April 28, 2003, New York
(Unassociated Press)
The nation rejoiced as one of the last redoubts of resistance in the war fell. In a sudden and unexpected collapse, the New York Times finally conceded that the Saddam Hussein regime had disintegrated, with none of the dire pre-war predictions borne out.
While there is still some mopping-up action required, with occasional bursts of negative news coverage of power and water outages and exhortations of anti-Americanism by imported Iranian mullahs, and continuing complaints about the coalition’s inability to prevent Iraqis from despoiling their own country and national treasures, the national coverage of the war has finally been reporting a successful battle plan in a relatively uniform manner.
After the fall of Baghdad with little resistance, and the shock and awe of the precision bunkum-busting weaponry from the blogosphere, the wind went out of the sails of the elite anti-Republican Guard at the Gray Lady and the LA Times, and other left-liberal screeds.
Morale had been low ever since the tragic battle in which reporters outnumbered the protestors at the Masters. Everyone lived in constant terror of the regime, with continual threats to have columns savagely spiked, or amputations of access, in the face of even the slightest deviation from the party line. At the end, there was little will to fight.
As a result, when the course of the war became clear, several reporters left their posts to join the opposition, and most of them simply dropped their keyboards without a word, often as a result of pre-arranged cell-phone communications with special-forces correspondents from the National Review, the Weekly Standard, and the Wall Street Journal.
Foreign correspondents, many of whom had rushed to the editorial aid of what they thought would be welcoming journalistic brethren across the water, were surprised to be attacked and denounced in many quarters of the American press (particularly the blogosphere) as people with no interest in the journalistic integrity of the American media, instead propping up dictatorial regimes in Atlanta and on West 43rd Street in New York. They were picked off, one by one, by blogger snipers, and few of them survived with credibility intact.
Despite the apparent war success, however, many remain concerned that the weapons of mass distraction haven’t yet been found, despite the abundant evidence of them. There is also frustration among some that much of the leadership remains at large. Of course, no one sensible expresses such concerns.
The whereabouts of “Commandante Howell” do, of course, remain uncertain. Many still believe that he was taken out early in the war, with a devastatingly accurate and precise description of him (using foul French words–the only even-slightly effective weapons available from that nation)–as a poseur and journalistic dillettante, more concerned with the admission of women in a men-only golf club than any serious issues. There have been rumored sightings of him in Catskills retreats and upper-West-Side semillon-and-brie receptions, but they are unsubstantiated, and he is known to have many doubles in his blinkered and antiquated “progressive” outlook.
Regardless of his disposition, the links between his former regime and the anti-war left haven’t been conclusively proven, but now that many are defecting, there is little doubt that they will be found and verified beyond any doubt. With the recent capture of key henchmen R. W. Apple, P. Krugman, A. Clymer and M. Dowd, revelations should come quickly now.
But the importance of actually finding the supreme leader at this point is denigrated, given his diminished, even insubstantial power.
“We don’t really care where he is,” said a spokesman for the New York Sun. “His credibility, and that of his regime, is shattered, and the people are finally free to read and believe as they wish.”
(Copyright 2003 by Rand Simberg)