The Out of Context Quoting of Donald Rumsfeld’s “Trained Ape” Comment — regarding the Obama Administration’s Undiplomatic Handling of Afghanistan President Karzai — Perfectly Demonstrates Robert Reich’s Hypothesis about Destructive American Tribalism — and Probably Equally Well Illustrates Chris Cilizza’s Observation that Americans Historically Have only Read Headlines — Ignorance’s Debilitating Brew Served Hot

25 March 2014

The liberal media wanted us to think that former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said that President Obama is an ape . . .

However, when we listen to the entire Fox News interview with him — regarding President Karzai’s recognition of Crimea as a new nation — we see that former Secretary Rumsfeld had made some insightful observations about failed American foreign policy and probably did not intend his ape comment to refer to the President.

Here is how two politically liberal outlets representatively slammed former Secretary Rumsfeld

From Salon:

Donald Rumsfeld, the man who as defense secretary helped orchestrate and oversee not one but two disastrous wars, appeared on Fox News on Monday in order to bash President Obama by negatively comparing him to “a trained ape.”

“A trained ape could get a status of forces agreement [with Afghanistan],” Rumsfeld said. “It does not take a genius. And we have so mismanaged that relationship.”

Rumsfeld went on to offer sympathy for Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, who recently angered the White House by voicing his support for Russia’s annexation of Crimea, saying that the wildly corrupt leader of the delicate and unstable Afghanistan government has good reason to be angry with his American backers.

“United States diplomacy has been so bad — so embarrassingly bad — that I’m not the least bit surprised that he felt cornered and is feeling he has to defend himself in some way or he’s not president of that country,” Rumsfeld explained.

From the Washington Post:

Former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Monday attacked the Obama administration for failing to secure a status of forces agreement with Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai.

Rumsfeld, speaking on Fox News, said even a "trained ape" could do better.

Aaron Blake, Rumsfeld bashes Obama on Afghanistan, says ‘a trained ape’ could do better, Washington Post (25 March 2014)

Notice the Post’s headline. It intentionally links the ape observation directly to the President.

Both publications arguably took the former Secretary out of reasonable context

You can listen to what Secretary Rumsfeld actually said in the clip of the Fox News video that is embedded in same Washington Post article, which deliberately misconstrued the context of the Secretary’s comments.

For example, below is how Secretary Rumsfeld introduced his critique of American policy toward President Karzai. One can tell, both from his chosen words and thoughtful tone, that Rumsfeld was likely not (even subconsciously) trying to say something racially provocative.

Secretary Rumsfeld began by explaining that President Karzai, a leader without a militia, had been chosen to lead Afghanistan exactly because the purported nation was unaccustomed to strong central authority. He continued that:

What happened is the United States government — and I realize these are tough jobs, being the President or Secretary of State —but, by golly, they have trashed Karzai publicly over and over and over.

Holbrooke, the special envoy did. Vice President Biden did. Secretary Hillary Clinton has. The President has been unpleasant to him.

And it seems to me, they have put him in a political box, where he really has very little choice. I think there is probably not a politician in the world, who — in dealing with the United States — instead of having the United States deal with them privately, through private diplomacy, came out repeatedly, publicly, in an abusive, unpleasant manner.

Karzai has been quoted as saying that he did not get the attention, when he spoke behind closed doors to the Obama Administration, and he was forced to yell.

He also said to the American people, given them my best wishes and my gratitude. But to the United States government, give them my anger, my extreme anger.

I think the United States diplomacy has been so bad, so embarrassingly bad, that I’m not the least bit surprised that he’s felt cornered and feeling he has to defend himself in some way, or he’s not president of that country.

Our relationship with Karzai has gone downhill like a toboggan ever since the Obama Administration came in.

This Administration — the White House and the State Department — has failed to get a status of force agreement. A trained ape could get a status of forces agreement. It does not take a genius.

We have mismanaged that relationship.

Does the policy meat of this story lie in:

(a) the ape allegation

or in

(b) Donald Rumsfeld’s reasonably accurate critique of the Obama Administration’s “try them in public” diplomacy style?

It is easier for American media to fling feces than to talk about substance, isn’t it?

On the one hand, we have liberal media trying to make Secretary Rumsfeld look like a racially insensitive fop — and on the other, we have the same media dodging the legitimate criticisms the former Secretary has of current American policy toward Afghanistan’s belabored president.

In substance’s regard, notice that Rumsfeld’s criticisms link our too public chastisement of Karzai to the latter’s endorsement of Russian aggression in Crimea. How intelligent is a foreign policy that forces former allies to become our enemies?

And why does the American media pretty consistently ignore the duty of real information delivery?

Robert Reich’s take on the preeminence of American tribalism

Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich has the answer to the above question:

We are witnessing a reversion to tribalism around the world, away from nation states. The same pattern can be seen even in America – especially in American politics.

Nations are becoming less relevant in a world where everyone and everything is interconnected. The connections that matter most are again becoming more personal.

Religious beliefs and affiliations, the nuances of one’s own language and culture, the daily realities of class, and the extensions of one’s family and its values – all are providing people with ever greater senses of identity.

Each tribe has contrasting ideas about rights and freedoms (for liberals, reproductive rights and equal marriage rights; for conservatives, the right to own a gun and do what you want with your property).

Each has its own totems (social insurance versus smaller government) and taboos (cutting entitlements or raising taxes). Each, its own demons (the Tea Party and Ted Cruz; the Affordable Care Act and Barack Obama); its own version of truth (one believes in climate change and evolution; the other doesn’t); and its own media that confirm its beliefs.

The tribes even look different. One is becoming blacker, browner, and more feminine. The other, whiter and more male. (Only 2 percent of Mitt Romney’s voters were African-American, for example.)

Each tribe is headed by rival warlords whose fighting has almost brought the national government in Washington to a halt. Increasingly, the two tribes live separately in their own regions – blue or red state, coastal or mid-section, urban or rural – with state or local governments reflecting their contrasting values.

Applying Reich’s perspective to the Salon and Washington Post mistreatments of Secretary Rumsfeld’s comments, we see that both publications were intentionally fomenting tribal conflict.

Why bother with substance, when it is easier to push the nonsensical buttons of gratuitous conflict?

Chris Cillizza’s idea — regarding why the media get away with fomenting conflict via their characteristic dumbing down style

When mostly everyone is ignorant and nobody gives a darn, why bother reporting anything that might require a brain to interpret?

[T]he average news consumer in the United States is a headline-reader -- at best.

A new study by the Media Insight Project, an initiative of the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and the American Press Institute -- the entire thing is enlightening about how we consume (and don't consume) news -- affirms this fact.

[R]oughly six in 10 people acknowledge that they have done nothing more than read news headlines in the past week.

And, in truth, that number is almost certainly higher than that, since plenty of people won't want to admit to just being headline-gazers but, in fact, are.

The lesson for politicians and those who cover them? The more complex an issue, the less likely it is to break through with a public that really consumes news via headlines and not much else.

It's also a reminder that simple messaging is almost always the most effective. "Hope and Change." "Compassionate Conservative." Easy to remember. Fits on a bumper sticker. Or a headline.

The moral? — Our culture feeds ignorance and stupidity in a positive feedback loop

Secretary Rumsfeld’s “trained ape” comment was taken out of context and reported as news, so as foster still more discord.

By doing this, Salon and the Washington Post presumably raked in some money, while simultaneously making us even more angrily and confrontationally dumb than we already were.

Using Donald Rumsfeld’s analogy, we can think of ourselves as human equivalents of trained-to-be-dumb apes.

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