The Forkes Report

Tim's Favorite Blogs

Chews the News
Silk Road
The Huffington Post
Media Matters
American Progress
Citizens For Ethics
Crooks And Liars
Common Cause
Sweaty Sheets

Media Matters

Blog Directories

Wednesday, December 3. 2008

Checked Out-2

Yesterday was meant for a commentary on the Bush interview with Charlie Gibson, the first, we found out, of what the president called a series of farewell interviews. But I got side-tracked with tangents.

Bush started his “farewell tour” with Gibson no doubt because Charlie just doesn’t have that hard nose attitude of the other nightly news anchors or any of the real tough bastards found on CNN or MSNBC. Got that impression from the interviews, although Gibson didn’t lob softball questions; he just doesn’t have the knack for follow-up questions.

On the question of why he started his war in Iraq, Bush completely evaded the question and frankly, Gibson didn’t really ask, leaving wiggle room for Bush to pull out the long since discredited reason of WMD. Even on that point, Bush dithered, calling it a “do over” he couldn’t do over.

It was boggling when Gibson asked the president that if the intelligence had been right, would he have still started the war. Bush, thinking that “right” meant WMD had been found, said “yes.” Gibson, taken aback a bit, had to clarify the question, “right” meaning, had the pre-war intelligence said there wasn’t any WMD, would the president have started the war. That’s when we got the child-like “do over” answer.

The real answer, the real question of course, had to do with the manufactured intelligence to start the war. There was intelligence pointing to WMD, and quite a bit more indicating there weren’t any Weapons of Mass Destruction. Vice President Dick Cheney cherry-picked the intelligence he needed to make his case to start the war.

That’s the question that wasn’t asked: was this all orchestrated by Cheney and Bush just the puppet? Actually, I doubt any interviewer would ask the president that question directly or even in a softer way. Through the first six years of his presidency, Bush prided himself on being the guy in charge, or at least having the perception he was in charge — the “decider.” Strangely, that macho bravado was absent during the interview and the president looked weary.

Yet Bush’s answer gets to an even deeper revelation about the prewar intelligence, something many have written about in the six years since Bush first said he was going to start his war, bullied Congress (cowards as the Democrats were) into giving him the authorization to start the war: the decision was made to invade Iraq and all they were looking for was a reason. WMD was the reason, but they, Cheney and his PNAC brethren, had to provide evidence to support their plans.

When asked the question, Bush had it in his mind that the “right” intelligence was defined as supporting the assertion Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, instead of what did the intelligence suggest and where did it lead. For Bush, invading Iraq was the “right” thing to do and evidence — the intelligence — supporting that decision was the only “right” intelligence.

If anyone still wants to give Bush the benefit of the doubt about whether or not he was determined to start war with Iraq regardless of the consequences, that reply to Gibson should be an answer.

But really, many of us have known that for six years. Bush’s revelations now just confirm what we’ve been trying to tell the country all these years. Bush couldn’t have started his war without the consent of the people though and in 2002-03, while the ruins of the World Trade Center still smoldered in our hearts and memories, all Bush, Cheney and their cohorts had to do was present the proof and browbeat those who opposed the war with the club of public opinion and at the time, President Bush had an 80% approval rating.
 Even today, noted Bush apologist Christopher Hitchens contends that there was an operational connection between Saddam Hussein’s government and Al Qa’ida — based solely on Abu Musab al-Zarqawi being in Iraq before the war started — and that the threat of WMD was very real. Boggles the mind.
 Zarqawi didn’t join Al Qa’ida until 2004, after he had proven his skill at killing and organizing killers.

Nearly 700 words into this and only one small question of that interview analyzed, but it is typical of Bush, who thinks in small circles, never more than one and never with opposing views. His is a world of “group-think,” where everyone has to be on the same, pre-determined page so that he, the president, doesn’t have to do too much, doesn’t have to think too much — doesn’t have to do the math.

In his political career, that really only started recently when he was sworn in as governor of Texas in 1995 (he had an unsuccessful run for Congress in the 1970’s), Bush has had a distain for government, an entity he saw as hindering his business and the business of his friends and family in the oil industry. He never had any idea of how to govern, let alone what to do when given the reins of government, he only wanted to be the guy in charge, to show his daddy he could not only do what daddy did, but do it better, which meant winning a second term.

Bush never had a legislative agenda, no real political or social philosophy, other than to get elected president. He left everything up to others, from the election, to winning the court decisions, to creating a legislative agenda — that was provided by the Project for a New American Century and all they needed was their “Pearl Harbor Moment.”

Once in the Oval Office, all Bush really wanted to do was look like a president, the guy in charge and as long as he had capable people, all on the same page, he just had to look presidential. How hard could it be?

September 11, 2001 started the process of proving just how hard it would be. Now, Bush had to make war decisions and as he pointed out in the Charlie Gibson interviews, he was unprepared for that most solemn and heavy of responsibilities. In other words, Bush said he was not prepared to be the Commander-in-Chief.

In December 2000 the Supreme Court put into the White House a man who knew he was not prepared to be the leader of the Free World, was not prepared to be president. For eight years this nation — and the world — has suffered for that decision. The saddest part, the worst Bush had to say for himself in that interview: none of it was his fault, he was just a victim of circumstance.

Makes you wonder: did he ever check in?

Posted by Tim Forkes in NEWS and POLITICS at 00:01 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

(Page 1 of 288, totaling 288 entries) » next page