News Corp Set To Air 9/11 Documentary Glorifying Bush; Producer Says He’s Not Interested In ‘Facts’

By Lee Fang/Think Progress






After spending over a decade promoting President Bush, the PATRIOT Act, and the Iraq War, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation appears to be up to the same tricks, this time with an hour-long promotional video about Bush’s leadershipduring the 9/11 attacks. Although News Corp. is perhaps best known for its Bush cheerleading through its Fox News subsidiary, the Bush documentary is airing on another News Corp. company with a better brand image, National Geographic.

The documentary has not aired yet, but is scheduled to come out a few days before the 10-year anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Early reviews of the program, however, paint Bush as a hero who discarded politics and his right-wing agenda once the planes hit the towers. The film also depicts Bush as a leader bent on capturing Osama bin Laden, no matter what:

“It’s not one of those moments where you weigh the consequences or think about the politics,” [Bush] adds. ”You decide. And I made the decisions as best I could in the fog of war. I was determined. Determined to protect the country.And I was determined to find out who did it and go get them.”

In reality, within hours of the 9/11 plane hijackings, Bush’s Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld began drawing up plans to launch a war in Iraq “even though there was no evidence linking Saddam Hussein to the attacks.” Indeed, Bush aides quickly went to work undercutting the proposed commission to study the events leading up the 9/11, and despite the growing evidence linking the terrorist act with Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda group, Bush never made bin Laden a priority. By January 2002, Dick Cheney told the press that bin Laden “isn’t that big a threat.” The next month, Bush said bin Laden was “not the issue.”

Will producer Peter Schnall critically, and accurately, explain to the public Bush’s actions during and after the horrific 9/11 terrorist attacks? In a recent interview about the program, Schnall said he tried not to push “it too far” with the former president, and that he was “less interested in facts than how” Bush “was feeling”:

“He would only take it to so far,” Schnall tells Zap2it. “If I had pushed it too far, he might have shut down a bit more, and my goal was to get him to talk about those four or five days. I was less interested in facts than how he was feeling.”

News Corp. has a long and complicated relationship with the Bush administration. In addition to promoting the Bush political agenda for two terms on Fox News, former Bush aides have flocked to the corporation as employees (Bush’s top strategist and spokeswoman, Karl Rove and Dana Perino, are among the many Bush admin alumni seen every day on Fox News). Bush’s assistant attorney general Viet Dinh, the “chief architect” of the PATRIOT Act, is an influential board member of News Corp. now overseeing the investigation of the hacking scandal now embroiling the company.

But if there’s any doubt that News Corp. isn’t serious about its latest attempt at Bush hagiography, take a look at the publicity effort around the documentary. On Tuesday, Matt Dornic promoted a special viewing of the documentary on the FishbowlDC website. Dornic is astaffer for Quinn Gillespie, News Corp.’s lobbying firm and public relations agency in Washington, DC

Right Rushes To Praise Bush For Obama’s Order To Kill Bin Laden

By Marie Diamond

President Obama announced late last night that he had authorized a military mission to kill the world’s most wanted terrorist. “Last week, I determined that we had enough intelligence to take action, and authorized an operation to get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice.” In response, conservative leaders and pundits rushed to heap praise on the president — President Bush, that is:

– Majority Whip Eric Cantor: “I commend President Obama who has followed the vigilance of President Bush in bringing Bin Laden to justice.” [Link]
– Former Bush Chief of Staff Andy Card: “[Bush] made sure everything was in place so that President Obama could have an opportunity to get Osama bin Laden.” [Link]

Other conservatives used the opportunity to advance their national security agendas, claiming the mission vindicated controversial Bush policies on everything from unilateralism to torture:

– Rep. Steve King (R-IA) tweeted, “Wonder what President Obama thinks of water boarding now?” — an allusion to the fact that the nickname of the courier who served bin Laden may have been elicited under tortured interrogation. [Link]
– Former Bush adviser Karl Rove said on Fox & Friends this morning: “I think the tools that President Bush put into place –- GITMO, rendition, enhanced interrogation, the vast effort to collect and collate this information — obviously served his successor quite well.”
– Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld noted that the critical intelligence that led to bin Laden’s death “very well could have been partly a result of the interviews that took place at Guantanamo.” [Link]
– Heritage Foundation President Edwin Feulner, wrote in a blog post, “Bin Laden’s elimination vindicates U.S. strategy in the region, started under President George W. Bush.” [Link]
– John Yoo, Bush legal adviser who wrote “torture memos”: “Without the tough decisions taken by President Bush and his national security team, the United States could not have found and killed bin Laden. It is the continuity of policies in the war on terror that has brought success, not the misguided effort of the last two years to disavow them.” [Link]

Meanwhile, some pundits went even further, criticizing President Obama for not giving his predecessor enough credit:

– Conservative blogger Michelle Malkin tweeted, “U know who Obama forgot 2 thank? Bush-era interrogators&detention staff who dvlped intel re couriers.” [Link]
– Conservative radio host Laura Ingraham tweeted, “BHO turning this into a campaign speech. He should have thanked GWB, not reminded us OB escaped.” She was also suspicious of the timing of the announcement, asking, “Did Obama WH wait to announce on anniv of Bush ‘Mission Accomplished’?!” [Link, link]
– Tea Party Nation head Judson Phillips “said that the death of Osama bin Laden happened in spite of President Obama and criticized the President for announcing the breaking news during Donald Trump’s ‘Celebrity Apprentice.’” [Link]

As for real estate mogul Donald Trump, he had more important things to tweet about this morning: “Don’t forget to watch Donald J. Trump’s Fabulous World of Golf—tonight at 9 pm, Golf Channel.”

UPDATEFormer Bush Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said, "I congratulate President Obama and his team for this significant accomplishment. I also congratulate President Bush who carried the War on Terror to our enemies and adopted the legal framework for that effort that continues today."

M.C.L Comment: I'm answering the call from  Extreme Liberal if you're a right wing lurker and you think you're going to post a link or make the following comments of giving Bush credit for what went down last night your comment will be deleted.