Considering your history of flip flopping on issues (i.e. Japanese products)
how long till you start endorsing Bush? Maybe when you think you can profit
from endorsing a Republican.


"Harry Krause" wrote in message
news:c3dhc2g=.9bec7855b5d82a751b5031b4c71e109b@108 1261375.nulluser.com...
INSIDE IRAQ
GOP loyalists in Baghdad try to keep news good

Critics say office is campaign outpost

By Jim Krane
ASSOCIATED PRESS

April 5, 2004

Inside the marble-floored palace hall that serves as the press office of
the U.S.-led coalition, Republican Party operatives lead a team of
Americans who promote mostly good news about Iraq.

Dan Senor, a former press secretary for Spencer Abraham, the Michigan
Republican who's now energy secretary, heads the office packed with
former Bush campaign workers, political appointees and ex-Capitol Hill
staffers.

One-third of the U.S. civilian workers in the press office have GOP
ties, running an enterprise that critics see as an outpost of Bush's
re-election effort with Iraq a top concern. Senor and others inside the
coalition say they follow strict guidelines that steer clear of politics.

One of the main goals of the Office of Strategic Communications - known
as stratcom - is to ensure Americans see the positive side of the Bush
administration's invasion, occupation and reconstruction of Iraq, where
600 U.S. soldiers have died and a deadly insurgency thrives.

"Beautification Plan for Baghdad Ready to Begin," one press release in
late March said in its headline. Another statement last month cautioned,
"The Reality is Nothing Like What You See on Television."

Senor, spokesman for the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority, said
his office is guided by ethical "red lines" that prevent it from
crossing into the Bush campaign.

"We have an obligation to communicate with the U.S. Congress and the
American people, given that they're spending almost $20 billion in Iraq
and have committed over 100,000 U.S. troops here," Senor said in an
interview with The Associated Press.

Known as the Green Room, the press office is inside coalition
headquarters in the Republican Palace that used to belong to Saddam
Hussein. The palace is in central Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone.

The office counts 21 Republicans - 11 of whom have worked inside the
Bush administration before their Iraq posting - among its 58 U.S.
civilian staffers, according to figures Senor provided.

More than half a dozen CPA officials in the press office worked on
Bush's 2000 presidential campaign or are related to Bush campaign
workers, according to payroll records filed with the Federal Elections
Commission.

The U.S. team stands in deep contrast to the British team that works
alongside it, almost all of whom are civil or foreign service employees,
not political appointees. Many of the British in Iraq display regional
knowledge or language skills that most of the Americans lack.

The drive to re-elect Bush is a sensitive topic. Several coalition
officials angered by what they see as CPA politicking - with U.S.
accomplishments in Iraq being trumpeted to help Bush - grumbled
privately, but would not go on record with complaints.

But Gordon Robison, a former CPA contractor who helped build the
Pentagon-funded Al-Iraqiya television station in Baghdad, said
Republicans in the press room intensely followed the Democratic
presidential primaries as John Kerry emerged as the presumed nominee.

"Iraq is in danger of costing George W. Bush his presidency and the
CPA's media staff are determined to see that does not happen," Robison
said.

Robison, a journalist who said his political affiliation is a private
matter, left Baghdad in March after finishing his contract with San
Diego-based defense contractor Science Applications International Corp.

One CPA staffer who spoke on condition of anonymity said the press
office had sent targeted "good news" releases to U.S. television, radio
and newspaper outlets that were timed to deflect criticism of Bush
during the Democratic primaries.

Rich Galen, 57, a well-known Republican strategist, oversees the daily
news releases sent directly to media outlets in the United States.
Before joining the CPA press operation late last year, Galen wrote a GOP
insider column and appeared on Fox News to harpoon liberal critics of
Bush.

Now, he's still writing an Internet column, but he's turned it into what
he calls a travelogue about Iraq. And he still appears on Fox - but
long-distance via satellite and as a CPA spokesman.

Galen has been press secretary for both former House Speaker Newt
Gingrich and former Vice President Dan Quayle.

Were he to get directly involved in the Bush campaign, Galen said, he'd
be far more effective working at an office in Virginia outside of
Washington, D.C., than from the Iraqi capital.

But putting a sharp strategist like him in the press room is a campaign
masterstroke, said Bob Boorstin of the Center for American Progress, a
nonpartisan political think tank in Washington.

"You know they're in trouble if they shipped Rich Galen over there,"
said Boorstin, who worked on four presidential campaigns, all Democratic.

"They're desperate to control the story over there. It's a very smart
thing on their part. He knows what he's doing."

Still, Boorstin said the shaping of the American message out of Iraq
should come as no surprise. The rigors of election year politics demand
the best possible portrayal of key policies, and Bush has staked his
presidency on the notion that he's a war president.