Brendan Nyhan

In another Wall Street Journal op-ed today, Ronald Kessler engages in some deeply fallacious reasoning (subscription required):

The fact that Mr. Bush bypassed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which lays out procedures for intercepting communications in terrorist cases, raises legitimate concerns. But it should be of more concern that al Qaeda and related terrorist organizations are trying to obtain nuclear and biological weapons that could wipe out major cities, kill millions of people and devastate the American economy.

By that logic, any decision to “bypass” existing US law should be of little concern because the threat from Al Qaeda is greater. Why worry about the law at all?

Kessler later throws in a misleading factual claim, stating that “[T]he Bush administration disclosed the NSA intercept program at its inception to congressional leaders, the FISA court and NSA’s inspector general.” But Bob Graham, the former chairman of the Senate intelligence committee, said that he was not told about domestic wiretaps in his briefing in late 2001 or early 2002, and Jay Rockefeller, the current senior Democrat on the committee, notes that he was not briefed on the program until July 2003.

In particular, Kessler singles out Harry Reid, saying that “some of those same congressional leaders who were briefed on the program, like Sen. Harry Reid, now castigate the president for disregarding the Constitution.” But contrary to Kessler’s implication that Reid was briefed when the program began, the Senator stated that he “personally received a single very short briefing on this program earlier this year prior to its public disclosure. That briefing occurred more than three years after the President said this program began.” Reid added that “based on what I have heard publicly since, key details about the program apparently were not provided to me.”

Sadly, this sort of hacktacular nonsense is the rule rather than the exception for the Journal.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed on the improving fortune’s of America’s middle class (subscription required), Stephen Moore and Lincoln Anderson write:

The middle class has not been “shrinking” or losing ground, it has been getting richer. For example, the Census data indicate that the income cutoff to be considered “middle class” has risen steadily. Back in 1967, the income range for the middle class (i.e., the middle-income quintile) was between $28,000 and $39,500 a year (in today’s dollars). Now that income range is between $38,000 and $59,000 a year, which is to say that the middle class is now roughly $11,000 a year richer than 25 to 30 years ago. This helps explain why middle-income families can buy things like cable TV, air conditioning, DVD players, cell phones, second cars and so on, that were considered mostly luxury items for the rich in the 1950s and ’60s.

Talk about an anachronism. Cable TV, DVD players and cell phones were not considered luxury items for the rich in the 1950s and 1960s — they didn’t exist! The only items on the list that did exist at the time were air conditioning and second cars.

(For more on Stephen Moore, see here and here.)

As I predicted yesterday, Scott McClellan tried to defend President Bush’s most damning previous statement about wiretapping by parsing what the President said as only referring to the Patriot Act. Here’s the transcript from his press briefing:

Q Scott, in April of 2004, President Bush delivered remarks on the Patriot Act, and he said at that time, “any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it require — a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we’re talking about chasing down terrorists, we’re talking about getting a court order before we do so.” Was the President being completely forthcoming when he made that statement?

MR. McCLELLAN: I think he was talking about in the context of the Patriot Act.

Q And in terms of the American people, though, when he says “nothing has changed” —

MR. McCLELLAN: I would have to look back at the remarks there, but you’re clearly talking about it in the context, as you pointed out, of the Patriot Act. The Patriot Act is another vital tool. That’s why the Senate needs to move forward and get that reauthorized now. We cannot let that expire — not for a single moment, because the terrorist threat is not going to expire. Those tools have helped us disrupt plots and prevent attacks and break up terrorist cells. We need those tools for our law enforcement and intelligence community. And we urge the Senate to stop the delaying tactics by the minority of senators, to stop their delaying tactics, to stop filibustering, stop blocking this legislation and get it passed.

Q So you don’t see it as misleading in any way when the President says, “nothing has changed”?

MR. McCLELLAN: You’re asking me to look back at something that is in relation to the Patriot Act. And it’s in relation to the Patriot Act —

Q But he’s talking about wiretaps —

MR. McCLELLAN: — and I’ll be glad to take a look at his comments. I think you’re taking them out — I think the suggestion that you’re making, I reject that suggestion. And I’ll be glad to take a look at those comments.

Here’s a similar White House defense reported by the Boston Globe:

The White House said the president’s comments — two years after approving the domestic surveillance program — applied to the kind of roving wiretaps the Patriot Act allows for law enforcement, not eavesdropping for foreign intelligence.

It’s crucial not to get bogged down in semantic debates about whether or not Bush’s words technically pertained only to the Patriot Act. That’s arguable, but it’s also irrelevant. What’s important is that President Bush said “a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we’re talking about chasing down terrorists, we’re talking about getting a court order before we do so” at a time when the United States was engaging in domestic wiretaps without court orders. His statement was certain to leave a misleading impression with the public.

Inspired by this Atrios post, here’s a chronology of technically true but misleading statements by President Bush and his administration that imply court orders are required for all government wiretaps:

President Bush — April 19, 2004:

For years,
law enforcement used so-called roving wire taps to investigate
organized crime. You see, what that meant is if you got a wire tap by
court order — and, by the way, everything you hear about requires
court order, requires there to be permission from a FISA court, for
example.

President Bush — April 20, 2004:

Secondly, there are such things as roving wiretaps. Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires — a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we’re talking about chasing down terrorists, we’re talking about getting a court order before we do so. It’s important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution.

President Bush — June 9, 2005:

One tool that has been
especially important to law enforcement is called a roving wiretap.
Roving wiretaps allow investigators to follow suspects who frequently
change their means of communications. These wiretaps must be approved
by a judge, and they have been used for years to catch drug dealers and
other criminals. Yet, before the Patriot Act, agents investigating
terrorists had to get a separate authorization for each phone they
wanted to tap. That means terrorists could elude law enforcement by
simply purchasing a new cell phone. The Patriot Act fixed the problem
by allowing terrorism investigators to use the same wiretaps that were
already being using against drug kingpins and mob bosses.

White House fact sheet – June 9, 2005:

The Patriot Act extended the use of roving wiretaps, which were already permitted against drug kingpins and mob bosses, to
international terrorism investigations. They must be approved by a
judge. Without roving wiretaps, terrorists could elude law enforcement
by simply purchasing a new cell phone.

President Bush — July 20, 2005:

The Patriot Act helps us defeat our enemies while
safeguarding civil liberties for all Americans. The judicial branch has a
strong oversight role in the application of the Patriot Act. Law
enforcement officers need a federal judge’s permission to wiretap a foreign
terrorist’s phone, or to track his calls, or to search his property.
Officers must meet strict standards to use any of the tools we’re talking
about. And they are fully consistent with the Constitution of the United
States.

White House fact sheet — July 20, 2005:

The judicial branch has a strong oversight role in the application of the
Patriot Act. Law enforcement officers must seek a federal judge’s
permission to wiretap a foreign terrorist’s phone, track his calls, or
search his property. These strict standards are fully consistent with the
Constitution. Congress also oversees the application of the Patriot Act,
and in more than three years there has not been a single verified abuse.

President Bush — December 10, 2005:

The Patriot Act is helping America defeat our enemies while safeguarding
civil liberties for all our people. The judicial branch has a strong
oversight role in the application of the Patriot Act. Under the act,
law enforcement officers need a federal judge’s permission to wiretap a
foreign terrorist’s phone or search his property. Congress also
oversees our use of the Patriot Act. Attorney General Gonzales delivers
regular reports on the Patriot Act to the House and the Senate.

Technically true but misleading claims are the signature tactic of this administration, so it’s not surprising to see them pop up again here. All I can say is we told you so.

Update 12/20: As The New Republic’s Michael Crowley and commenters have pointed out, some of these statements may be completely false. That’s definitely a possibility, though most or all of them could be parsed as technically accurate in reference to the Patriot Act, as I note in a comment below.

Ultimately, however, semantic debates of this sort are a diversion, and that’s why I avoided the issue in the post. We didn’t use the word “lie” to describe any of Bush’s statements in All the President’s Spin because it relies on unknowable information about intent, and bogs us down in arguments about whether statements are completely false. The same applies here. What matters is that the President made statements to the American people that were demonstrably misleading. Whether they were full-blown “lies” or not is irrelevant.

Via Josh Marshall, Jonathan Alter discloses that President Bush called New York Times executive editor Bill Keller and publisher Arthur Sulzberger to the White House and attempted to persuade them not to run the blockbuster story that the administration authorized a vast, lawless expansion of the government’s surveillance powers. Alter gets this exactly right:

Bush was desperate to keep the Times from running this important story—which the paper had already inexplicably held for a year—because he knew that it would reveal him as a law-breaker. He insists he had “legal authority derived from the Constitution and congressional resolution authorizing force.” But the Constitution explicitly requires the president to obey the law. And the post 9/11 congressional resolution authorizing “all necessary force” in fighting terrorism was made in clear reference to military intervention. It did not scrap the Constitution and allow the president to do whatever he pleased in any area in the name of fighting terrorism.

Marshall has more on the specious Kristol/Schmitt argument that the expansion was justified by wartime necessity.

Two major questions remain, however. First, are Marshall and Kevin Drum correct that this program involves some sort of new technology that isn’t covered by the FISA law? And second, why did the Times sit on this story for a full year? Drum, who previously wondered about this, now points to a statement released by Keller suggesting that the Times “satisfied ourselves that we could write about this program — withholding a number of technical details — in a way that would not expose any intelligence-gathering methods or capabilities that are not already on the public record.” This is one of several pieces of evidence he cites in support of the conclusion that new technology involved was responsible for the delay.

However, there’s no reason to think that the Times couldn’t have rewritten the story in a manner that would have protected American intelligence capabilities a year ago. Isn’t it possible that the Times held off partly for political reasons? A year ago, President Bush had just been re-elected in large part due to his claims that he would do a better job of protecting the country from terrorism. Times journalists who fear accusations of media bias might have hesitated to release such an explosive story at that time. But with President Bush increasingly unpopular and under fire from liberals and conservatives alike, the Times overcame its doubts and decided put the story out.

This is part of a larger story I hope to tell in my dissertation about how presidential scandals are driven in large part by approval ratings. Media outlets and politicians appear to time their rhetoric for maximum impact. And in this case, the environment for creating a scandal is far more favorable today than it was a year ago. Similarly, Democratic criticism of the program is far more harsh than it would have been as recently as 2004 — and that’s because they don’t fear the repercussions of questioning Bush’s anti-terror policies nearly as much as they once did.

Update 12/20: Soon after posting this, an Atrios link pointed me to an LA Times story stating that “The New York Times first debated publishing a story about secret eavesdropping on Americans as early as last fall, before the 2004 presidential election.” The Times article said this about the timing of the paper’s initial reporting:

The White House asked The New York Times not to publish this article, arguing that it could jeopardize continuing investigations and alert would-be terrorists that they might be under scrutiny. After meeting with senior administration officials to hear their concerns, the newspaper delayed publication for a year to conduct additional reporting. Some information that administration officials argued could be useful to terrorists has been omitted.

It’s now clear that this statement was misleading. Many people (including me) read “a year” literally, and inferred that the Times first uncovered the program in December 2004. But if the Times knew about the program before the election it lends even more credence to the theory presented above. When is a newspaper most sensitive about charges of bias? Immediately before an important election. It’s likely that the risk of facing charges of trying to throw the election to Kerry was part of what deterred the Times.

Besides President Bush’s reference to Osama bin Laden as “Saddam,” the most grating trope of today’s press conference was his insistence that he “understands” every disagreement and criticism that has been levelled at him. In a wonderful example of the practice of feigned responsiveness, Bush would say “I understand” or “I fully understand” various concerns before dismissing, ignoring or caricaturing them:

Now, I can understand you asking these questions and if I were you, I’d be asking me these questions, too. But it is a shameful act by somebody who has got secrets of the United States government and feels like they need to disclose them publicly.

…I can fully understand why members of Congress are expressing concerns about civil liberties. I know that. And it’s — I share the same concerns.

…We have been talking to members of the United States Congress. We have met with them over 12 times. And it’s important for them to be brought into this process. Again, I repeat, I understand people’s concerns.

…Now, I recognize there is a debate in the country, and I fully understand that, about the nature of the enemy. I hear people say, because we took action in Iraq, we stirred them up, they’re dangerous. No, they were dangerous before we went into Iraq.

…You know, there’s an interesting debate in Washington, and you’re part of it, that says, well, they didn’t connect the dots prior to September the 11th — “they” being not only my administration, but previous administrations. And I understand that debate. I’m not being critical of you bringing this issue up and discussing it, but there was a — you might remember, if you take a step back, people were pretty adamant about hauling people up to testify, and wondering how come the dots weren’t connected.

…And, again, I understand the press and members of the United States Congress saying, are you sure you’re safeguarding civil liberties. That’s a legitimate question, and an important question. And today I hope I’ll help answer that. But we’re connecting dots as best as we possibly can.

…I still want to make sure, though, that people understand that I care about them and that my view of the future, a bright future, pertains to them as much as any other neighborhood.

…Now, if you don’t think there’s an enemy out there, then I can understand why you ought to say, just tell us all you know. I happen to know there’s an enemy there. And the enemy wants to attack us.

…David, my job is to confront big challenges and lead. And I fully understand everybody is not going to agree with my decisions. But the President’s job is to do what he thinks is right, and that’s what I’m going to continue to do.

The real question: does he “fully understand” how condescending this is?

Congratulations to my friend Chris Mooney. His book The Republican War on Science received a very favorable review in the New York Times Book Review yesterday, and Morgan Spurlock of “Super Size Me” has optioned the movie rights.

Here’s an excerpt from my review of the book:

I want to recommend that everyone pick up a copy of The Republican War on Science.

The reason why I am endorsing the book is simple: it addresses a very important part of the problem that we described on Spinsanity and in All the President’s Spin. In the public sphere, PR-driven spin is increasingly substituting for reasoned debate, and that is a very bad thing for democracy. Chris was one of the first people to understand the importance of what we were doing at Spinsanity, and I think that perspective informs his take here. TRWOS takes a deeply reported and researched look at how conservatives are using PR to confuse debate over science and science policy on issues ranging from evolution to global warming to embryonic stem cell research.

[Disclosure: I read an early version of the manuscript for the book and gave Chris feedback on it.]

Deboarah Solomon, the Simon Cowell of newspaper magazine journalism, went for the jugular again during an interview with author Peter Watson in last week’s New York Times Magazine:

WATSON: I do not believe in the inner world. I think that the inner world comes from the exploration of the outer world – reading, traveling, talking. I do not believe that meditation or cogitation leads to wisdom or peace or the truth.

SOLOMON: Then I don’t understand why you would want to write a history of ideas, since inner reflection and dreaminess surely count at least as much as scientific experiment in the formation of new ideas.

WATSON: To paraphrase the English philosopher John Gray, it is more sensible to look out on the world from a zoo than from a monastery. Science, or looking out, is better than contemplation, or looking in.

SOLOMON: If that were true, how would you explain a novelist like Virginia Woolf, whose achievement was based on the rejection of the panoramic outward view in favor of inner sensibility?

WATSON: The rise of the novel generally is a great turning in. But I don’t think it has given a lot of satisfaction to people. It has not achieved anything collective. It’s a lot of little personal turnings that lots of people love to connect with. But these are fugitive, evanescent truths. They don’t stay with you very long or help you do much.

SOLOMON: You strike me as deeply unanalyzed. Have you ever considered seeing a psychiatrist?

Brutal stuff.

(Previous installments: parts 1, 2 and 3.)

As some of you noticed, some posts disappeared on Friday when Typepad had technical difficulties, but everything is now back up to date.

Here’s a lesson in how party elites try to placate their base.

With grassroots conservatives increasingly angry about President Bush’s failure to address illegal immigration to their satisfaction, the National Republican Senatorial Committee is on pander patrol. It just sent out a faux survey/fundraising email (PDF) under the name of its chair, Elizabeth Dole, which begins:

Illegal immigration is putting a major strain on local, state and federal government. It impacts our national security, our economy, education system, and health care systems.

As Chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, I want to know where loyal Republicans like you stand on this critical issue.

We need to move towards decisive action to address this growing challenge.

That’s why the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) is conducting an important National Survey on Immigration Policy. This survey will gauge your opinions on the impact of illegal immigration in your area, current immigration policy and various proposals to address illegal immigration.

She then lets loose with a stream of semi-hysterical rhetoric that appears to implicitly criticize President Bush, as in this passage:

Illegal immigration in America has doubled since the 1990 census because of many factors: Immigration laws are just not being enforced…or they are bad laws that need to be changed…or we as a nation have not had the resources and the will to enforce the laws and properly control our borders. (her ellipses)

And if you click through to the “survey” (PDF), which is online here (but requires personal information), you’ll see at least two noteworthy questions:

5. Do you support charging the governments of incarcerated aliens in our nation’s prisons for the
costs of their trials and imprisonment either through direct requests or by deducting costs from any
aid prisoners’ homelands receive from the U.S. government?

…7. Do you believe the government should deputize volunteer ‘Minuteman’ forces to augment the
Border Patrol along the U.S. border?

To your average conservative, these might sound tough. But is the NRSC seriously considering proposing the deployment of the so-called “Minutemen” to the border? Of course not. However, seeing the idea being “considered” is designed to placate the base. Likewise, billing foreign governments for illegal immigration is simply never going to happen.

And, of course, once you have vented your anger about illegal immigration by completing the survey, you’re taken to the inevitable request for donations to the NRSC.

This survey suggests two things:
(1) Republicans are worried about the illegal immigration issue. Their base is already demoralized, and it’s making things worse.
(2) Howard Dean’s predictions that President Bush is going to scapegoat illegal immigrants next may not come true. But panicked Congressional Republicans may be running “Wilfredo Horton” ads sooner than we think.