Shame on Bush — and Us

by Rosa Brooks
from LA Times

THE MEDIA’S Stockholm syndrome finally seems to be wearing off.

Like freed hostages who gradually cease to identify with their captors, mainstream media outlets seem to have been seized by a new spirit of liberation in their coverage of the Bush administration. Lately, we’ve seen a rash of astonished, outraged stories and editorials relating to the administration’s recently discovered malfeasance.

They go something like this:

• President Bush commuted “Scooter” Libby’s prison sentence! That’s outrageous! Bush’s own Justice Department routinely calls for some of the harshest sentences available under the federal sentencing guidelines! Why, Bush is a hypocrite!
• Bush is ignoring his constitutional duties! As the New York Times ponderously opined two weeks ago: “President Bush is notorious for issuing statements taking exception to hundreds of bills as he signs them. This week, we learned that in a shocking number of cases, the Bush administration has refused to enact those laws….” Why, the executive branch doesn’t even pretend to execute laws it doesn’t like!
• And, hey, this whole time, Dick Cheney’s been completely off the reservation! The guy kept everyone out of the loop, including the Cabinet, as a recent Washington Post series meticulously documented. When senior administration officials learned - belatedly - of Cheney’s machinations on military commissions, Guantanamo and interrogation tactics, many of them considered the vice president’s positions unjustified, outrageous, even dangerous. Why, much of the time, virtually no one seems to have supported the controversial positions Cheney took, except for Cheney himself, a handful of dedicated acolytes and the clueless president (who was allowed to be “the decider” only as long as Cheney rigged the options in advance).

The new media message is righteous and clear: Administration officials tricked us - all of us! They assured us that everything they did was legal … necessary … for our own good … but now we see that they were lying!

(Continued here.)