Mass Deception: Moral Panic and the U.S. War on Iraq

209 Pages·2010·0.529 MB·English

by  Scott A. Bonn

Mass Deception
CRITICAL ISSUES IN CRIME AND SOCIETY
Raymond J. Michalowski, Series Editor
Critical Issues in Crime and Society is oriented toward critical analysis of
contemporary problems in crime and justice. The series is open to a broad
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Mass Deception
B
Moral Panic and
the U.S. War on Iraq
Scott A. Bonn
Rutgers University Press
New Brunswick, New Jersey, and London
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Bonn, Scott A., 1957–
Mass deception : moral panic and the U.S. war on Iraq / Scott A. Bonn.
p. cm. — (Critical issues in crime and society)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8135-4788-6 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN 978-0-8135-4789-3 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Iraq War, 2003– —Deception. 2. Iraq War, 2003– —Causes.
3. Deception—Political aspects—United States. 4. Rhetoric—Political
aspects—United States. 5. Bush, George W. (George Walker), 1946– I. Title.
DS79.76.B657 2010
956.7044(cid:2)31—dc22 2009044962
A British Cataloging-in-Publication record for this book is available
from the British Library.
Copyright © 2010 by Scott A. Bonn
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without
written permission from the publisher. Please contact Rutgers University Press,
100 Joyce Kilmer Avenue, Piscataway, NJ 08854–8099. The only exception to this
prohibition is “fair use” as defined by U.S. copyright law.
Visit our Web site: http://rutgerspress.rutgers.edu
Manufactured in the United States of America
For my parents, Theodore and Donna,
who have always encouraged me to find my own voice,
even when it did not resonate with theirs.

Contents
Foreword by Michael Welch ix
Preface xiii
1 George W. Bush and the Drums of War 1
2 Why Do Many in Society Drink the Kool-Aid Served
in a Moral Panic? 17
3 Empirical Evidence of an Elite-Engineered Moral Panic
over Iraq 46
4 How the Bush Administration Sold the Iraq War to the
U.S. Public 80
5 The Power Elite, State Crime, and War Crime 101
6 The Higher Immorality and Crimes of the
Bush Administration 121
7 What Are the Lessons of the Iraq War? 148
Appendix 173
Bibliography 177
Index 187
vii

Foreword
Amid the frenzy of the attacks on September 11, the Bush administration
pushed forward its plan to invade and occupy Iraq—a nation that had no
involvement with the terrorist plot. Those developments prompted some
observers to recall the memorable words of Senator Hiram Johnson, who
declared: “The first casualty when war comes is truth” (Stevenson, 1948,
p. 2445). With that concern in mind we turn to Mass Deception: Moral Panic
and the U.S. War on Iraq. In this very important book, Scott Bonn offers to
criminologists and sociologists, as well as students and citizens alike, an oppor-
tunity to understand in-depth the mechanics of political manipulation. The
penetrating analysis herein relies on critical communication theory to deci-
pher the Bush narrative on 9/11 and the alleged links to Saddam Hussein.
Integrating concepts from sociological theory and media studies, Bonn focuses
on moral panic, the power elite, and manufactured consent, thereby paying
tribute to the enduring work of Stanley Cohen, C. Wright Mills, and Noam
Chomsky.
In these opening comments on Mass Deception, I wish to reflect on a tri-
angle of influence in which Bonn blends the thoughts of Cohen, Mills, and
Chomsky while not losing sight of his own critique of mass communication.
From the onset, Bonn elaborates on the meaning of moral panic, a concept
used to interpret exaggerated and turbulent reactions to a putative social
problem. The concept was initially developed in the 1960s by Cohen in his
groundbreaking book Folk Devils and Moral Panics. Since then the concept has
been used—and misused—by an array of researchers, journalists, and social
commentators (see Garland, 2008). The third edition of the book (2002)
allowed Cohen to look back on the idea of moral panic along with areas of
inquiry where it has made further impact, ranging from welfare issues to asy-
lum seekers. While recognizing its many territories of expansion, it is also
crucial to attend to the depth and complexity of the concept. The 2002 ver-
sion of Folk Devils and Moral Panics stands apart from its previous editions for
its ability to delineate further the explanatory power of moral panic. Cohen
considers three extensions of moral panic theory that lend themselves to the
ix