Re: [Marxism] A sobering assessment

["Dayne Goodwin" <daynegoodwin@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 8/1/07, Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Rightwing radio and TV news shows have been gloating over the fact that
> two "opponents" of the war in Iraq recently wrote an op-ed piece in the
> NY Times claiming that the surge was working.
>
> July 30, 2007
> Op-Ed Contributor
> A War We Just Might Win
> By MICHAEL E. O'HANLON and KENNETH M. POLLACK


another critique at:
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/073007.html

   . . .
Yet the authors – and the New York Times – failed to tell readers the
full story about these supposed skeptics: far from grizzled peaceniks,
O'Hanlon and Pollack have been longtime cheerleaders for a larger U.S.
military occupying force in Iraq.

Indeed, Pollack, a former CIA analyst, was a leading advocate for
invading Iraq in the first place. He published The Threatening Storm:
The Case for Invading Iraq in September 2002, just as the Bush
administration was gearing up its marketing push for going to war.

British journalist Robert Fisk called Pollack's book the "most
meretricious contribution to this utterly fraudulent [war] 'debate' in
the United States." (Meretricious, by the way, refers to something
that is based on pretense, deception or insincerity.)
   . . .
After the U.S. invasion of Iraq failed to locate the promised weapons
of mass destruction – and a stubborn Iraqi insurgency emerged –
Pollack offered an apology for his high-profile role in promoting the
war.

In fall 2004, Pollack told an interviewer for the New York Times
magazine, "I made a mistake based on faulty intelligence. Of course, I
feel guilty about it. I feel awful. … I'm sorry; I'm sorry!" [NYT
Magazine, Oct. 24, 2004]

But now Pollack – having re-positioned himself from war booster to war
critic – can reinvent himself again as a grudging convert to the
wisdom of Bush's war strategy, without either him or the Times editors
alerting readers to this reverse metamorphosis.
   . . .

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