What, Me Worry?

Bush abandons the Alfred E. Neuman school of public relations.

Daniel Henninger writes about the frustration that many in the conservative movement have felt at the lack of a spirited intellectual defense from the administration with regard to its policies both foreign and domestic. It has indeed been a mystery to many observers that the White House could have such a clear view of how to fight a war against Islamofascism as well as moving the economy forward with pro-growth policies like tax cuts, and yet not know how to promote this same agenda with the public. For some time it has seemed that the administration did not even understand the need to let the American public see that they were confident of their own actions by vigorously defending them. Unfortunately in the new media environment silently allowing one's actions to speak for themselves is just not enough. There are several reasons for this that require any Republican administration, now or in the future, to take a more pro-active approach to the management of public relations and information in the age of a hostile dinosaur media, a collapsing hard left Democratic party and the rise of new media.

One must recognize that The Elite Media Monoculture is not on the side of America and certainly not of this Presidency. It is clear that they do not want him to succeed. But in order for this President to fail, the President's defense policy must also fail since so much of the administration's political capital is founded on the war against terrorism. The press cannot, of course, make the case that the overall strategy is failing since that would require an extended philosophical debate and an argument over facts which they are unwilling to discuss or put forward. A detailed analysis of how the war is being fought and its overall goals and strategy is the last thing they want. Nor do they want to notice the continuing progress being made in Iraq and the rest of the Middle East as a result of White House policy. Indeed, Old Media has gone out of its way to avoid discussing a great deal of what is actually happening in Iraq as well as the broader Middle East precisely because it does not fit their world view or their agenda of ridding the country of a Republican administration. That the President's policy in Iraq is actually succeeding is a fact that they simply do not wish to discuss.

Thus the members of Old Media have been attempting very hard to do the next best thing. They have been working tirelessly to erode the confidence of the American people at home because they know that a foreign policy cannot last if it does not have the support of the people. And because the facts show that the President's Iraq policy is slowly but surely achieving its goals in Iraq, the elites have instead chosen to attack the administration's credibility and ethical standing in the hope that they will be able to sour the American public on the President. In the last few years we have seen plenty of examples of them trying to bring down this President, even going so far as to cook up fake National Guard documents, fake testimony about troops targeting journalists, fake claims about a war for oil, fake stories of flushing Korans down toilets at Guantanamo and fake sanctimony about intelligence which everyone had and no one doubted at the time.

The Elite Media Monoculture has become Pravda; providing a daily dose of propaganda in favor of America's enemies and against America being able to defend itself against those who wish to destroy it. They are doing their best to present only that information which puts the President and his administration in the worst possible light, while at the same time fabricating bad news and ignoring everything else which shows the administration's policies to be effective. In such an environment it is vital to offer an intellectual defense of our actions. One cannot be shy about it. The support of the American people is critical to the war effort and the press knows it. Failing to defend one's ideas in this day and age is to give up the field to the enemy.

At the same time we also have to contend with the implosion of the Democratic party. Having been taken over by the radical hard left, the Democrats, like the press, have chosen to side with America's enemies because they think that it will be the road by which they return to power. And the return of their power is what they want the most. In concert with the Elite Media Monoculture, the Democrats have chosen to launch an all-out political war against the Republicans and the President hoping that it will win them back the White House and the congress. And like the press, they have chosen the politics of personal destruction rather than a debate over the issues. The basic idea is not so different. They believe that if they can discredit Republicans and the President that the American people will turn to them as the logical alternative. Never mind that they have no plan and do not appear to take the defense of the country seriously. Never mind that they have lost in election after election because the public knows they are not a serious party. Never mind that we live in dangerous times and that Democrats seem not to notice it and to blame all problems on the United States. Somehow, against all evidence, they think that this path will bring them back to power.

If the administration does not defend itself, loudly and with moral authority, they could be right. Fortunately the White House seems to be getting the message and they are now starting to do what they should have been doing all along.

Bloggers, talk radio and the rest of the new media have for some time been doing much of the grunt work of defending the administration as well as conservative and libertarian political ideas in general, and that will continue to be the case in the future. The new media environment makes it a certainty that the Internet will be critical to the debate over politics, culture and economics both now and in the future. But at the same time any conservative or Republican administration must understand that in the information age silence is not golden. Especially when so much is at stake and so many on the hard left want you to fail. If conservatives are to survive and thrive in this new world of instant information combined with a hostile hard left, they need to understand the battle of ideas and come to it prepared to fight for what is right. Remaining silent and hoping for the best is just not an option.