I don’t have much to say about Scott McClellan’s new book
All the President’s Spin (p. 145):
The White House turned to tactics it had used in previous political fights to build public support. Mustering as much damning evidence as possible, the administration executed a carefully crafted public relations campaign centering on Iraq’s alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction.
In the autumn of 2002 Bush and his White House engaged in a carefully orchestrated campaign to shape and manipulate sources of public approval to our advantage. We’d done much the same on other issues — tax cuts and education — to great success, but war with Iraq was different. Our lack of candour and honesty in making the case for war would later provoke a partisan response from our opponents that further distorted and obscured a more nuanced reality.
All the President’s Spin (p. 145):
[T]he White House glossed over gaps in intelligence and caveats about sources, frequently presenting worst-case scenarios as fact. Officials also used loaded rhetoric to make suggestions that could not be proven and invoked powerful images, such as a “mushroom cloud,” when discussing the threat Iraq posed.
…[T]he administration presented ambiguous information as if it were certain and used exaggerated rhetoric to present claims based on patchy evidence. At times, it also invoked connections, such as a link between the September 11 attacks and Iraq, which its own evidence did not support… [T]he overall pattern is one of sacrificing ambiguity for the sake of selling the war.
…[T]he administration chose a different path — not employing out-and-out deception but shading the truth; downplaying the reason for going to war; trying to make the weapons of mass destruction threat and the Iraqi connection to terrorism appear just a little more certain than they were; quietly disregarding some of the crucial caveats in the intelligence and minimising evidence that pointed in the opposite direction.
They also encouraged Americans to believe as fact some things that were unclear and possibly false (for example, that Saddam had an active nuclear weapons programme) and other things that were overplayed or wrong (for example, that Saddam might have had an operational relationship with Al-Qaeda). In late August, at the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention in Nashville, Cheney said: “Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies and against us.”
…As the campaign accelerated, caveats and qualifications were downplayed or dropped altogether. Contradictory intelligence was largely ignored or disregarded. Evidence based on high confidence from the intelligence community was lumped together with intelligence of lesser confidence. A nuclear threat was added to the biological and chemical threats to create a sense of gravity and urgency. Support for terrorism was given greater weight by playing up a dubious Al-Qaeda connection to Iraq.
By contrast, the Wall Street Journal editorial page dismisses McClellan’s claim that the administration used “propaganda” to sell the war by stating that Bush “[had] no choice but to make his case” (poor guy!):
[A]ny U.S. President has no choice but to make his case for going to war. It is an obligation of democracy. In Iraq, the long march to the 2003 invasion included months of debate at the U.N. and in Congress.
Outside of the WSJ, however, I think most Americans recognize the distinction between making your case and systematically distorting the evidence. That’s why a majority of Americans now believe that the administration “deliberately misled the American public about whether Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.”
Finally, per Ezra Klein, it’s important to note that the publication of this book does not excuse McClellan from his role in promoting the administration’s deceptions.