Thursday 30 June 2005

Army Recruiting Up; Now Eyes Increase In Applause

White House To Investigate Low Clapping During Ft. Bragg Terror Speech

As the U.S. Army announced, yesterday, that they met their recruiting goals for the month of June, the White House dispatched Chief of Staff Andy Card and others to Fort Bragg, to begin an investigation on the sparse amount of applause during the President's speech there Tuesday evening.

Insiders say that after the recruiting woes, the Army has a "significant" applause problem.

Gen. Richard B. Myers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, though not confirming the applause problem, did hint that it was a concern of the top military officials.

"Military personnel receive a proper amount of training in applause and there are periodic reviews in place to insure they maintain their applause skills".

The White House, in choosing Fort Bragg for the location of the speech, were confident beforehand that the President would receive a "wild ovation" upon taking the stage, and anticipated that his speech would be interrupted many times with applause and gruff shouts of "Hoo-ah".

None of that occurred.

It was 25-minutes into the 28-minute speech, when the President offered the line, "We will stay in the fight until the fight is done" that applause first broke out. Troubling to both the White and the military commanders is that the applause appeared to be led by a White House staffer who was involved in organizing the logistics of the speech.

Some Republicans moved quickly to respond to what appears to be a significant embarrassment. There's calls for a panel to investigate the applause issue, something the military and the White House want to avoid

Card and the White House will look into the rumors that military commanders at Fort Bragg ordered the soldiers not to applaud. They say that there are reports that "some of these commanders are from Blue states" and that they set out "to embarrass the President".

White House Strategist Karl Rove stated that "these commanders may need some therapy"

House and Senate Democrats are seizing the applause issue to hammer away at the Administrations lack of preparedness in launching the war in Iraq.

"It shows, over-and-over, that they have gone into this war on the cheap", stated Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV). "It shows that they didn't anticipate the need for applause".

"What we need is a policy to get it right", said Senator John Kerry (D-MA), Mr. Bush's opponent in the 2004 election

The issue is causing a strain at the White House. At a press briefing yesterday, White House Spokesperson Scott McClellan blamed the media for the problem.

"With all the major television and cable networks covering the speech, they could have added an applause track to the broadcast".

Later in the day, McClellan backtracked from that statement, issuing a new statement that the White House, and the military, "have never used, nor do we endorse, the use of applause tracks".

"The President is more than capable of generating applause when he needs it. He's an applause champion".