Meanwhile, Back at Abu Ghraib

What is the best way to bury a scandal? Bring out the bad news when attention is focused elsewhere.

That's USA Today's scathing comment on the recently released report on the Abu Ghraib prison scandal. The report, like motel toilets, has been sanitized for your protection. And strategically released while most people's attention is elsewhere. Between Teresa Heinz Kerry's "shove it" shtick and John Kerry's wrong-handed throw at Fenway, who's got time to care?

Read USA Today's editorial here.

Comments

[huh?]

Abu Ghraib? What's that? I haven't heard anything about that.

[R C Dean]

So, should they sit on reports like this? For how long? How would timing the report to get maximum media coverage (and thus damage the incumbent and help the challenger) not be precisely as manipulative as timing it to get minimum coverage?

[Ken Shultz]

Tenet?s resignation was a step in the right direction, but until Bush fires Rumsfeld, and I don?t mind if he gives Rumsfeld the same phony praise he gave Tenet on the way out, I'll have a hard time supporting anything either Bush or Rumsfeld wants to do with foreign policy. Bush could fire Rummy right now, which in light of the impending election is highly unlikely, or, if Bush wins the election, he could fire Rummy after the election. But, given the Administration's reluctance to admit a mistake, I don?t think that?s very likely either. So I guess I'm going to have a hard time supporting anything either Bush or Rumsfeld wants to do with foreign policy, which is awful considering that their job is to make tough calls about things like defending us from rogue states like Iran, et. al.

Here's a distinction Kerry could make! Kerry could argue that if he?s elected President, unlike Bush, he will fire his Secretary of Defense if his Secretary of Defense condones torturing people and ignoring the Geneva Conventions. Before we can know for certain that the incompetence that led to disasters like Abu Gharib is fixed, don?t we need to make certain that the incompetent people who were running the department at the time won?t be in charge to make the same mistakes again? Mr. Kerry has an opportunity to assure swing voters that he would run a clean Defense Department in this regard, and that may be the kind of distinction swing voters are looking for. Indeed, if you haven?t made up your mind about Bush yet, aren?t you just waiting for a good reason to vote for Kerry instead?

[Joe Sabel]

Abu Ghraib is a big deal, and responsibility goes all the way to the top. Bush has created a huge impetus for more terror.

[George W. Bush]

I am so embarrassed about this. I will resign.

[jrdroll]

"And strategically released while most people's attention is elsewhere"
I thought "Sticky Fingers" Berger was strategically released. Bush that cunning moron.

[Ken Shultz]

Seriously, even with Soccer Moms, I'd bet that defending torture is a loser, and Soccer Moms are vicious! Why doesn't Kerry make a campaign issue out the Geneva Conventions and the use of torture?

[Rick Barton]

"Why doesn't Kerry make a campaign issue out the Geneva Conventions and the use of torture?"

Because Kerry must not share your assessment of the political potency of the issue, and he is as devoid of principle as Bush is.