1 Boring Old Man

Well, here it comes – the pre-Semptember Administration campaign to sell us on the idea that Bush’s Surge is working. We know about the ad campaign using Ari Fleischer. Then there was Bush’s speech about the comparisons with Viet Nam, bolstered by the usual sarcastic Weekly Standard commentary from William Kristol ["Like a pig in muck, the left loves to wallow in Vietnam. But only in their ‘Vietnam.’ Not in the real Vietnam war."]. Even the Pentagon is getting into the act. Michael O’Hanlon [of O’Hanlon and Pollack who wrote the very suspect op-ed supporting the Surge] is defending their spin. And it’s all leading up to General David Patreas‘ report [coming on September 11].

Notice, the criticism of the War and the Surge is attributed to "the left." As always, it’s tempting to jump into things and argue with what they’re saying when they mount one of these campaigns. This time, I’m not willing to do that. Their Viet Nam argument is kind of silly. We should have stayed longer? What is the evidence for that? Were that true, seems like they’d have brought up the point a long time ago. But it’s not the content of the ad campaign that matters. It’s that they have an ad campaign at all. Now they’re blaming Viet Nam on Liberals. They’re evoking a new permutation of their tired "cut and run" Talking Point from last year. They’re doing the nth iteration of divisive polarization [Left vs. Right] to justify following the same course they’ve always followed. They’re mounting a media blitz to have it their way. Can you imagine what it has come down to? An ad campaign to set American Foreign Policy? Next year they’ll probably give a free iPhone and a bamboo steamer to the first 1000 people who vote for a Republican…