by Deb Cupples | Since the new millennium, the Bush Administration has seemed to be all public-relations, all the time -- like those Madison Avenue ad agencies that craftily convince TV viewers that fast-food "meat" is highly nutritive and deserves to be called meat.
Our nation would be so much stronger today if President Bush's team had spent the last 7+ years creating truly positive realities instead of falsely positive images.
I'm reminded of this, because our military has reportedly doctored photos of deceased soldiers before sending them to the media. The Associated Press reports:
"The Associated Press retracted two government-issued photographs last night after a photographer in Texas alerted the agency that the photos in question appeared to be doctored.
"Bob Owen, chief photographer of the San Antonio Express-News, notified the AP that the photos of two deceased soldiers, who died in Iraq on Sept. 14, were nearly identical. Upon examining the photos, Owens noticed that everything except for the soldier’s face, name, and rank was the same. The most glaring similarity, Owen told CJR, was that the camouflage patterns of the two uniforms were “perfectly identical.” (AP)
I can't imagine how the military hoped to benefit from doctoring the photos, but it must have had some kind of goal in mind. Otherwise, it wouldn't have devoted staff time to those tasks.
I'll never grasp why the Bush Administration seems to view the con job as the answer to almost everything. It's as though President Bush, or the people working for him, simply don't care if the Commander in Chief's credibility is dashed to bits.
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