February 20, 2006
CLEANING UP AFTER 41:
Eyewitnesses peel back lies on war debate (Jay Bookman, 02/20/06, Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
[T]ake the claim that the administration decided to invade Iraq because "Sept. 11 changed everything."Paul O'Neill, President Bush's first treasury secretary, long ago revealed that administration officials were intent on invading Iraq from the moment the president took office.
"It was all about finding a way to do it," O'Neill says of Cabinet meetings he attended before Sept. 11. "That was the tone of it. The president saying, 'Go find me a way to do this.' "
In his new book "State of War," James Risen confirms that account by reporting that in April 2002 — long before most Americans had even heard war was a possibility — CIA officers in Europe were summoned by agency leaders and told an invasion was coming.
"They said this was on Bush's agenda when he got elected, and that 9/11 only delayed it," one CIA officer recalled to Risen. "They implied that 9/11 was a distraction from Iraq."
George H. W. Bush made five big mistakes:
(1) Dan Quayle
(2) raising taxes
(3) leaving Saddam in power
(4) David Souter
&
(5) losing his re-election bid
George W. Bush picked the most qualified VP in American history, even though he added nothing politically, potentially costing him the election. He's cut taxes four times and never made the Reagan/Bush mistake of raising them, even in the face of record deficits. He was so set on appointing an anti-Souter he was willing to buck his own party's chatterers to name a friend he knew he could trust not to go Washington. He put enormous effort into winning a historic re-election. Anyone who thought he was going to leave Saddam in power, irrespective of 9-11, wasn't paying enough attention to deserve the franchise, nevermind a column. When Saddam failed to honor the UN ceasefire accords he wrote his regime's death warrant. When he tried to assassinate 41 he signed it. 9-11 just made it easier for W to deliver it.
Posted by Orrin Judd at February 20, 2006 8:49 PMIn at least one of his debates with Al Gore, Bush made it pretty clear that he supported removing Saddam from power.
If I recall correctly (only a 50% likelihood), the context in which he said this was supportive of the Clinton administration efforts. At any rate, it was only after 2000 election that regime change in Iraq became a partisan issue.
Posted by: Kevin Colwell at February 20, 2006 10:59 PMWell gee, it wasn't like regime change in Iraq was , like, passsed by Congress and signed by Clinton. No biggy.
If we had -- after the 93 assassination attempt against a President who'd been out of office for what, a month? -- any other sitting President in American history with the sole exception of Carter Saddam would have been gone then and there.
Asit was we had a man whose foreign policy meandered between feckless and incompetent.
Posted by: Jim in Chicago at February 21, 2006 2:05 AMAgree on (3) and (4). But:
(1) Dan Quayle was played by a pre-Internet MSM propaganda machine. (Hint: "potatoes" is the correct spelling for a pluraity of taters.)
(2) The Dems drummed endlessly for #41 to override his promise to not increase taxes. Because of the crisis of the deficit, which (according to unbiquitous scholarly journals must be stopped lest it destroy future generations), #41 fell for it.
GW#41 finally capitulated and agreed to raise revenue, on the condition of receiving bipartisan support, fool that he was.
Bzzt, wrong. The MSM instantly re-wrote history. They immediately portrayed #41 as a promise-breaker. "Read my lips", hah! Liar! Hoo hah!
GB#41 was bounced for breaking the promises that the MSM demanded he break.
Posted by: Gideon at February 21, 2006 2:12 AMOJ:
To be fair to 41, removal of Saddam would have gone beyond his UN mandate, and we can all guess how the Democrats would've responded to that. Probably with impeachment proceedings.
Posted by: Matt Murphy at February 21, 2006 2:13 AMThe Dan Quayle "potatoe" thing was unfair, but Quayle has said a LOT of stupid things over the years, and has utterly failed to distinguish himself as anything other than a moderately competent Congressperson.
Posted by: Noam Chomsky at February 21, 2006 3:15 AMGideon:
Dan Quayle was a lightweight who hurt 41, even if not technically an idiot. It was a wasted pick.
Falling for the Beltway wisdom is unforgivable.
Posted by: oj at February 21, 2006 7:19 AMMatt:
No American president who considers himself bound by a UN mandate should be permitted to continue in office.
Posted by: oj at February 21, 2006 7:20 AMThat the UN mandate forbid regime change just proves that an UN mandate is not always worth having. The coalition determined the mission and what was the result?
1. The war being "legal" did not keep massive antiwar protests from breaking out all over the globe. People forget that the US embassy in Germany was target of a terrorist attack in February 1991, to give just one example. So much for multilateralism.
2. The liberation of Iraq would have been much easier in 1991. Since then:
- Islamism spread everywhere throughout the 90s and Iraq was not exempt from this trend.
- Hundreds of thousands of educated, potentially helpful Iraqis left the country.
- The regime had time to prepare an insurgency
- The regime had time to foster contacts with terrorists
- The US army became smaller
- Our position re Iran became weaker
3. And it did not help either that:
- The US and UK were saddled with enforcing the no-fly zones (the French pulled out in 1996, I think). This meant frequent attacks on our aircraft while the rest of world called it peace.
- The whole hugely corrupting oil-for-food thing happened.
- Anti-sanctions propaganda was used to portray the US alone as bully and child killer while the "coalition" couldn´t wait to do business with Saddam.
- The US became a paper tiger in the eyes of their enemies. Osama said so himself.
I remember the discussions back then. The consensus was that it would be a quagmire. "The country will break up! Turkey fears an independent Kurdistan! It´s colonialism! The Arab street will explode! The Arabs really respect Saddam! Those camel drivers don´t want democracy. We´ll be over there until 1996! Syria and Iran will meddle!" But even dealing with Iran would have been easier back then.
So much for successful diplomacy.
Ok, you already know all of this. It bears repeating, though.
Posted by: werner at February 21, 2006 7:21 AMwerner:
Yes, the UN was useful in dragging everyone else into our war, then should have been ignored once the shooting started.
Posted by: oj at February 21, 2006 7:36 AM"Go find me a way to do this."
We can see in our mind's eye, James Knox Polk using these very words.
Posted by: Lou Gots at February 21, 2006 7:59 AMFWIW: Jay Bookman went on an embarrassing tear in 2002 accusing the Bush admin with attempting to build an 'empire'.
I don't have Lexis/Nexis, but I would love someone to analyze the little cretin's columns from 2002-2006 and watch the conspicuous dropoff of
his use of the 'E word' as time has passed.
'so what is it, Jay, were you wrong or have you been careless in reminding us that we have just established an Empire in the Mideast?'
Even by the low standards of the AJC, he's really lame.
The thing about 43 is, he's a Chief Executive who's an executive. As J.P. Morgan said, "I don't hire lawyers to tell me if I can do what I want to do. I hire lawyers to tell me how I can do what I want to do."