SaveDarfur.Org Ad Campaign Misleads About the Bush Admin's Role in Darfur

Over the last few days, the non-profit organization SaveDarfur has been running heart-wrenching commercials showing the victims of ongoing genocide in Darfur. The commercials are quite effective on an emotional level, as they should be for anyone with a heart. And then, at the end, there is a call to action for viewers.

Is it a call for the UN to get serious about forcing Sudan (a member of the UN Human Rights Commission) to stop blocking deployment of a 22,500 member UN Peacekeeping force? (something already approved by the Security Council)

Is it a call for public pressure for sanctions or even military action against Sudan?

Of course not. The end of the commercial implores viewers to tell President Bush to take action to stop the genocide. And implies he hasn't been doing anything along those lines by not saying anything else on the matter.

Well, perhaps one could make the argument that they are working within the limits of a 30-second television commercial - you can't always squeeze in the full story in that short of a time span.

However, they are also running a print campaign that is under no such limitations. And here is what the print campaign is saying:

We have seen the haunting pictures, heard the cries of grieving mothers. Mr. President, you can end it tomorrow when you speak to the United Nations and the world. You need only stand up and say that the United States and its allies will take decisive action now to protect lives in Darfur. That the United States, and the rest of the world, will move now to deploy the UN force they've already approved. In America the support for action crosses partisan lines. John McCain and Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and Bob Dole support taking action now.

Please, Mr. President. Beyond politics, beyond borders, beyond religion, there is the moral imperative to save lives. Mr. President, the world is waiting. The lives of two million people hang on your every word tomorrow. Please don't let them down.

Well, maybe SaveDarfur.org simply isn't aware of all the Bush Adminstration has done to try and halt the genocide in Darfur. Except for the fact that they have the following items on their own website - a press release dated September 19th:

Washington, DC – The Save Darfur Coalition today applauded President Bush’s commitment to get UN peacekeepers into Darfur and his appointment of Andrew Natsios to be his Presidential Special Envoy for Sudan during his address to the United Nations. The Coalition also stressed the need for both Mr. Natsios and President Bush to immediately increase pressure on the Sudanese Government to accept the already authorized UN peacekeeping force. Natsios previously served as the Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and as the Special Humanitarian Coordinator for Sudan.

“By appointing Andrew Natsios to be his Special Envoy for Sudan, the President has told the world that he is serious about ending the crisis and building a lasting peace, and that means getting true security to the people who need it,” said David Rubenstein, Coordinator of the Save Darfur Coalition. “The true measure by which history will judge the President’s efforts to end this genocide is not what he says today, but what he does tomorrow. He and Mr. Natsios must be relentless until the genocide is stopped.”

So even as they were producing the TV and Print commercials and making the media buys, they were applauding Bush on their own website.

But maybe the Bush Admin isn't taking the actions needed to pressure Sudan into allowing the UN peacekeeping force into Darfur.

Or maybe the Bush Admin IS pressuring Sudan. Once again, from SaveDarfur's own website:

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told Sudan in firm terms on Wednesday it must choose between "cooperation and confrontation" with the rest of the world and accept a U.N. force for Darfur. "Innocent people are suffering and dying. The humanitarian situation, already tenuous, is at risk of becoming a complete disaster. And the hope of peace is now in danger of collapsing altogether," she said of Darfur. Aside from the threat of punitive action, the United States has begun dangling the carrot of incentives if Sudan agrees to a U.N. force, including the promise of reconstruction funds and improved bilateral ties. "If the government of Sudan chooses cooperation -- if it works with the United Nations and welcomes the U.N. force into Darfur, then it will find a dedicated partner in the United States," said Rice. Darfur has become a rallying cry in the United States among a range of religious, political and rights groups and the Bush administration is under strong pressure to act. The Save Darfur Coalition ran a full-page advertisement in The New York Times on Wednesday, showing mass graves in Darfur. "When all the bodies have been buried in Darfur, how will history judge us?" said the headline on the advertisement.

Why is the Coalition calling upon President Bush to help make sure UN peacekeepers are sent immediately to Darfur? Shouldn’t that be the UN’s responsibility?

The recent television ads sponsored by the Save Darfur Coalition asking President Bush to take the lead in pushing for the deployment of a UN force in Darfur are not meant in any way to “bash” the President, but rather to urge him to follow through on the good work he and his Administration have already begun. We are both cognizant and appreciative of the fact that the President has done more for the people of Darfur than any other world leader. In fact, it is because of his leadership thus far that we direct our pleas to President Bush now. The hard truth is that the United Nations does not have a standing army it can choose to deploy, it must instead rely on its member states to do the hard work necessary to actually deploy a peacekeeping force once that force has been authorized. As the strongest of member states, we believe that the United States, under the President’s leadership, must lead the international effort to raise and deploy that UN peacekeeping force. While we are not calling for U.S. troops in Darfur, we are calling for the strong U.S. leadership necessary to ensure that a capable UN force is raised and sent to Darfur as soon as possible.

It is also worth noting that while these ads running in the U.S. call for stronger leadership from President Bush, similar ads being run internationally call upon various international leaders to provide strong leadership as well. Advocacy directed at President Bush is not the sum total of our advocacy efforts, but is in fact only the U.S. directed portion of a larger international advocacy campaign directed at the top echelon of world leaders.

We are both cognizant and appreciative of the fact that the President has done more for the people of Darfur than any other world leader

So why is there NO mention of that in the TV or print ads? Why didn't SaveDarfur re-word the commercials to say something along the lines of "President Bush has exercised strong leadership to stop the genocide. Please call him up and say you back him to take even more concrete action!"

Well, maybe a look at the Executive Committee for SaveDarfur.org would reveal just WHY they don't want to give him such credit in their commercials - it includes many sworn enemies of the Bush Adminstration who have had no qualms about spreading lies about the Bush Admin in the past:

American Jewish World Service
American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA Society)
Amnesty International USA
Citizens for Global Solutions
Darfur Peace and Development
Genocide Intervention Network
International Crisis Group
Jewish Council for Public Affairs
NAACP
National Association of Evangelicals
National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA
STAND: A Student Anti-Genocide Coalition
Union for Reform Judaism
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

I have a suggestion. Instead of calling President Bush to take action on Darfur when he already clearly is doing such by the very admission of those running ad campaigns claiming otherwise, I would suggest that freepers and other Americans outraged by this misleading advertising campaign use the contact information on the SaveDarfur website and tell SaveDarfur to tell the whole story in the commercials, instead of implying that Bush is doing nothing to stop the genocide. This may have been an honest mistake, or it may be politically motivated (after all, the November elections are not far off). But either way, it reeks no matter what the underlying motives may have been, and is counterproductive towards stopping the genocide in Darfur. SaveDarfur.org should pull these ads immediately and issue an apology to the Bush Adminstration for not telling the entire story:

Mail
Save Darfur Coalition
Suite 600
2120 L Street NW
Washington, D.C. 20037

81 posted on 10/02/2006 2:01:53 PM PDT by onyx (We have two political parties: the American Party and the Anti-American Party.)

Well, SaveDarfur doesn't want that, apparently:

While we are not calling for U.S. troops in Darfur, we are calling for the strong U.S. leadership necessary to ensure that a capable UN force is raised and sent to Darfur as soon as possible.

Meaningless drivel. The regime in Khartoum is sanctioning this. Unless we're willing to punish the hell out of them, nothing will be achieved. The troops of the African Union will be driving around in an area the size of France looking for trouble and always arriving too late...assuming the African Union is actually allowed to shoot the Islamists.

Regards, Ivan

Even a few Apaches flying about would be quite a deterrent - if you give the Janjaweed militias running about in technicals a chance of meeting sudden death from above on their rounds, this activity would abate a fair amount. Heck, even use Predators with Hellfires.

The liberal numbnuts of the world simply do not want to face the fact that the only way to end genocidal violence is the threat of violence against the perps with a willingness to back up the threat with action. Dialog simply aids and abets the perps. Time is on their side.

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