos in that post and some excerpts in the comments originated with yours truly. I am sure many folk's eyes glaze over at all the info but Moon is no soundbite. The thing is, the reality-free right and all that goes with it, was molded and nurtured along by Moon's operatives and cash the last 35 years or so. When people scratch their heads and ask what happened to the conservative movement, MOON DID!

Boettcher - absolutely no doubt had he lived, our nation and the world would have been different. NO DOUBT! He would have been the voice of opposition to this theofascist political machine. That said, one person whose opinions I respect a great deal told me that Boettcher had been depressed at the time of his death. I still wonder though.

Moon is trying to hold on until Jan 2013 when his Kingdom will have a relaunch. It is called Cheon Il Guk, which he declared started in 2001 but now he says the official start or "D" day is in 2013. At 91, Moon is sometimes wheel-chaired around now. Btw, the folks in heaven can't wait for his arrival. The Moon org teaches that the Kingdom of Heaven does not start until Moon goes there to take his seat next to God. Moon claims to be God incarnate - that his words are God's. He says there is no need to try to discern any difference between "Heavenly Father" and "True Father." His son says Jesus, Muhammad and all past saints bow before Sun Myung Moon.

On the links I posted. Octafish, if I could only get people to sit their asses down and watch one thing it would be the 1991 panel of former Moon editors. Scoobie Davis transcribed this part of Whelan's talk. (Note the Q&A sound is not so good but it is quite revealing - Warder says he quit the UC because he realized Moon was a racist who saw Korea as the master race and they wanted to take his child to be raised Korean nannies.)

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9008719207533458404&hl=en

<I>"They (the Moonies) are subverting our political system. They're doing it through front organizations--most of them disguised--and through their funding of independent organizations--through the placement of volunteers in the inner sanctums of hard-pressed organizations. In every instance--in every instance--those who attend their conferences, those who accept their money or their volunteers, delude themselves that there is no loss of virtue because the Moonies have not proselytized. That misses the central, crucial point: the Moonies are a political movement in religious clothing. Moon seeks power, not the salvation of souls. To achieve that, he needs religious fanatics as his palace guard and shock troops. But more importantly, he needs secular conscripts--seduced by money, free trips, free services, seemingly endless bounty and booty--in order to give him respectability and, with it, that image of influence which translates as power."</I>


The next thing I would suggest would be the Frontline:

http://www.mediachannel.org/originals/moontranscript.shtml

- you can find a transcript of a NBC Nightly News program from 1990 on the Moon org here. The new archives for Kos doesn't include the quote boxes for some reason but you should be able to figure what is a quote and what is not.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/12/15/172136/-Why-TV-news-will-NOT-cover-Sun-Myung-Moons-influence-on-our-nation

Gorenfeld's Prospect piece you posted is a must read and from a few years ago..this is a must read also, imo.

http://www.au.org/media/church-and-state/archives/2001/06/moon-shadow.html

But the editor panel, imo, if one hasn't seen it the odds of them having any real understanding as to what the paper is about are not so good. When people say it was started to fight communism, that, imo, is BULLSHIT!

Keep up the good work.

[blm]

30. thanks for the added info

.

[blm]

14. Newsweek should apologize for peddling that malignant, murderous thug as if he was harmless.

.

[Octafish]

27. No offense meant, but the guy is the silver-spooned embodiment of the military industrial complex.

Odd how his real biography gets forgotten, replaced by the balderdash and horsefeathers of the likes of Solomon.

[blm]

28. He's a murderous thug repackaged as a benevolent statesman.

He had serious HELP from a few traitorous Dems more loyal to the BFEE's global fascist agenda than to their fellow countrymen.

[Johonny]

16. Bush seems reasonable these days

he wins awards because compared to modern republicans he seems almost sane. He served in a lot of different areas of government. He was interested in governance. It's like he thought the departments of government should work. You could disagree with him over policy and still be considered an American. He looks good because his party is so horrible these days. Oliver Stone even made him come off well in his "W" movie. I don't think Stone agrees with the greed is good Reagan America Bush was a part of, but compared to what would follow...

I really don't understand what conservatives are even talking about 90% of the time. It is like they exist in a totally different plane of reality. Bush reminds people that it didn't always feel that horrible.

[Nye Bevan]

19. He was much, much better than his son.

He raised taxes on the rich. He signed the civil rights law. And he was smart enough to limit Desert Storm to only liberating Kuwait, as opposed to making it an imperialist crusade in the style of his son.

Dubya, Palin and Huckabee make me positively nostalgic for the GHWB style of Republican.

[Runework]

23. Bush sr was better than his son?

haha look into his history, you might change your mind

[Atman]

21. Told ya!

Here it comes...paving the way for Jebbie.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=714910&mesg_id=714910

[blm]

24. Wow...looks like DU has a good share of Poppy Bush/global fascism advocates here.

No surprise. Poppy Bush has always had a few Dems who just 'LOVE' him so much. All those unrecs couldn't have just come from rw trolls.

[David__77]

26. We need to remember that "wimp" theme. We may need it soon.

With the gaggle of Republicans looking at the presidency, I think it may be something we could get to stick, among other things.

[hatrack]

29. Wow, they'll do anything to sell a subscription these days . . .

:puke:

[bobthedrummer]

31. ^