Blogger Who Blamed Halliburton for Iraq Rains on U.S. Economys Parade

     A liberal blogger who blamed war profiteers, neo-conservatives, and supporters of Israel as three real reasons for the war in Iraq was Parade magazines choice to ask Is the American Dream Still Possible in the April 23 edition of the magazine.

     On HuffingtonPost.com Nov. 23, 2005, David Wallechinsky argued that It is a simple fact of life that when there is a war, there is money to be made. In short, War is great for business if you happen to be Halliburton, he railed, echoing a persistent attack line of far-left critics of the Bush administration.

     Wallechinskys HuffingtonPost bio describes him as a contributing editor to Parade magazine who writes about dictators, the federal budget and other topics.

Apparently, casting a gloomy pall over the strong American economy and misrepresenting study data are among those other topics.

     Wallechinsky cherry-picked poll results from his magazines own survey of middle-income Americans about their financial outlooks. He left out of his write-up how 84 percent the vast majority of respondents said it is still possible to achieve the American Dream and 74 percent said they take responsibility for their own financial success or failure.

     Ignoring that, Wallechinskys story focused on survey results showing 83 percent complaining of having little money to spare after paying the bills or 81 percent who believe businesses dont make decisions based on what is best for their employees.

     Although most of the families Wallechinsky found were optimistic about their personal circumstances, Parade editors selected negative quotes for the insets, including the charge by Richard Oden of Conyers, Ga., that for most Americans, the traditional American Dream is a pipe dream. Oden heads his own consulting firm and admitted he believes he will recover from a financial setback he suffered a few years ago.