{"id":13063,"date":"2007-09-30T13:45:23","date_gmt":"2007-09-30T17:45:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/13063.html"},"modified":"2007-09-30T13:45:23","modified_gmt":"2007-09-30T17:45:23","slug":"freedoms-watch-finds-a-new-target","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/freedoms-watch-finds-a-new-target\/","title":{"rendered":"Freedom’s Watch finds a new target"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Freedom’s Watch burst upon the political scene last month, it was part of a coordinated effort to rally support for staying the course in Iraq. The group unveiled four slick TV ads<\/a>, including one featuring a veteran who lost a leg in Iraq who argued that we have to stay in Iraq because “they attacked us.” It was part of a $15 million dishonest blitz, asking Americans not to believe their lying eyes.<\/p>\n

It’s hard to say if the group moved the needle at all — opposition to Bush’s policy is about where it’s been for months — but it appears the group is poised to move onto its next initiatve<\/a> and start pushing for yet another war in the Middle East.<\/p>\n

Next month, Freedom’s Watch will sponsor a private forum of 20 experts on radical Islam that is expected to make the case that Iran poses a direct threat to the security of the United States, according to several benefactors of the group.<\/p>\n

Although the group declined to identify the experts, several were invited from the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington research group with close ties to the White House. Some institute scholars have advocated a more confrontational policy to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, including keeping military action as an option.<\/p>\n

Last week, a Freedom’s Watch newspaper advertisement called President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran “a terrorist.” The group is considering a national advertising campaign focused on Iran, a senior benefactor said, though Matt S. David, a spokesman for the group, declined to comment on those plans.<\/p>\n

“If Hitler’s warnings were heeded when he wrote ‘Mein Kampf,’ he could have been stopped,” said Bradley Blakeman, 49, the president of Freedom’s Watch and a former deputy assistant to Mr. Bush. “Ahmadinejad is giving all the same kind of warning signs to us, and the region — he wants the destruction of the United States and the destruction of Israel.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

For far too many on the right, it really is 2002 all over again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Freedom’s Watch burst upon the political scene last month, it was part of a coordinated effort to rally support for staying the course in Iraq. The group unveiled four slick TV ads, including one featuring a veteran who lost a leg in Iraq who argued that we have to stay in Iraq because “they […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13063"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13063\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}