SlowpokeBlog

I wasn't going to do a strip about the Petraeus hearings or the MoveOn ad because, frankly, the whole thing bored me. "Bush administration conducts massive PR blitz using four-star general as cover; public-interest group calls BS, and gets falsely accused of hating on the whole military." Whatever. We've been through this before with Colin Powell.

Then the U.S. Senate decided to wade into the matter. In an astonishing swipe at the First Amendment, they sanctimoniously declared Gen. Petraeus to be off-limits to criticism, with 25 craven Democrats -- including my own Jim Webb, for whom I went door-to-door in a trailer park -- voting for the resolution. That did it.

I saw the MoveOn ad the day it appeared in the Times, and while I thought the Petraeus-Betray Us rhyme sounded a little like a snarky blog comment, I was glad to see someone getting out in front of the story and telling it like it is. Because it was already patently obvious to anyone following the news closely that his testimony was part of a highly-coordinated White House media offensive. As TPM noted, according to the Washingtoh Post, Petraeus was plugged directly into the Decider's office:

Another new arrival in the West Wing set up a rapid-response PR unit hard-wired into Petraeus's shop. Ed Gillespie, the new presidential counselor, organized daily conference calls at 7:45 a.m. and again late in the afternoon between the White House, the Pentagon, the State Department, and the U.S. Embassy and military in Baghdad to map out ways of selling the surge.

Anyone who thought we were going to get an honest, independent assessment of the war from Petraeus -- and this seems to include much of our media, who should know better -- is gravely lacking the healthy skepticism that has become so vital to understanding our current political landscape. By accepting the partisan role of spin man for the perennially dishonest Bush administration, Petraeus did in fact betray the public trust that is, for better or worse, heaped on soldiers of his stature. Do I like saying that about our current commander in the field? No. But don't blame me, or MoveOn. (Another right-wing talking point twists the meaning of the MoveOn ad to say it's akin to calling Petraeus a "traitor" -- um, no one is accusing him of helping the enemy. Though the war in Iraq has, in fact, made terrorism worse.)

The point of my cartoon, however, is not so much to defend MoveOn, but to illuminate the hypocrisy of Republicans when it comes to respect for members of the military. They're all too eager to trash vets if they're Democrats. And they'll trash active-duty soldiers too, if they don't toe the neocon line. (If you haven't read "The War as We Saw It" yet, you should.) A Montana Republican newsman and former politician recently claimed the soldiers couldn't have written that op-ed themselves, that it had to be a liberal scheme. As the cousin of someone who served in Iraq, I find this faux-pro-military posturing obscene.

Most people won't know it, but the drawing of Petraeus as a farting poodle is a reference to a mini-controversy that erupted on Daryl Cagle's site over a cartoon he drew of Petraeus as Bush's pet dog. I decided to make him fluffier and gassier.

Oh, and August has a good cartoon up today about the Repubs' hypocrisy re: free speech. For people who complain so much about the easily offended, they sure do get easily offended!