Reuters ‘Analysis’: Obama Not ‘Going It Alone’ Like Bush Did; Oil Now a ‘Concrete Interest’
On Thursday at Reuters , Andrew Quinn, with the help of Caren Bohan, cobbled together a pathetic “analysis” full of sympathy for a “struggling” Barack Obama and recognition of the need to keep oil flowing from Saudi Arabia. It also contained a false jab at George W. Bush and the War in Iraq. First, let's look at Quinn's Bush jab: Obama is committed to partnering with other countries rather than going it alone as did his predecessor George W. Bush, which both broadens and complicates the decision-making process. This got the attention of Jeffrey Goldberg at the Atlantic (HT Instapundit ), who linked to the identical but unbylined Reuters item at the New York Times. Goldberg's response: This, of course, is wildly inaccurate and misleading. Say what you will about the second Iraq war, but George W. Bush made partnerships with many nations in advance of the invasion, including and especially America's most valuable ally, Great Britain, as well as Australia, Spain, Hungary, Poland, Denmark, South Korea, the Czech Republic, and a couple of dozen others. Reuters should correct this inaccurate statement. Good luck with that. Quinn's assertion is more than “wildly inaccurate.” It's objectively false. ICasualties.org has a list of casualties by country entitled (of all things): “Coalition Military Fatalities By Year and Month.” 23 Counties are listed. There was a military coalition. George W. Bush was not “going it alone.” Additionally, Fox Nation has a post indicating that the Iraq War coalition involved roughly twice as many nations (30, reportedly per the State Department) as the Libya (cough) “kinetic military action” (16). What's more, even though the wire service appears to have been childishly determined to avoid using the word “coalition” during the Iraq War, I was able to find two examples where Reuters did acknowledge the existence of a military coalition: July 7, 2006 (“US Sees Security Transfer in Half Iraq's Provinces”) —
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on March 25, 2011. Filed under