Donald Rumsfeld: Still There
Remember Donald Rumsfeld? He seems like a bad dream. And yet here he is, popping up in Washington to talk about how the U.S. needs a Ministry of Propaganda. Here’s what he told Sharon Weinberger of Wired’s Danger Room:
We need someone in the United States government, some entity, not like the old USIA . . . I think this agency, a new agency has to be something that would take advantage of the wonderful opportunities that exist today. There are multiple channels for information . . . The Internet is there, pods are there, talk radio is there, e-mails are there. There are all kinds of opportunities. We do not with any systematic organized way attempt to engage the battle of ideas and talk about the idea of beheading, and what’s it’s about and what it means. And talk about the fact that people are killing more Muslims than they are non-Muslims, these extremists. They’re doing it with suicide bombs and the like. We need to engage and not simply be passive and allow that battle of competition of ideas.
Uh, yeah. First, let’s just note that Rumsfeld has always preferred the idea of technology to actually, you know, learning about technology. "Pods are there"? Does he mean iPods? Podcasts? And to mention "talk radio" in the same breath as e-mail or these mysterious pods—what in the world is this septuagenarian talking about? Rumsfeld probably just learned how to program his VCR.
Second, when Rumsfeld tried a version of this in miniature in Iraq, his actual fix was comically stupid. The Pentagon hired the Lincoln Group to pull off a propaganda campaign designed at discrediting the insurgency. It amounted to planting fake news stories in the Iraqi press written by soldiers that said things like the insurgents "crawled on their bellies like dogs in the mud." For this, the Pentagon spent more than $25 million and arguably broke the law.
Finally, Rumsfeld manage to be the first secretary of defense in history not just to botch two wars, but to botch two wars simultaneously. For that, no one should ever listen to this man ever again. Whatever he says is discredited by the sheer fact that he’s the one saying it. He should be legally obligated to end of all his sentences with, "...but, on the other hand, I’m a total jackass."
Comments:
Posted 01/23/2008 06:52pm with
“Rumsfeld has always preferred the idea of technology to actually, you know, learning about technology.”
Definitely. My former co-worker Eric Miller found out in 2004 that Rumsfeld didn’t even use email: http://pogoblog.typepad.com/pogo/2004/12/noinformation_w.…
Posted 01/24/2008 08:14pm with
The statement, “whatever he says is discredited by the sheer fact that he’s the one saying it” is a repugnant logical fallacy (ad hominem). Shame on you. Hypocrite.
Posted 01/25/2008 09:32am with
Spencer,
Thank you for pointing out how incredibly full of hot air Mr. Rumsfeld is, was, and always will be. Just because he’s been out of power for a couple of years doesn’t mean his ideas have aged well.
“Pods are there” indeed.
Posted 01/25/2008 11:20am with
well i think the reason Rummy doesn’t use email is because he knows how long term messages can be and that is dangerous to his position. It is not related to knowledge of technology, so becareful of that leap.
Sun Tzu said that ‘all war is based on deception’ so all of this is just a part of normal war time thinking…as wrong as it may be.
Our only hope is that we the people come together and change those ways.
Posted 02/02/2008 12:13am with
Jack, Rummy has no position. He is all imposition. And those pods are his vision of something like pods of Orca Whales. Call them Pods of Propagandists. I can see them now, swimming in the sea of citizens, spreading the virus rummus alcoholicus throughout the nation.