Why is ABC Airing Pre-Election Propaganda?

It would be nice if a film about 9/11 could be made that might bring the country together, and truly educate us about the mistakes that were made and the heroism that we witnessed. But ABC has not chosen this route. Instead, they have decided to air a shameful “docu-drama” which promotes the big lie that Clinton had an easy way of capturing Osama bin Ladin and didn’t bother.

To support this lie, the film has at least one scene in it which is complete fiction. The scene in question is one in which Sandy Berger apparently tells CIA agents about to capture Bin Ladin that if they do so, they will not have the support of the Clinton Administration. He then hangs up on the agent.

ABC admits that this scene is not reality; they call it a “fictionalized composite”, but it is in no way supported by even the most wing-nut reading of the 9/11 Commission Report. And it’s not just harmless fiction. People are already taking this to heart as real history, and writing things like “one unbelievable sequence shows how . . . Sandy Berger . . . actually hung up the phone on the CIA agent on the ground.”

It’s unbelievable alright, and not just because it didn’t happen. It’s unbelievable, and unconscionable that ABC is promoting this film by an avowed right-wing activist, as if it were meant to educate or enlighten. The film was promoted primarily to conservative think tanks, blogs and commercial outlets, and ABC is running it without advertisers. Which begs the question, who is paying for this? I think I have a guess.

If that weren’t bad enough, ABC has Scholastic Books making school guides for this so as to indoctrinate high schoolers about to vote in their first elections. This isn’t about Bill Clinton, or even Sandy Berger for that matter. Both of them probably made their share of mistakes and are more than capable of defending themselves. This is about the worst terrorist attack on American soil being used, once again, as propaganda.

At heart, it’s an attempt by a right wing film-maker and his backers to influence public opinion about how Democrats supposedly handle national security crises – but it’s not going to spark any intelligent discussion on that topic because it’s based on a complete lie. One Fox News Network is more than enough.

ABC should fix the errors in its film before releasing it, apologize to those it slanders, and put up a warning that the film is not a documentary in any sense of the word; it’s meant to entertain, not to educate. If they don’t do that, then this film should be considered an in-kind contribution in an election year. And if you don’t believe me that this is being used to help Republicans, just listen to Rush Limbaugh bloviating his support for this propaganda.

What we need on the anniversary of September 11th is some healing – not this outrageous attempt to exploit the deaths of 3,000 Americans for political fodder. And I hope you’ll do something about it.