{"id":304626,"date":"2017-04-22T09:32:38","date_gmt":"2017-04-22T08:32:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/whats-wrong-with-this-picture-fawning-praise-of-bushs-veteran-art-ignores-iraqi-victims\/"},"modified":"2017-04-22T09:32:38","modified_gmt":"2017-04-22T08:32:38","slug":"whats-wrong-with-this-picture-fawning-praise-of-bushs-veteran-art-ignores-iraqi-victims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/whats-wrong-with-this-picture-fawning-praise-of-bushs-veteran-art-ignores-iraqi-victims\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s Wrong With This Picture? Fawning Praise of Bush\u2019s Veteran Art Ignores Iraqi Victims"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/fair.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/WaPoCuriosityCompassion.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-5587953\" src=\"http:\/\/fair.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/WaPoCuriosityCompassion.png\" alt=\"Washington Post: George W. Bush\u2019s best-selling book of paintings shows curiosity and compassion\" width=\"350\" height=\"405\" \/><\/a>George W. Bush\u2019s recent public relations tour, designed to rebuild his image as a tortured artist wrestling with the demons\u2014a flawed but morally introspective tragic figure\u2014has been remarkably effective. As FAIR (<a href=\"http:\/\/fair.org\/home\/george-w-bush-now-on-right-side-of-press-corpss-nostalgia-machine\/\">3\/7\/17<\/a>) noted last month, Bush has been the lucky recipient of dozens of friendly write-ups, interviews and TV appearances, all with only the mildest of liberal chiding around the margins.<\/p>\n<p>In all of the fawning press coverage, one thing has been notably absent: Bush\u2019s Iraqi victims.<\/p>\n<p>Bush\u2019s new PR tour centers around him painting wounded American veterans\u2014foregrounded as the primary negative consequence of Bush\u2019s invasion of Iraq. In ten of the most prominent articles praising Bush in the past few months, not a single one mentions his Iraqi victims:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cGeorge W. Bush&#8217;s Painted Atonements\u201d (<b>New Yorker<\/b>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/culture\/cultural-comment\/george-w-bushs-painted-atonements\">3\/3\/17<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>\u201cBush Nostalgia Is Overrated, but His Book of Paintings Is Not\u201d (<b>New York Times<\/b>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2017\/04\/17\/books\/review\/george-w-bush-portraits-of-courage.html?_r=0\">4\/17\/17<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>\u201c\u2018W.\u2019 and the Art of Redemption\u201d (<b>New York Times<\/b>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2017\/03\/21\/opinion\/w-and-the-art-of-redemption.html\">3\/21\/17<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>\u201cGeorge W. Bush on Immigration Overhaul Efforts, Anti-AIDS Efforts\u201d (<b>NPR<\/b>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.npr.org\/2017\/04\/13\/523709915\/george-w-bush-on-immigration-overhaul-efforts-anti-aids-efforts\">4\/13\/17<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>\u201cHe Was Almost Killed in Afghanistan. Now He\u2019s Been Painted by the President Who Sent Him There\u201d (<b>Washington Post<\/b>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/local\/he-was-almost-killed-in-afghanistan-now-hes-been-painted-by-the-president-who-sent-him-there\/2017\/03\/13\/989224be-0423-11e7-ad5b-d22680e18d10_story.html?utm_term=.05dbcc2249ae\">4\/13\/17<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>\u201cGeorge W. Bush\u2019s Best-Selling Book of Paintings Shows Curiosity and Compassion\u201d (<b>Washington Post<\/b>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/entertainment\/books\/george-w-bushs-best-selling-book-of-paintings-shows-curiosity-and-compassion\/2017\/03\/11\/f252174c-05af-11e7-ad5b-d22680e18d10_story.html?utm_term=.e7604a3e45a7\">3\/12\/17<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>\u201cGeorge W. Bush&#8217;s Talent as a Painter Finds an Ironic Muse: the Combat Veteran\u201d (<b>Guardian<\/b>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/artanddesign\/2017\/mar\/06\/george-w-bush-art-painting-portraits-in-courage\">3\/6\/17<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>\u201cFormer President George W. Bush to Appear on <b>Today<\/b> for his &#8216;Portraits of Courage&#8217; Book\u201d (<b>Today<\/b>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.today.com\/news\/former-president-george-w-bush-appear-today-his-portraits-courage-t108308\">2\/17\/17<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>\u201cFrom Caricature to Man of Character: How Time and Art Change Image of Bush\u201d (<b>Christian Science Monitor<\/b>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.csmonitor.com\/USA\/Politics\/2017\/0323\/From-caricature-to-man-of-character-How-time-and-art-change-image-of-Bush\">3\/23\/17<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>\u201cFormer President Bush Honors Veterans With \u2018Portraits of Courage\u2019\u201d (<b>Voice of America<\/b>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.voanews.com\/a\/president-george-bush-portraits-of-courage\/3748579.html\">3\/4\/17<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Only one article makes vague reference to the Iraqis killed and injured (<b>Washington Post<\/b>\u2019s Philip Kennicott opaquely mentions \u201dthe trauma here and in Iraq\u201d), but none note the specific number of deaths\u2014with serious estimates ranging from <a href=\"http:\/\/journals.plos.org\/plosmedicine\/article?id=10.1371\/journal.pmed.1001533\">500,000<\/a> to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/news\/2007\/09\/14\/poll-civilian-death-toll-iraq-may-top-1-million\">1 million<\/a>\u2014that resulted from Bush\u2019s war of aggression. None profiled an Iraqi who suffered or continues to suffer as a result. This is likely for the same reason Bush didn\u2019t bother to find any to paint\u2014they simply don\u2019t factor into the US moral calculus.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/fair.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/NYTRedemption.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-5587952\" src=\"http:\/\/fair.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/NYTRedemption.png\" alt=\"NYT: W and the Art of Redemption\" width=\"350\" height=\"351\" \/><\/a>One of the glowing profiles, by Kane Farabaugh of US government\u2013funded <b>Voice of America <\/b>(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.voanews.com\/a\/president-george-bush-portraits-of-courage\/3748579.html\">3\/4\/17<\/a>), doesn\u2019t even contain the word \u201cIraq.\u201d Others make glib jokes about it, like the <b>New York Times<\/b>\u2019 Mimi Swartz (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2017\/03\/21\/opinion\/w-and-the-art-of-redemption.html\">3\/21\/17<\/a>):<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>The <b>New Yorker<\/b>\u2019s art critic, Peter Schjeldahl, can barely hide his surprise when describing the quality as astonishingly high, the portraits \u201chonestly observed and persuasively alive.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><b>Why the shock and awe?<\/b> Because Mr. Bush\u2019s artistic talent goes against the stereotype we have of him.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>To the extent the Iraq invasion is addressed, it\u2019s a punchline. Iraqi victims aren\u2019t just ignored; their trauma is used to jazz up an otherwise mediocre piece of art criticism.<\/p>\n<p>This type of runaway nationalism is so common we hardly notice it. To the extent Bush is sorry, he only regrets the Americans he helped kill and maim, roughly 2 percent of those who suffered as a result of the invasion. The other 98 percent are faceless Arabs whose humanity isn\u2019t worth touching on, much less exploring.<\/p>\n<p>All cultures naturally prioritize their own, but the wholesale erasure of Iraqis from Bush\u2019s rebranding tour, framed as \u201catonement\u201d and \u201credemption\u201d, is striking in its raw nationalist myopia.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><em>Adam Johnson is a contributing analyst for <strong>FAIR.org<\/strong>.<\/em> <em>You can find him on <strong>Twitter<\/strong> at <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/adamjohnsonnyc\">@AdamJohnsonNYC<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>This piece was reprinted by <a href=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\">RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission from <a href=\"http:\/\/fair.org\/home\/whats-wrong-with-this-picture-fawning-praise-of-bushs-veteran-art-ignores-iraqi-victims\/\">FAIR<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>George W. Bush\u2019s recent public relations tour, designed to rebuild his image as a tortured artist wrestling with the demons\u2014a flawed but morally introspective tragic figure\u2014has been remarkably effective. As FAIR (3\/7\/17) noted last month, Bush has been the lucky recipient of dozens of friendly write-ups, interviews and TV appearances, all with only the mildest [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2521,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-304626","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304626","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2521"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=304626"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304626\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=304626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=304626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=304626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}