Media frenzy

The media is all over Bush these days, and doesn’t seem to let up any when he tries to defend himself.
Indeed, for some people he appears to be “escalating” the bitter war debate.  Since when is defending yourself the same as escalating the conflict?  Oh, yeah, when it’s Israel.

In the mean time, some people just can’t help but prove the President’s point.

The White house is fact checking NYT articles now too.

As long as I’m on the press’ case there’s this article about the Civil Right’s Division of the Justice Department, where some disgruntled lawyers are piping about how hard life is over there because of the administration.  (Quotes are from Powerline)  People are leaving left and right.

If one reads deep enough into the article, however, one learns that the attrition rate during the five years of the Bush administration (13 percent) is essentially the same as it was during the last five years of the Clinton administration (11 percent). I would have expected a much larger disparity based solely on the high rate at which baby-boom lawyers are retiring these days.

The organization Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law complain that the government isn’t bringing enough cases dealing with “discrimination based on the statistical impact on women or minority groups.”   Although…

As the Bush's administration's former civil rights chief says, "It's not a prosecutor's job to bring lots of cases, it's a prosecutor's job to bring the right cases." Which the Bush administration seems to be doing. In the next to last paragraph of its piece, the Post quotes a Justice Department spokesman who notes that "the department is on the winning side of court rulings 90 percent of the time compared to 60 percent during the Clinton years."

Typical.

I also noted that the press is really going after this Willie Pete issue.  I admit I’m torn about the use of White Phosphorus in battle.  If we have other mechanisms that cause smoke for flushing out and protection and all that other stuff, why do we need that variety? 

Anyway, I see this as some other eventual attempt at attacking Bush, even though it really has nothing to do with the current administration.  It’s almost like they are setting up a straw monkey to see how he responds to it.

Update:  Here is A Soldier’s Perspective on how badly the media gets it wrong about WP and how it is actually used in combat.