By this stage of the game this Admin. is not going to change the way they deal with this subject, I'm hoping for better from the next.
A couple of examples
Send people out who have just returned from Iraq, Afghanistan to talk about what's really happening, I'm not talking about Generals, but lower ranks.
Get someone who understands the Arab/Islamic world to start flooding their media with the who, what where and why we are doing what we're doing.
while I'm at it they could do a much better job of explaining this to the American people. (given what kind of comments I see here on Islam and the GWOT, it's really needed).
That are a multitude of ways the Admin could have gotten their messages out -- but they had to do it, which they didn't.
The excuses from the Bots -- that the Media to mean to them -- just doesn't wash.
Reagan was no media darling, yet he managed to get his message out.
Several times, Bush had political capital, and instead of using the bully pulpit to get some real accomplishments, he squandered the capital. Heck, he couldn't even find the veto pen until he found it for something as nationally important as --- stem cell research.
Bush, at any time during his presidency, could have ask for -- and he would have received -- network air time.
Even this last speech showed him as a weak, hesitant president.
Where was the Bush who gave those inspiring speeches in front of the troops a year or two ago? We saw those hidden away on cable news channels. Never once was such a speech given on national television. They all should have been.
One thing's for sure, the PR machine will be a lot smarter if the next Administration is a Democrat one. The Republicans lead with their chin on every PR battle the go in to. It's amazing what slow learners they're proving to be.
I'll say it again. Media centric warfare is the way of the future. It can be used, negated or co-opted, but it cannot be ignored. Handling the media the way that the current Administration has will prove increasingly fatal to future endeavors.
This is exactly right. The WH has the bully pulpit and what that means is that it can issue press releases on anything anytime it wants. If those releases are info that flatly contradicts the opposition line (stories and reports just like you suggest) it will get MSM coverage due to the fact that the opposition will vigorously try to discredit them. The WH version will get aired just to put the opposition attacks in context. As Hewitt says the battle has to be waged without cease.
As some have characterised it it's an info war. The administration seems to think that info battles are unseemly but in a war you have to engage the enemy to win the battles. Staying back from battle gives the enemy the run of the territory. That is what the MSM and the Dems have had for four years.