It’s not 2003, especially when you can’t even be bothered to try to make the sale

Especially for those of you younger people, Michelle Goldberg [gift link] reminds us about how saturated the run-up to the Iraq War was in both pro-war and pro-administration propaganda:

Donald Trump must envy George W. Bush for the cultural compliance he got while dragging America to war in Iraq.

If you didn’t live through it, it’s hard to convey the atmosphere of stifling conformity that choked the country in the run-up to that disaster. Much of the Democratic Party fell in line; authorization for military force against Iraq passed the Senate 77 to 23. Phil Donahue was fired by MSNBC for giving voice to the antiwar movement. Artists were canceled for expressing their opposition.

When, on the eve of the invasion in March 2003, Natalie Maines, the lead singer of the Dixie Chicks, denounced Bush from a London stage, the fallout nearly buried the band. Radio stations boycotted their music and two Colorado D.J.s who played their songs were suspended. Once one of the most popular country acts in America, the band fell out of the Billboard Top 40.

This is presumably what Trump was expecting, but there are critical differences. First, the United States was actually the target of a horrible terrorist attack. (“But Iraq had nothing to to with it,” you say. You just don’t understand this eleventy-dimensional dorm room bong hit strategery:)

I would say “you had to be there” but trust me, it was every bit as stupid as it sounds at the time.

Anyway, not only was the Bush administration exploiting an actual security threat, always better campaigners than governors they also engaged in an all-hands-on-deck propaganda campaign, having a popular president as the front man. Trump has none of this going for him, and it shows:

Trump has received no such deference for his adventurism in Iran, so he’s trying to force it. On Sunday night, during a tirade on his Truth Social website, the president attacked The Wall Street Journal for reporting on an Iranian military strike against American planes in Saudi Arabia, and called on other news outlets to be charged with “TREASON.” Brendan Carr, Trump’s thuggish Federal Communications Commission chairman, threatened to revoke broadcasters’ licenses over their war coverage. Criticizing CNN’s reporting on the war last week, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth made clear that he’s hoping its new owners quash its independence: “The sooner David Ellison takes over that network, the better.”

Rarely in modern history has an American administration made such blatantly authoritarian efforts to subdue its critics. Such naked coercion is a screaming sign of democratic breakdown. But we shouldn’t lose sight of how Trump is failing to bend the country to his will. Even as he’s wrecking American institutions, Trump is revealing the limits of his cultural influence.

American wars usually commence with public enthusiasm even if they end in shame. The whole concept of “wagging the dog” — made famous in the 1997 satire starring Dustin Hoffman and Robert De Niro — assumes that a president can get his ratings up and deflect attention from a scandal by bombing another country. But it’s not working for Trump. The Iran war has been unpopular from the jump, garnering less support in polls than any other American conflict for which we have public opinion data. Trump’s approval remains about as low as it was when the war began.

Republicans, being largely in lock step with Trump, continue to broadly support the war. But conservative influencers, a crucial part of the right’s propaganda ecosystem, are bitterly divided. 

I’m skeptical that the schism among influencers will have much of an impact on the Republican side in the short term — as long as Trump is in office, he’s the Republican Party. But it could make it harder for a Vance or Rubio who lacks the inherent ability to drive sporadic or first-time voters to the polls. If Joe Rogan types even just get out of electoral politics in 2028 this would be a win for the Dem candidate, And either way, the war is just getting zero traction outside of the party base, including surprisingly critical coverage from media that is not literally controlled by Bari Weiss.

There is another likely factor — the Iraq War went so badly that at least for now it seems to have deadened the usual rally-around-the-flag effect. I don’t know how long the lesson will remained learned but we’ll take it while it lasts.