My colleagues at Media Matters have just published an excellent piece detailing how the right’s smears of Cindy Sheehan worked their way up the pipeline of the echo chamber and came to become the accepted truth. Read it.
Cindy Sheehan, mother of a soldier killed in Iraq, has drawn significant media attention for staging an anti-war protest outside President Bush’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, where she is demanding to meet with the president. On August 8, Internet gossip Matt Drudge posted an item on his website, the Drudge Report, in which he falsely claimed that Sheehan “dramatically changed her account” of a meeting she had with Bush in June 2004; Drudge attempted to back up his false assertion by reproducing Sheehan quotes from a 2004 newspaper article without providing their context. After the story appeared on the Drudge Report, it gained momentum among conservative weblogs and eventually reached Fox News, where it was presented as hard news and in commentaries. Media Matters for America will examine how one false story on an Internet gossip site ended up the focus of prime-time cable news coverage.
Let us see … maybe dramatically changed her account was not the exact phrasing I would have used. Having said that, it seems readily apparent to anybody that read the contemporaneous reporting, http://www.thereporter.com/republished, that they, overall, had a pleasant experience, as far as that can go. She indicated that she had not been happy with the war, and on that, she has remained consistent. However, since that time, she has now come to describe the President as having been rude, acting inappropriately, giving them dirty looks, and having a party type atmosphere. This is in no way consistent with her recounting of the events at the time of the events, not even remotely.
As I stated on a prior thread, I really do feel for this lady. My two younger brothers are currently in Iraq right now, one in Basra, and one in Baghdad, and despite my support for the war and our President, were either of them to be killed, I cannot imagine if or how my feelings would change.
I was in a discussion with Quaker on another thread where I indicated that it was my “observation”/speculation that her recollection was being clouded by her grief. If you read her own words, posted on www. michaelmoore.com, you will see that she states that her actions are being driven by her anger. So, my observation that the grief was clouding her recollection was wrong, but she acknowledges that she is being driven by anger, which can also have the same effect.
Additionally, my assumption that her anger is in part being fueled by the anti-war groups seems to be fairly accurate, since she herself indicates that they are “Right now, what we are doing right here in Crawford is the anti-war movement. We have such a strong coalition of groups. GSFP, Code Pink, Veterans for Peace, Military Families Speak Out and the Crawford Peace House”.
Also, something that stuck out to me was the fact that in the original article, they indicated that they did not pursue a more aggressive tone with the President as “… in the end, the family decided against such talk, deferring to how they believed Casey would have wanted them to act”. Apparently, they no longer believe that to be the case.
Regardless of how this all plays out, it is a horrible tragedy. I cannot imagine the pain she must be going through, and pray that I never find out. However, I suspect that were I in the same boat, I would not want my personal tragedy to be played out in public like this. Additionally, had I been killed during my service, I can assure you that I would have rolled over in my grave had my parents done this.
Hunh?
The very quotes you provide say just the opposite:
Sheehan, 2004: We haven t been happy with the way the war has been handled. The president has changed his reasons for being over there every time a reason is proven false or an objective reached.
Sheehan, 2005: This is an immoral war based on a false premise. Iraq was never an imminent threat and the Downing Street Memo proves Bush went to war for oil, greed and all the wrong reasons.
Where’s the “dramatic change”?
More importantly, why is it necessary for Michelle Malkin, Matt Drudge, Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, and the rest of the usual suspects to try to prove there’s something wrong with this woman? Is it so unthinkable that a mother whose son has given his life for a “noble cause” should ask what that cause is?
This whole controversy would go away if George Bush had enough courage to face one woman who disagrees with him.
The pretense of this silly MM article is to illustrate that Cindy Sheehan’s position on the war, and on the president has not changed, since last year. And, that suggesting otherwise is a big lie.
Really?
Cindy Sheehan version 2004
“I now know he’s sincere about wanting freedom for the Iraqis. I know he’s sorry and feels some pain for our loss. And I know he’s a man of faith.”
“We haven’t been happy with the way the war has been handled. The president has changed his reasons for being over there every time a reason is proven false or an objective reached.”
Patrick Sheehan version 2004
“We [presumably his wife is among the 'we'] have a lot of respect for the office of the president, and I have a new respect for him because he was sincere and he didn’t have to take the time to meet with us.”
Cindy Sheehan in 2005
It has been seven months since your ignorant and arrogant lack of planning for the peace murdered my oldest child. It has been two days since your dishonest campaign stole another election& but you all were way more subtle this time than in 2000, weren t you? You hardly had to get the Supreme Court of the United States involved at all this week…
“This is an immoral war based on a false premise. Iraq was never an imminent threat and the Downing Street Memo proves Bush went to war for oil, greed and all the wrong reasons.”
“All of Casey s commendations say that he was killed in the GWOT the Global War on Terrorism. I agree with most of GWOT, except that Casey was killed in the Global War Of Terrorism waged on the world and its own citizens by the biggest terrorist outfit in the world: George and his destructive Neo-con cabal.”
Last year, Mrs. Sheehan was a grieving mother, who lost a son fighting a war for which she had mixed feelings.
A year later, it appears that she’s been fully indoctrinated by Michael Moore, Code Pink wing of the Democratic Party.
One thing is painfully clear: her positions on the war and George Bush have dramatically changed. To deny that is to deny Cindy Sheehan’s own words.
They like beating up on uppity women like Mrs. Sheehan. It’s what they enjoy.
Quaker, as expected, you tend to focus on the points that are not in dispute to attempt to show that she has not changed her position in this matter. Nobody is questioning the fact that she has been and continues to be against the war.
This whole controversy is a manufactured PR stunt. It is only a “controversy” because the libs scream and cry trying to make it so. As you well know, President Bush has already met with this lady, and anything else which she is going to add is not going to change anything. Now that this has become an anti-war publicity ruse, it would be utterly fruitless, and incredibly stupid, to meet with her. Lose-lose for the President, and would give her a soapbox larger than deserved.
But, the left can continue to use this lady to further their ends.
I still gotta disagree.
George Bush said our soldiers died for “a noble cause.” Ms. Sheehan wants him to explain that noble cause.
If he was even marginally competent as a leader, the President could meet with her and give a plausible explanation. He won’t because he can’t.
Ms. Sheehan is correct. The rationale for this misadventure has changed many times. The President likes to use fine sounding phrases like “noble cause,” but when he’s asked to explain them, he’s got nothing.
Honestly, I don’t know if Ms. Sheehan is being “used” by anti-war groups or not. It seems to me she’s in Texas on her own decision. I don’t see any reason to doubt she believes what she says.
The losing proposition for the President isn’t meeting with Ms. Sheehan. The losing proposition is allowing Ms. Sheehan to continue to sit outside his ranch calling attention to his inability to articulate a reason our soldiers are in Iraq.
And you are leaving out the fact that they didn’t have a conversation the first time because it was a photo-op. Not to mention Bush didn’t know her son’s name. And refered to her as “mom” (A little campy when addressing a mother and her soldier son? I mean where is Bush’s etiquette?) While Bush is taking much needed vacation time for “The Struggle” that is his life, he remains a coward by not seeing Sheehan. Maybe Bush is to busy writing about his struggle…..hhmmm?
You keep leaving out the fact that he has already met with her.
The Con spin machine
–Person tells the truth about the administration
–Anonymous sources smear whistle blower in shlocky media like Drudge, CNS, Newsmax, Fox
–Mainstream media reports “questions have been raised” about truthteller
–Right wing pundits (No Facts, Insanity, Oxyrush) bloviate for weeks
–Truth is never addressed
Rinse, lather, repeat.
Because I keep thinking it doesn’t matter.
Ms. Sheehan gave up her son. She’s asking the President to give up a half hour of “clearing brush.” What’s his reason for refusing her? That she only gets one visit per dead son? That she’s not “entitled”?
Those aren’t reasons. They’re excuses.
This is no longer about her wanting to meet with the President, it is a PR stunt. She had her audience with the President, and at that time, according to her own words, chose to do what she thought he son would have wanted. Now, a year later, in the throes of a lib PR campaign, she is distorting the original meeting, and demanding to meet with him again. I can only speculate, but I doubt her motives are about seeking insight and revelation into her loss. This, by her own words, is now fueled by her anger.
Let’ try that again.
This is no longer about her wanting to meet with the President, it is a PR stunt.
Pot, meet kettle. If anyone knows about PR stunts, it would be the Cheerleader-In-Chief. I know, I know, maybe he wasn t responsible for that little Pentagon shindig planned, but to hear him tell it, that little MISSION ACCOMPLISHED stunt didn t meet with his approval, either.
I think that Cindy Sheehan is less interested in a PR stunt or insight into Bush’s “Noble Cause” then she is interested in stopping other Mothers having to go through the same nightmare that she is living. my .02 cents…
You’ve also hinted at what you think are the President’s reasons for refusing to meet with her: a lose-lose proposition?
In other words, meeting with this woman would not be to the President’s political advantage, yes? Kinda makes you wonder about the purpose of that meeting she already had, doesn’t it?
“This is no longer about her wanting to meet with the President, it is a PR stunt.”
Ghandi’s salt walk was just a PR stunt. The black sit-ins at cafes in the South and Rosa Parks were just PR stunts. But they were effective because they put the onus on the other side to “please explain why we cannot do this”, knowing full well that the explaination was baloney.
Cindy has the right to say whatever she wants, even if it is nothing but political point-scoring. She’s being smeared because her “please explain” clearly points out the administration’s lack of a coherent explaination for the war.
If O’Reilly and Drudge were around during the Civil Rights era, they would be screaming about “all the blacks causing a ruckus” and nit-picking minor inconsistencies in MLK’s speeches from one week to the next. And not once addressing the core problem.
I think Cindy is on an August PR stunt that beats Bush’s stunt. The brush-clearin’ and pickup-drivin’ is getting to be a tired old PR stunt. Maybe this ‘popular’ president will eventually meet with her, or, paraphrasing the Rude Pundit, maybe he just don’t give a sheeit.