Phil Donahue’s vindication: Media icon unloads on Fox, Cheney and what happened at MSNBC

[Hissyspit]

12. More:

A lot of people — not just on the left, but those in general who either did not support the war from the beginning or turned on it early — were upset to see a lot of the most vocal, prominent and unrepentant supporters of the invasion being treated as experts, and resuming their role as pundits and talking heads. Did you share that frustration?

Yes. Oh, sure. How can you not, seeing Dick Cheney instruct us on foreign policy?

One of the things I don’t think has had enough attention [is that] every major metropolitan newspaper in this country supported the invasion of Iraq. Now, if there’s a major metropolitan newspaper in this country that condemned the invasion that I don’t know about, I’m happy to hear from them, and I will apologize, personally. Seventy-seven United States senators voted for the war. Hillary voted for the war, John Kerry voted for the war, Chuck Hagel voted for the war, and there were others; only 23 senators voted no. Of the 23, only one was a Republican — Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, and he lost his seat at the next election. (Thank God the voters of Rhode Island were good enough to elect him governor the following year.)

The war, which was … a massive blunder, never came up during the presidential contest in either ’08 or ’12. It never came up. The closest it came to the surface was Ron Paul, who did say on the stump, “Why are we invading all these countries? What are we doing?” As you see in my film, the actual debate on the floor of the House and the Senate, of the Iraq War resolution, which unconstitutionally gave Bush permission to invade, it wasn’t in any way obedient to Article I, Section 8 [of the Constitution], which states only Congress can declare war. Congress did not declare war. Congress did not want the job. It’s a third rail issue; if they’re wrong then that could be it. So they, hands over their eyes, handed the president a piece of paper which gives him permission if he thinks he should, and if it doesn’t work, they’re able to say, “Well, he said, he thought, he told us …”

I’d very much like you to see the behavior of the congressmen (in my film). They were summoned to the White House by WHIG, White House Iraq Group. This is a Karl Rove committee that included the advertising warriors who named our invasion “Shock and Awe,” and “Rolling Thunder,” like video games. And they gave them their talking points: “A smoking gun will become a mushroom cloud”; “The longer we wait, the more dangerous he becomes”; “Saddam has more weapons of mass destruction than Hitler ever had”; “I see Hitler in Saddam Hussein.” And they read this, they’re looking down at the piece of paper, in what was at most a shell debate, that led to the deaths of over 4,500 service people, men and women both, not to mention how many injuries, we’re not even sure, we’re not even sure how many Iraqis are dead, and the refugees are in the millions.

This is unbelievable. You’ve got to see this debate. It’s truly a very instructive piece on what you can do if you scare the people. George Bush took this nation, the mainstream media included, and led it right into this war. It was an amazingly executed, brilliantly executed, plan. The politics of fear. And so when I see Cheney, my god, Americans got a lot out of trying, we haven’t won a war, and we’re spending $2 billion a day on things that go “boom.” We have become a warrior nation. We have no respect for diplomacy. We have to be tough, and we don’t talk to people we don’t like. We don’t talk to Ahmadinejad; Putin talks to Ahmadinejad. We didn’t talk to Putin; Putin talked to us. And we’re beginning to show an unbecoming insecurity. We’re stomping around: “Exceptionalism! Exceptionalism!” Well, easy, big fella; it would be better if someone from another country said we were exceptional.

Do you think if the war had been debated more sincerely, and its presentation to the public hadn’t been so sanitized, folks like Cheney would have a harder time reemerging as they have?

Well, let’s understand that he’s reemerging on Fox, right? I mean, I haven’t researched this, has he been on any of the major networks? Has he been on ABC? He’s not been on “Meet the Press,” has he? I don’t know.