The Clever Formulation of Blame and the Cultivation of a New Myth of Betrayal
September 11th is a time to remind ourselves that it is always wrong to try to influence the behavior of your fellow human beings by killing them. But since pretty much everything that can be said about 9/11 has already been said a thousand times (apart from the things that will not be revealed for another 15 years or so), I am moving on to another subject.
For a long time I have been trying to figure out exactly how the Administration and its handlers were going to explain away their failures in Afghanistan and Iraq and explain how these failures occurred despite them having been given a blank check to spend from the American people plus almost zero political opposition to these measures over the first three years or so of both operations (Afghanistan and Iraq). Obviously, for them to simply admit to have been serially and consistently wrong is out of the question for them. I finally decided that in the tradition of party politics, when the day finally comes that both Afghanistan and Iraq have to be acknowledged as failures in terms of American involvement, the Administration will have to find a way to blame the Democrats. This will be difficult since the only Democrats that have had any influence on the events in Afghanistan and Iraq have been the ones that have played along with the Administration (and it would be foolish for the Administration to blame them for agreeing with policy). And as for opposition to policy, well the tiny number of active and vocal Democratic dissenters have been simply ignored to the point that they cannot be said to have unfluenced events at all. Hence, how to blame the blameless? So for the Administration, how do you take a situation where you have had it your own way for years and years and then afterwards try to pretend that the resulting debacle is somebody else's fault? This is the dilemma for Bush and Co. as well as Cheney Inc.
My feeling is that the technique that will be used is the creation of a myth involving the "Dolchstoss" (German for "Dagger Thrust) i.e. Stab in the Back. I first learned about this possible way out for the Administration's troubles from a Harper's article entitled, "Stabbed in the Back" (http://www.harpers.org/StabbedInTheBack.html) where the author traces the origins of how leaders and regimes have dealt with loss through the use of a mythology of betrayal from within. The idea is that when you promote the idea that your military and country are unparalelled in their righteousness and invincibility then the only way that failure and loss could legitimately occur is by way of internal sabotage of some kind. For example, even though the rest of the world knows that the US lost the Vietnam War, the prevailing story here in this country is still that the war was not "lost" but rather that the war effort was stymied and held back by dissenters at home. It's a convenient way to avoid admitting having been wrong and a way to avoid admitting losing a war.
Fast forward to our time. How are the Republicans going to find a way to blame the Democrats for the failure of Republican policies, wars, and other disasters? The answer is through claiming that the tiny, largely ignored anti-war liberals somehow demoralized the entire rest of the country plus its troops by exercising their constitutional right to question policy. Additionally the Administration will try to claim that this same largely ignored, small percentage of people somehow emboldened America's enemies despite their being small in numbers and with effectively no clout policy-wise. It will be a delicate dance, but I think the Republicans will pull it off....for a time.
For a long time I have been trying to figure out exactly how the Administration and its handlers were going to explain away their failures in Afghanistan and Iraq and explain how these failures occurred despite them having been given a blank check to spend from the American people plus almost zero political opposition to these measures over the first three years or so of both operations (Afghanistan and Iraq). Obviously, for them to simply admit to have been serially and consistently wrong is out of the question for them. I finally decided that in the tradition of party politics, when the day finally comes that both Afghanistan and Iraq have to be acknowledged as failures in terms of American involvement, the Administration will have to find a way to blame the Democrats. This will be difficult since the only Democrats that have had any influence on the events in Afghanistan and Iraq have been the ones that have played along with the Administration (and it would be foolish for the Administration to blame them for agreeing with policy). And as for opposition to policy, well the tiny number of active and vocal Democratic dissenters have been simply ignored to the point that they cannot be said to have unfluenced events at all. Hence, how to blame the blameless? So for the Administration, how do you take a situation where you have had it your own way for years and years and then afterwards try to pretend that the resulting debacle is somebody else's fault? This is the dilemma for Bush and Co. as well as Cheney Inc.
My feeling is that the technique that will be used is the creation of a myth involving the "Dolchstoss" (German for "Dagger Thrust) i.e. Stab in the Back. I first learned about this possible way out for the Administration's troubles from a Harper's article entitled, "Stabbed in the Back" (http://www.harpers.org/StabbedInTheBack.html) where the author traces the origins of how leaders and regimes have dealt with loss through the use of a mythology of betrayal from within. The idea is that when you promote the idea that your military and country are unparalelled in their righteousness and invincibility then the only way that failure and loss could legitimately occur is by way of internal sabotage of some kind. For example, even though the rest of the world knows that the US lost the Vietnam War, the prevailing story here in this country is still that the war was not "lost" but rather that the war effort was stymied and held back by dissenters at home. It's a convenient way to avoid admitting having been wrong and a way to avoid admitting losing a war.
Fast forward to our time. How are the Republicans going to find a way to blame the Democrats for the failure of Republican policies, wars, and other disasters? The answer is through claiming that the tiny, largely ignored anti-war liberals somehow demoralized the entire rest of the country plus its troops by exercising their constitutional right to question policy. Additionally the Administration will try to claim that this same largely ignored, small percentage of people somehow emboldened America's enemies despite their being small in numbers and with effectively no clout policy-wise. It will be a delicate dance, but I think the Republicans will pull it off....for a time.
Posted at 9/08/2006 04:21:00 PM UTC
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1 Comment(s):
The Bush Administration is already in the process of blaming everything on the Clinton Administration, and fantasy pieces such as "The Path to 9/11" tell the tale for the uninformed masses ready to lap up whatever new story they hear.
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