The New York Times' drug dealers, Part I

I made a mistake in my last two posts. Celebrating diversity is not the opiate of the people. The New York Times is the opiate of the people. Surely its columnists are dealers in sedatives that repress the mind from actually thinking; lulling readers into an intellectual state that can only be regarded as torpid. Daily the "Paper of Record" dispenses its opinion like literary pills, teasing the intellect with a false sense of sophistication but leaving it damaged and confused. It's a sort of seditious magic trick, craftily performed to win approval, only to smite the audience on the backside of the head: The hand is indeed quicker than the eye, and the brain.

How else to describe the attacks on the Church spooned out by Nicholas Kristof (twice in one week, and by a man who is not a Catholic!). Or the indictments passed along by Frank Rich, written like so much syrupy gossip - "Hey, did you know that so-and-so said this; and can you believe that so-and-so said that?" - in perfect ear-tickling prose, all form, no substance (Rich is the sort of man who dominates conversation at a dinner party). Maureen Dowd's cramp-laced whinings; or Bob Herbert's completely uncircumspect wonderings; or Paul Krugman's snivellings for socialism: Each of these are not the kind of people destined to impress judges at a Logic Contest, unless it be a feminist/postmodern logic contest, where "my-logic-is-not-your-linear-patriarchal-logic" wins debates.

Where to begin? The misdeeds and the misdoers are too many. It feels a lot like doing battle with "spiritual wickedness in high places," though to think thus is to flatter the NYT.

I shall begin today with Mr. Bob Herbert, the man who this week swallowed the camel of Aidan Delgado without so much as flinching. Twice Herbert featured in his columns the story of Delgado, the honorably discharged US reservist, now a self-appointed whistleblower on all things Iraq. Herbert makes this startling conclusion at the end of his second column on Mr. Delgado:

"Mr. Delgado's complaints and the entire conduct of this wretched war should be thoroughly investigated."

Please note the fallacy hidden in the sentence. It goes something like this: The war (in Iraq) is wretched. Mr. Delgado's claims prove that. Therefore the war is wretched.

Well, though fallacious, that's not exactly the fallacy I wanted to point out. That kind of fallacy can be excused.

But the kind of fallacy that cannot be excused is this: Mr. Delgado's complaints prove that the war in Iraq is wretched. Therefore, Mr. Delgado's complaints should be thoroughly investigated.

See the problem?

Herbert posits that Delgado's complaints need to be investigated, though Herbert has just used those complaints to prove Herbert's own presumption: the conduct of the entire war is wretched (though the conduct should be "thoroughly investigated").

Confused? You SHOULD be, because if you're not, you are addicted to the opiate which drips from Herbert's pen.

Here's what Herbert does not investigate AT ALL:

1) The truly dubious claim that a young college student enlists in the Army Reserve in Florida (is that where?) on September 11, 2001, without knowing that the United States was under attack. (Can you imagine his two recruiters not knowing that this was going on? Does Herbert, or anyone, call these two recruiters? No.)

2) That the same student, whose father is an alumnus of the Peace Corps and anti-war through and through, would ever sign up for the military in the first place.

3) That this student, while as a reservist in basic training, would morph into an Arabic-speaking (he learned to speak Arabic while living in Egypt with his parents; his dad employed by the State Department, I believe) Buddhist pacifist who seeks nothing other than to be a conscientious objector. (Any witnesses to Delgado's religious or political proclivities prior to his conversion from alleged militarist to pacifist? Any friends from high school or college?)

4) That this reservist, now activist and war critic, when asked by two different interviewers "What else did you witness?" answers that he witnessed only to what amounts to hearsay. (Moreover, many if not most of the pictures Delgado is showing on the lecture circuit he's been enjoying were taken by other photographers; only some, the "grainy ones," the ones taken without a telephoto lens [amazing that he should point this out], are pictures he actually took.)

5) That US servicemen smashed bottles on the heads of Iraqis while driving down city streets (Delgado only HEARD about this); that a US military officer slashed Iraqis with an antenna; or kicked a child. (Any other witnesses? Herbert doesn't ask.)

6) That Delgado claims that the imprisoned at Abu Ghraib were NOT bad criminals, an admission that Herbert (et al) accept without full disclosure. For Delgado admits that the Abu Ghraib prisoners were sent there by - you got it - IRAQI judges for all sorts of crimes, many petty to American standards. Yes, apparently prisoners were brought to Abu Ghraib by American forces. But the implication is that EVERYONE was harmless and illegally rounded up by American troops, when the majority, per Delgado's own words elsewhere, were detained by Iraqis. Americans were largely just on guard duty.

7) That Delgado claimed inside knowledge of Abu Ghraib atrocities (particularly one event) when he worked almost exclusively as a Humvee mechanic. Delgado admits that he did not SEE the atrocities (particularly one event where several Iraqi prisoners were shot during an alleged prison riot). In fact, Delgado gets the number of dead from that event wrong in two interviews; and compared with official statements. How does a "witness" get this wrong? Herbert doesn't seem to care to know.

Mr. Herbert could have taken just a few minutes to do what I did: I Googled Delgado and landed on several transcripts of interviews he gave to various left-leaning journalists (see Amy Goodman's interview with Delgado; then compare it with Scott Fleming's interview at Alternet.)

That Herbert should have asked BASIC journalistic questions about Delgado; that he should have had at least a pretense of skepticism, goes without saying.

BUT THERE IS MORE

Herbert reflects on the power of photography, namely Delgado's collection of images, to sway public opinion (in his favor, no less):

"This is what happens in war. It's the sickening reality that is seldom seen in the censored, sanitized version of the conflict that Americans typically get from the government and the media.

Americans' attitude toward war in general and this war in particular would change drastically if the censor's veil were lifted and the public got a sustained, close look at the agonizing bloodshed and other horrors that continue unabated in Iraq. If that happened, support for any war that wasn't an absolute necessity would plummet."

One wonders if Herbert is paying attention to himself, for there is hardly a more UN-circumspect argument a man could make. For the liberal Herbert has made a conservative's argument about all sorts of things, like partial birth abortion or homosexuality.

Does Herbert want to inform the largely sanitized public about what really goes on during an abortion, particularly a late term abortion? If so, let's show some pictures of such procedures. Why be so squeamish? And while we are at it, let's show some video of homosexual sex acts in bathhouses and rest stops; or just even in the "marriage beds" of gay couples. Don't we want to be informed?

In fact, let's see if we can drum up images of Bill Clinton in the Oval Office abusing a woman (an underling) with a cigar; and receiving fellatio while on the phone discussing military ops in Bosnia. That way we might learn from the censorious press that the private life of a sitting President might indeed have grotesque public consequences.

Perhaps if we showed more images of breast-cancer surgeries, or colonoscopies, we might reduce the number of those procedures. Or perhaps we should have seen some recent video of Terri Schaivo (all video clips were years old, her husband wanting to keep the public eye off her), particularly during her last days, complete with audio.

(One wonders whether Herbert agreed with fans or critics of The Passion of the Christ. Fans applauded the film for its unflinching look at Christ's sufferings, images that allegedly drew the devout and the fence-sitters closer to the Lord; while critics flinched at the realism, finding the violence gratuitous and 'Jew-baiting" [to this censorious group a more sanitized movie would have better served the public.])

Mr. Herbert states the obvious: inundating people with horrible images of things may indeed influence behavior. Show enough bad images of even GOOD things, like colonoscopies, and one might reduce support for that life-saving medical procedure.

But notice Herbert does not ask us to look at images of innocent civilians getting blown up by insurgents. Notice there is no reference to beheadings. Or the grotesque deaths of American soldiers. Or the collapsing towers in New York. Nope. Don't want to see those things. Why?

You know why. But if you don't, you're drugged.

Peace.

BG

©Bill Gnade 2005/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.

Part II of the this series begins here. You don't want to miss it. Seriously.

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