t r u t h o u t - Michael T. Klare | Wag the Dog

t r u t h o u t - Michael T. Klare | Wag the Dog:
Crisis scenarios for deflecting attention from the President's woes.

KLARE: "It bears repeating that this administration - more than any other in recent times - has employed deception and innuendo to mold public opinion and advance its political agenda. Indeed, the very scandal now enveloping the White House - the apparent conspiracy to punish whistle-blower Joseph Wilson by revealing the covert CIA identity of his wife, Valerie Plame - is rooted in the President's drive to mobilize support for the invasion of Iraq by willfully distorting Iraqi weapons capabilities. Why then would he and his handlers shrink from exaggerating or distorting new intelligence about other hostile powers, and then using such distortions to ignite an international crisis?...

...If past White House behavior is any indication, we can safely assume that the President's men are considering every option for turning these foreign crises into a compelling distraction from the administration's current political malaise. They have already shown by their decisions in Iraq that they are prepared to spill a lot of blood in pursuit of political advantage, and so the possibility that a contrived crisis with Syria, Iran, or North Korea might erupt into something much greater - even a full-scale war or economic meltdown - may be unlikely to deter them from a wag-the-dog maneuver."

THE UNKNOWN CANDIDATE: I wouldn't put anything past this administration. As expected, they have recently ratcheted up the political "campaign" rhetoric with half-lies and distorted partial-truths directed at Democrats in an attempt to discredit their criticism. But I have to say, as much as this "Wag the Dog" scenario is plausible, it is just as plausible that attacking Syria, Iran, and Korea have always been in the neo-con plans. Like Iraq and 9/11, the administration needs only the right excuse to launch their bombs--and if they have to manufacture that excuse with lies or by any other means-- so be it.