How the right still frames Iraq

President Barack Obama's instruction to "turn the page" on the Iraq War has set off a new wave of frustration on the American Left, which believes that the architects of this war of aggression should face some accountability for the death and destruction. But Obama's non-partisan olive branch–hailing all sides as "patriots" and praising the troops for carrying out a difficult assignment–may reflect his realistic assessment that the balance of national political/media power still tilts sharply to the neocon and right-wing side. Indeed, the biggest controversy around Obama's speech Tuesday night was not whether the United States should acknowledge war crimes in Iraq but whether Obama should praise former President George W. Bush for supposedly salvaging the war effort by ordering a "surge" of 30,000 more troops in 2007. In coverage of the speech, every major U.S. news outlet repeated the now-enshrined conventional wisdom that the "surge" turned the tide of the war. For instance, the Washington Post noted that Obama had called Bush before the speech but added that Obama's aides wouldn't comment on whether "Obama gave Bush credit for his decision … to order the 2007 troop surge that led to a reduction in violence." Though the U.S. press did carry some critical commentary about the overall consequences of the Iraq invasion, particularly its death toll and trillion-dollar price tag, there were no suggestions in the mainstream media that Bush and his neocon aides deserved a long visit with the International Criminal Court at The Hague.