Rich Tips Next MSM Bush-Bashing Milestone: When Iraq Death Toll Equals 9-11's

It wasn't easy, but I battled my way this morning to the end of Frank Rich's pay-per-view column, Donald Rumsfeld’s Dance With the Nazis. Tempting as it was, I didn't turn the cyber-page despite prose that you might find in the dictionary next to the definition of 'turgid'.  Take Rich's description of Donald Rumsfeld's recent remarks: "[a] toxic effort to impugn the patriotism of administration critics by conflating dissent on Iraq with cut-and-run surrender and incipient treason."

My persistence was rewarded with two nuggets from the column's concluding paragraphs. First, as a certified spokesman for MSM sentiment, Rich made clear that in liberal media-land, Iraq is not part of the war on terror.  Rich dismissed Pres. Bush's assertion that Al-Qaeda and our foes in Iraq are part of the same “ideological struggle of the 21st century.”  Sniffed Rich: "One more drop in the polls, and he may yet rebrand this mess War of the Worlds." Movie titles aside, and messy as it might be, we are indeed engaged in a new kind of world war.  And if more proof were needed that the MSM doesn't understand that, here it was.

Finally, Rich tipped the MSM's hand as to what will be the next major MSM Bush-bashing milestone: the day on which the number of American lives lost in Iraq equals that of 9/11. Here's how Rich foreshadowed what is sure to be an unrestrained liberal feeding frenzy: "The number of American dead in Iraq — now more than 2,600 — is inexorably approaching the death toll of that Tuesday morning five years ago."

Had Rich been writing during WWII, would he have demanded that FDR call off the dogs on the day American war casualties equaled those lost at Pearl Harbor?

Mark Finkelstein lives in the liberal haven of Ithaca, NY, where he hosts the award-winning, web-casted TV show Right Angle.  Contact him at mark@gunhill.net