When the right bashes Reid for agreeing with Petraeus

September 13, 2007

At a Capitol Hill press conference yesterday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid expressed his disappointment with the ineffectiveness of the president’s “surge” policy. “This week’s testimony confirmed that the Bush Administration is continuing to pursue its flawed strategy even as every objective assessment of the surge reports that it has failed to bring the Iraqi government closer to political reconciliation,” Reid said.

As Tim Grieve explained, Reid’s quote became far-right fodder on Fox News this morning.

[Fox anchor Megyn Kelly] beat [White House Press Secretary Dana Perino] to the response: “Obviously,” the Fox journalist said, “Sen. Reid does not consider Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker to be an objective source since he says something else is true from what they offered the U.S. Congress today.”

Not that it was necessary, but Kelly then asked Perino for her reaction to what Reid had said.

“Well,” Perino said, “I think it’s unfortunate and regrettable that there are some people who have decided to look at Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker as political operatives when they have been nothing but the most stalwart of citizens serving their country. The information that they provided was based on the facts on the ground.”

Sure, it’s kind of amusing that a Fox News “journalist” took a slightly harsher tone in attacking Harry Reid than the White House press secretary did, but that’s not the funny part here.

Go look at Reid’s quote again — he said Iraq hasn’t made progress on political reconciliation. I’m curious, why do Republicans and their network believe this is outrageous? Indeed, isn’t this an example of Harry Reid agreeing with Gen. Petraeus?

This was on the front page of the WaPo over the weekend.

In a preview of his report to Congress next week, Gen. David H. Petraeus yesterday expressed disappointment in the lack of progress toward political reconciliation in Iraq. Administration officials said he wants to return to Washington for another assessment in six months to allow more time for Iraqi politics to catch up with what Petraeus regards as rapidly improving security conditions.

Writing to his troops, the top U.S. commander in Iraq emphasized that violence there had diminished in eight of the last 11 weeks. But while “many of us had hoped this summer would be a time of tangible political progress,” Petraeus said in a letter addressed to “Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, Coast Guardsmen, and Civilians” serving in Iraq that “it has not worked out as we had hoped.”

So, Reid and Petraeus are on the same page when it comes to Iraqi political progress. Why are the White House and its cable news network disagreeing? Do they think Petraeus is wrong?

I think what’s happened here is an example of how the conservative brain works. It’s like that study we talked about the other day — researchers showed participants an M or a W. When an M appeared on screen, the participants were instructed to tap a keyboard. When a W appeared, they were supposed to do nothing. There were far more Ms than Ws, so participants got into a habit of tapping the keyboard in a “knee-jerk fashion.” Liberals recognized when there was a change (they stopped tapping the keyboard), whereas conservatives didn’t (they kept tapping the keyboard).

It’s the same thing here. Harry Reid said something about Iraq, which causes Fox News and the GOP to throw a punch. He keeps talking, they keep punching. But then he says something that’s actually in line with the administration’s position — and the Republican pugilists lack the wherewithal to actually stop punching.

It’s kind of sad, really.

“The information that they provided was based on the facts on the ground.”

What about the facts in the sky? In the sea?

  • It’s gotten to the point where I no longer care what Reid or Pelosi have to say. They’ve taken away the one weapon we had – the possibility of holding impeachment hearings – and have offered no explanation for doing that.

    They’re both just as cavalier toward those who gave them majorities as the GOP has always been. Some “100 hours”!

    I don’t wish them them well. I wish them ill. We’re not going to see any progress in this country until the odds of returning to office become 50-50.

  • I could maybe go along with Perino, if she had said, “The information that they provided was designed to support the president’s policy, and was based on selective facts picked from all the reports from those on the ground.”

    Because that’s what it was – Advanced Cherrypicking (prerequisite – Cherrypicking 101 and 102). I mean, if you had to manipulate and select only the facts that supported the argument to go into Iraq in the first place, it only makes sense that as the totality of the facts continues to show that it was a mistake, and that the execution of the engagement has been a disaster, you have to continue to select only those facts that make this look like it is trending toward some kind of success. Too bad that lies don’t magically turn into the truth; wishing doesn’t make it so, but I guess if that’s the reality you have to create, eventually it does become real – to you.

    The administration and their shills cannot give one millimeter of ground to a Democrat who actually said something that also came out of the good General’s mouth, because once you admit that Harry Reid says anything truthful, it might be that people will start wondering what else he’s telling the truth about – and they can’t afford for people to start thinking and questioning, can they?

    It is some kind of world these people live in, isn’t it? Alice in Wonderland would think her own life was normal in comparison.

  • It doesn’t matter what Patraeus and Crocker actually said. The Republican party line is that their “report” shows that following the Bush strategy is the right way forward, without respect to so-called facts. If you don’t believe that, then you are ignoring the objective advice of these two patriotic, non-political professionals.

    Republicans don’t adapt to reality. They create reality. Perception is everything.

  • Outrage is the oxygen to the republican body. Without it they go weak, collapse and likely die. That’s why they created their vast noise machine – to deliver a daily dose of outrage, even where none exists. It keeps them going. It doesn’t have to have any basis in fact, just so long as the next one arrives before this one wears out.

  • Or, another way to look at it is that this report worked. First, it makes Reid look like a traitor for contradicting the General. Second, it infers the General didn’t let slip something that wasn’t positive about the situation in Iraq. As far as they’re concerned, mission accomplished. I guarantee their viewers won’t read your blog.

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