Month: November 2006

He was on the team to rehabilitate him. But he now realizes

"I don’t have the time to devote to such a critical responsibility."

As the church lady would say, isn’t that special?

It’s just a flesh-wound!

(Hat tip: Southern Appeal.)

… when JPod has to tell you that Santorum actually lost by eighteen points. Boy, the Corner was enjoyable reading today. Keep it up, guys! 

Lawrence Eagleburger just said on Fox that he expects that Gates was selected precisely because he won’t change course in Iraq. This interview with a former close colleague of Gates, Fritz W. Ermarth, suggests the same. I sure hope they’re wrong. It looks to me like Daddy’s friends are bailing out "the boy" again. Well, at least someone is. At this point, I’ll take anyone not clinically delusional.

This was the final insult – to you and to me:

In brief remarks, Rumsfeld described the Iraq conflict as a "little understood, unfamiliar war" that is "complex for people to comprehend."

He then compared himself to Churchill. Yep: still clinical. The truth is: it was Rumsfeld who little understood and was unfamiliar with the actual conflict he was tasked with managing. It was not too "complex for people to comprehend." It was relatively easy to comprehend. If you invade a post-totalitarian country and disband its military, you better have enough troops to keep order. We didn’t. Rumsfeld refused to send enough. When this was made clear to him and to everyone, he still refused. His arrogant belief in a military that didn’t need any actual soldiers was completely at odds with the actual task in Iraq. But he preferred to sit back as tens of thousands of Iraqis were murdered and thousands of U.S. troops died rather than to check his own ego.

So let me put this as simply as I can: Rumsfeld has blood on his hands – American and Iraqi blood. He also directly ordered and personally monitored the torture of military detainees. He secured legal impunity for his own war crimes, but that doesn’t mean the Congress shouldn’t investigate more fully what he authorized. He remains one of the most incompetent defense secretaries in history (McNamara looks good in comparison). But he is also a war criminal: a torturer who broke the laws of this country. The catastrophe in Iraq will stain him for ever. His record of torture has indelibly stained the United States.

(Photo: Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty.)

I’ll be on Anderson Cooper’s CNN show tonight, and on CBC in Canada (as well as the BBC). Hence the blog-gap.

Perfect for today: The Jacksons sing: "Can You Feel It?"

We now have a chance to save what’s left of Iraq.

(Photo: Brendan Smialowsi/AFP/Getty.)

Watching the president’s press conference, we have finally gotten to see what happens when George W. Bush is forced to face reality. It wasn’t pretty. He was prickly from the word go, defensive, and also revealing. He was trying to say (I think) that he had already decided to fire Rumsfeld last week, even as he was insisting that Rummy would stay for two more years. So Bush’s own spin is that he was lying through his teeth last week. Good to have that confirmed in his own words. The removal of the increasingly deranged Rumsfeld is, of course, great news. This blog has been calling for such a move for close to two years. Frankly, I doubt it would have happened without what Bush called the "thumping" of last night. But it’s a start. If Bush were truly interested in reaching out, he would have picked a Democrat to replace him. I’m not sure what to make of Gates. But Rummy’s removal shows we do not have a complete nutcase in the White House. Given recent comments, that’s a relief.

(Photo: Brooks Kraft/Corbis for Time.)

My publicist has been told point blank that Bill O’Reilly personally won’t have me on his show to debate conservatism. David Frum was also a no-show for a radio show in Canada this morning. Cluck, cluckety cluck. So am I blackballed by Hannity as well?