Bush Lies, Petraeus Lies, Traditional Media Doesn't Care

I talked a little about this last week in a post called "Did Bush Escalate So That He Could De-escalate?", and it seems like my theory might prove to be correct (or at least close).

Gen. Petraeus talked about bringing troops home next year when he gave his white-wash of a report to Congress this week. Today, news reports are claiming that Bush will soon announce that he will bring troops home next year per Petraeus's suggestions.

This appears to be all a charade because our military will be stretched to its limits by next year, and Bush will be forced to reduce troop numbers in Iraq regardless.

The clueless traditional media seems so eager to report the future troop reductions that they are overlooking the fact that such reductions will occur not by Bush's choice but because Bush has no other options. In overlooking that fact and not reporting on it, the TM is making it seem like Bush IS choosing to bring troops home because he and Petraeus are claiming that the surge escalation has worked and conditions are improving in Iraq.

Of course they're not improving, the surge escalation hasn't worked, and Bush and Petraeus are lying, but the TM is too lazy or too foolish to report that either. Thank goodness we have Media Matters for America to correct the TM:

Myths and falsehoods about progress in Iraq

Summary: Supporters of the Iraq war -- rather than waiting for testimony by Gen. David Petraeus and U.S. ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker on the effect of President Bush's troop increase in Iraq -- have engaged in a campaign to convince the media and public that progress is being made in Iraq and that the "surge" is "working." Media Matters has compiled some of the most pervasive myths and falsehoods advanced by opponents of withdrawal in service of the "surge is working" message, which many in the media have been complicit in perpetuating.

[...]On the August 20 edition of Fox News' Special Report, host Brit Hume said that "evidence mounts that the troop surge is working as planned." An August 16 editorial in Investor's Business Daily was headlined, "A Surge of Success." And on the August 21 edition of MSNBC's Tucker, U.S. News & World Report editor-in-chief Mortimer B. Zuckerman asserted: "[T]he fact is that, by far, the consensus is that the surge is working." However, by the administration's own standards, the national political reconciliation that the Bush administration identified as essential for the success of its escalation strategy has not occurred.

[...]an August 25 Associated Press article reported that while violence is down in Baghdad "from peak levels ... the death toll from sectarian attacks around the country is running nearly double the pace from a year ago." Moreover, McClatchy Newspapers reported on August 15 that while U.S. officials have said civilian casualties have decreased in Baghdad, they have "declined to provide specific numbers, and statistics gathered by McClatchy Newspapers don't support the claim."

[...]Statistics compiled by the Iraq Coalition Casualty Count on its website iCasualties.org, which publishes death count totals provided by the Department of Defense, show that more U.S. troops have died in Iraq during June, July, and August this year than the same three-month period in 2003, 2004, 2005, or 2006. The website currently lists the total U.S. death count for this period at 264.

Read the whole article for MMfA's list of myths and their debunking of those myths.

The ONLY way to support the troops, at this point, is to bring them home. Period. Not one more should die for Bush's lies.