Incite -- (v) 1: give an incentive; 2: provoke or stir up; "incite a riot"; 3: urge on; cause to act |
Wednesday, May 12, 2004
Written by: AnonymousIN RESPONSE TO ANSWERMAN'S POSTS BELOW Answerman argues that it was inevitable that the pictures would somehow get published. This ignores the argument itself, which is that CBS should have been responsible enough to safe keep them rather than publish them. I admit that I don't know enough about the actual methods by which CBS got its hands on the pictures. It may be that the foreign media would have gotten their hands on the pictures anyhow. But it could just as well be true that a little bit of prudence and patriotism on CBS's part could have kept the pictures out of the public arena. Answerman also argues that the pictures were necessary to generate corrective action, but that is not true. Does he really think that the media would have needed the pictures to make an issue of this? He also ignores the fact that the army itself initiated the investigation. BUT LET'S LOOK AT THE BIGGER PICTURE I understand his argument - that strong public debate is sometimes needed to adequately deal with serious problems. But he fails to realize that the Abu Ghraib debate isn't really about this isolated incident of prison abuse - it is an attempt to discredit the entire war. It is about using the behavior of a few to falsely portray the actions of the vast majority of Americans in Iraq and to undermine public support for the Bush administration. Until the good side of what is happening in Iraq is also shown, there is no debate, but just a continuing effort to distort what is actually happening there. Answerman's failure to realize what is actually taking place in Iraq is evident in his two posts below. His pessimism about the war effort demonstrates that he is swallowing the media's portrayal of failure. But this is precisely our greatest danger. As long as the terrorists believe that Americans will accept the media's message of quagmire, they have hope. Their strategy is not to defeat us in Iraq, but to defeat us in America. Somalia and Vietnam (and now Spain) are their great sources of inspiration. I believe in the freedom of the press. What I don't believe is that the many people actively distorting the situation on the ground are patriots. I also believe that the Bush administration has made many major mistakes. Fallujah and the recent UN cave are the two major examples. But the sudden faltering of support among the war's initial supporters is a far greater failure than any of those made by the Bush administration. Americans must realize we are in a war aimed at our destruction. Accordingly, we have to keep certain issues in perspective in order to preserve a common front against the enemy. It doesn't mean we can ignore problems and failures, but it does mean that we cannot lose sight of the fact that the administration and the military are composed of humans who will make mistakes. We must remember that the enemy is the real problem, and he will be defeated primarily through our will, unity, and determination, and not by the flawless execution of some mythical perfect plan.
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