Fareed Zakaria - Reinventing History on 12/30/06

Below is a textbook example of revisionist history, courtesy of Newsweek's Fareed Zakaria. Mr. Zakaria blames Iraq's current plight on the Bush administration's "thoughtless engineering." He steers blame away from the Iraqis themselves despite the fact that Iraqis have been unable to resolve disruptive tribal behavior in order to capitalize on the exceptional opportunity afforded by our country. He ends his article with a definitive statement even though the effort is still a work in progress. This is the classic "white man's burden" mentality that western countries have historically adopted attempting to assist third-world countries without success.

What I find most manipulative is that Zakaria refuses to mention the Bush administration's continued loyalty to the Iraqi people despite the fact that they are almost alone in their quest. Larger than the Iranian led insurgency itself is the American media's constant negative spins fueled by personal bias pumped daily to the public, which is directly responsible for blow back the administration must daily overcome. The resultant loss of public support engenders a loss of support for the war effort, thus hampering the administration's ability to go all out and win.

As is often the case in such smug articles, I see no solution suggested. Simply a finger pointed to facts, based on incomplete knowledge, recognizing that eventually a percentage of the masses will digest and believe incomplete facts as rote. This transparent tactic deserves to be singled out.

Vengence of the Victors
By Fareed Zakaria Newsweek

(Last paragraph of Zakaria's Article - for article in full, see attached)

It has now become fashionable among Washington neoconservatives to blame the Iraqis for everything that has happened to their country. "We have given the Iraqis a republic and they do not appear able to keep it," laments Charles Krauthammer. Others invoke anthropologists to explain the terrible dysfunctions of Iraqi culture. There may be some truth to all these claims—Iraq is a tough place—but the Bush administration is not quite so blameless. It thoughtlessly engineered a political and social revolution as intense as the French or Iranian one and then seemed surprised that Iraq could not digest it happily, peaceably and quickly. We did not give them a republic. We gave them a civil war.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16409404/site/newsweek/