Left-Wing Media Responses to Obama’s Libya Invasion

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On March 19th, 2011, President Obama followed the directives of the United Nations Permanent Security Council (Russia abstaining), and initiated a U.S. offensive against Moammar Qaddafi‘s Libya. Qaddafi was ostensibly attacked for bloodily putting down a nascent rebellion, following recent similar revolts in Tunisia, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and most successfully, neighboring Egypt.

It will be fascinating to monitor the left-wing media in their surely schizophrenic responses to Obama’s new conflict, given their vehement and relentless attack on President Bush in his military campaigns following 9/11, which he was authorized in broadly bi-partisan fashion to carry out. The mental acrobatics will assuredly put Cirque de Soleil to shame.

One resource to monitor and compare any disparity in narratives on the left between “Bush’s” Iraq War and “Obama’s” Libyan campaign (whose offensive codename “Odyssey Dawn” reminds me of a band in the 1970s) is The Wayback Machine. Using this tool, one can enter a website address and track it back in time. The dates of the initial offensives for Iraq and Libya are eerily similar: March 19th, eight years apart. So we will enter in the website addresses and compare the responses for March 21st, 2003 and 2011. (Providing ample time to get on top of the story and formulate an opinion).

Media Matters
As you can see, 2003 archiving has been scrubbed. Let’s look at March 21st, 2011. Nothing but unabashed criticism of FoxNews.

DailyKos
One of the most vehement protesters of the Iraq War. Let’s go back in time to 2003. The closest ‘snapshot’ date is March 26th. We have “selling the public an easy war” – a criticism of Dick Cheney. There is alarmism about Iraq’s Republican Guards, which were cut to shreds by American forces; followed by a lament to abandon the Geneva Conventions because the U.S. military bombed an Iraqi television station. The next story brands the military campaign “Bush’s War on the World.” One of the strangest articles criticizes the Iraqi forces for seeming ‘overconfidence.’ After a regular bit, there is one of the endless casualty bios we witness during the Iraq War (not criticizing DK for running it, but these pieces have disappeared under Obama). DK then cites ‘experts’ who claim that ‘Shock and Awe’ “failed completely.” We can forgive them for the misestimation, since they hadn’t lived through an Obama presidency yet.

Let’s glance at DK today. There is a nice fluff piece on “Netroots for the Troops” – a charity for our military overseas. God love ’em, but where’s the criticism of Obama on Libya?

Mother Jones
This should be one of the more interesting comparisons. We won’t be surprised to find fierce criticism if we go back in time to March 2003 – to the 20th. On ‘War Watch’ – we have a questioning of the legality of the war (but the problem is, they are questioning it based on international standards, not on Constitutional grounds. Whether or not Congress can “authorize” the president to go to war is the relevant matter.) We have hand-wringing about “profiling” of immigrants – left-wing hysteria, if one can judge as much. There is a photo of George Bush as a cowboy and a reader criticism featured that implies Bush is going to war to avoid doing anything about domestic issues. There is an insinuation that Bush entered the war because he was “in the pocket” of Big Oil, which turned out to be completely false liberal fantasy (the left tends to ascribe materialist motives to everything the supposed right does.) Unrelated, there is a chilling appraisal of a documentary of the Weather Undeerground, minced with weasel words. Quote, “Watch the film, and it’s impossible not to wonder what response the Weather- men’s bombs might provoke today.” Very principled and consistent with your non-violent posture on the war, Mother Jones.

The Mother Jones entry for March 21st led to one hilarious false positive, a headline on the frontpage: “Why aren’t you outraged by this, America?” Aha! We have our lefty outrage against President Obama for Libya! But alas, it is just a piece lamenting the James O’Keefe set-up of NPR’s Ron Schiller. But Eureka! we have a relevant piece, “What’s happening in Libya explained.” this article proves that the left can do by-the-numbers journalism to suit it’s purposes, intermixed with slick false narratives, or convenient presumptions. Examples:

Libya has been ruled for 42 years by a cunning, repressive, eccentric dictator who has frequently described his own people as “backwards.”

And this varies with Saddam Hussein’s regime how? Let me help: Hussein’s reign was about 100 times worse.

Inspired by pro-democracy uprisings across the Arab world, Libyan dissidents had planned a “day of rage” for Thursday, Feb. 17.

Aren’t we a bit coy to call all of these uprisings “pro-democratic”? Democratic surely doesn’t mean “Western liberal” or “peaceful.”

Mother Jones shows that it can do reasonably fair journalism, but only if it suits its political purposes, which apparently is helping Democrats get elected.

HuffingtonPost
Although there are no articles archived for 2003, the website is famous for its relentless attacks on George Bush during the Iraq War. In the absence of a 2003 article, let us see what is online today, March 21st. The lead story is “Obama’s Libya Policy Makes Strange Bedfellows Of Congressional Critics,” which signals a reasonably critical editorial stance towards the action. Ironically, there is a passage on the War Powers Act, making a distinction that suggests the left elite knew calling “Bush’s war” “illegal” was a fraud all along:

Under the War Powers Act of 1973, the president can send U.S. armed forces into conflict only with the authorization of Congress or if the United States is under attack or serious threat. Absent such authorization, however, the president does have a 48-hour window to report about military deployments overseas. While Congress is supposed to be consulted “in every possible instance,” a broadening interpretation of executive powers has greatly diminished its “sign-off” authority.

In other words, President Bush went out of his way to seek (unnecessary) U.N. approval, built a “Coalition of the Willing” (is there any other kind?), and then received authorization from Congress: Exactly what a president is supposed to do. In contrast, here is criticism from a Republican and a Democrat cited in the article:

“I think [the president] has a duty and an obligation to come to Congress,” Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah.) told The Huffington Post. “I see no clear and present danger to the United States of America. I just don’t. We’re in a bit of the fog at the moment as to what the president is trying to ultimately do.”

“In the absence of a credible, direct threat to the United States and its allies or to our valuable national interests, what excuse is there for not seeking congressional approval of military action?” asked Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) in a separate interview. “I think it is wrong and a usurpation of power and the fact that prior presidents have done it is not an excuse.”

This strange bit of standard journalistic practice was preceded by a bizarre admission:

Lower on the leadership ranks, a strange-bedfellows coalition of progressive-minded pols and Tea Party members has emerged, not only raising doubts about the underlying strategy but the legality of it as well.

If President Obama is losing Huffington Post, it shows a weakness in political position that does not bode well for the rest of his presidency. We are still early on in the conflict, and the radical sites seem hesitant to pull the trigger on slamming Obama (for continuing all manner of relatively pro-war policies that are increasingly vindicating Bush from a political standpoint), and the more mainstream left Huffington Post is lurching into open criticism.

New York Times
The standard bearer of the left. If President Obama has lost NYT on the offensive, then he could be in real political trouble. First, let’s check 2003. Scrubbed. No surprise there. One could get it on Lexis-Nexis if one wanted. But we all remember the Abu Ghraib front page stories for forty days, so its reputation for anti-war coverage during the Bush presidency is famous. Let us compare today’s feature story on the event, “Airstrikes in Libya; Questions Back Home.” This a fairly tame headline, and indicates a likely fawning response to the attack (from the left’s point of view, the Times was weak on condemning the Iraq War offensive in the initial stages). What one finds, however, is pretty forceful criticism underlaying the “balanced” meta-narrative. One sign that Obama is losing the left:

The decision to join in a military assault against Colonel Qaddafi seemed sure to prompt further debate about whether there is a consistent Obama doctrine for defining national interest and the need for the use of force, could strain relations with liberals who are already uneasy about the president’s escalation of the war in Afghanistan and, should it not go well or continue for weeks or months, divert attention from his domestic policy and political initiatives.

The New York Times shows an unusually critical bent directed against their anointed leader Barack Obama.

CodePink
Crickets chirping on Libya. But there are cute “war criminal” costumes caricaturizing Condaleezza Rice and George Bush.

CNN
We don’t need The Wayback Machine to recall the daily casualty updates. (The Wayback server is down, anyway). What distinguishes CNN from the other lefty outlets is blatant apologism for Obama with a piece, “Why Libya 2011 is not Iraq 2003.” What ensues is a mealy-mouthed and feckless attempt to justify the attack on the grounds that ‘the UN and the Arab League said it was okay.’ The article whitewashes the fact that Hussein was much worse, and had not only gassed his own people, but attacked the sovereign state of Kuwait. In addition, Qaddafi cooperated with the United States in giving up its wmd program after the United States invaded Iraq, as Bergen disingenuously writes, nearly “unilaterally” (I guess Congress doesn’t count, nor the British, Aussies, and other nations who assisted in the endeavor). One would expect more of a ‘national security expert’ than what one finds in this specious, illogical piece. But then again, “this is CNN.”

LA Times
Shockingly, a reasoned and consistent op-ed piece is published entitled, “Libya: It’s not our fight.” The by-line reads: “Regardless of its good intentions, the U.S. intervention in Libya will be depicted once again as aggressive, predatory and anti-Muslim.” Although one can dissent from the line of argument, at least there are principles at work, and a valid point of view. (At a minimum, there must be consistency for a logical argument to be ‘valid.’) I would disagree with the author, however, that Islamists are at war with the West because of U.S. actions. The only thing needed to provoke Islamists is to exist and to be non-Muslim.

The Daily Beast
The new left-wingers on the block show the most aggressive criticism yet in “Behind the Libya War.” The by-line’s first sentence captures the tone: “Why are we bombing Libya, when we’re nearly broke and already fighting elsewhere?” The acerbic vibe doesn’t end there:

It’s remarkable, when you think about it. The U.S. is already fighting two, deeply frustrating wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The public mood is isolationist; the president is by nature cautious; the federal government is nearly broke. Libya is peripheral to core American interests, and most Americans would have trouble finding it on a map, even with the name written in.

The same liberal elitist condescension is there (Beinart is a professor), only this time, it is directed at a Democrat, and not a Republican. Professor Bienart’s premise is shaky, however: The reason for Obama’s foray into Libya is related to his foreign policy advisor’s upbrining in the “crucible” of Bosnia. I guess. But still, Beinart’s academic (in more than one sense of the word) dissent from a Democrat-led policy shows there’s a first for everything – although we can find true professorial vivisection from the almost-right Niall Ferguson. Which brings us to Newsweek.

Newsweek
Oxford professor continues his scathing criticism of Obama on the pages of Newsweek with his appropriately titled, “The Big Dither.” (Ferguson’s questioning by MSNBC libs over Eqypt is too delicious not to link up.) Although, Ferguson supports the war for his own reasons, he questions Obama’s timing:

This was the right thing to do. Was. But it should have been done weeks ago, when it first became clear that Gaddafi, unlike Mubarak, was able and willing to unleash military force against his opponents. Now, with loyalist forces approaching the rebel stronghold of Benghazi, it may well be too late.

Ferguson has maintained that when one has a strategic vision, one is better able to identify interests and take decisive action in the international arena. And Obama surely lacks strategic vision, as far as conventional international relations analyses go.

Foreign Policy
Further along on the academic path, but breaking mainstream due to the popular takes of famous anti-semitic and neo-realist scholar Stephen Walt, we find Foreign Policy. FP echoes the apocalyptic tidings of the left during the Iraq War, calling Obama’s Libyan expedition a “quagmire ahead.” FP contributes to the discussion by unveiling this little-discussed nugget:

Finally, Qaddafi is a particularly unscrupulous and ruthless adversary with long experience using terrorism as a strategic weapon — Libya was a large source of suicide bomb volunteers during the Iraq war — so members of the coalition should expect terror retaliation in various forms.

The left continues its usual trend of chicken little naysaying without actually delving into the fundamental issues and principles at play. Perhaps elitists think the American people are too dumb to think more deeply about whether or not America should commit troops to warfare?

Conclusion
President Obama’s questionable handling of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, his continuation of Bush’s security policies, and his initiation of a war with Libya have yielded at least one positive result, by the left’s own standards: A true diversity of opinion on the left, and even some burgeoning agreement with the right. That’s “hope and change” I can get behind.