I Have No Plans To Attack al Jazeera On My Desk
I'm inclined to be skeptical of this report (from the Daily Mirror, meta-reported in the Post) that the President wanted to bomb al Jazeera. One would have to be very, very confused to consider such a thing. Although I think the President is very confused, I'm not willing to go with very, very confused quite yet.
On the other hand, consider the administration's response to the story as reported by the Post:
"We are not interested in dignifying something so outlandish and inconceivable with a response," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told the Associated Press in an e-mail.
Given that we know that the administration is willing to mislead with half-truths, it would simply be irrational to interpret this as a denial. Which is not to say that it should be interpreted as an admission, either. Rather, we know that we must demand 'yes' or 'no' answers.
We first learned this when Mr. Bush told us that there were "no plans to attack [Iraq] on [his] desk." Later we found out that the planning was well underway. So the plans must have been in his drawer, or have moved on to Powell's desk, or whatever. But we discovered something important about Mr. Bush at that point: we couldn't interpret his words in the ordinary way, in the way we'd interpret the words of someone we knew we could trust. It was a despicable use of conversational implicature to prey on our trust and good will in order to deceive us.
In fact, I feel a tug--which I want to resist--to count McClellan's evasive answer as Winglish for 'yes'. And given Mr. Bush's terrible decision-making in the past, I suppose I wouldn't put this past him. One thing I think everyone can agree on: if he was serious about bombing al Jazeera, then this counts to some degree against his stability and/or competence.
If I had to bet money on this right now, however, I'd bet that it was a joke. And I'll have no sympathy with those who try to turn such a joke, made in private, into a serious matter. Reagan's "we start bombing in five minutes" joke was a breath-takingly idiotic mistake, but only because it was made in a non-secured environment. (Actually, I've always thought there would have been a certain poetic justice in it if that had caused the end of the world. What more fitting way for humanity to be destroyed?) Anyway, even Bush isn't off-kilter enough to start contemplating bombing legitimate news organizations in friendly countries--friendly ARAB countries, at that.
[Drum's on this one, too.]
I'm inclined to be skeptical of this report (from the Daily Mirror, meta-reported in the Post) that the President wanted to bomb al Jazeera. One would have to be very, very confused to consider such a thing. Although I think the President is very confused, I'm not willing to go with very, very confused quite yet.
On the other hand, consider the administration's response to the story as reported by the Post:
"We are not interested in dignifying something so outlandish and inconceivable with a response," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told the Associated Press in an e-mail.
Given that we know that the administration is willing to mislead with half-truths, it would simply be irrational to interpret this as a denial. Which is not to say that it should be interpreted as an admission, either. Rather, we know that we must demand 'yes' or 'no' answers.
We first learned this when Mr. Bush told us that there were "no plans to attack [Iraq] on [his] desk." Later we found out that the planning was well underway. So the plans must have been in his drawer, or have moved on to Powell's desk, or whatever. But we discovered something important about Mr. Bush at that point: we couldn't interpret his words in the ordinary way, in the way we'd interpret the words of someone we knew we could trust. It was a despicable use of conversational implicature to prey on our trust and good will in order to deceive us.
In fact, I feel a tug--which I want to resist--to count McClellan's evasive answer as Winglish for 'yes'. And given Mr. Bush's terrible decision-making in the past, I suppose I wouldn't put this past him. One thing I think everyone can agree on: if he was serious about bombing al Jazeera, then this counts to some degree against his stability and/or competence.
If I had to bet money on this right now, however, I'd bet that it was a joke. And I'll have no sympathy with those who try to turn such a joke, made in private, into a serious matter. Reagan's "we start bombing in five minutes" joke was a breath-takingly idiotic mistake, but only because it was made in a non-secured environment. (Actually, I've always thought there would have been a certain poetic justice in it if that had caused the end of the world. What more fitting way for humanity to be destroyed?) Anyway, even Bush isn't off-kilter enough to start contemplating bombing legitimate news organizations in friendly countries--friendly ARAB countries, at that.
[Drum's on this one, too.]
posted by Winston Smith at
8:48 AM
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