In a book making a case that George W. Bush has lied over and over to the citizenry, the president of the United States and his dishonest advisers receive credit for one thread of truthfulness: their admission that they make life-and-death decisions by relying on Christian faith rather than fact-based reality.
The book is by Frank Rich. It is grounded in fact-based reality – lots of facts, lots of ugly realities.
Like many commentators who can fairly be termed politically liberal, Rich, a columnist with The New York Times, has become unhinged by the George W. Bush-Dick Cheney White House.
Rich’s disagreements with the president and all his men (a few women, too) have been obvious since 2001. Unlike so many other columnists, however, Rich has done his homework about the so- called war on terrorism, the invasion of Iraq, the reaction to Hurricane Katrina and other cataclysmic events. My, has he done his homework.
In an exhaustive – and sometimes exhausting – indictment, Rich catalogs hundreds of half-truths and what he calls undiluted lies communicated by the Bush White House to the citizenry it is supposed to serve honestly. Along the way, Rich indicts lots of journalists (especially Washington Post reporter/book author Bob Woodward, not to mention New York Times colleagues), bloggers, Democratic politicians, Hollywood moviemakers and others with a platform who could have helped disseminate the truth but instead kowtowed to the White House fearmongers. He indicts untold millions of those without a platform as well, the voters (and nonvoters) who constitute “an American culture that was an all-too-easy mark for the flimflam.”
Although Rich was best known as The Times theater critic before becoming a columnist, it turns out he possesses considerable investigative skills, as he follows the muckraker’s maxim about proving what public officials knew and when they knew it.
For readers who might charge Rich with exaggeration (could a president and his staff really lie so frequently and so baldly?) or partisan political bias, he provides a timeline at the rear of the book. The entries in the right-hand column of the timeline “chronicle the story that was sold by the Bush administration and other relevant events, news reports or official statements that were known publicly at the time,” Rich explains. The left-hand column entries “chronicle what the administration was learning behind the scenes about intelligence and other war-related matters, and not telling the public. The events in this hidden timeline were revealed publicly only later.”
Rich understands that for the most part he is not breaking news: “While the controversial policy choices made by the Bush administration are well known, equally important is the way it dramatized its fable to the nation and made it credible to so many, even when it wasn’t remotely true.”
But he also understands that he is aggregating information in a way nobody else has. The aggregation allows Rich to speculate in an informed manner about why so many lies occurred during such a relatively short period. His answer: “to amass power and hold on to it.”
All U.S. presidents have sought to amass power and hold on to it. Rich believes, however, that no previous administration has crossed so many ethical, moral and sometimes legal lines. The context provided by Rich is helpful and disturbing, especially as he demonstrates how President Ronald Reagan and his “image maven” Michael Deaver influenced Bush and his spinmeister Karl Rove.
Rich explains that when Reagan “cut any federal subsidy for the elderly, it was time for him to be televised surrounded by flags cutting the ribbon at a new nursing home. The pictures could be counted on to carry the day and to drown out any discouraging words from Reagan critics on the evening news. Bush and Rove took this playbook as a starting point and then upped the ante.”
Bush and Rove perhaps do not care that Rich is suggesting they are congenital liars. But voters – those who cast ballots for Bush during 2000 and 2004, those who despise Bush’s presidency, and everybody in between – ought to care. Billions of budget dollars and an untold number of lives hang in the balance.
Steve Weinberg is a freelance investigative journalist.
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The Greatest Story Ever Sold
The Decline and Fall of Truth From 9/11 to Katrina
By Frank Rich
Penguin, 341 pages, $25.95
