The New Republic taken in again?

Great Debates
81

No, it wasn’t.

My grandmother used to live in a fairly sleazy part of town. One of the businesses about a half block from her apartment was a dirty bookstore, owned by someone with (apparently) a sense of humor.

Outside his store was a large, hand-lettered sign -**

IF YOU CAN’T READ, I GOT PICTURES. **

Leave aside the obvious problems of written communication with illiterates, and contrast his situation with mine.

He was at least trying to communicate with those who didn’t understand his message by using a different medium. Unlike him, I can’t do that with you, ElvisL1ves. No matter how carefully I explain things, you don’t seem to get it.

So I am different from the dirty bookstore owner. If you can’t, or won’t, read, I can’t draw you a picture.

Sorry about that.

Regards,
Shodan

82

So you *can’t * make yourself admit what is obvious to everyone else? You won’t accept even the most basic responsibility for what you say and do? That’s what makes you “usual”, you know.

You don’t fucking *have * a message, unless it’s “I think all Democrats suck and I don’t need a reason”. Don’t pretend to have anything more to say unless you actually say it.

83

[QUOTE=Shodan]
Kerry…was clearly lying about what he was doing at least some of the time)
[/QUOTE]
I should point out that you are basing this assertion not on a news account, but on some wingnut’s op-ed.

84

A discussion that, by contrast, was actually researched and analyzed.

85

Latest reason to be disgusted with The New Republic: they’ve hired a guy whose previous main claim to fame was a book-length screed essentially claiming that the Catholic Church’s pedophile-priest scandal was manufactured by various people with something to gain from blowing a few incidents out of proportion.

Like I said at the top, I’ve got no motivation to defend TNR. The quicker that rag goes out of business, the sooner nobody will be able to say “even the liberal New Republic says [insert right-wing talking point here].”

This of course has no bearing on Beauchamp’s honesty. Just making the point that this ain’t no knee-jerk defense of TNR. Fuck 'em.

86

I’m bumping this thread because of the recent developments concerning the Drudge release of documents demonstrating pretty conclusively (to me, at least) that the editors of The New Republic haven’t been able to stand behind this story since early September at the very latest.

Now, the release of these documents has been strange as well - first appearing on Drudge, then being removed from the front page. Additionally, Jonathan Chait apparently is disputing Drudge’s description of the contents.

Be that as it may, my take on them is that TNR can no longer substantiate any of these stories, haven’t been able to for some time, and the time for a lengthy correction and explanation is way overdue.

National Review is still linking the documents - so I’ll use their links to the originals. They are long PDFs, so be warned.

One.
Two.
Three.

I’ll comment on specific points of this tomorrow, promise.

87

Damn.

I was going to post this with the title:

Dagger Brigade Flat Ass Rules – TNR & Scott Beauchamp
Link 3 posted by Mr. Moto has the findings and recommendations which include:

A whole lot of other stuff was also found to be fabricated including the supposed mocking of a disfigured woman, a soldier wearing a piece of human skull on his head, running over stray dogs with a Bradley, and the like.

Investigating officer Major John D. Cross also recommended that the unit re-publish the Dagger Brigade Flat Ass Rules. However, I have not been able to find out what those are.

From the conference call transcript in the first two links it seems clear that TNR Editor Foer practically pleads with Beauchamp not to recant his stories and the other impression I get is that Beauchamp just wants to walk away from the whole mess.

The only recent response I could find from Foer to this leak is at the Observer.

Observer

After reading the transcripts and the army’s official findings I can’t understand why The New Republic insists on standing firm on this issue. They cannot still be in a position to be worried about their credibility.

88

For the sake of conjecture, lets assume the utter worst about Beauchamp. Lets just say he made it all up, every word, jot and tittle. What of it? Well, what we make of it, of course. That’s where things get grey.

Is TNR’s credibility in threat? Well, clutch my pearls and swoon! Who cares? Credibility is a pretty raggedy-ass thing these days. Set a metric. The falsehoods (presumed) of TNR against the blind credulity of the New York Times solemn horseshit about WMD? A Beauchamp would be maybe a thousandth part of the wretched Judith Miller (a milli-miller?)

But the larger “message”? If we are only discussing the problems of a liberal excercise in verbal buzzkill, it ain’t much. So if this so dreadfully important, it must signify something larger, something important, a lesson to be taken to heart.

The Great Gasbag has a lesson for you, a moral to the foible. A dishonest and unworthy soldier told some lies. About soldiers misbehaving. He told those stories to denigrate our heroes and thier Commander. It therefore naturally follows that stories about such mishavior are suspect and thier sources likely harbor malign and unpatriotic motives. In the darkness of their hearts, they crave to see America humiliated etc. etc.

Do you have to be over 50 to really get the *deja voodoo * of all this? Like through a glass sickly, the words take shape, down the years…“We would have won der var in Irak but der liberal-sheisskopfs der backenstabben…”

89

I hear you through a glass darkly elucidator.

The Iraq-WMD-Bush-chimphitler-Cheney-Halliburton-achtung thingy is more important than the TNR-Beauchamp thingy.

Gottit.

90

So a transcript of a conversation with the guy’s superior in the room reveals that he will not talk further about the matter, but does not deny anything, and interviews with other soldiers reveal that when they did find human remains they were buried “with as much dignity as possible,” and that nobody ever swerved to hit a dog “because that would greatly increase the level of unnecessary risk.”

I’m frankly unsurprised that nobody stepped forward to say, “Yeah, we did this stuff.”

I also find the stuff of “Shock Troops” to be pretty much the opposite of shocking. I mean, does anybody believe that there was never a soldier who would make fun of a disfigured person? Show cruelty to animals? Mess around with a found skull? The things that we know some individual soliders have done make these things pale in comparison.

There’s people in every town in America who would do any of those things every day, and who haven’t spent years seeing awful, cruel, disgusting and dehumanizing things on a regular basis.

I know it goes against some people’s dewey-eyed glorification of American soldiers to think that this might be so, but the truth is that these are just regular guys exposed to very extreme circumstances.

91

[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
i]National Review* is still linking the documents - so I’ll use their links to the originals. They are long PDFs, so be warned.

One.
Two.
Three.

I’ll comment on specific points of this tomorrow, promise.
[/QUOTE]
I’m glad to hear it. Because, as always, I have no interest in going through the PDFs to guess what your argument might be, then rebut my guess.

I’ll look forward to hearing what you have to say, then demolishing it as usual. :slight_smile:

[QUOTE=Aquila Be]
A whole lot of other stuff was also found to be fabricated including the supposed mocking of a disfigured woman, a soldier wearing a piece of human skull on his head, running over stray dogs with a Bradley, and the like.

Investigating officer Major John D. Cross also recommended that the unit re-publish the Dagger Brigade Flat Ass Rules. However, I have not been able to find out what those are.

From the conference call transcript in the first two links it seems clear that TNR Editor Foer practically pleads with Beauchamp not to recant his stories and the other impression I get is that Beauchamp just wants to walk away from the whole mess.
[/quote]
I find it hard to be surprised that an institution with plenty of incentive to cover its own ass, and near-total control over the lives of the witnesses, would be able to ‘prove’ that Beauchamp’s allegations were false.

And after his being held incommunicado for about a month, and probably either being browbeaten or in solitary the whole time, I can understand why Beauchamp would want to just walk away from the whole deal.

At this point, I’d believe the military on the subject if and only if they gave Beauchamp and all the witnesses to his story an honorable discharge, so that they could corroborate or contradict Beauchamp’s story without fear of reprisal.

And since Beauchamp was supervised while he spoke, my sentiment is that in the transcript, we’re hearing the words his minders wanted him to say, rather than what he might have said freely.

I have zero respect for The New Republic, but in their position, I’d stand firm too.

92

Well, let me ask you something, Hentor.

If someone tells you a story, and you don’t know the person and so can’t judge his character, do you automatically believe that story or do you bounce it against facts you already know to judge its credibility?

How about if the person is talking about things you have no experience or knowledge of? Do you ask for corroboration or seek it yourself?

If the story has elements in it that are false or exaggerated, does that cast doubt on the rest?

In this particular case, I think the articles in question contained a number of falsehoods, secondhand stories, and battlefield urban legends. And since none of this can be corroborated at all, The New Republic has the responsibility now to do some reporting in a big hurry to corroborate this. If they can’t, and I don’t think for a second they can, the articles should be retracted.

Anyway, I wish to point out a couple of passages:

Remember what I said above about the jobs of a journalist and a soldier not being compatible? Looks like Pvt. Beauchamp has learned this lesson pretty well. I’m happy he got his priorities straight, and I hope the rest of his military career goes well.

Also in the first document, Franklin Foer begs Beauchamp not to talk to any other news outlets (particularly the Washington Post and Newsweek) so that they could control the story of the investigation and the story reversals. Beauchamp’s squad leader agrees that this seems fair, as their reputation was the one in jeopardy.

Yet that conversation was in early September. We’re now closing in on November and TNR has said nothing. If they asked Beauchamp not to talk so that they could control this disclosure, they abused this courtesy by disclosing nothing.

Because of this, I think editorial changes ought to be made at TNR, especially since this sort of thing damaged the reputation of the magazine in the past.

93

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
At this point, I’d believe the military on the subject if and only if they gave Beauchamp and all the witnesses to his story an honorable discharge, so that they could corroborate or contradict Beauchamp’s story without fear of reprisal.

And since Beauchamp was supervised while he spoke, my sentiment is that in the transcript, we’re hearing the words his minders wanted him to say, rather than what he might have said freely.
[/QUOTE]

That’s not the point, though. The point is whether the articles can be verified. And they can’t

All of your points may be fair ones, but they ought to be made by TNR in their retraction when they say they can’t corroborate these stories.

94

[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
That’s not the point, though. The point is whether the articles can be verified. And they can’t.
[/QUOTE]

Actually, to be fair, I should state that Foer claims to have corroborated these stories through independent interviews with other soldiers. However, that statement is directly at odds with the Army investigation, so he ought to provide as much proof as he can of this. As of now, of course, we just have his assurance that all is well.

I think we all agree that more than that is needed.

95

[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
Well, let me ask you something, Hentor.

If someone tells you a story, and you don’t know the person and so can’t judge his character, do you automatically believe that story or do you bounce it against facts you already know to judge its credibility?
[/quote]
Sure, of course it’s the latter, at least superficially. That’s why I saw (and see) no real reason to doubt this one, since the acts he describes aren’t really that shocking. Do you argue otherwise? Do you doubt that these types of things ever happen?

Sure, stories need to be honest and factual, and if they are clearly erroneous, they should be disregarded. If some group or individual routinely provides erroneous stories, they ought to be disregarded as well. That’s my larger point about how guys like you routinely buy into any right-leaning story from any source, despite coming generally to have the rug pulled out from under you. The learning curve seems very, very flat.

96

[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
Actually, to be fair, I should state that Foer claims to have corroborated these stories through independent interviews with other soldiers. However, that statement is directly at odds with the Army investigation, so he ought to provide as much proof as he can of this. As of now, of course, we just have his assurance that all is well.

I think we all agree that more than that is needed.
[/QUOTE]
From the Army, I’m sure you mean.

I agree. It’s time for them to relinquish all control over Beauchamp and the other witnesses in this matter. Give an honorable discharge to any of them that want one, and give some sort of credible ‘hands-off’ guarantee to the rest.

And what Hentor said @90. It would be surprising if stuff like this didn’t happen.

97

[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
In this particular case, I think the articles in question contained a number of falsehoods, secondhand stories, and battlefield urban legends.
[/quote]
And I think that an elephant is sitting in your living room.

I don’t think that, obviously, but your thoughts about whether things are factual are, for purposes of this debate, meaningless.

Why? Does the environment in which their previous corroborations have come undone mean nothing - a military CYA operation disguised as ‘investigation’ with absolutely no transparency, hence no credibility?

Remember what I said above about how if you’re in the military, they pretty much have you by the balls? Looks like Pvt. Beauchamp has learned this lesson pretty well. :rolleyes:

Because of posts like this, I think editorial changes ought to be made at Mr. Moto, especially since this sort of thing has damaged his reputation as a poster in the past. :wink:

98

[QUOTE=Hentor the Barbarian]
Sure, of course it’s the latter, at least superficially. That’s why I saw (and see) no real reason to doubt this one, since the acts he describes aren’t really that shocking. Do you argue otherwise? Do you doubt that these types of things ever happen?
[/QUOTE]

What type of things are we referring to? Because when we are discussing these stories, they seem to break down in the details, which is why I tend to think of them as passed on urban legends.

The bit about the dog killing was a prime example. I’ve seen videos of soldiers taunting kids with bottled water from moving vehicles, so I wouldn’t be surprised by much. If it had been a story about a soldier killing dogs with a Hummvee, most people would have read it for what it was worth.

But the story involved a crewed vehicle usually commanded by a senior noncomm or commissioned officer who would have been raked across the coals if the thing had been damaged by plowing it through the corners of buildings. This detail plus the maneuverability and visibility of the armored vehicle caused a lot of people to raise eyebrows, and many of these people weren’t the right-wing ideologues you want to pin blame on.

You say stories need to be honest and factual, but you don’t seem overly concerned with details like this. But these also are facts, and journalists ought to be honest about them as well. Otherwise we’re right back to the “fake but accurate” standard - and I don’t think that helps the media much, whether the journalism in question is opinion reporting or straight news reporting.

In one of my posts above, I linked to a Washington Post opinion piece by a writer and lawyer who was also an Iraq war veteran. He indicated that he had some doubts of these stories. And he stressed that whatever stories that came from the battlefield needed to be corroborated in an absolutely bulletproof way. I notice that lots of folks weren’t willing to believe General Petraeus’ facts and figures wholly at face value. They wanted independent verification.

And so it really shouldn’t be surprising that what was essentially a leak from a government employee in a magazine should be subject to similar calls for verification. And of course, TNR has been slow to provide such. I really don’t see many people here defending them, and what defenses I do see are weak ones.

99

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
Because of posts like this, I think editorial changes ought to be made at Mr. Moto, especially since this sort of thing has damaged his reputation as a poster in the past. :wink:
[/QUOTE]

Whatever your opinion is of me (or mine is of you) nobody has seen fit to make a movie about it.

100

[QUOTE=RTFirefly]
I agree. It’s time for them to relinquish all control over Beauchamp and the other witnesses in this matter. Give an honorable discharge to any of them that want one, and give some sort of credible ‘hands-off’ guarantee to the rest.
[/QUOTE]

Why should they do that?

Why should the Army release a soldier early from his enlistment obligations to protect the reputation of a magazine? That absolutely makes no sense to me.