my guess is that all of these books are pretend indictments of the administration - there is nothing really new or damaging in any of them - what is woodwards main claim? that the decision for an iraq invasion was made in january 03????? many have already made the argument that the decision was made a year or 2 before then. thats why i caution about these faux crises...

http://www.counterpunch.org/whitney04192004.html offers a different version to me - saying (among other interesting things) "Woodward is the ultimate insider; a major player among Washington power brokers. He is as much a part of the established order as anyone in the Administration or anyone leading a major American corporation." (altho this article suggests the woodward is in fact 'pushing gwb outta the lifeboat', rather than taking my 'faux-crisis' position)

and if we really believe that media control is as bad as i suspect, then clarkes book release and 60 mins appearance etc during 911comm suggests that we need to be skeptical. (his book was at the whitehouse vettors in oct). woodward also gets 60 mins billing, and *2* full sessions on larry king this week. plus full whitehouse access. and vetting.

praps u inadvertently highlight the real issue - when u mention the apparent 'simultaneous denial of, and support for the new Woodward book...'. lets be clear, the whitehouse isnt denying the book - in fact, most of them say 'i agree with what he says' but there are little pretend fights here and there - as ive suggested before, praps its a rovian masterstroke to clear the decks, 8 months before the election, knowing how deep their pockets are, its best to get little things outta the way. remember the awol/alabamaguard issue - which looked like a possible election breaker at the time, and now we can hardly remember it. and remember when the democrats were salivating about using the lincoln footage in *their* ads (not gwbs), and now 'mission accomplished' is just a trivial issue...part of a long laundry-list that has lost any sense of meaning. and as we get closer to the election, they'll be able to say 'look - we've had o'neill and clarke and woodward, and none of them have been able to do any sort of longlasting damage to the president - he still has a 3% lead over kerry'. i cant even remember what oneill's 'damaging claims' were any more - something about gwb being incurious or something. schlock horreur. and clarke's claim? that terrorism was considered important, but not urgent. not so damaging. and now woodward is also getting the media red carpet - *2* headline appearances on larry king this week. and its not like we are in a slow news week...(i only assume that larry king is part of the std cnn machine - i dont watch him normally).

woodward got incredible access and the book is on the whitehouse.gov suggested reading list - i guess its a logic stolen from murderk - pretend to pretend to be fair and balanced. (btw - i want everyone at fauxnews on rico charges).

fwiw - woodards book was published by simon&schuster - which is a viacom property. viacom also gives us cbs - recently famous for pulling the reagan movie, and for denying move-on ads at the superbowl cos it was 'activist' or some such rubbish. viacom also gives us mtv - which pulled the orchestrated janet/breast stunt, which opened the gate for pulling stern and a bunch of other outrages... i dont know specifically whats going on, im just pointing out the connection.

praps some of the reason they spared woodward the faux-character-assassination include:
a) everyone knows woodward - his book would have got publicity anyway. no-one had ever heard of oneill or clarke before their books. praps the attacks were to ensure that their books received the requisite coverage. ie rove didnt need to pretend that woodward was a turncoat.
b) clarke and oneill were one hit wonders - they were never gonna write another book... woodward still has a channel (wapo et al) for use in the future - if they attack him now, he is no use in the future.
c) it would also be dangerous to attack woodwards credibility - particularly after the (apparent) hagiography 'bush at war'.
d) other reasons????

in fact, the choice of woodward - 'the guy who sank nixon' - to write an insiders account, with full access, is praps significant in itself. it makes sense to position woodward as unimpeachable, cos he has apparently investigated everything about the war and he essentially gives the admin a clean bill of health. 2 books now and he has hardly uncovered anything amiss - in the most scandal-ridden cadministration in history.

im just speculating...



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but we were *saving* the village
wotisitgood4.blogspot.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Adam
Sent: Wednesday, April 21, 2004 1:36 PM
To: Luke Ryland
Subject: Rovian Logic


OK, here is one to try to figure out...

The Bush administration's simultaneous denial of, and support for the new Woodward book...
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/04/20/woodward.book/

Did Rove figure it would just look too bad to come out after yet another 'turncoat'? Wouldn't be surprised if they did a quick poll which told them to do so...