University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Theses from the College of Journalism and Journalism and Mass Communications, College Mass Communications of 12-2011 GREETED LIKE LIBERATORS: MEDIA, METAPHOR, AND MYTH IN THE RHETORICAL CONSTRUCTION OF OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM Charles Franklin Bisbee University of Nebraska-Lincoln, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/journalismdiss Part of the Journalism Studies Commons Bisbee, Charles Franklin, "GREETED LIKE LIBERATORS: MEDIA, METAPHOR, AND MYTH IN THE RHETORICAL CONSTRUCTION OF OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM" (2011). Theses from the College of Journalism and Mass Communications. 21. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/journalismdiss/21 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journalism and Mass Communications, College of at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses from the College of Journalism and Mass Communications by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. GREETED LIKE LIBERATORS: MEDIA, METAPHOR, AND MYTH IN THE RHETORICAL CONSTRUCTION OF OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM by Charles Franklin Bisbee A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of The Graduate College at the University of Nebraska In Partial Fulfillment of Requirements For the Degree of Master of Arts Major: Journalism and Mass Communications Under the Supervision of Professor John Bender Lincoln, Nebraska December, 2011 GREETED LIKE LIBERATORS: MEDIA, METAPHOR, AND MYTH IN THE RHETORICAL CONSTRUCTION OF OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM Charles Franklin Bisbee, M.A. University of Nebraska, 2011 Adviser: John Bender Journalistic performance in covering the presidential argument to undertake Operation Iraqi Freedom drew almost instantaneous criticism from within the profession. The general line of criticism held that journalists failed a “watchdog” standard of applying scrutiny to the rhetoric of public officials in terms of fact-based and legitimate argumentation. Alleged causes were usually rooted in al-Qaeda’s September 11, 2001 terroristic attacks inside the United States. Some critics submitted that post-attack journalistic “patriotism” granted President George W. Bush an overly-generous benefit of doubt in framing an American response. Others faulted journalistic norms. But the criticism in itself is open to critique as limited, however admissible. My thesis is directed at expanding the discussion by considering how journalists might have used the classical theories of rhetoric as a watchdog aid in covering President Bush’s rhetorical war on terror. Three key speeches channeled a part of that war towards an invasion of Iraq. Chapters One through Three concentrate on breaking down those speeches as Aristotle, Cicero, and other ancients might have. Metaphor’s ability to function as a fact in rhetorical reality is particularly stressed as the president often used metaphor related to World War II. Approaching the speeches in this fashion raises watchdog questions journalists could have raised at the time working solely with the Bush texts. Chapter Four explores the use of Operation Iraqi Freedom in the convention acceptance speeches of the two major party nominees for the 2004 presidential contest. This allows the chance to consider convention rhetoric on a war in the first election in sixty years featuring an incumbent wartime president standing for re-election. Chapter Five concludes that a variety of reasons contributed towards making journalistic failure here a failure, in part, from taking rhetorical language at the most superficial level. Ignoring metaphor was particularly unfortunate as the figure over time steered the legitimate Bush rhetoric downward from the classical theory. iv Acknowledgments Filing the names of everyone who helped me get here into a list seems somehow an underwhelming mode of expression in acknowledging the contribution each has made. No one, however, least of all myself, seems to have thought of a better way. I begin with the project at hand. My adviser, Dr. John Bender, shared time, expertise, and patience virtually beyond measure. Probably few advisers are also as tolerant towards one’s occasional lapses into stream-of-consciousness in working out the point to be discussed. He saw my project through on likely more levels than I will ever be able to imagine. Thanks to his colleagues on my committee. Professors Charlyne Berens and Barney McCoy understood a subject and approach to it that I sense are not often undertaken in the discipline. I also need to thank them for staying with a project that took quite the while to develop. Traces of the interests of a few professors outside my home college can be found in the thesis. Thanks to Dr. Ronald Lee in the College of Arts and Sciences, Department of Communication Studies, for first throwing the term “rhetorical criticism” my way. In the same college, Department of History, Dr. Benjamin Rader, for his wide-ranging courses in American intellectual, social, and cultural history and thought. In that college’s Department of Modern Languages, French section, Drs. Thomas Carr and Jordan Stump, for their infectious enthusiasm and standards for things literary in a different culture, and for indulging my constant mistakes and malapropisms in the basic grammar of a second language. Debts of acknowledgement outside the university are almost too numerous to v even organize. For taking chances on professional association, or extending friendship, or both: Jerry Chizek, Bernie Glaser, Kevin Duffy, and Neal Erickson; Kandra Hahn; Kim Robak; Jeff and Mary Brown; Ron and Diane Withem; Tim and Loretta McNally; Jerry Prazan; Dave Newell; Chris Beutler. Also, in this regard, to Dr. D. Paul Hartnett, state senator emeritus, for backing his encouragement of my “non-traditional” pursuit of higher education with allowing one-third of his staff to go on reduced hours to attend classes. Thanks also to my Hartnett staff colleagues, Bill Stadwaldt and Sally Schultz, for support even after discovering they were also, so to speak, “doing the school thing” with me. Thanks to Jennifer Hart for providing a place where I could come to undisturbed grips with finishing the project. To my parents, Jeannine and the late Lanny Bisbee; and my brothers, Randall Eugene Bisbee, 1963-1991; and Christopher Lee Bisbee, USN (ret.). I am lucky in having two wonderful friends who happen to be in the next generation. Thanks to Marianne Worthington for being who she is, and many long I-29 journeys to plant literal and figurative boot when and where needed. Thanks finally to Jessica Kolterman, for being who she is, for fending off barbarians at the gates and wolves at the door while my project passed from the contemporary to the historic, and for sharing the depth of her belief in the human being. vi CONTENTS Abstract…………………………………………………………………………….ii Introduction… …………………………………………………………………..1-36 Chapter 1. Mission………………………………………………………...37-73 Chapter 2. Mission in Iraq……………………………………………….74-117 Chapter 3. The Shadow Lurks………………………………………….118-140 . Chapter 4. Convention!...........................................................................141-168 Chapter 5. Streetcar Fare for Mr. Lippmann…………………………...169-183 1 Introduction Metaphor, Myth, Meaning I wonder about the finding of objective fact more and more. I wonder whether there is a fact out there. I know there is. Tokyo is the capital of Japan. There are facts. But so much of what we argue about, weapons of mass destruction, the threat from Iraq, are arguments [sic]. They’re not facts. -- Chris Matthews, host, MSNBC’s Hardball Seattle Times editors chose the Sunday edition for April 18, 2004 to publish their Operation Iraqi Freedom exclusive. The front-page photograph disclosed more than twenty aluminum boxes, draped by American flags signifying them as coffins, inside a cargo plane. A blurred foreground figure in the near edge of the blunt backlighting was securing the braces. A caption noted the plane’s location as Kuwait International Airport and the date as April 7. Staff reporter Hal Bernton’s accompanying story detailed the honor guard “ritual” held whenever remains of American fallen in Iraq arrived there from Baghdad in beginning the journey home. “ ‘The way everyone salutes with such emotion and intensity and respect,’ ” Bernton quoted the photographer, Seattle resident and cargo worker Tami Silicio. “ ‘The families would be proud.’ ” Bernton’s story also touched on the exclusivity aspect in saying that “photographs of [military] coffins returning to the United States have been tightly restricted … during 2 the conflict in Iraq.” Referenced here was a Pentagon regulation barring “media coverage of deceased military personnel” at all “interim stops” from duty stations on through Dover Air Base, Delaware, where morticians prepared remains for family (Milbank, “Curtains”; Vandan). On Thursday, April 22, Bernton reported that employer Maytag Aircraft had discharged Silicio from her contractor position. Company president William Silva said the military shared “ ‘concerns’ ” he did not specify over Silicio’s “actions [in taking the photograph] violating government regulations.” Maytag was then three weeks into providing cargo and support services under its six-month Kuwait Air Terminal Operations contract with the U.S. Air Force’s Air Mobility Command (Czyzyk). Related events broke elsewhere the same morning. In Tucson, Arizona activist Russ Kick posted to a Web