None of you seem to mind my obsession with Ambergate, so I’m going to give it one more whack. Ambinder wrote:
And yet — we, too, weren’t privy to the intelligence. Information asymmetry is always going to exist, and, living as we do in a Democratic system, most journalists are going to give the government the benefit of some doubt, even having learned lessons about giving the government that benefit.
Talk to anyone who’s handled raw intelligence and s/he will tell you something on the order of this: “I thought it would be like a secret newspaper, but instead what’s already available in open-source materials is often more useful.” Rarely is there ever a clear policy option “implied” by intelligence — that’s a category error. Policymakers read intelligence, use it or discount it in whole or in part, and then make decisions. Intelligence is a text to be interpreted, not a compass pointing to true north. What’s more, those who acquire and analyze intelligence on a discrete subject use the same body of open-source information to shape their judgments as the rest of us do.
Which implies choices for journalists. We can choose to treat intelligence as more definitive than it is and enable the presumption of deference to those who say, Well, if only you saw the intelligence I saw… Or we can choose to treat intelligence-based claims as valuable but not definitive, and contextualize such claims within larger bodies of evidence.
In other words, “we weren’t privy to the intelligence” is the new “no one could have predicted”.
This shit never changes. Governments like to bamboozle people. One way they can do this is by claiming there is top secret intelligence proving whatever it is that they people to believe. In Ambinder’s world, even if this stop secret intelligence turns out not to mean what the government said it meant, we were still wrong to question it.
How is that not contrary to the first principles of journalism?
Update. Speaking of Marc Ambinder, this analysis of Fran Townsend’s remarks in an interview with Ambinder is spot on (from Michael Scherer, of all people):
In an interview with Marc Ambinder, Fran Townsend, a former Homeland Security adviser to Bush, says that the White House provided the language to Ridge only because he previewed his speech internally. “So I called him said, here’s what I think should go in it,” Townsend tells Ambinder. “It wasn’t an order. I didn’t regularly see his speeches in advance. He made speeches all the time without running it by us.” This is less of a denial than a startling admission: Townsend, whose job profile had nothing to do with politics, is admitting that she wanted political language praising the President inserted into an election-year statement about new measures to protect against terrorist attack.
Scherer’s whole piece, based on an advance copy of the book, is worth reading.
Neal
I wonder if TNC asks himself on a daily basis what he’s still doing over there.
Leo
OT: Anyone here seen the trailer for a movie called “Law-Abiding Citizen”?
Based on the trailer alone, I think it may be the most transparent appeal to right wing fantasy life in the history of Hollywood. It’s like Rambo, Dirty Harry, and Saw all mixed together with a bunch of added craziness stacked on top.
I can’t even count the right wing tropes in just the 2:30 minute trailer. Ugh.
Third Eye Open
You’re looking at it from a policy perspective, or what is know as wonkishness.
When you leave those ‘quaint’ notions of objective reality alone, and embrace an us-vs-them persona, you can see that just because the DFH were right, doesn’t mean they were right for the correct reasons. So Carpe-Carnim, my son!
Hunter Gathers
Shorter Ambinder – Because the Daddy Administration told me to. I can haz ‘safety’ and tax cutz? I love you Daddy!
Will
The only thing I am able to take away from the Ambinder controversy is that because of it, I have read his posts for the first time since November. I imagine I’m not the only one returning to his blog to follow this crap since the election ended, based on third-party links.
So maybe he’s intentionally prolonging this with these stupid, provocative retorts on this issue. The “controversy” is helping his site traffic.
va
Forget journalism, it’s contrary to the first principles of the Enlightenment.
Ambinder: the most objective people are the ones who know nothing.
DougJ
Based on the trailer alone, I think it may be the most transparent appeal to right wing fantasy life in the history of Hollywood. It’s like Rambo, Dirty Harry, and Saw all mixed together with a bunch of added craziness stacked on top.
Interesting.
MoeLarryAndJesus
Please stop using the “Ambers” or “Ambergate” terms. These are benign nicknames for a malignant apparatchik. Don’t help cute up the feeb’s image by using the term his friends use.
Is it just me or does he remind anyone else of the Peter Pettigrew rat-bastard from the Harry Potter movies?
El Cid
Well, the Founding Fathers fully hoped that one day American citizens and journalists would make sure and trust the government whenever it said it had to do some controversial policy based on secret information they couldn’t see. It was pretty much their core notion of democracy that citizens shut up and realize that the government just can’t tell you everything, so, you know, just fucking let them do their stuff.
Keith G
Ackerman is simply saying what was being said by a few experts that I heard in 02 and 03. Back when some of us were saying, “Whoa, sumpin aint addin up.”
Corner Stone
@Leo: I’m curious to hear more about the Saw=Winger Nonsense?
Self reliance? Eliminating potential societal bloodsuckers?
Corner Stone
@MoeLarryAndJesus:
If only this POS would smile and wave as he taps his head with the wand and turn back into a damn rat. I’d forgo justice against his kind if he’d just fucking leave the social discourse.
Corner Stone
@El Cid: Actually, I’m pretty sure they *had* to depose that one democratically elected dude in that one country that one time. The NYT told me it was all good anyway. What’s with all the ruckus?
Corner Stone
@Corner Stone: Damn it, I screwed that one up. It was supposed to be, “What’s the rumpus?” from the fucking classic Miller’s Crossing.
If you haven’t seen it, Netflix it now. You’ll thank me later.
El Cid
@Corner Stone: Don’t worry your little head about it. The government will take care of it all, as long as it’s being run by good patriot American conservatives.
Jack T.
@ Neal:
If he doesn’t ask himself, I’d like to ask him.
Ash Can
So are we to assume, from what these guys themselves have written, that people like Ambinder and Ackerman, for all their scholarly-sounding dissertation, basically just fell off the back of the turnip truck? That these supposed journalists are too awestruck in the face of governmental power to question what they’re told? Cripes, what amateurs.
Corner Stone
@El Cid: Well, that’s a relief I can tell you that.
For a second there I thought I was going to have to decide if our President *knew* about the arms sales or was ignorant of them – and which scenario was worse. Now I just have to worry whether or not Paula Abdul’s coming back for another season as judge! Yay!
trizzlor
A bit off topic, but this thread reminds me a lot of the excellent recent British comedy In The Loop which parodies the run-up to the Iraq war and all of the bullshit theatrics associated with it including hiding committees behind boring names, selectively leaking and re-leaking classified documents, and scheduling votes based on when news hits the press. It’s a pretty fascinating look into how “information is power” has become “influence is power” once the underlying information can mean anything.
Corner Stone
@Corner Stone: Oh, and you could’ve said “don’t worry your *pretty* little head about it”. I would’ve been happy with that.
Corner Stone
@Ash Can: Um, Ackerman too? As in, “also”?
Jason Bylinowski
Just a little encouragement to DougJ: I like that you won’t let this go. Ambinder is an equivocator from word “go”. I’m not hating on Ambinder – actually I think he (sometimes) has a real knack for getting into the heads of the pols he writes about. There have been a few times when I’ve admired his sort of detached amusement of the whole scene. His biggest mistake is thinking that he can take that skill and turn it towards te man on the street. Actually, that’s where most journos screw up, because more often than not they unintentionally insult the regular joes out there like me.
But that faint praise aside, skewer him. He’s a big boy, he can take it. Besides, if he learned his lessons from Halperin like I figure he must have, all this is like water off a duck’s back to him. The real value of your commentary is that it serves as an eye-opener to his readers. That also is what really draws me to blogging in general, as it is more or less a constant stream of criticism from all sides regarding all issues. (This is also why it is important to me to try to occasionally look into rightie blogs as well, because a little criticism never hurt anybody. )
Good job though, man, seriously.
And with that, I’m probably gonna relurk for awhile, as I’m all laid-up from an entire 12 hour day of working on my truck – anybody ever try to change an EGR valve on a Ford Expedition? Good God what a clusterfuck that was.
Ash Can
@Corner Stone: Mea culpa; I misinterpreted Ackerman and shouldn’t have jumped on him. I should probably go to bed.
JK
Don’t Worry About the Government – Talking Heads
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwvxWQP9Bxc
Marc Ambinder – useful idiot for advancing Republican talking points.
Corner Stone
@JK: There’s a suspicious lack of the word “fuck” in this post.
You trying to tell us something?
stickler
The job of journalism is to act as stenographers to power. Wasn’t that clear before? Those men with the power, they must have our best interests at heart, right? So the job of the journalist is to make their day easier.
Fear not, citizen! The Journalist stands eternally vigilant, to uphold the will of the State!
CathiefromCanada
I think it was Fran Townsend who made what I consider to be one of the most remarkable statements of the Bush administration. She was chattering on TV one day about listing all the successes of the Bush Administration and she included the capture of Osama Bin Laden — which she categorized as “a success which hasn’t happened yet.”
JK
@Corner Stone:
When are you having your Balloon Juice Beer Summit with General Winfield Stuck?
Watching Mad Men, Rescue Me, and Breaking Bad has momentairly lowered my level of piss and vinegar brought on by longtime unemployment and the creeping stupidity oozing from the MSM and the blogosphere.
JK
@CathiefromCanada:
Would be truly amazing if the miracle of miracles happened and Bin Laden and Zawahiri were actually captured or killed during Obama’s first term.
Not only would it be justice served, but the thrill of seeing assholes like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Michelle Malkin, and Sean Hannity struck dumb would be priceless.
Mike P
What’s interesting is that since he’s taken a bit of a beating, he’s done a bit better, both w/the Townsend interview and with this bit about the Politico trying to push the Failed Obama Presidency meme. I think most people here will get a kick out of the actual Politico piece.
The message to us: keep whipping the journalists asses enough so that they do their damn jobs.
ItAintEazy
@Corner Stone & Ashcan
Nope, you two are unfortunately right. During Spackerman’s The New Republican days, he was a true-believing, bed-wetting, kool-aid drinker leading up to the Eye-Rack war like any other moran and Serious Person.
Only when it was obvious to those with more than 2 brain cells to rub together that Saddam had no weaponsofmassdestruction and was actually keeping a lid on a powderkeg did he recant and start his famous “Iraq’d” blog at the TNR website that was heavily critical of the war, which for obvious reasons can’t be found anymore thanks to the neocon fuckholes that kicked him out later on.
Mike P
Oops, nevermind…I see that the Scherer wrote something I attributed to Ambinder.
JK
@Ash Can: @ItAintEazy:
The Washington Press Corps are the greatest collection of bed wetters and nail biters ever assembled.
I’ve seen and heard many accounts describing how paralyzed with fear many White House correspondents became following the 9/11 attacks. There was one account of NYT writer Cheyl Stollberg scared shitless when she was called upon by Bush during one of the last press conferences leading up to the Iraq war.
Anne Laurie
@Neal:
I imagine him shaking his head and repeating after the late, much-lamented Steve Gilliard: “You white people — are you crazy, or just stupid? No? Well, then, you must be evil.”
To be fair, the Atlantic still pays James Fallows to blog, and Fallows was “prematurely correct” about Iraq, even in the print edition.
Corner Stone
@JK: I’m pretty sure you mean Sheryl “Gay” Stolberg.
And I only nitpick you here because the “gay” part es muy importante. Teh gay makes all the difference.
ItAintEazy
@JK
I guess I was being too hard on Spackerman. I mean, yes he was a mincing bedwetter back when the Bushevikis were lying about Eye-rack, nut unlike those half-wits Ambinder and Stollberg, he actually learned from his mistakes and has become better for it.
It’s not the fact that they made mistakes in the first place that’s maddening, it’s their see-no-evil asscovering and dick-in-the-mouth lecturing of those who were fucking right in the first place that that makes me want to superglue their rectums and force-feed them laxatives.
Warren Terra
The Townshend quote, with its inadvertent revelation, reminds me of the rules imposed on that climate scientist (Hanson, iirc?) by the Bushie political appointees, which not only censored content of official written reports (must have more creationism and less global warming) but also required that his public speeches must be fully scripted, pre-approved by the appratchiks – and, most critically and most relevantly, must contain at least one complementary reference to the guidance or accomplishments of George W Bush, by name, per page.
And the wingers accuse the Democrats of looking for inspiration to Stalin, or the Obama supporters of quasi-religious belief in their President.
RE Ackerman, as said above, he was wrong on Iraq for the classic reason that he bought the BS of people purporting to be better-informed. He wised up fairly early and very comprehensively and openly reconsidered how he got bamboozled at some considerable length. And he went against the war back when the careerist thing to do was clearly to keep on banging on with Democracy Promotion and believing things would improve in the next Friedman Unit.
Also, as there was praise upthread for the British Iraq Warmongering Comedy In The Loop, it’s relevant to point out that Ackerman was a consultant to the film, hooking its creators up with intelligence analysts and policy professionals and explaining how they combined to distort reality and mislead, among others, himself.
JK
@Corner Stone:
You’re right. I wasn’t sure about the spelling
Loneoak
I’ve always thought it was beside the point that the “intelligence” used to lie us into to Iraq was “wrong”. In what universe would Iraq’s possession of WMDs be a solid reason for invasion, from a moral or national security perspective? It was an immoral and fucking stupid idea from the beginning, regardless of the reasons presented at the time. The “I believed the government’s intelligence” excuse therefore fails–it learns the wrong lessons.
I thus find it hard to get in a huff about Ambersgate because trust in government is secondary to having the basic moral and intellectual compass that tells you how to use either knowledge or skepticism.
bob h
How do Ambinder, Townsend, et. al. explain the terror alert that was declared the day after Ned Lamont beat Joe Lieberman in the Dem primary in 2006? Snarled airports, stranded travelers, based on premature disclosure of vague British Muslim plans to hijack passenger aircraft?
Svensker
@Loneoak:
Yes. My husband and I thought that Saddam had some low level WMD (assumed chemical) but figured he was absolutely no threat to the U.S. at all. He was a nasty little fuck, but self preservation was a big deal for him — no way he would have voluntarily taken on the U.S. military.
WMDs were just waved around as a big scary booga booga, to get the country to agree to war. Dick and Dubya WANTED to find them, for justification, but it was strictly a cover.
Some right wing fucktard admitted to me the other day that going into Iraq was not warranted but he said, “at least Saddam isn’t paying anti-Israeli terrorists anymore, so that’s a good thing.” Yeah, 5000 Americans dead and thousands wounded, somewhere between 100,000 and 500,000 Iraqis dead and thousands wounded, trillions of dollars poured down a rat hole, priceless archeological treasures destroyed — not to mention the Iraqi library with its priceless untranslated manuscripts — and this little fuck justifies it now that Saddam’s not giving $25K to the families of suicide bombers anymore. Yeah, that was worth it.
Fuck Bush, fuck Ambinder, fuck them all.
Scott
For some reason, reporters seem to be getting unveiled as infinite douchebags lately. The most recent, in an utterly brilliant and near-fatal takedown by aimai, is Joe Klein.
T. O'Hara
Is this really about a political appointee saying something nice about the president who appointed him in the months before an election? Coming from the same crew who use the word “treason” for saying something against their president’s plan? Hypocrisy, much?
jwb
It’s also odd that these people who will take such intelligence on faith are the same ones who will claim that government can’t do anything right.
Jason
It’s an excellent apology for brochure-writing, though. That Ambinder’ll be the net’s Peggy Noonan. I’m surprised Presidents even bother with speechwriters anymore.
JGabriel
@MoeLarryAndJesus:
I agree with MoeLarryandJesus: You really can’t have Ambinder without the bind.
.
JGabriel
Warren Terra:
You have to understand the Conservative mindset to get why they would think that. Herewith, a little illustrative play that may explain it all for you:
Sane person: (Criticism of some random wingnut outrageousness)
Wingut: But the Democrats do it too!
Sane person: No, Stalin did it. Nazis did it.
Wingnut: Same thing!
In other words, anything that Stalin or the Nazis did is justified for the GOP to do, because Stalin and Hitler were Democrats, and the GOP can’t be criticized for anything the Democrats do too, because the Democrats doing it would would be worse.
.
RSA
I think that if it were someone else besides Ambinder making that statement, he’d have a point. Ackerman’s right, too, but they’re talking past each other to some extent. I actually have talked with people who handle raw intelligence, and even if it comes from public information, it’s not always obvious what’s there. A lot of it is detecting patterns and relationships that don’t jump out at you: a sequence of events in different cities, a meeting between two people in some unexpected context, a series of financial transactions all distantly related to a single person, and so forth. Anyone can see the pattern, maybe, but only after it’s been pointed out. That’s a reasonable interpretation of an information asymmetry that exists; your average journalist doesn’t have access to those interpretations, which are produced by experts. And contra Ackerman, I think that even if a single policy option isn’t indicated, intelligence can narrow the choices a lot.
crack
According to Scherer’s quote all Ashcroft did was urge an increase in the treat level. Who doesn’t want more treats?
gVOR08
The only thing interesting about Ridge’s claim of political pressure is the claim that a Bush appointee had to be told to apply political criteria to his actions. Or at least it would be interesting if one believed Ridge.
asiangrrlMN
Here’s the thing. I knew most of what W. was saying was bullshit as he was saying it because I actually followed the reports and such that came out at the time. It didn’t take a great deal of effort to see that it was just a load of crap. In addition, there were many bloggers in the lefty blogosphere who were faithfully documenting the lies at the time. So, if Ambinder couldn’t find the information, then he fucking wasn’t trying.
bago
Joe Klien is getting hammered by commenteres such as plukasiak and their like. I don’t think Klein is savvy enough to know their tropes.
I call for some WARBLOGGING! Follow these trolls to the ends of the internets and mock them near and far.