These guys already spent millions of dollars to brand and sell Iraq, by paying off reporters, pundits, politicians, lobbyists, businesses that produce bumperstickers, t-shirts, etc. What makes them think that throwing another $400k at an ad agency is going to change anything?

You know what the Iraq occupation needs? How about another front?

Outstanding! If I could only be programmed to think I'll be cool by supporting the war... wow!

Iragmire, New and Improved. Now fortified with Irony, Amnesianol, and a full daily dose of IEDs. Ask Dr. Strangelove if Iragmire is Reich for you. Most common known side effects: Death, Slaughter, Beheadings, Loss of limbs, Loss of Sight, and Just no longer giving a Shiite about the Troops.

...

No need to change what's going on in Iraq. Just change the perception! Adjust the filters. Yes! I can hear the talking heads now.

So I'll get all the sex I want if I support the Iraq war....... SWEET!... where do I sign up? Maybe instead of imprisoning the DC Madam, they could enlist her services.

It is not a war... It's an Iraqi Festival of Freedom!

Just like the Clean Skies initiative gutted our environmental laws.

Just like the Patriot Act destroyed our civil liberties and constitutional rights.

Remember - Michael Moore will be here in less than an hour!

Are we just figuring this out? The White House Iraq Group was a marketing group, created to sell the war. Marketing was employed in renaming the "estate" tax the "death" tax and renaming "escalation" to "surge". Ever notice when the White House has new talking points, the talking heads like O'Reilly and Limbaugh chime in unison. Talking points is another term for marketing script.

While politicians have to sell themselves, the Bush administration has taken marketing to new heights that I've never seen before in government. So, since they used marketing to get the war going, they're going to use marketing to keep the war going.

Spending our own money to fool ourselves... brilliant!

a very groovy campaign.

branding is how bush got support for this war in the first place. so that strategy isn't off.

PS yes "Festival of Freedom" is cleaver.

Advertising is a smoke screen that allows them to hide stuff from you they don't want you to know. I associate advertising with LIES. I want transparency because I do not trust them. It's all part of the FASCIST PSYOPS against Americans.

Per my *slightly* off topic link in #11 above
Sitemonitor- I see links all over here in these comments. Any explanation for why mine was deleted?

[911 stuff is nowhere near on topic-ever here. And it has nothing to do with this thread. Read the commenting policy if you wish to continue posting here-Sitemonitor]

Well, the PDF is a long file, but well worth the read. I Wondered if others picked up the Texas Longhorn salute that bush gave as I did. Apparently much of the world outside of America did see it as either the sign of the Demon or a sign of infidelity of someones mate.

There's a lot of information in this file, we should all be aware of what the Administration is trying to do.
It gives an excellent view of just how Fucked up the Bush Administration has been and still is.

The focus of this report is on how to sell occupation to the Iraqis, not how to sell the war to the american populace.

That said, the RAND Corp's sunny recomendations are a bit far-fetched as the "hearts and minds" of the remaining Iraqis aren't going to be receptive to a newly-contrived marketing campaign until:

01)they can walk down the street without being shot or bombed.
02) They have unfettered access to potable water.
03) They have a reliable power grid.

The absurdity of our government wasting our tax dollars on this tripe is beyond disgusting.

Boy, this is BushCo in a nutshell, isn't it? You get it into your head to strangle a bunch of kittens or something, and your main concern is how to sell it. Whether your actions are right are wrong doesn't matter. You want to do it, and are GOING to do it regardless, so all that matters is telling people that they were turr'rist kittens and you're a great and mighty war prez'nit for slaying that there sack full of freedom-hatin' folks. Heh heh. All hail Beloved Leader.

Whoa, here's a scary thought. The *entire* Bush administration fills the same role as a sleazy defense attorney. Our tax dollars at work, legitimizing the actions of a spoiled, petulant trust fund kid.

StirFry @ 17:

as they say, its just lipstick on a pig....a quite fitting analogy considering who we're dealing with.

This is beyond lipstick on a pig. This is a pig in black fishnet stockings, stilleto heels, sporting the distinctive aroma of pigpen perfume.

Hmmm. If Iraq is in such a straight, (which it is) it would be a good idea to change Iraq. But is bombing the living daylights out them the right way? What can we seriously do to help? Not go to war. War is not the only answer. I know people that if they feel they want to help change something, they do something about it, (Not by carrying a weapon and screaming at them to become like us or we'll kill you).

Am I wrong?

88keys

But they wouldn't dream of rolling out the new ad campaign till after Labor Day, right?

This is nothing new, they've been using Madison Avenue techniques to sell the Iraq War for the last couple of years.

That's why every month or so, they say, 'Don't buy that old crap we were selling last month, TRY THE NEW, IMPROVED IRAQ WAR. NEW SURGE POWER! MORE ACTIVE AGENTS!

Looks like Karen Hughes has been doing an astounding job. Wasn't she hired back to the White House specifically to improve our image?

THE IRAQ WAR DIFFERENCE

'Push... Pull... or... Tow... $1,500.00... Same As Cash Trade In Guarantee... We Accept All Makes, All Models... Stop By Our Lexington Avenue Lot Today And Walk Away With The...

DEAL OF THE CENTURY!!!

All Prices Plus Tax, Tag, Title, Freight And Processing Fees. Dealer Retains All Rebates And Incentives. See Dealer For Details. Photos May Not Be Actual Vehicles In Stock. Not Responsoble For Typographcal Errors.

The system of free healthcare for all was adopted in Britain's darkest hours,in 1948 right after the United States reduced Europe to ruins. Out of their almost inconcievable anquish, came their great healthcare system. Much as our own social security system was born out of the great depression. My point is, no matter how many 'quiet lives of desperation' exist now, nothing will change until something of unbelievable horror happens, not only to the poor, but also the wealthy. There are many threats on the horizon, but apparently it is the shared agony on a large scale, that forges a new world view and change.
The average Joe is still able to eat a cheap meal get some kind of roof over his head, a TV and computer...and is basically asleep at the wheel...and will remain so.

I wonder if serial killers think along branding lines when they try to tell the cops that have caught them why the people they killed needed to be murdered, the good old, "if I can only make them see it my way" line of logic. In other words, THESE MOFOS ARE EFFING INSANE!

In the land of the blind the one eyed man is king.

Fred F. @ 44:

Looks like Karen Hughes has been doing an astounding job. Wasn't she hired back to the White House specifically to improve our image?

Yes she was. She is our Official Muslim Whisperer, and you know how much all those Progressive Arab heads of state love being told how to behave by a Female Texas Christian Fundy.

...

In America, if people don't want what's in the box, the answer is always to change the box.

[Hey kids! LTNS!]

Peptic Skeptic @ 30:

Well, the PDF is a long file, but well worth the read. I Wondered if others picked up the Texas Longhorn salute that bush gave as I did. Apparently much of the world outside of America did see it as either the sign of the Demon or a sign of infidelity of someones mate.

There's a lot of information in this file, we should all be aware of what the Administration is trying to do.
It gives an excellent view of just how Fucked up the Bush Administration has been and still is.

I'm glad someone here actually read the pdf, or tried to. I read pages xiii to 38 and 161 to 213, and I'm just about to dig into Chapter 2, which promises to have the most criticism of the inept efforts of Rumsfeld and Cheney and their supporters in the Pentagon. It's hard not to read the report (or at least the parts I've read so far) as a veiled criticism of the Bush Administration's failing War on Terror.

I think Nicole and the vast majority of commenters on this article owe it to themselves to understand this report and to understand that it's not about "rebranding" the Iraq war/occupation. Quell those jerking knees, my friends! To the extent that it addresses the problems in Iraq, it looks at the many failures as object lessons.

What the authors of the report (and their supporters in the Pentagon) are doing is examining an important aspect of 4 G Warfare Doctrine (4th Generation, if you were wondering). That aspect is known in the trade as Netwar, and thus this report has it's major focus on marketing. But what really floors me are the recommendations for branding strategies, especially the long term ones. Check it:

There is currently a struggle within the Pentagon over warfare doctrine, i.e., the principles and theories by which wars are fought. The mobility faction, which favors small agile force, got a real feather in it's cap after the quick initial victory in Iraq. However, the COIN (counter-insurgency) folks were totally ignored (as were the conventional warfare dudes), possibly because Rumsfeld and the neocons had such a hard on for the high tech battlefield.

COIN doesn't obviously intrude on either mobility or conventional, although there are some overlaps with mobility warfare in 4 G doctrine. However, (and this is the part I found so surprising), the report calls into question the entire strategic basis for the war by some of it's long term suggestions and conclusions. The COIN guys really get it. Bottom line: If we're going to rebrand the military as well as our country, we cannot do so by means of wars like the one we're conducting in Iraq. It's not just about the conduct of a particular war, it's about conducting any war, and the questions that need to be asked before being stampeded into one.

Seriously, read the report, or at least the pages I listed. Keep an open mind and don't assume that because it's from RAND or because it was sponsored by the Pentagon that it's evil. The world is not so simple as that.

sad @ 48:

The system of free healthcare for all was adopted in Britain's darkest hours, in 1948 right after the United States reduced Europe to ruins.

That made me dizzy. Do they call you the Human Centrifuge?

Yep aOK...glad it's good with you!

:)

miss_kitty, I was so disgusted and disheartened by the Libby thing that I was physically ill all that day. So I figured I needed a little break from politics and arguing about politics and partisanship of any stripe. There's much less heartburn in arguing about iPhones and Open Source software.

With all the talk about the Administration and its exaggerations leading up to the Iraqi war, one has to go back to the early twentieth century and the period leading up to WWI to get a glimpse of the tactics the Bush/Rove propaganda machine used to send our troops off to this unnecessary war in Iraq.

To turn Americans into unthinking robots is "hard work" according to our clueless President, and requires deliberate planning, but it can be done. In the period leading up to World War I, Woodrow Wilson----a Democrat elected President in 1912-----initiated a propaganda machine that effectively changed the minds of millions of Americans. His Executive Order 2594 created the Committee on Public Information (CPI), headed by journalist and publicist George Creel. The CPI, under Creel, was given the assignment to conduct a propaganda campaign intended to convince the American people to support the United States entry into a war against Germany. The plan was publicly announced as a program to influence the thoughts of millions in this country and overseas, but most importantly Creel was to use his political and advertising skills to convince those Americans who felt war could be avoided. Sound familiar? George Bush and his team of political advisers Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfield, Condi Rice and their underlings have used the same techniques, but secretly and with more "hubris". Wilson's order was public, something the secretive Bush White House would find unfathomable.

Some of the methods used by Creel and his cohorts are the same that President Bush and his political advisers in Washington are using today to justify our war in Iraq.
Then, they used newspapers, Liberty Bond posters, and something new at the time, "Newsreels." The Committee spawned a new propaganda tool, the "four minute men." More on their role later.

In 1917, newspapers were the main source of information. The CPI overwhelmed the public with details to insure even the most diligent reader would have difficulty sifting through and analyzing every bit of the government's propaganda. By the end of 1917, as an example of information overload, the CPI was sending every newspaper in California an average of six pounds of information-filled paper a day. The similarities to today's 24 hour news cycle with constant repetition (keep saying it until it becomes true) is not coincidental.

"Newsreels" in the 1910's were the most productive form of getting the message out to the masses. These popular showings were often aimed to reach those who couldn't read. With patriotic movies like "Pershing's Crusaders" shown in more than 4100 theaters with accompanying "newsreels", Creel and his cronies could indoctrinate movie audiences.

In a move that may have proved pivotal, the government established a network of "four minute men." These were community leaders, teachers, and members of the clergy who were recruited for the sole purpose of giving rousing, spirited, and patriotic speeches between the changing of movie reels (which on average took about four minutes, thus the four minute moniker). Today the "four minute men" would take the guise of the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly.

According to James Mock and Cedric Larson in their 1939 book "Words That Won the War" suggestions for "four minute men" included: no single word should be wasted because the speaker had just four minutes to make their case. "Speakers were reminded to review their speech time and time again until the ideas were firmly fixed in their mind" (think talking points, those used by politicos and pundits alike) "and that no speech was perfect and could always be improved upon." Mock and Larson concluded that the four minute man project was a success. America entered the war in 1917 and fought hard, earning the respect of their European allies, who had had doubts Americans would put up a good fight due to the unpopularity of the war in the US. With American help the Germans were defeated.

Today we wait for the outcome of the Libby indictment and hearings in Congress regarding the rush to war. Many readers may think this is but a rehash of History, has no bearing on the war on terror, or is just the ramblings of an out of touch Liberal. But remember what the mainstream media, Clear Channel Radio, and especially Fox news reported in the run-up to the Iraqi war. It was reported that Iraqi's would greet soldiers as liberators, oil sold from Iraqi wells would pay for the war, occupation would be brief etc; yet none of these reports proved true. Given the help of unpatriotic and in some instances paid and unpaid government journalist (Armstrong Williams, Judith Miller, Robert Novak, Jeff Gannon) it is easy to see how subtle untruthfulness, lying, and propaganda can be used to trick the masses and turn independent thought processes into mush. It worked in the early twentieth century. Bush and his cronies are betting it works for them too.

How do we know they're not already branding at Abu Ghraib & Gitmo?

The thing about this magic term, 'Brand', is that in the end you are what you are. You don't change what people think about you just by telling them you're something your not. Their experience will 'out' the lie every time. What they're saying is that they want you to believe in their lies a little while longer. To, in fact, 'change the subject'. They want us to talk about the war differently over the coming months in the hope that by the end of the year they'll have come up with some other stalling tactic...then another...and another...until they can claim some sort of 'threat' to the nation and declare martial law, dissolve the Congress and put troops in the streets...guess what? If they try that they'll soon find out just who the troops really are - and they ain't this bunch of neo-con thugs.

Maybe renaming the Iraq war would help, but 'ClusterF*ck' and 'Oops' are already trademarked.