Chronicle of a War Foretold
August 30, 2006 11:47 AM Subscribe
Lie by Lie. The first installment in Mother Jones' timeline of the Iraq War (Warning: big Flash file, with instructions).
Gee, based on the title, this can't possibly be biased in any way.
/sarcasm off
posted by tadellin at 12:00 PM on August 30, 2006
/sarcasm off
posted by tadellin at 12:00 PM on August 30, 2006
Exactly tadellin. It's incumbent upon Mother Jones to report on all those tons of WMD that were found in Iraq in order to remain fair and balanced.
posted by bardic at 12:02 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by bardic at 12:02 PM on August 30, 2006
Tadellin, sarcasm doesn't find WMDs. Truthiness finds WMDs.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 12:04 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 12:04 PM on August 30, 2006
sarcasm will win the war on terror.
posted by chunking express at 12:06 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by chunking express at 12:06 PM on August 30, 2006
And carter FTW.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 12:11 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 12:11 PM on August 30, 2006
The timeline looks to be well-research, with citations, but the presentation isn't that great. I'd prefer a larger size, and a DHTML/Ajax approach might work better than Flash in this case.
posted by kirkaracha at 12:22 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by kirkaracha at 12:22 PM on August 30, 2006
More baseless cynicism.
posted by tkchrist at 12:24 PM on August 30, 2006 [1 favorite]
posted by tkchrist at 12:24 PM on August 30, 2006 [1 favorite]
Facts have a well known liberal bias.
posted by lordrunningclam at 12:24 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by lordrunningclam at 12:24 PM on August 30, 2006
I think it works pretty well - there's an awful lot of data in there. But it's also a very tangled web. I think I'd like a printout as well.
posted by carter at 12:29 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by carter at 12:29 PM on August 30, 2006
I picked up this issue of Mother Jones at a friend's house and his four year old son pointed to the cover, which features Bush in full Strangelovian bomb-riding attire and said, "Do you know who that is?" I said, "Who?" He said, "That's George Bush. He's not very nice. He wants to control the world and everyone."
posted by NationalKato at 12:38 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by NationalKato at 12:38 PM on August 30, 2006
I hope your friend reported his son to the authorities. If he didn't, you should.
*looks meaningfully at NationalKato*
posted by languagehat at 12:40 PM on August 30, 2006
*looks meaningfully at NationalKato*
posted by languagehat at 12:40 PM on August 30, 2006
Beautiful resource.
Yeah, tadelin . . . real bias in those quotes from Bush and his lackeys. Care to show us any misquotes, errors, or biased statements in this? Otherwise, you can leave the sarcasm tag closed.
posted by fourcheesemac at 12:41 PM on August 30, 2006
Yeah, tadelin . . . real bias in those quotes from Bush and his lackeys. Care to show us any misquotes, errors, or biased statements in this? Otherwise, you can leave the sarcasm tag closed.
posted by fourcheesemac at 12:41 PM on August 30, 2006
Slight derail - Blazecock, I've already lost the etymology of "truthiness" - was it something Don Rumsfeld said or Colbert or was it from someone more or less reputable? I forget.
Anyway, the war on terror ain't working - I just about pissed myself recently (from terror, mind you) when a pack of feral dogs chased me around Fairmount Park on my bike. I kid you not!
posted by Mister_A at 12:49 PM on August 30, 2006
Anyway, the war on terror ain't working - I just about pissed myself recently (from terror, mind you) when a pack of feral dogs chased me around Fairmount Park on my bike. I kid you not!
posted by Mister_A at 12:49 PM on August 30, 2006
I wonder if they just have the straight database available for people to make a better presentation? The online presentation is nowhere near as bad as the print layout was, but it's still awful.
posted by arialblack at 12:58 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by arialblack at 12:58 PM on August 30, 2006
What were a pack of feral dogs doing on your bike?
posted by Marla Singer at 1:00 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by Marla Singer at 1:00 PM on August 30, 2006
It is not a lie if your holy lord and savior Jesus Christ wants you to say it.
posted by ND¢ at 1:01 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by ND¢ at 1:01 PM on August 30, 2006
Waitaminute. The Bush Administration lied to us??!?! NOW I'M PISSED!
posted by keswick at 1:02 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by keswick at 1:02 PM on August 30, 2006
Fyi, you can get a pretty good printout of the online article by buying the magazine. I got one, and while not as vivid as a 17-inch screen, the material it's made out of is ultralight and way portable -- I even took it into the bathroom. Technology rocks!
The article is well-researched, and only presents facts/quotes. Yes, how they're chosen and presented may indicate bias, but there are a helluva lotta facts here that are conveniently dropped from most histories of the war. I like how some are tagged in "this will come back to haunt someone/cause irony/expose a lie" crimson.
Plus, the cover's Dr. Strangelove photo-collage is a classic.
posted by turducken at 1:11 PM on August 30, 2006
The article is well-researched, and only presents facts/quotes. Yes, how they're chosen and presented may indicate bias, but there are a helluva lotta facts here that are conveniently dropped from most histories of the war. I like how some are tagged in "this will come back to haunt someone/cause irony/expose a lie" crimson.
Plus, the cover's Dr. Strangelove photo-collage is a classic.
posted by turducken at 1:11 PM on August 30, 2006
Gee, based on the title, this can't possibly be biased in any way.
/sarcasm off
posted by tadellin at 12:00 PM PST on August 30
I'm pretty fucking sick of people failing to read the post before spouting off bullshit.
posted by Optimus Chyme at 1:30 PM on August 30, 2006
/sarcasm off
posted by tadellin at 12:00 PM PST on August 30
I'm pretty fucking sick of people failing to read the post before spouting off bullshit.
posted by Optimus Chyme at 1:30 PM on August 30, 2006
I'm actually annoyed at MoJo for skipping a lot of details related to the 2000 election, and for stopping at 2003. Why release an unfinished piece of journalism to the public?
posted by Saucy Intruder at 2:22 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by Saucy Intruder at 2:22 PM on August 30, 2006
Facts have a well known liberal bias.
The faith-based community would probably agree.
Why release an unfinished piece of journalism to the public?
I tend to agree, actually - although they're hitting a lot of the high points in the MoJo presentation, I think that some of the additional context supplied by the 2000 election is missing.
However, I did find the MoJo presentation interesting - it's been a while since I've tried to mentally weave a whole cloth out of the events of the last few years (in part because it's just too damn painful) and so this was illuminating.
posted by FormlessOne at 2:57 PM on August 30, 2006
The faith-based community would probably agree.
Why release an unfinished piece of journalism to the public?
I tend to agree, actually - although they're hitting a lot of the high points in the MoJo presentation, I think that some of the additional context supplied by the 2000 election is missing.
However, I did find the MoJo presentation interesting - it's been a while since I've tried to mentally weave a whole cloth out of the events of the last few years (in part because it's just too damn painful) and so this was illuminating.
posted by FormlessOne at 2:57 PM on August 30, 2006
Perhaps slightly relevant, from Romenesko: "Mother Jones doesn't get much buzz because it's based in SF":
"In New York, the media is a bunch of reflecting mirrors," says former Mother Jones editor Deirdre English. "A story in the New York Observer will be commented upon in five other publications. Mother Jones can do something huge and media doesn't comment."
posted by mediareport at 3:49 PM on August 30, 2006
"In New York, the media is a bunch of reflecting mirrors," says former Mother Jones editor Deirdre English. "A story in the New York Observer will be commented upon in five other publications. Mother Jones can do something huge and media doesn't comment."
posted by mediareport at 3:49 PM on August 30, 2006
You WHAT? They lied about the war!?
Why didn't someone tell me sooner!?!?!?!?
posted by reklaw at 4:08 PM on August 30, 2006
Why didn't someone tell me sooner!?!?!?!?
posted by reklaw at 4:08 PM on August 30, 2006
Is there a federal publication, on a .gov site, that in clear and unambiguous terms, says, "Umm ... yeah, we didn't find anything"?
I ask because I'd like to point it out to the warmongering fools I know who swear that Fox News has the courage to tell the truth - that WMD were found. If I could just say, "Dude, your own government says they couldn't find anything," that'd be a huge help.
posted by adipocere at 4:33 PM on August 30, 2006
I ask because I'd like to point it out to the warmongering fools I know who swear that Fox News has the courage to tell the truth - that WMD were found. If I could just say, "Dude, your own government says they couldn't find anything," that'd be a huge help.
posted by adipocere at 4:33 PM on August 30, 2006
I'm pretty sick of you.
posted by keswick at 2:07 PM PST on August 30
I don't blame you. It must have been tough to become so irrelevant so quickly. Curse you, 11/18/04!
posted by Optimus Chyme at 5:11 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by keswick at 2:07 PM PST on August 30
I don't blame you. It must have been tough to become so irrelevant so quickly. Curse you, 11/18/04!
posted by Optimus Chyme at 5:11 PM on August 30, 2006
From the horse's ass to your ears: (scroll down to near the bottom)
Now, look, part of the reason we went into Iraq was -- the main reason we went into Iraq at the time was we thought he had weapons of mass destruction. It turns out he didn't, but he had the capacity to make weapons of mass destruction. But I also talked about the human suffering in Iraq, and I also talked the need to advance a freedom agenda. And so my question -- my answer to your question is, is that, imagine a world in which Saddam Hussein was there, stirring up even more trouble in a part of the world that had so much resentment and so much hatred that people came and killed 3,000 of our citizens.
posted by Saucy Intruder at 5:52 PM on August 30, 2006
Now, look, part of the reason we went into Iraq was -- the main reason we went into Iraq at the time was we thought he had weapons of mass destruction. It turns out he didn't, but he had the capacity to make weapons of mass destruction. But I also talked about the human suffering in Iraq, and I also talked the need to advance a freedom agenda. And so my question -- my answer to your question is, is that, imagine a world in which Saddam Hussein was there, stirring up even more trouble in a part of the world that had so much resentment and so much hatred that people came and killed 3,000 of our citizens.
posted by Saucy Intruder at 5:52 PM on August 30, 2006
MoJo forgot to mention that we told Saddam Hussein that we had no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts, like their border disagreement with Kuwait, on July 25, 1990.
posted by owhydididoit at 7:18 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by owhydididoit at 7:18 PM on August 30, 2006
Don't get me wrong, I really like it, I was just surprised not to see them mention that wee misrepresentation. Maybe they left it out because the lie wasn't told to Americans.
posted by owhydididoit at 7:21 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by owhydididoit at 7:21 PM on August 30, 2006
the icon for "expanded executive powers" looks suspiciously goatsecxy. I wonder if that was on a purpose!
posted by mcsweetie at 8:45 PM on August 30, 2006
posted by mcsweetie at 8:45 PM on August 30, 2006
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posted by zenzizi at 11:58 AM on August 30, 2006