Olberman Our New Murrow
If you missed Keith Olberman's commentary on Donald Rumsfeld's accusation that Americans who criticize the Bush Policy in Iraq are basically traitors, then you missed a chance to witness history. Olberman's courage and genius should be celebrated and cherished. God bless him. The man has a set of stones.
The following is posted at Keith's blog. If you don't want to read it, check out the video posted at Crooks and Liars.
Feeling morally, intellectually confused?
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The man who sees absolutes, where all other men see nuances and shades of meaning, is either a prophet, or a quack.
Donald H. Rumsfeld is not a prophet.
Mr. Rumsfeld’s remarkable speech to the American Legion yesterday demands the deep analysis—and the sober contemplation—of every American.
For it did not merely serve to impugn the morality or intelligence -- indeed, the loyalty -- of the majority of Americans who oppose the transient occupants of the highest offices in the land. Worse, still, it credits those same transient occupants -- our employees -- with a total omniscience; a total omniscience which neither common sense, nor this administration’s track record at home or abroad, suggests they deserve.
Dissent and disagreement with government is the life’s blood of human freedom; and not merely because it is the first roadblock against the kind of tyranny the men Mr. Rumsfeld likes to think of as “his” troops still fight, this very evening, in Iraq.
It is also essential. Because just every once in awhile it is right and the power to which it speaks, is wrong.
In a small irony, however, Mr. Rumsfeld’s speechwriter was adroit in invoking the memory of the appeasement of the Nazis. For in their time, there was another government faced with true peril—with a growing evil—powerful and remorseless.
That government, like Mr. Rumsfeld’s, had a monopoly on all the facts. It, too, had the “secret information.” It alone had the true picture of the threat. It too dismissed and insulted its critics in terms like Mr. Rumsfeld’s -- questioning their intellect and their morality.
That government was England’s, in the 1930’s.
It knew Hitler posed no true threat to Europe, let alone England.
It knew Germany was not re-arming, in violation of all treaties and accords.
It knew that the hard evidence it received, which contradicted its own policies, its own conclusions — its own omniscience -- needed to be dismissed.
The English government of Neville Chamberlain already knew the truth.
Most relevant of all — it “knew” that its staunchest critics needed to be marginalized and isolated. In fact, it portrayed the foremost of them as a blood-thirsty war-monger who was, if not truly senile, at best morally or intellectually confused.
That critic’s name was Winston Churchill.
Sadly, we have no Winston Churchills evident among us this evening. We have only Donald Rumsfelds, demonizing disagreement, the way Neville Chamberlain demonized Winston Churchill.
History — and 163 million pounds of Luftwaffe bombs over England — have taught us that all Mr. Chamberlain had was his certainty — and his own confusion. A confusion that suggested that the office can not only make the man, but that the office can also make the facts.
Thus, did Mr. Rumsfeld make an apt historical analogy.
Excepting the fact, that he has the battery plugged in backwards.
His government, absolute -- and exclusive -- in its knowledge, is not the modern version of the one which stood up to the Nazis.
It is the modern version of the government of Neville Chamberlain.
But back to today’s Omniscient ones.
That, about which Mr. Rumsfeld is confused is simply this: This is a Democracy. Still. Sometimes just barely.
And, as such, all voices count -- not just his.
Had he or his president perhaps proven any of their prior claims of omniscience — about Osama Bin Laden’s plans five years ago, about Saddam Hussein’s weapons four years ago, about Hurricane Katrina’s impact one year ago — we all might be able to swallow hard, and accept their “omniscience” as a bearable, even useful recipe, of fact, plus ego.
But, to date, this government has proved little besides its own arrogance, and its own hubris.
Mr. Rumsfeld is also personally confused, morally or intellectually, about his own standing in this matter. From Iraq to Katrina, to the entire “Fog of Fear” which continues to envelop this nation, he, Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney, and their cronies have — inadvertently or intentionally — profited and benefited, both personally, and politically.
And yet he can stand up, in public, and question the morality and the intellect of those of us who dare ask just for the receipt for the Emporer’s New Clothes?
In what country was Mr. Rumsfeld raised? As a child, of whose heroism did he read? On what side of the battle for freedom did he dream one day to fight? With what country has he confused the United States of America?
The confusion we -- as its citizens— must now address, is stark and forbidding.
But variations of it have faced our forefathers, when men like Nixon and McCarthy and Curtis LeMay have darkened our skies and obscured our flag. Note -- with hope in your heart — that those earlier Americans always found their way to the light, and we can, too.
The confusion is about whether this Secretary of Defense, and this administration, are in fact now accomplishing what they claim the terrorists seek: The destruction of our freedoms, the very ones for which the same veterans Mr. Rumsfeld addressed yesterday in Salt Lake City, so valiantly fought.
And about Mr. Rumsfeld’s other main assertion, that this country faces a “new type of fascism.”
As he was correct to remind us how a government that knew everything could get everything wrong, so too was he right when he said that -- though probably not in the way he thought he meant it.
This country faces a new type of fascism - indeed.
Although I presumptuously use his sign-off each night, in feeble tribute, I have utterly no claim to the words of the exemplary journalist Edward R. Murrow.
But never in the trial of a thousand years of writing could I come close to matching how he phrased a warning to an earlier generation of us, at a time when other politicians thought they (and they alone) knew everything, and branded those who disagreed: “confused” or “immoral.”
Thus, forgive me, for reading Murrow, in full:
“We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty,” he said, in 1954. “We must remember always that accusation is not proof, and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law.
“We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men, not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate, and to defend causes that were for the moment unpopular.”
And so good night, and good luck.
Not bad.
But can we rightly claim that Olberman is the next Edward R. Murrow when his views match the vast majority of the population's?
Let Rumsfeld, Bush, and Cheney say whatever they want. Nobody outside of the Bible Belt Confederacy takes it seriously anyway.
August 30, 2006 8:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Gettysburg, would it were true that it doesn't matter what the chief architects of the bush edifice of disaster think: how many troops does anyone else have?
as for olbermann, it's always worth remembering that he's a baseball guy through and through, an excellent grounding for his present work!
August 30, 2006 8:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good for Keith Olbermann. His comments go beyond the usually permitted range of TV. This is actual, heartfelt, passionate political speech. God damn, let's have some more!
August 30, 2006 8:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Olbermann is good, but his use of Neville Chamberlain and Winston Churchill is no better than the neocons.
Everyone repeat after me: if Britain had listened to Winston Churchill and forced the start of World War II earlier, Britain would have lost the war. That time that Chamberlain bought with his dreaded "appeasement" was necessary for Britain to build up his war machine. It wasn't like they sat around and waited for 1939 to come around. They militarized like crazy-- as did FDR as well (allowing him to come through with Lend-Lease).
The real lesson of Munich is that war really is the last resort, even against a Hitler. By treating it as one, Britain was eventually-- with A LOT of help from the US and the Soviet Union-- able to defeat the German war machine. Had Winston Churchill been heeded, in contrast, he would have been remembered as the man who lost the West.
August 30, 2006 9:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
I saw Olberman's report. It didn't quite have the moral clarity of Murrow, and the reference to Chamberlain was a little murky, but his comments were light years ahead of modern competition.
Damn good stuff for 2006.
I hope it helps his ratings. The Emporer is walking around naked. We have to convince the MSM that it is OK to demand somebody put a towel around him.
Oh, as I recall history, there was a brief moment just before the German war machine was at full strenght that the British and French could have acted effectively. Hitler was really worried because he was so exposed. Chamberlain's appeasement happened just at that moment. Of course, a few months later, Dilan Esper's assessment is entirely accurate.
Ron Byers
August 30, 2006 9:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Let's not get carried away with our revisions of history.
Had Churchill been listened to, Britain would have started building up its forces against Hitler much sooner, and would have been in much better shape in 1940.
Chamberlain's appeasement handed off the Sudetenlands, and its people in Czechoslovakia, to Hitler. I do not consider it defensible. Was it necessary to give Britain time to arm? Maybe, but that time was necessary because Britain had been so slow to arm in the first place.
The irony is, Hitler himself went to war prematurely, when he invaded Poland. Germany had not finished the process of rearming. Perhaps he needed the fresh conquests to keep the German economy afloat.
Olberman's analogy of Rummy to Chamberlain was truly very cheeky. Talk about truth to power.
August 30, 2006 11:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
I was glad to see KO put up General Jack D. Ripper's pic...I mean LeMay's pic. Good time to re-watch Dr. Strangelove and Seven Days In May seeing how the only true patriots, those in the White House and Pentagon, are banging the "Iran Is The Root Of All Evil" drum.
Tragically everything old is new again.
August 30, 2006 11:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
.
Everything old is new again? Got that right. That's the only script these scumbags know...
~OGD~
August 31, 2006 12:11 AM | Reply | Permalink
Woulda, coulda.
Well, of course all historical comparisons fall flat, but Olberman showed guts. He turned the typical chickenhawk claim and turned it on its head, since they like to use Chamberlain as an insult to tar skeptics. It was a brilliant way to insult them for their hubris.
Besides, it's hard to claim that England would have lost the war. Nobody is suggesting that Churchill needed to be followed, only taken seriously and not merely dismissed out of hand.
August 31, 2006 12:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
Good job here by Olberman, but I would also recommend Fred Kaplan's take-down of Rumsfeld's speech.
If I'd been Fred's editor, I might have suggested he titled the piece, "The Four Strawmen of the Apocalypse", because that's about as much substance as there was to Don's diatribe.
For the benefit of this site, the four strawmen are:
1. "With the growing lethality and availability of weapons, can we truly afford to believe that somehow vicious extremists can be appeased?"
[This is in fact a GOP favorite - the non sequitur strawman. WMD proliferation problem means ideological extremists can't be appeased. That's like saying because it's so easy for an IT start-up to get its products patented, Microsoft can't afford to do business with them.]
2. "Can we really continue to think that free countries can negotiate a separate peace with terrorists?"
[Fred Kaplan dissects this by questioning what you mean by terrorists. It can just as easily be dissected by questioning what you mean by "free country". Is Rummy saying only "unfree" countries, let's say Zimbabwe, may negotiate with ideological enemies (who Mugabe calls terrorists)?]
3. "Can we truly afford the luxury of pretending that the threats today are simply 'law-enforcement' problems, rather than fundamentally different threats, requiring fundamentally different approaches?"
[Now we're in classic strawman territory. Has anyone suggested that what we face is simply a law-enforcement challenge? Thought not.]
4. "And can we truly afford to return to the destructive view that America—not the enemy—is the real source of the world's trouble?"
[More strawman 1.01. Assuming by "we", Rummy means Americans, has a majority of this country ever suggested we are "the real source the world's trouble"? Yep, I'm also drawing a blank.]
Kaplan's got his own response to each of Rummy's baseless rhetorical questions, and it's well worth a read.
One other point though on this Chamberlain-Churchill-Hitler historical analogy. My understanding of the relevant history is that Churchill's criticism of Chamberlain was not so much for negotiating with Hitler, it was for giving up far too much in negotiations and trusting Hitler to keep his promises (as well as not using the threat of war soon enough).
What's also interesting to note is that Bush himself has criticized Western leaders who trusted Stalin to keep promises (like the right to self-determination) made after WWII. Of course when doing so, George's autocue writers are careful to airbush out Churchill's role as a Yalta signatory.
As ever, history is a little too complex to be honestly packaged into soundbite-sized propaganda.
August 31, 2006 2:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
crackPot, kettle, black?
Rumsfeld is eminently illsuited to speak of appeasement, given his history of being the GOP Presidents' goto guy when they need a handshaker with the devil who is enemy of enemy for over 3 decades. Some examples:
From the Rumsfeld Central Asian Appeasement Collection:
August 31, 2006 3:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
I guess you must have missed the recent August 2, 2006, anti-appeasement op/ed by the odious Max Boot for the LA Times, where he mused:
August 31, 2006 4:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
Right on cue, PCA.
Kazakhstan's strongman is arriving any day soon.
Business as usual I guess.
August 31, 2006 4:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
It's a measure of how desperate the Bushites have become that they have taken to labelling the clear majority of Americans who oppose them as appeasing, morally-and-intellectually confused traitors. The clear majority opposed to Bush policies includes a growing number of Republicans, so the recent rantings of Rummy and his odious ilk would seem to offer Democrats a golden wedge opportunity to pry the growing number of Republicans and independents who are coming to their senses away from the radical Bushite Right. This is an opportunity to put into stark contrast how isolated Bush, Cheney, Rummy and the Gang are from mainstream American values. Why are Democrats not taking more advantage of it?
August 31, 2006 7:04 AM | Reply | Permalink
I heard one wag say that Rumsfeld was given the job of uttering those immortal words because he is going to be thrown from the train very soon.
Now for Cheney.
August 31, 2006 7:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
But of course if they had listened to Churchill in '35 or '36 and stopped Germany before its rearmament program was completed England and France could have easily won. When the Germans re-occupied the Rheinland, their high command was terrified, knowing that Germany was not ready.
From a moral and practical standpoint was should be a last resort in almost all circumstances. This was just one of the rare exceptions.
August 31, 2006 9:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oooh, goodie! I've got a rail we can ride Cheynut out of town on!
August 31, 2006 9:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
The Emporer is walking around naked. We have to convince the MSM that it is OK to demand somebody put a towel around him.
As I recall, it's only Justice that's asked to be modest in this administration....
August 31, 2006 9:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
"But of course if they had listened to Churchill in '35 or '36 and stopped Germany before its rearmament program was completed England and France could have easily won."
Just like the Iraq War was going to be a cakewalk, right?
Look, I know Germany was still remilitarizing, but the British forces were insufficient and overcommitted in 1935 and 1936. Britain could have tried to force a fight, but there was no way that the British Army (with or without France's help) could have "easily won" any war against a significant adversary in 1935 or 1936.
More importantly, the 1935 or 1936 argument isn't the "Munich appeasement" argument that everyone makes. People make it sound like buying time through appeasement was idiotic and cowardly and Britain should have marched straight into a conflict against a superior-armed adversary instead. That argument justifies madness.
August 31, 2006 11:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
When the administration is trying to play such a weak hand, timing is everything. The reason for this media-offensive, is because one year ago this week, America was watching while Hurricane Katrina inundated New Orleans and George Bush decided to show his leadership by tipping his nose out the window of Air Force 1. What better way to distract the public from the coming anniversary of the most visible of Bush administration failures, than by stoking the flames of the terrorist threat, and stirring the passions of wartime "debate".
Unfortunately, the effort may have succeeded. Pundits have devoted much more commentary to Rumsfeld than of Katrina.
However, the price that the Administration has paid for their gambit may be just as bad as reviewing footage of floating corpses in New Orleans, as illustrated by Keith Olbermann’s stinging indictment and the sudden fluttering of eyes as America wakes up from this fiasco.
On balance, I think the administration traded one sh*t sandwich for another.
August 31, 2006 1:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
PLEASE! PLEASE! The image of ANYONE in this administration naked makes me want to splash my beets!
Jan Knaus
August 31, 2006 2:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
The arrogance of Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush astounds me. Think about it this way. Presumably the reason for ignoring all expert advice in the "war on terror" is because "9/11 changed everything" or that this "new war requires new thinking" (to paraphrase the administration since 9/11). If this is true, then where did Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush discover the knowledge to fight these new enemies? How did these men learn something that no one else could think of? How did they know that they were right and that experts in, say, the Middle East and terrorism were wrong?
I think it's high time that everyone in this country with the opportunity to do so should call "bullshit" on these people. We're way beyond the point of being deferential to authority here. The country's foreign policy is a disaster, and every thinking person knows it. And of course those that don't are enchanted by the authority of the Bush administration for various reasons, though they act as though they have "seriously" thought about these issues. They need to have bullshit called on them too. Olberman's comments were so refreshing, I was beside myself. I hope it starts a trend.
August 31, 2006 4:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Personally, I like Cheney better when I can actually see him speak and hear his words.
It's when he seemingly disappears for weeks on end that I start to worry.
Rumsfeld getting canned would be a token campaign gesture for the GOP wouldn't it?
August 31, 2006 6:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Nice, I missed it, but here's the update:
Donald Rumsfeld with Kazakstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev
August 31, 2006 10:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
Fascism = authoritarianism = monarchism = theocracy = bushism ... it's all the same thing.
A belief that some minority has the right to rule the majority. It matters little if it's the true believers, a master race, a family dynasty, the chosen people, a ruling class, or the current DC/Euphemedia Analstocracy.
It's all anti-democratic, thus Anti-American*.
This nation now lives under an appointed ruler (not an elected leader) who rules by signing statement. You can call it "technical" or "virtual" but it's still fascism.
This is what the stolen election of 2000 was all about. There was zero attention paid to the Will of the People of Florida and the nation. The result of the vote (not the vote count**) was well known shortly after the election when the uncounted ballots were extrapolated by precinct, and Gore won FL by tens of thousands. Any ethical, moral, real American would have conceded to Gore at that point.
Thus, the contract generally known as the US Constitution was put into breach on January 6th, 2001. This is the "original sin" that must be remedied. It is the essence of our ongoing nightmare.
It was this overruling of the will of the (former) American People that left us open to the 9-11 attack, which was a far less important event compared with the election theft. It simply allowed the 21st Century Neo-Fascists to have their "Reichstag fire" to consolitdate control.
The more important part was that the only global force for good in the past several decades -- the public opinion of the American People -- was taken out of the global, moral equation. Which is why prior to the election theft we could stop plane-crashing over the Pacific at the Millenium with help from Jordanian Intelligence, and after... well, not so much. We had lost our moral ascendency, our place as the court of last resort.
Certainly this is a "kinder, gentler" fascism. But did you expect goose-stepping, tanks in the streets and racial hate speech? It's much more efficient to simply scream "Mushroom clouds in 45 minutes!!" through every Euphemedia outlet in order to terrorize a population into compliance (20 guys with boxcutters pales in comparision, doesn't it?).
But make no mistake, it is fascism pure and simple.
It demands active opposition. Unlike their agents in congress, the American People are not impotent. We can still refuse to be complicit with the atrocities committed in our name.
We must demand impeachment. But we must do so loudly -- at every opportunity, in large and small ways -- and in ways that make others uncomfortable.
We need impeachment to Redeem Our National Soul.
It is our ONLY moral, patriotic option.
How do we get it? "Violence" is the answer.
_________
*"After Socialism, Fascism combats the whole complex system of democratic ideology, and repudiates it, whether in its theoretical premises or in its practical application. Fascism denies that the majority, by the simple fact that it is a majority, can direct human society" - Benito Mussolini 1932
**"Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decided everything." -- Josef Stalin (echoed by Pol Pot, Bushes, Scalia, Rehnquist, Baker, Harris, Blackwell, etc...)
--
www.january6th.org
September 1, 2006 1:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
If this is true, then where did Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush discover the knowledge to fight these new enemies?
9/11 changed everything, and that's why we need leaders with a Cold War-era understanding of what terrorism is to do something about it.
September 1, 2006 4:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
For a man that pushed the Plame BS prerhaps Lord Haw Haw would be a better comparison than Murrow. The WAPO's words sum it up nicely:
The sons of the prophet are noble and bold,
and quite unaccustomed to fear.
But the bravest by far in the ranks of the Shah
was Abdul Abulbul Amir
September 1, 2006 6:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
Peter W. Galbraith, "The true Iraq appeasers", Boston Globe, August 31, 2006
September 1, 2006 7:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
Link, please, Mr. BS. BTW, do you believe everything you read in the WAPO? I would like a link to the entire article.
Jan Knaus
September 1, 2006 9:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/31/AR2006083101460_pf.html
Also, it is currently linked at Drudge.
The sons of the prophet are noble and bold,
and quite unaccustomed to fear.
But the bravest by far in the ranks of the Shah
was Abdul Abulbul Amir
September 1, 2006 10:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
I couldn't respond better than Larry Johnson has. See his response. You are a troll, and this article is bullshit for anyone with a brain.
Jan Knaus
September 1, 2006 5:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
By the way, your pithy quote:
The sons of the prophet are noble and bold,
and quite unaccustomed to fear.
But the bravest by far in the ranks of the Shah was Abdul Abulbul Amir
Yeah, right!!!!!......Is refuted by reality. My advice? Grow up.
On the other hand,
"Honor, truth, nobilty, and courage have nothing to do with religion; but fear has everything to do with it." by...........
Jan Knaus
September 1, 2006 5:30 PM | Reply | Permalink