[Rhodes22-list]Wally's political reply

[Bill Effros]

Not so, Ed.

I don't have time for a point by point rebuttal, but the heart of your argument seems to be that the underlying problem is that facts known to the intelligence community were somehow withheld from the President in a way he could not have known.

That's not what happened, although it is true the administration wove a fabric of half-truths to make it appear that way.

In the Clinton White House, the President read and commented on every Presidential Daily Briefing (PDB) he received.  George Bush did not read the PDBs.   They were summarized for him every day by CIA Director Tenet--George Bush himself changed that procedure.  Only, President Bush took a lot of vacations--he has been on vacation for more than 40% of his time in office--so Tenet was not on hand to summarize all the PDBs.

Bush was on vacation when the CIA provided the information about Osama's plans to hijack planes inside the United States.  He remained on vacation at his ranch in Texas for the whole month.  Tenet remained in Washington, and testified he didn't brief Bush for the entire month, although the CIA subsequently said he had flown to the ranch once.

Bush doesn't know what's going on because he's clearing scrub on his ranch instead of minding the store.  

There's no excuse for it, no matter which side of the political spectrum you favor.

Bill Effros



  
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: ed kroposki 
  To: 'The Rhodes 22 mail list' 
  Sent: Thursday, April 22, 2004 11:54 AM
  Subject: RE: [Rhodes22-list]Wally's political reply


  Wally,

  "The guy got caught messing around and lied about it." 

  The messing around part had a more significant angle.  The lady was not only
  a subordinate, but in a position where he had significant responsibility of
  trust to her.   An intern represents a unique position.  It is more than
  employer to employee.  Legally and ethically is closer to father and
  daughter.  She was not put there for his sexual enjoyment.  There is no
  question that a whole lot of women would willingly have had sex with him.
  And, I would have no problem with his doing so.  But his taking advantage
  the special relationship that the two positions had was a special wrong.
  And, he lied in a court proceeding under oath.  That is the crime of
  perjury.  He was disbarred for that in Arkansas; anybody else would have
  time in jail.

  "On the other hand we have a sitting president that claimed while running
  for office that he was against Nation Building. Once elected he spread
  around a bunch of rumors as facts leading us into war against a nation that
  posed no real threat to our National Security. This pisses me off much
  more."

  Here Rummy's evaluation of intelligence comes in perspective.  He was given
  information and looked at that information thru narrow blinders.  He
  evidentially did not fully evaluate all the alternatives.  It appears that
  those advisors close to him gave him primarily a narrow view or were content
  to let him believe a limited view.  Maybe he did not have the smarts to
  predict the future or have trust in those who saw different possibilities.

  As President he expected the CIA and the Pentagon's office of military
  intelligence to give him good information.  I say that they did not do their
  jobs.  The attorney general said that they were hindered by the previous
  administrations rules (memo).  I would say that was not a sufficient excuse.
  The president should have been explicitly told that all information he was
  getting was weak and bias.  He should have been told that emphatically, and
  the fact that he was told that should have been documented (there is no
  information that this was done).  The fact that he was not strongly informed
  of the weakness in his information is problematic.  However, I think that at
  the time he as President of the USA, he had a right to expect he was getting
  good information.  Now that we all know the some of flaws, the issue is, are
  the flaws fixed?  Since the answers to that are state secrets, it will be
  years before the truth gets out.    

           Ed K


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