MSNBC's ratings are bad and getting worse by the month, and what a wonder this isn't when its marquee evening host refuses to ditch the myths of her ideology in favor of indisputable facts.
The network's Rachel Maddow, a self-described "national security liberal," seldom lets a week pass without blaming former president George W. Bush for something, anything that's gone wrong, especially in the Middle East, that bastion of peace and stability until the convulsions of the Bush junta.
On her show Wednesday, Maddow spoke of the New York Times reporting that the United Arab Emirates, one of four Arab nations allied with the United States against the Islamic State, stopped air strikes in late December after a Jordanian pilot was shot down and captured. The pilot was later executed by immolation, the barbaric spectacle recorded by ISIS and posted on social media.
Maddow could not resist comparing the "crucial international coalition" -- her wording -- assembled by President Obama against ISIS and that allegedly meager effort cobbled together by Obama's ignoble predecessor during his war in Iraq --
The UAE is part of the coalition of countries who have agreed to conduct air strikes against ISIS alongside the United States. They had been dropping bombs on ISIS targets in Syria along with this crucial international coalition. But since Christmas Day, since the day after a Jordanian pilot was downed and captured in Syria, the United Arab Emirates has stopped conducting air strikes, apparently for fear of the safety of their pilots.
Yesterday of course ISIS released a video purporting to show that Jordanian pilot burned alive while trapped in a cage. Today the New York Times reports that the UAE in December suspended its air strikes in support of the coalition. And that news raises a couple of really interesting points. One is about the integrity of this coalition with which we are engaged in our military campaign against ISIS. It's us and a handful of Arab countries -- Jordan, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and UAE.
Not to be confused with the "crucial international coalition" cited by Maddow only moments earlier ...
Securing the support of those four Arab countries, those four Muslim countries, was incredibly important to this administration when they undertook this air campaign in Syria. They said not only do we not want to do it alone, we don't want to do it without Sunni Arab allies. A lot of political import placed on that united front. This was not going to be the United States going it alone in the Middle East again. This was going to be the United States engaging in air strikes against ISIS with Syria's Arab and Muslim neighbors.
Hmm, sounds familiar. Where have I heard (or read) this before? How about that, from the same source cited by Maddow in her report -- the New York Times.
In a front-page story last September after Obama's address to the nation on military strikes against ISIS, Times reporter Mark Lander engaged in Maddowesque revisionism to assure the Gray Lady's readers that Obama's actions bore no resemblance to those of the loathed Bush.
Two weeks later, the Times ran this correction (hey, these things take time) --
An article on Sept. 11 about President Obama's speech to the nation describing his plans for a military campaign against the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, gave an incorrect comparison between efforts by the president to seek allies' support for his plans and President George W. Bush's efforts on such backing for the Iraq war. The approach Mr. Obama is taking is similar to the one Mr. Bush took; it is not the case that, "Unlike Mr. Bush in the Iraq war, Mr. Obama has sought to surround the United States with partners." (emphasis added)
Avid Times reader Maddow often cites the paper on her show. Apparently she's not so keen on reading the corrections, though for many people, especially conservatives, it's their favorite section.
Kudos to Hot Air's Ed Morrissey for picking up on this in September and linking to a March 2003 post in the Times archives on the 40-nation coalition assembled by Bush.
"Other countries have not been named publicly but are likely members of the coalition," the Times reported. "They include Israel, as well as several Arab states that are providing bases and other assistance to the war: Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, Jordan, Oman, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Egypt."
The Times also cited an op-ed by National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, published several days earlier in the Wall Street Journal, stating that "the Australian Navy is supporting coalition troops and clearing mines, Polish special forces are defending an oil platform, a Danish submarine is patrolling nearby waters, and 'Czech and Slovak special chemical- and biological-weapons response forces' are standing by to respond to bio-warfare attacks."
So when it came to securing support from "Arab and Muslim neighbors" situated near the conflict, unilateralist yahoo Bush lined up seven -- compared to four for Obama, Nobel peace laureate and statesman for the ages. Even worse, as Maddow was forced to point out, Obama's meager alliance is in danger of "falling apart."
Perhaps it's time for Obama to pick up the phone and speak with former President Bush -- either one, come to think of it -- about coalition building.
