{"id":16221,"date":"2008-04-07T16:35:23","date_gmt":"2008-04-07T20:35:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/15139.html"},"modified":"2008-04-07T16:35:23","modified_gmt":"2008-04-07T20:35:23","slug":"white-house-claims-give-up-its-rose-colored-glasses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/white-house-claims-give-up-its-rose-colored-glasses\/","title":{"rendered":"White House claims to give up its ‘rose-colored glasses’"},"content":{"rendered":"

White House spokesperson Tony Fratto received a series of questions about Iraq during today’s press briefing, and the deputy press secretary used an interesting phrase<\/a> more than once. (Think Progress has the video<\/a>)<\/p>\n

Q: Also, how does this latest violence in Iraq and the latest uncertainty about what’s going on color the Petraeus-Crocker testimony this time around? It obviously has changed the equation. I mean, weeks ago it looked like the surge was — you know, had this pretty rosy cast, and now with all this renewed violence, I think it has changed the dynamics. So how has this changed the equation?<\/p>\n

FRATTO: Well, I think we’ve thrown out all of the rose-colored glasses in how we look at Iraq, and try to look at it through clear lenses as to what is actually going on in the country.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And then again, a few minutes later, after a question about Iraqis protesting the American troop presence in Iraq:<\/p>\n

Q: Do you think it takes any of the steam, though, out of what Petraeus and Crocker will be saying when you see those images juxtaposed?<\/p>\n

FRATTO: No, I don’t think so. I mean, it’s — look, every — like I said, we threw out the rose-colored glasses. I think we have a very clear-eyed view of what’s happening in Baghdad.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Ben asked<\/a> a good question: “When exactly did the White House throw away its rose-colored glasses?”<\/p>\n

That’s a good one, and I’d just add a couple more.
\n
\nFor several years, when Democratic critics of the Bush administration’s policy in Iraq insisted that the White House was looking at the war through rose-colored glasses, the right responded that Dems were a) wrong; b) undermining the troops; and c) emboldening terrorists. Now that the White House is willing to concede that they used to look at Iraq through rose-colored glasses, does the Bush gang think Dems were right all along?<\/p>\n

For that matter, hearing Fratto today, I kept thinking that I’ve heard the White House use this phrase before. And then I remembered.<\/p>\n

* Tony Snow, August 17, 2006<\/a>: “[F]or those of us who have seen the President behind the scenes, he doesn’t sit around and ask for people to put on rose-colored glasses.”<\/p>\n

* Tony Snow, September 29, 2006<\/a>: “President, again, is not looking through rose-colored glasses. He insists on getting the best intelligence [on Iraq] he can from his people on the field.”<\/p>\n

* Tony Snow, December 18, 2006<\/a>: “On the other hand, we don’t want to be accused of looking through rose colored glasses at what clearly is an unacceptable position within Iraq.”<\/p>\n

* Tony Snow, February 15, 2007<\/a>: “I don’t want to be accused of putting on rose-colored glasses. It’s going to be tough [in Iraq].”<\/p>\n

* Tony Snow, September 12, 2007<\/a>: “We don’t want anybody to look through rose-colored glasses, but we would like people to understand that there has been success [in Iraq].”<\/p>\n

Now, however, the White House wants us to believe the White House was<\/i> looking at Iraq though rose-colored glasses, but they’ve since been “thrown out.”<\/p>\n

That’s good to know, but it sounds like one White House spokesperson believes a previous White House spokesperson didn’t know what he was talking about.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

White House spokesperson Tony Fratto received a series of questions about Iraq during today’s press briefing, and the deputy press secretary used an interesting phrase more than once. (Think Progress has the video) Q: Also, how does this latest violence in Iraq and the latest uncertainty about what’s going on color the Petraeus-Crocker testimony this […]<\/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-16221","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16221","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=16221"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16221\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16221"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16221"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16221"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}