The Way to Win: Taking the White House in 2008 (Free Republic Credited)

In 2004, the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth started out on the margins of the presidential race. In an era of Old Media domination, they might have stayed there. When the group's founders held a news conference at the National Press Club in Washington on May 4, there was nothing in the next day's Washington Post, and the episode got scant attention elsewhere. A conservative website, FreeRepublic.com, however, covered the news conference and listed the fax numbers of Establishment news organizations, urging readers to send missives demanding to know why they were "blacking out" the event. A day later, the Post and New York Times carried short stories inside the paper. The Post report included the Kerry campaign's response that the Swift Boat Veterans was a "politically motivated organization with close ties to the Bush administration."

The SBVfT was organized by Vietnam veterans who profoundly resented Kerry's role in the antiwar movement. Some of the men personally had served with Kerry in Vietnam. The group was funded and promoted by prominent Republicans, several of whom had ties to both President Bush and Karl Rove, though no evidence of a coordinated effort ever emerged.

As it happened, the SBVfT need not have worried about the amount of coverage they would receive, in either the New Media or the Old. And the spasm of publicity would come at the worst possible time for Kerry. On July 28, one day before Kerry formally accepted the Democratic nomination at the party's national convention in Boston, Drudge touted the imminent release of Un¿t for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry. On the morning of Drudge's report, the book was ranked at #1,318 on Amazon.com. The next day it had jumped to #2, and within a couple of days it hit #1.

Hindsight is 20/20. I blame the Turks for their perfidy, not State. As for preventing infiltration, sabotage, and sniping I think we have prevented some. One can always look at the remaining issues and say we could have prevented them too. But there were bound to be problems - nothing this big and violent will ever be "tidy', to use Rummy's favorite word. But widespread oil well fires? Mass starvation and refugee flows? Mass uprisings against our troops? A lot of what the pessimists predicted did not occur. I think we had a hand in preventing much of this.

Hindsight is 20/20.

Yes, and that's why we ought to avail ourselves of it as much as possible -- it's what history is all about.

Call it "political ground truth" for testing political-scientific hypotheses against. Hindsight tells us that Communism doesn't work, in such a way that liberals and socialists can't BS people any more the way they did in 1905 and 1925, about how well it was going to work.

I blame the Turks for their perfidy, not State.

Not perfidy -- they had a change of government, and we didn't handle the new people right. In any case, they had the absolute right to change their minds, change their policies, or whatever. Sovereignty.

One can always look at the remaining issues and say we could have prevented them too.

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Talking down to the Turks and generally frosting the new kids running Turkish policy when we didn't have to, was something we could have avoided. I don't know who was responsible for that screwup, but I kinda don't think it was Powell or Rice. It was Bush, Rumsfeld, or Cheney, or some combination, would be my ten-cent bet.

A lot of what the pessimists predicted did not occur. I think we had a hand in preventing much of this.

No doubt, but getting the 4th ID in there sooner, and getting lots more uniformed warm bodies in-country to help squash Saddam's rearguards and kill Mukhabarat "werewolf" assassination teams that were shooting U.S. troops, often sneaking up on them and shooting them in the back of the head at point-blank range with secreted pistols, was something that Rumsfeld and Bush were told they needed to do going in, by Shinseki (who was only the Army Chief of Staff and had run the Bosnian operation, what the hell did he know?!) and other senior military people.

In short, Rumsfeld and Bush knew going in, that they'd need more boots. They'd been told they would need more. But they didn't listen, they sent their eggs back repeatedly with explicit instructions to reduce the size of the invasion force -- they tried to do Iraq "on the cheap". Didn't work, they got caught -- and the reason is a major embarrassment for Bush, although the 'Rats haven't picked up on it yet: Bush wanted to do Iraq "cheap" so he wouldn't have to work too hard to defend his tax cuts for upper-income payers. He was running a "guns and butter" policy just like Landslide Lyndon, and he got caught on the fence. I wish he hadn't, if only because it helps the 'Rats -- but more for the sake of our casualties -- but like it or not, there it is.

I think Halperin has a thing about Drudge. I don't know if it's love or hate, but there's definitely something there.

I saw him on Charlie Rose earlier tonight, and you're right. He does get walleyed when Drudge comes up -- as far as I could tell, that is. Damned Rose keeps interrupting people and talking over them, trying to supplement, clarify, infill, and steer -- he drives me nuts. I found myself shouting at the TV at least twice, "____Damn it Charlie, SHUT UP!"

But Halperin's thing, I think, is envy. That, and dislike of a journo who's (in Halperin's opinion) allied to the GOP and does the RNC's/Karl Rove's bidding.

Oh, and Halperin -- if someone can get a transcript -- practically admitted that the MSM is allied to the 'Rats, and that they tried to sit on a couple of stories, the Swift Boat story being the prime example. He also credited the pajamarati with screwing with Algore's mind and messing up his campaign image in 2000, by factchecking him and blowing all sorts of whistles.

Congrats, GOPJ! You're quoted in today's The Note promo for Halperin's book:

Oh, Irony -- thy name is the reaction to The Way to Win. The book looks at how America's political-media culture has become a polarized Freak Show, with extreme voices at the center of the country's politics -- and facts and decorum pushed to the fringe.

Washingtonpost.com, freerepublic.com, and other websites are filling up with comments from the Right and the Left about the book, and the alleged political allegiances of the authors.

Those who hope Americans can unite around shared beliefs will be happy to hear that there is stark agreement: Halperin and Harris are extremely biased.

However, the nature of that bias is not so clear

GOPJ, on freerepublic.com, says this:

"[Halperin is a] biased, self-serving, puffed up shill for the MSM and their liberal democrat handlers." LINK

And drindl, on washingtonpost.com, says something completely different: "Halperin is the WORST partisan in the news business, and the Note is the worst of the worst of political commentary -- precious and fawning and straight out of the mouth of Rove. It's below the quality even of People Magazine." LINK

At the same. . .

The Way to Win sightings: Road warrior partisans of all types are snapping up the book. At the Orlando Airport Borders, Republican super attorney Ben Ginsberg, who worked on both of President Bush's campaigns, was seen buying a copy. And Richard Plepler, Friend of Chris (Dodd) and HBO honcho, was spied grabbing his at Reagan National.

The Way to Win Just Asking: Which Olympian-sized leading Republican 2008 presidential candidate recently cited The Way to Win in a private meeting with political types a long way from his home state. The soon-to-be-unemployed man cited the book's concept of the Freak Show and praised both the text and the two authors by name.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.