#5 DeBunkers At Last || Condi to the RESCUE! ==Part 3

The Washington Note Archives

First Wilkerson, now Scowcroft. Who's next? Condi to the RESCUE !


ush is not blameless. He is the president. Ultimately, he is responsible for the decisions of his administration. However, Bush always finds ways to bail himself out of trouble. If he has to use Cheney and Rummy as scapegoats, he will. This has been done before. Reagan was guilty as sin in the Iran-Contra scandal. However, the GOP managed to scapegoat a bunch of other people to save Reagan. Once Reagan no longer needed saving, GHWBush pardoned the Iran-Contra scapegoats.

Wilkerson and Powell with Military backgrounds are both livid over the prisoner abuse. Yet another shoe will drop when the whole truth is written about Abu Graib. The General, Karpinski, who was cashiered for Abu Graib, is also speaking out.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/082405Z.shtml
Posted by: bakho at October 21, 2005 09:29 PM


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I think it's important for progressives not to do as the Republicans do, namely to ignore particular evidence in favor of big, self-righteous generalizations.

As several posts above remind us, Scowcroft came out publicly against Bush's Iraq venture before the war was launched and did what he could to stop it. It would seem, from some of the posts, that the right has no monopoly on selective amnesia: how can anyone have forgotten this so quickly? Scowcroft has behaved honorably from very early in the whole debacle. He should earn our gratitude and respect.

Powell is a different story. He let Bush use him and spit him out. He knew that the administration's presentation at the UN was mostly crap but gave it anyway. He may have tried to moderate policies by working behind the scenes, but no one took his advice. He should have resigned when he saw that no one would listen to him. He was still thinking like a soldier, who is not supposed to question his orders, instead of a cabinet member serving an administration (supposedly) accountable to the people. I wouldn't call Powell a "coward," but he forgot where his principle loyalties ought to lie: to the American people, not to Bush and Rumsfeld. You could call him an opportunist, though not a very shrewd one. He hoped that his service to Bush would advance his own career, but in the event it ruined him. He is damaged goods now.

I don't know much about Wilkerson, but the posts in his defense persuade me to give him the benefit of the doubt.

It's easier to be pure when you have no public visibility, no power, no ruthless Rovian bastards eager to destroy you for speaking out. Give Scowcroft credit; he spoke up when there was still a chance to change course, though the Bushies weren't listening to him or anyone else. Powell failed us, but even so, better he should speak up now, indirectly, through his associates, than never at all.

We can't go back in time and undo the last 5 years. All we can do is put an end to Bush's power before he does further damage. If that involves late hits and opportunistic piling on, well, that's the way political reversals of fortune happen. What has changed is that others are hearing the voices of isolated truth-tellers who were crying in the wilderness a year or two ago. Honor and praise to those who stood up first, before it was safe; but to complete what they began, we need the others.

Then we can spend the next decade or two trying to reverse the harm Bush has already inflicted.

Paul Breslin
Evanston
Posted by: Paul Breslin at October 23, 2005 12:20 PM
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I am aware that a plan of succession was debated in Congress should a terrorist take out most of D.C., but was a bill introduced and passed? Likely, it was but as an amendment to a much larger piece of legislation.

And one last thing. Many have written here that Bush was elected in November, but I beg to differ. The Ohio Coingate scandal is the tip of the iceberg. The GAO just this past week issued a scathing report on the dangers inherent electronic voting. Rep. Conyers issued a 102-page report on the discrepancies in the Ohio vote, and the report is quite damning. We must have a bipartisan push to reform our voting systems and our election laws in this country, and we cannot tolerate more whitewashs like the Baker-Carter Commission report. The only "nonpartisan" voting rights "expert" allowed to testify during its hearings is the same Jim Dyke (RNC wheeler-dealer) who is currently shepherding the Miers nomination through the Senate.

First, we must remove the current administration, prosecute the criminals within it, and restore our country. Promptly attending to that worthwhile task on a bipartisan basis would do a great deal to restore our tarnished international reputation.

Second, we all must cooperate and work closely together to ensure that future elections are not tainted by partisan dirty tricks and hacked electronic voting so that future "cabals" cannot highjack our country from its people.

And last, we must work our way out of the quagmire in the Middle East, and for that reason we must embrace the Scowcrofts and the Wilkersons and the Clarkes and the O'Neills and all the rest of the patriots on both sides of the spectrum in order to accomplish what presently seems to be almost impossible.

Let's all stop kvetching and get to work.
Posted by: SherAn at October 23, 2005 01:57 PM
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