Tuesday, October 24, 2006

The GOP Hypes the Terrorist Threat -- Again

From The New Republic:

The latest Al Qaeda propaganda short, circulated around the Internet this week, looks pretty effective if you ask me. Various shots of mujahideen, striking heroic poses, are set alongside translated quotes from terrorist leaders such as Ayman Al Zawahiri, who promises that previous Al Qaeda terrorist attacks are "nothing compared to what you will see next." Wait--sorry. That's a description of the latest campaign ad from the Republican National Committee. My mistake. The ad, entitled "These Are the Stakes," plays clip after clip from real-life Al Qaeda videos in order to impress upon voters that the terrorist organization is not to be trifled with. It's supposed to be an attack ad--imploring Republicans to vote this November. It looks like a recruitment film.

That isn't entirely a coincidence. Shortly before the 2004 presidential election, a videotape surfaced featuring bin Laden himself criticizing George W. Bush. According to Ron Suskind's recent book, The One Percent Doctrine, CIA analysts agreed that "bin Laden's message was clearly designed to assist the President's reelection." The revelation didn't get much attention, but it confirmed what many on John Kerry's campaign had felt in 2004--and what liberals have been saying for years. The short version is this: Al Qaeda needs the GOP. The GOP, in turn, needs Al Qaeda. And the press continues to play right along.

Read the rest.

This is the article that should have been written in the summer of 2004. The fact that it wasn't, aside from possibly a few bloggers, indicates how deeply the mainstream press bought into the Bush administration propaganda.

The fact that it is a lefty magazine talking about it now shows just how much the press is still buying into the narrative on Iraq that the Bush people have been spinning.

Watch in the coming days as there will be more and more propaganda from Bush/Rove on how their policies are keeping us safe. Do you think it's a coincidence that Saddam Hussein's verdict is cheduled to come down two days before the November elections?


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