A few days ago, when speaking truth to power about the betrayal of David Petraeus to the soldiers and to the American people, I took a little bit of heat from the lurkers and the very small fragment of cowardly Vichyites among us who care more about what Republicans think of us than they do about facts and truth.
Now George Lakoff comes out and explains why the Betrayus frame and the moveon.org ad were spot on accurate. Via buzzflash
First, Lakoff titles the article, "Whose Betrayal?" And he's exactly right. The people who are betraying the American people and the soldiers in the military are not the protestors of the Iraq War, it's the proponents of the Iraq War. It's time we said so.
Lakoff then cites Greenspan's bombshell of a book in which Greenspan, the ardent lifelong conservative Republican, has a dose of conscienceness and admits from the inside that the Iraq War is mostly about oil. This is very important because these words are coming from a staunch Reagan and Bush Republican from the inside and carry tremendous weight.
Lakoff explains the effectiveness of the Betrayus ad.
The ad worked brilliantly to reveal, via its framing, an essential but previously hidden truth: the Bush Administration and its active supporters have betrayed the trust of the troops and the American people.
And right he is! Just because someone points out that David Petraeus betrays the troops does not make a person anti-military, against the soldiers, or whatever other smears lurkers and Vichyites toss his way. The military has had many great people serve in it but it's also had its Timothy McVeighs' and Oliver Norths'. Wearing a uniform is not a shield to hide from truth.
Here's the money paragraph from Lakoff.
MoveOn hit a nerve. In the face of truth, the right-wing has been forced to change the subject -- away from the administration's betrayal of trust and the escalating tragedy of the occupation to of all things, an ad! To take the focus off maiming and death and the breaking of our military, they talk about etiquette. The truth has reduced them to whining: MoveOn was impolite. Rather than face the truth, they use character assassination against an organization whose three million members stand for the highest patriotic principles of this country, the first of which is a commitment to truth.
The issue is not Moveon or DFQ.
The issue is this: Who has been betraying the trust of the American people -- including our troops -- in bringing about the American invasion of Iraq and in continuing the occupation? What were the acts of betrayal and with what consequences? And is a betrayal of trust still going on, and if so where, how, and by whom?
That's the issue to be discussed. Add to those questions these questions?
- Why did Bush ignore the pre 9/11 warnings?
- Why did Bush cut counterterrorism funding in 2001?
- Why was NORAD inoperative on 9/11?
- Why is Osama Bin Laden still alive more than six years after 9/11?
- Why is Al Qaeda operative in Iraq now but wasn't prior to 2004?
- Where's the 9 billion dollars Paul Bremer lost?
- Where are the 190,000 weapons David Petraeus lost?
- Why did Bush want to put Bin Laden linked companies in charge of American port security?
- What kind of creature reads "My Pet Goat" for 7 minutes with a blank smirk on his face when told America is under attack?
- How many civilians have really been killed in Iraq under Bush?
- Why is Bin Laden being ignored by Pakistan?
- Why aren't we supporting the return of the democratically elected President of Pakistan, President Bhutto, instead of the Bin Laden protecting dictator General Musharaf?
- Why does Saudi Arabia get a free pass for helping to fund 9/11?
- Why hasn't Executive Order 13303 been plastered on the front page of every newspaper so people can see that the Iraq War is mostly about oil?
- Why haven't the Saudi linked banks that fund terrorism been shut down?
- Why did Iran elect a crazy man when Bush was President and a saner man when Clinton was President?
Here are some questions that need a thorough discussion. But conservatives can't have that discussion. Instead it's easier for them to bash Moveon.Org (whom I don't always agree with) and critics like me instead of dealing with the truth. It's what makes them cowards. It's also what makes them bad Americans and bad people.
UPDATE: Here is the original link from the
Rockridge Institute.
Also I want to point out that Senator Hagel, a very conservative Republican, used stronger language than me to expose what Petraeus was doing. And if that's not good enough, there's Admiral Fallon who called Petraeus an ass licking chicken shit.