Make of this what you will:
In a highly unusual reversal, the Defense Department’s inspector general’s office has withdrawn a report it issued in January exonerating a Pentagon public relations program that made extensive use of retired officers who worked as military analysts for television and radio networks.
Donald M. Horstman, the Pentagon’s deputy inspector general for policy and oversight, said in a memorandum released on Tuesday that the report was so riddled with flaws and inaccuracies that none of its conclusions could be relied upon. In addition to repudiating its own report, the inspector general’s office took the additional step of removing the report from its Web site.
Has this ever happened before?
e.c.
i can’t say if it’s happened before, but i’m sure we’ll see it happen again.
pretty much sums up most of what came out of the bush administration.
slag
This freakin amazed me last night, and I don’t quite know what to make of it.
The article didn’t really cite any previous situations like this, which makes it even harder to determine the larger context for this thing.
Aaron
Wow, I do not remember anything like that.
I am also quite interested in this, as I am almost done with my M.A. thesis which dealt with this exact program. The DoD report, which was around 70 pages, was absolutely ridiculous. Its methodology, particularly in the way it examined the ties of individual retired military analysts to the defense industry, was laughable. The entire “report” was basically just a cover for the DoD program . . .
Napoleon
I am sure Brian Williams will mention this prominently on the NBC nightly newscast tonight just like he did the Pulitzer for that guy who wrote the stories that media like NBC were running government propaganda that the Pentagon was illegally creating.
In my perfect world the justice department raids NBC news and all the rest of them right at 6:30 pm on a weeknight in order to seize records related to this matter, shutting them down in the process, just to f- with them and force them to actually acknowledge the existence of what they were doing, unless they just go with the “we were experiencing technical difficulty”.
By the way in this same perfect world John Yoo gets arrested right in the middle of one of his classes and as they march him to the waiting FBI vehicle they stop in front of the sign of the Stanford Law School to give the press a chance to photograph him in handcuffs.
BethanyAnne
It’s times like this when I wish David Hackworth was still alive. He could answer that question, and would probably write a column about it.
Aaron
Also worthy of note is that Victoria Clarke, one of the people in charge of implementing the program, was also a driving force behind the idea of embedding reporters with military units.
Taken together, these programs sought to leverage journalists access in order to turn the news media into an information/propaganda arm of the Pentagon and the DoD.
TheFountainHead - 'Easily Led'
This is a really interesting move. It’s a total concession without actually having to make one. My guess is that now the Inspector General does absolutely nothing. They’ll never issue a new report or instigate a new investigation. The DoD saves a little face in that the truth never gets published by the Pentagon and at the same time they’ve given themselves cover from those pesky people looking for the truth by pulling the report.
It’s actually very much Obama-fu.
slag
My big question here: Have all the right people gotten fired already, or is there more to be done in that respect?
MattF
I’m sorta thinking that the SecDef, a certain Mr. Gates, is having some influence here. Wouldn’t be entirely proper to do it in public, since the Inspector General is supposed to be independent. But I can easily imagine that various informal conversations have been had.
gbear
I belive that the pre-Obama response to this kind of thing was ‘more cowbell’.
Over the last eight years, the sentence “report was so riddled with flaws and inaccuracies that none of its conclusions could be relied upon” would have been used to make excuses for Bush’s fuckups (they gave me bad information) rather than to reverse or bring an end to bad policy.
I can’t think of any previous similar situations.
ArtV
I dunno what it means, but I’m sure it’s good for Republicans.
geg6
I have never heard of such a thing in all my years. This story stunned me when I read about it last night. Simply stunning.
Captain Haddock
Sounds like the initial report was typical Bush era CYA.
I’d like to see Obama’s team pursue a new investigation — but taking on the DOD and media would require a massive set of stones.
Anoniminous
The DoD and all its works – public and private – are always lying to great fanfare and then quietly issuing retractions.
Kind of cool to watch it happen again and again and again and again over the years and realize how easy it is to play ‘journamalists’ like a $2 banjo.
Legalize
No doubt this will give rise to the newest wingnut poutrage explosion. I expect to hear Broder et al soberly reflecting upon how disgracefully the Obama administration is treating the out-going Bushies, who, after all, kept us safe after 9/11, and and and the Obamas insulted the queen of England while simultaneously grovelling at the feat of terrorists while blaming America for all (ALL I tells ya) of the world’s problems. Look forward not backward. Also.
Face
I have a feeling there’s at least a thousand reports they could rescind for inaccura….er, LIES.
Try just about any report on Iraqi Army progress circa 2003-2007.
Gunner
Well, that certainly reassures me that the DOD IG’s office is an effective, independent auditor and watchdog of the programs and operations of the DOD. That was about as subtle as Stalin removing people from photographs, and just as effective. I’m sure no one has copies of the report.
JK
@Napoleon: This decision blows and Brain Williams is a useless, clueless tool.
gwangung
Given that he’s a UC Berkeley law professor, the only reason they’d do that is if they’re stopping by to arrest Condi Rice.
Hm. I’m OK with that.
(And I’m also OK with rubbing it into the Cal weenie’s face….adding insult to injury…)
KevinNYC
I’m assuming when they say the report was issued in “January” that was pre-Inauguration.
CalD
Who knew whitewash would come off that easily? You mean all it really takes is one good squirt with the garden hose?
Comrade Kevin
@Napoleon:
Nothing like a frontal assault on the 1st Amendment by the Justice Department, eh?
Napoleon
@gwangung:
Whoops, but you get the idea I was getting at.
@Comrade Kevin:
Hey, its a fantasy. We will be lucky if Yoo and gang ever get prosecuted for torture, let alone anything else.
Glidwrith
@Comrade Kevin:
How the hell do you conflate a person’s right to free speech with a propaganda arm directed by the DoD using ex-military arm’s dealers to soberly tell all Americans that we simply must go to war using private news channels?
Mark Gisleson
When the media ignored Barstow’s Pulitzer, the Bushies would have been smart to have kept their mouths shut. Instead Rummies goons just mau maued Barstow saying he made up the facts for his Pulitzer on how the Pentagon “used” network military analysts to propagate their lies.
I think Gates and Obama just let Rummy know that his shit won’t fly, and if he doesn’t stfu worse stuff than this will be coming out.
Mark Gisleson
Boehlert just wrote about this:
http://tinyurl.com/cpzwm2
Indie Tarheel
@Legalize:
Awesome new word. I pledge to use it whenever and wherever possible.
asiangrrlMN
Wow. I am stunned. It must have been a really, really, really poorly-written report in order to have been ACTUALLY withdrawn. My mind boggles.
RememberNovember
@Mark Gisleson:
Bigger question- do they give Medals of Freedom for war profiteering?
Bush did.
Aaron
The report was terrible, a couple of the more outrageous ways were:
Barry McCaffrey was listed as having “no relationship” to defense contractors, despite the fact that his own fucking website proudly claimed he worked for at least two defense consulting firms
The DoD claimed that absent a definitive legal definition of propaganda, it could not rule one way or the other on whether the program was legal or illegal. However, this clearly ignores both the 1987 Supreme Court case Meese v Keene as well as various GAO and Office of Legal Counsel rulings.
In short, the investigator started with the idea that there was no impropriety and squeezed whatever evidence he couldn’t ignore into that framework
Pennypacker
Why does the Pentagon hate the military?