Coming
Soon!
From Common Courage Press
Recent
Stories
May
20, 2003
Linda
Heard
The Cage of Occupation
Edward
Said
The Arab Condition
May
19, 2003
CounterPunch
Wire
"Terror" Slut Steve Emerson
Eats Crow
Veteran
Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
A Letter to Kofi Annan on Powell's Missing
Evidence
Ross
Vachon
Dennis Miller's New Gig: the Last
Refuge of Goofy?
John
Chuckman
Blair's Awkward Lies
Matt
Vidal
Corporate Media and the Myth of the Free Market
Michael
S. Ladah
The Fine Print to Bush's Road Map
Robert
Fisk
Bush's Eternal War Backfires
Elaine
Cassel
Clarence Thomas, Still Whining After All These Years
Jonathan
Freedland
Ann Coulter's Appalling Magic
Steve Perry
Play It Again, O-Sam-a
May
17 / 18, 2003
Uri
Avnery
The Children's Teeth
Peter
Linebaugh
An American Tribute to Christopher
Hill
Gary
Leupp
Nepal Today
Rock and
Rap Confidential
The Republican Plot Against the Dixie Chicks
Walter
Sommerfeld
Plundering Baghdad's Museums
Ron Jacobs
Condy Rice's Yipping Tirades
Thomas
P. Healy
Dubya Does Indy
Tarif Abboushi
Bush, Sharon and the Roadmap
Francis
Boyle
Debating US War Crimes in Iraq
Mark Davis
An Interview with Richard Butler
Richard
Lichtman
American Mourning
Michael
Ortiz Hill
Overcoming Terrorism
Adam
Engel
Uncle Sam is YOU!
Alan Maas
The Best News Show on TV
Poets'
Basement
Reiss, Guthrie, Albert
Elaine
Cassel
Good Enough for an Alien
Website
of the Weekend
The 37 Americans Who Run Iraq
Song of
the Weekend
Talkin' Sounds Just Like Joe McCarthy Blues
May
16, 2003
Leah
Wells
In Iraq Water and Oil Do Mix
Ben Tripp
Fear Itself
Sharon
Smith
The Resegregation of US Schools
Ramzy Baroud
Does Defeat Have to be So Humiliating?
Sam
Hamod
A Nation of Fear
Phil Reeves
Baghdad Pays the Price
Robert
McChesney
The FCC's Big Grab
Mark Engler
Those Who Don't Count
Steve
Perry
We're All
Extras in Bush's Movie
Website
of the Day
Iraq and Our
Energy Future
May
15, 2003
Ayesha
Iman and Sindi Medar-Gould
How
Not to Help Amina Lawal: The Hidden Dangers of Letter
Writing Campaigns
Julie
Hilden
Moussaoui and the Camp X-Ray Detainees:
Can He Get a Fair Trial?
Tanya
Reinhart
Bush's Roadmap: a Ticket to Failure
Laura Carlsen
Here We Go Again: NAFTA Plus or Minus?
Kenneth
Rapoza
The New Fakers: State Dept. Undercuts
New Yorker's Goldberg
Stew Albert
A Story I Will Tell
Steve
Perry
Bush's Little
Nukes
Website
of the Day
Strip-o-Rama
May
14, 2003
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Jason
Leopold
The Pentagon and Hallburton: a Secret
November Deal for Iraq's Oil
David
Lindorff
Fighting the Patriot Act: Now It's
Alaska
John
Chuckman
Giggling into Chaos
Jack
McCarthy
Twin Towers of Journalism: Racism
and Double Standards
Wayne
Madsen
Assassinating JFK Again
M.
Junaid Alam
The Longer View
Paul
de Rooij
The New Hydra's Head:
Propagandists and the Selling of the US/Iraq War
James
Reiss
What? Me Worry?
Steve Perry
More on Saudi Arabia Bombings
Website
of the Day
A Tribute to Ted Joans
May
13, 2003
Saul
Landau
Clear Channel Fogs the Airwaves
Michael
Neumann
Has Islam Failed? Not by Western
Standards
Uri
Avnery
My Meeting with Arafat
Steve Perry
The Saudi Arabia Bombing
Jacob
Levich
Democracy Comes to Iraq: Kick Their Ass and Grab Their Gas
William
Lind
The Hippo and the Mongoose: a Question of Military Theory
The
Black Commentator
Fraud at the Times: Blaming Blacks for White Folks' Mistakes
Stew Albert
Asylum
Hammond
Guthrie
An Illogical Reign
Website
of the Day
Sy Hersh: War and Intelligence
May
12, 2003
Chris
Floyd
Bush, Bin Laden, Bechtel, and Baghdad
Dave
Lindorff
America's Dirty Bombs
Sam
Hamod and Elaine Cassel
Resisting the Bush Administration's War on Liberty
Uzi
Benziman
Sharon and Sons, Inc.
Jason
Leopold
The Decline and Fall of Thomas White
Rich Procter
George Jumps the Shark
Federico
Moscogiuri
Going to Israel? Sign or Else
Steve
Perry
Bush's War Web Log 5/12
Book
of the Day
Fooling
Marty Peretz
Website
of the Day
T-Shirts to Protest In
Hot Stories
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Elaine
Cassel
Civil Liberties
Watch
Michel
Guerrin
Embedded Photographer Says: "I
Saw Marines Kill Civilians"
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Paul de Rooij
Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click Here
for More Stories.
|
May
21, 2003
Ari
"the Fabulist" Fleischer Quits the Scene
The
Liar's Gone, the Enablers Remain
By DAVE LINDORFF
White House flack and fabulist Ari Fleischer quits
his post and says he is leaving because he wants to be with family,
because he's been in government service too long and wants to
go into the private sector, da-da, da-da--all the usual things
people in government positions of power say when they abandon
ship. Is there more to this though? We're talking about the public
face of the super-secretive Mini-Bush White House. There are
no places Fleisher could move to where he'd get the power, influence
and public recognition he has obtained over the last two years.
So could this be a case of the first rat leaving a doomed ship?
That might sound ridiculous looking at
Bush's poll numbers, but maybe Ari knows stuff we don't know.
After all, the U.S. economy is pretty close to a sinking ship--the
dollar's going relentlessly south, which will eventually mean
rising interest rates and a dead economy, or soaring inflation
and a return to the era of stagflation, unemployment is reaching
record levels,  states are going bust,
and now there's talk of the property bubble bursting, which will
upset the middle class no end.
Meanwhile, Al Qaeda is successfully sticking
a giant thumb into the eye of Bush's anti-terror campaign, reminding
everyone why invading Iraq was a pretty stupid idea.
Oh yeah, and Iraq is starting to look
more and more like the quagmire that everyone except Bush's circle
of Iraqi exile friends and his blissfully ignorant advisers,
Rumsfeld, Wolkowitz and Chaney, predicted it would be.
The pundits of the increasingly state-organ-style
corporate media have already called the 2004 election for Bush,
but this is nonsense. Even if the Republicans manage to subvert
some close votes in states where they have the courts in their
pockets, it's quite possible that if Democrats manage to put
forward a candidate with a modicum of spine and intelligence,
who will highlight the domestic and international catastrophes
that this unelected, wilfully ignorant alcoholic Texas yahoo
has wrought, Bush and his gang could end up being swept from
power in a wave of voter anger not seen in years. Fleischer,
while not a central figure in the new Imperial White House, is
a courtesan who is necessarily privy to the thinking of its key
players, and may have been hearing worried talk that has led
him to decide he should git while the gittin's good.
Fleischer has been a brazen liar for
the Bush Administration--so much so that he has been a source
of genuine entertainment for what passes for a White House press
corps. But he can't have enjoyed the thought that the lies would
have to grow in audacity and shamelessness as the economy and
foreign policy come crashing down.
A second thought: That wonderful kiss
on the head Ari had bestowed by Bush when he said he was leaving.
You have to love the imagery there. There's something marvelously
feudalistic about it: the monarch bestowing a token of his affection
on the obsequious servant who has repeatedly defiled himself
defending the honor of his sovereign. Somehow, one can't picture
the Bush, with his new imperial pretentions, hugging or shaking
hands with a second tier aide like Fleischer in such a moment.
Finally, there's the matter of that White
House Press Corps. Some have speculated as to why Fleischer never
resigned. I don't see why that is a puzzle. The man has demonstrated
over the years that he has no principles. Like a flack for Exxon/Mobil
or Grace Industries, he obviously sees the job of media relations
as one big con job, so why would he suddenly feel the need to
resign? No, the real question is why no one in the White House
Press Corps has had the sense of principle and the courage to
say that they would no longer participate in the charade that
is being passed off as journalism. They all know that they've
been lied to repeatedly, but they are the willing conduits of
those lies to the American public. Night after night, one can
watch them carrying Fleischer's water, not cracking a smile as
they gravely report the latest politically timed raising of the
terror alert level, not bursting out laughing as they report
on the president's claim that Al Queda is no longer a problem.
These people--who call themselves journalists--actually
allowed themselves to be scripted into a fake White House press
conference, where the president pretended to be selecting reporters
to ask questions when they had actually submitted them in advance
and he had picked the ones he would answer, and where those few
reporters who objected, like Helen Thomas, were unceremoniously
dumped in the rear of the pool among the potted palms (with no
protest from her colleagues).
Fleischer will certainly not be missed.
He managed to drag the role of Presidential spokesperson further
into the slime than it had been since Ron Ziegler's days during
the Nixon Administration. The sad thing is that even with the
liar Fleischer gone, we're stuck with the same pathetic enablers
in y the White House Press Corps.
Fleischer's replacement will have no
trouble picking up the job of media manipulation from his predecessor.
He or she will have able assistance from the people asking the
questions.
David Lindorff
is the author of Killing
Time: an Investigation into the Death Row Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal.
A collection of Lindorff's stories can be found here: http://www.nwuphilly.org/dave.html
Today's
Features
CounterPunch
Wire
"Terror" Slut Steve Emerson
Eats Crow
Veteran
Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
A Letter to Kofi Annan on Powell's Missing
Evidence
Ross
Vachon
Dennis Miller's New Gig: the Last
Refuge of Goofy?
John
Chuckman
Blair's Awkward Lies
Matt
Vidal
Corporate Media and the Myth of the Free Market
Michael
S. Ladah
The Fine Print to Bush's Road Map
Robert
Fisk
Bush's Eternal War Backfires
Elaine
Cassel
Clarence Thomas, Still Whining After All These Years
Jonathan
Freedland
Ann Coulter's Appalling Magic
Steve Perry
Play It Again, O-Sam-a
Keep CounterPunch
Alive:
Make
a Tax-Deductible Donation Today Online!
home / subscribe
/ about us / books
/ archives / search
/ links /
|