Clearly, the technique works: Joe McCarthy was known for it, but hardly invented it.

Politicians lie or twist, the media stenographers relay. The op-ed pages may fulminate - elsewhere in the rag. There may be a correction or contextualization - a day or two later on A17.

Dems used to be pretty good at it, I believe...

I hope Pete Ashdown (http://www.peteashdown.com), Hatch's Democratic challenger can make some use of this, though with Bush's approval ratings currently at 58% in Utah, I hope Utahns would be receptive to his setting the historical record straight.

I think the most important lies were simply conveyed by association.  They talked about 9/11 and they talked about Saddam Hussein.  They didn't have to explicitly connect them, just talk about them in the same breath, not once, but over and over and over again.  And leave it to others to make the connections.  In fact, the care they took to talk this way--not making the connections in overt claims, but strongly implying them--is itself compelling evidence of their intent to deceive.  A number of folks I've interviewed have pointed this out.

Of course, Cheney did make the connection explicitly, insisting--probably to this day, if you could get him on the record--that Atta met with Iraqi intelligence agents.  But that's Cheney for you.  That's his job.  Pushing the envelope.

I did a study in school on Bush speeches, and noticed a particular, commonly-repeated pattern in the layout of his speeches in the run up to the Iraq War.

First paragraph would be thanks, followed by an introduction, followed by the danger presented by Iraq. Then he would pivot seemlessly into Al-Qaeda and 9/11 for a paragraph. The fourth paragraph and onward were all about Iraq.

The message was: Iraq = Al Qaeda. They left it to lower level surrogates to make that argument more blatantly. But Bush's speeches would construct a link in one's mind without stating it directly.

Tricky, eh.

You persist in not "getting it" Bush, Hatch they all can say whatever they want to say. Doesn't matter if what they say is an outright lie. Nobody, that means the MSM, is going to call him on it.

They have been lying for five years. Do you really think they are going to stop now?

Does anyone think a libel suit would work, The comments by Orin can't be called humorous, parody, etc. A little blot on his record can make an old guy worried about his legacy nervous. Maybe even change direction for fear of getting hit again.

I would have loved to see someone stand up and call Hatch on it at the meeting!  Something like that could be a turning point for the public taking back control.

The sociometric star phenomenon is a fairly old and well-documented one. In school, it's the kid with a lot of friends. In Utah, I could see it being Orrin Hatch. And, since it's Utah, no amount of foot-in-mouth disease is going to alter that fact.

However, beyond the Mormon enclave, Hatch becomes more and more deserving of the nickname "Booby".

What if the paper asked Sen. Hatch whether or not he was aware at the time he made that statement that there had been others before him to make that same mistake?  Isn't national security in general and Iraq in particular important enough to speak carefully about them?  Statements like his are dishonest at best.

It absolutely makes sense.  They've stopped shouting it on MTP and This Week and have been constantly feeding the beast through their local invitation only "town meetings."

I'll make sure I go to my Congressman's meetings.

He's not quite the fine artist of doublespeak that one finds in the ranks of the Bush administration.

IMHO, Hatch is by far the most accomplished and consistent liar on the Republican side. I just think  he got caught with his pants down, so to speak.

It would not surprise me in the least to learn that this is part of a larger, conscious effort by Republicans to manipulate the public by feeding bad information to local opinion leaders.

They also feed it to the hungry media. From the NYT.

Under the Bush administration, the federal government has aggressively used a well-established tool of public relations: the prepackaged, ready-to-serve news report that major corporations have long distributed to TV stations to pitch everything from headache remedies to auto insurance. In all, at least 20 federal agencies, including the Defense Department and the Census Bureau, have made and distributed hundreds of television news segments in the past four years, records and interviews show. Many were subsequently broadcast on local stations across the country without any acknowledgement of the government's role in their production.

On a related note, CNN looked into identical news release quotes from the military. Apparently CNN accepted the military's explanation of the "mixup."

1/05 The government paid syndicated columnist and TV personality Armstrong Williams to promote No Child Left Behind. Armstrong promoted No Child Left Behind on CNN, two Christian networks, and Sinclear Broadcast Group. The White House stated that this was an isolated incident.
link

It is reported that the Pentagon contracted the Lincoln Group to pay Iraqi news to run their propaganda. On ABC, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley assured the American people that Bush was "very troubled" by the news.
link

But at the same time, Donald Rumsfeld wants the US to fight the war on terror by operating a more effective, 24-hour propaganda machine, or risk a "dangerous deficiency."
link

It's not just about propaganda, it's about about money.

One contract, for $6 million, was for public relations and advertising work in Iraq.

The other Lincoln contract, which is with the Special Operations Command, is worth up to $100 million over five years for media operations with video, print and Web-based products. That contract is not related to the dispute over propaganda and was not for services in Iraq, according to command spokesman Ken McGraw.

War propaganda or political progananda doesn't bother me at all. Hell, I grew up listening to AFRTS. However, I don't want it broadcasted into my living room as "news."