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Miscellaneous Powered byMovable Type 3.2 var site="s11makis"    Home | Archives and Links | Old TPRS | Praise |  Tuesday, January 03, 2006 It's just a few blocks away near Great Satan Square  Posted by Jack Cluth at 04:03 PM | Why, yes, I AM a rocket scientist | 8516 Comments (0) | 8516 TrackBack (0) "This is the only sane member of this Administration...." Ex-Powell Aide Moves From Insider to Apostate What I saw was a cabal between the vice president ofthe United States, Richard Cheney, and the secretary of defense, DonaldRumsfeld, on critical issues that made decisions that the bureaucracydid not know were being made. And you’ve got a president who is notversed in international relations and not too much interested in themeither COL Lawrence B. Wilkerson, US Army (Ret.) MY NEW HERO #26: COL Lawrence B. Wilkerson, US Army (Ret.)  Whatis a person to do in a situation such as the one Lawrence Wilkersonfound himself in? You’ve sworn to support the President and hispolicies, yet your time on the inside of the process has revealed toyou the evil and corruption inherent in those responsible for creatingthe policies. To his credit, I suppose, Wilkerson’s military backgroundprevented him from trying to upset the apple cart from the inside.Nonetheless, Wilkerson saw firsthand what a corrupt and self-servingcabal can do when handed the reigns of power and the end result is an Imperial Presidency,whose existence is “justified” by repeating the neo-Conservativemantra, which, roughly translated, is either “the war againstterrorism” or “9.11”.Eventually, Wilkerson had seen enough, and decided that he could nolonger in good conscience continue to serve an Administration thatknows nothing of honor, service, and integrity. What’s an honorable manto do when he realizes that he is serving a dishonorable and corruptcabal? One honest man on the inside would be eaten alive, and Wilkersonknew this. Were he to attempt to change the system from within, or evento become a whistleblower, this Administration would have buried him sodeeply it would be as if he had never exisited.Wilkerson in the end knew that he had no choice but to get out, buthe had been on the inside long enough to realize that if he spoke outabout what he knew and what he had seen, he would still be buried by anavalanche of propaganda and political assassination. To his credit,Wilkerson did not allow this reality to deter him, and the BushAdministration certainly hasn’t proved his fears to be inaccurate.Wilkerson has seen combat, and he knows what an ugly andunprincipled mess it can be. He has seen things that no man should haveto carry with him through life. Yet, service to his country is the lifehe chose for himself. Perhaps Wilkerson’s mistake was in assuming, orat least hoping, that other men would be guided by the same principlesof honor and integrity that have illuminated his path. Sadly, “honor”and “politics” and not words commonly found being used in the samesentence. Continue reading "This is the only sane member of this Administration....">> ITwas in early 2004, the beginning of President Bush’s re-electioncampaign, that Lawrence B. Wilkerson first printed out a letter sayinghe wanted to quit as chief of staff for Secretary of State Colin L.Powell. “In essence it said, ‘Dear Mr. President, I findmyself at variance with a majority of your foreign policies and evenyour domestic policies and therefore I respectfully submit myresignation,’ ” Mr. Wilkerson recalled recently. But the letterremained in a desk drawer for the rest of Mr. Bush’s first term. Nearlytwo years later, Mr. Wilkerson, a 60-year-old retired United StatesArmy colonel, has finally completed his journey from insider toapostate. Alone among those who surrounded Mr. Powell in the firstterm, he is speaking out critically, assailing the president asamateurish, especially compared to the first President Bush, anddescribing the administration as secretive, inept and courting disasterat home and abroad. Nor has he spared his former boss, whom he says wasoverly preoccupied with “damage control” for policies set by others.Too many lies, too many ugly messes created by trying to cover upand explain away those lies. For someone dedicated to serving hiscountry, that’s got to wear on you…and it certainly did on Wilkerson.When a man who has spent his career and entire adult life upholding acode of honor, it’s got to rankle being around people for whom “honor”is neither relevant nor a matter of priority. Lawrence Wilkerson saw aworld in which power corrupts, and absolute power is the ultimate goal.Being a man of honor, it’s no wonder Wilkerson resigned. What good anddecent person would want to be surrounded by those who so willingly andeasily engage in such dishonor? Mr. Wilkerson has also attacked the Bushadministration for allegedly condoning torture and setting lax policieson treatment of detainees that led, he charges, to the abuses at AbuGhraib prison in Iraq and the black eye they gave to the United StatesArmy…. He says his decision to speak in the open aboutthe policy wars of the first Bush term was slow in coming, but a majorfactor was the revelations about Abu Ghraib, which he said he realized,after studying the matter, had resulted from decisions on prisonertreatment and intelligence set shortly after Sept. 11, 2001. Armydiscipline is something Mr. Wilkerson says he has understood sinceVietnam, where he flew helicopters starting in 1969. “I’ve been there,”he said. “I’ve stood on the hot parade ground as a pilot. I’ve cursedgenerals.” He added, “I understood the bestiality that comes over menwhen they’re asked to use force for the state.” Herecalled that a battalion commander once declared an area a free-firezone, “which means that anything that moves, you shoot it.” One of hisgunners killed a 13-year-old girl, Mr. Wilkerson says, adding, “I willalways live with that for the rest of my life.”Wilkerson is clearly a man who understands the perils and pitfallsof power. Having seen it firsthand in combat, Wilkerson would seem tobe singularly qualified to identify it and fight it in the civilianworld. Of course, the civilian world knows nothing of military honorand discipline. The civilian political world is about power, money, andinfluence- not concepts that respond to military discipline. “Larry has two qualities that Powell appreciated,”recalls another top aide to the former secretary. “First, he couldalways find the big picture in whatever was going on. Second, he alwaystore things apart. He never takes things at face value, and what he’sdoing now is a kind of exaggeration of what he used to do internally.”Mr. Powell turned to Mr. Wilkerson to go with him to the C.I.A. to sortthrough the mounds of material prepared to buttress the case againstSaddam Hussein on the eve of the Iraq war, for the lengthy presentationthe secretary gave on Feb. 5, 2003, at the United Nations SecurityCouncil. “He found that the draft didn’t have thesourcing and backing that we wanted and he tore the whole thing apartand put it back together,” the former State Department officialrecalled. “He was Powell’s internal iconoclast.” Mr. Wilkerson recallsthe preparation of the Feb. 5 presentation, which Mr. Powell hasacknowledged will be remembered as a blot on his career because of itsmistakes on intelligence, as an exercise in frustration. Itwas an embittering experience for everyone at the State Department, Mr.Wilkerson says, to be saddled with presenting what turned out to befalse information at the United Nations, and also to have beensidelined in the running of postwar Iraq by the Pentagon. “When Irationalize for myself not resigning, I did it by saying, ‘This is theonly sane member of this administration,’ ” Mr. Wilkerson said of Mr.Powell. And how sad is that, when the only way a man can rationalize notresigning is to attempt to convince himself that he works for the onlyperson in the Bush Administration who is not evil and corrupt? For aman who has devoted his life and his career to the service of hiscountry, that’s got to be a tough pill to swallow. Those who fear for our country and the direction in which it’s beingled owe a debt of gratitude to Lawrence Wilkerson. Without good,decent, and conscientious public servants like Wilkerson, we risk beingturned over completely to those concerned with nothing beyond money,power, and influence.The truly sad aspect of this sorry saga is that the wrong personresigned. Lawrence Wilkerson, and those like him, should be the ones inpower, for when government is without honor and integrity, evil hasfree reign.WE DESEVER BETTER.<<All done! Posted by Jack Cluth at 07:21 AM | Politics & other bad ideas | 8437 Comments (1) | 8437 TrackBack (0) How to be a successful Right Wing (chicken)hawk Yellow Elephant Chickenhawks: Robust, Uninhibited DebateNot everyone who supports Iraq war should, or can enlistTalking Points Against the “Chickenhawk” argument These are very good points made in the argument.It’s a shame that the Left has resorted to labelling non-military aschickenhawks, as civilians we have done much to support and help thevaliant soldiers overseas. They spend long hours griping about how onlythe poor and un-educated serve in the armed forces, yet continue torestrict access to recruiters and ROTC to educated, even affluent,students that wish to serve. By “support our troops,” Itake it that the Left only supports them when they are added in thecasualty count. In a very sick and disturbing way, they parade aroundthe grief of a lost hero, yet never honor the thousands that return totheir families safely and even re-enlist. They can only support thetroops if they characterize them as a group that they can definitelyidentify with: victims. By degrading morale at home, bashing themilitary’s Commander-in-Chief, and never believing the mission thesoldiers are sent for— it tells me that there is a huge disconnectbetween their rhetoric and actions. Darin   Manyof us have wondered why it is that some of the most ardent and gung-hosupporters of Our Glorious Leader’s war in Iraq are those on the Rightwho fight the war from the comfort of their keyboards. Amazing how easyit is to wave the flag and be uber-patriotic when the closestyou will get to seeing service in Iraq are the magnetic ribbons on theback of your SUV. Yep, it’s all good, just as long as someone else’schild or loved one is doing the fighting and dying. Indeed, these folksaren’t called “chickenhawks” without good reason, eh?We wonder, though…just how do these folks do it? How can they notsee the hypocrisy inherent in their “I support our troops and the warin Iraq- primarily because I’m not there risking my sorry ass”philosophy? How can they look at themselves in the mirror, knowing thatthey cannot begin to justify their hypocrisy without some seriousdisregard of reality and some impressive logical leaps?Honestly, the chickenhawks have it down to a science.Yes, like any other dedicated collection of Republicans, they havetheir talking points, which they stick to with the rabid fealty of thewell-and heavily-indoctrinated. Yes, why engage in an actualhonest-to-God discussion of the issues when you can deflect any and allunpleasant thoughts by merely invoking the Almighty talking points? Continue reading How to be a successful Right Wing (chicken)hawk>> 1)We are engaged in a war of ideas on college campuses that is essentialto winning the war on terror. This is also very important since hatefulprofessors are spewing anti-American rhetoric at the students every dayand students rarely hear all sides of the argument.A war of ideas? Man, who’s going to tend to the dead and wounded??Oh, the humanity…. And hateful professors? Spewing anti-Americanrhetoric?? Yes, these folks have a SERIOUS (and completely baseless)persecution complex. But they certainly look spiffy in their BrownShirts, don’t they?? 2) The Vietnam war was lost because there weren’t enough people on the homefront telling the truth and supporting the war….Uh, what truth? That we were supporting a corrupt and inept regimewho couldn’t have governed their way out of a wet paper sack? Thatthere was no central political or military strategy in the AmericanGovernment? That American troops were asked to fight an uncovential warusing conventional strategy and tactics? Or perhaps that our governmentcompletely ignored public opinion, convinced that they could not affordto lose face and still hope to keep their jobs? Right; 58,000 Americans died for no reason. Vietnam had nothing thatcould even remotely be related to American national security interests.We simply took over from the French, who got their butts kicked at DienBien Phu, recognized they had nothing to gain by continuing the fight,and got the hell out of Dodge. Those who do not understand history are doomed to repeat it…and itcost us 58,000 lives and a broken generation to figure this out. Andnow a whole new generation of leaders has proven repeatedly that theyknow NOTHING of the lessons taught by our own history. 3) Where were these leftists when Clinton wassending our troops to Kosovo, Somalia, and Haiti? They weren’t signingup then. Also, why aren’t they serving in various UN peacekeepingmissions worldwide, according to their logic?Well, a good number of us didn’t support these missions, either, butregardless, this is an “apples & oranges” comparison. Somalia, andHaiti were “peacekeeping” missions (Kosovo was a NATO operation tocounter Serbian genocide), not pointless (and seemingly endless) warsof aggression. Nice try, y’all, but you lost this argument before youeven left the gate. 4) The troops in our programs tell us it is soimportant to continue the battle of ideas on campuses and to supportthe men overseas through programs like what we did with FreedomAlliance to send needed supplies and thank you notes over there duringthe conference.Yes, it IS important to continue the debate. That is, after all,part and parcel of what a democracy is all about. To call this aBATTLE, however, is to prove that y’all take yourselves WAY tooseriously.What all y’all fail to realize is that those of us on the Left donot hate our troops. I am wholly supportive of any program or heartfelteffort to get anything to our men and women in uniform overseas thatmakes their existence more pleasant and endurable. Speaking for myselfalone, I resent the implication that somehow those of us who oppose thewar in Iraq also hate our troops. What an arrogant, unfounded, andcruel accusation. But then, it’s all about winning for you, isn’t it?Whatever it takes, eh?? 5) We are the ones fighting for the right to servein ROTC on campuses. The same leftists who criticize us for not joiningthe military are stripping willing and able college students at Yale,Harvard, Emory, Stanford, etc from their rights to serve their country.No one is stripping anyone of their right to serve their country.Anyone so inclined can enlist. What the opposition to ROTC is designedto do is to point out that there are those of us who do not believethat the military belongs on a college campus. Join ROTC if you want.In fact, I wish you would. If you support the war so wholeheartedly,shouldn’t you be helping to fight it? 6) The majority of Americans do not serve in themilitary, so the Left is essentially disenfranchising them fromcontributing their voice to the debate.Now THIS is a talking point. It has absolutely no basis in truth,but if you repeat it often enough, people will begin to think it’sGospel. What a beautifully crafted piece of propaganda…. 7) The logic is flawed that only people who areinvolved in something can voice an opinion about it. For example - thepublic voices its opinion about a wide range of government programseven though most people are not in the government, and people speakabout welfare but not many are actually on it or administering it.Uh…this is a pointless and useles piece of Doublespeak if ever therewas one. All those of us on the Left are doing is asking that those whoso wholeheartedly support the endless war in Iraq from the safety oftheir keyboards give some thought to putting their money where theirmouth is…figuratively speaking, of course.We have never stated that only people who are involved in somethingcan voice an opinion about it. What we are saying is that thechickenhawks who so vociferously support the war in Iraq might be morecredible if they were willing to assume some of the risks instead offighting from the safety of their keyboards.Of course, being a Chickenhawk means never having to actually do theheavy lifting. Think I’m kidding? Check out this list of Republicanpoliticians, pundits, and preachers:Dick Cheney: did not serve. Several deferments, the last by marriage.Dennis Hastert: did not serve.Tom Delay: did not serve.Roy Blunt: did not serve.Bill Frist: did not serve.Mitch McConnell: did not serve.Rick Santorum: did not serve.Trent Lott: did not serve.John Ashcroft: did not serve. Seven deferments to teach business.Jeb Bush: did not serve.Karl Rove: did not serve.Saxby Chambliss: did not serve. “Bad knee.” The man who attacked Max Cleland’s patriotism.Paul Wolfowitz: did not serve.Vin Weber: did not serve.Richard Perle: did not serve.Douglas Feith: did not serve.Eliot Abrams: did not serve.Richard Shelby: did not serve.Jon Kyl: did not serve.Tim Hutchison: did not serve.Christopher Cox: did not serve.Newt Gingrich: did not serve.Donald Rumsfeld: served in Navy (1954-57) as flight instructor.George W. Bush: failed to complete his six-year National Guard; gotassigned to Alabama so he could campaign for family friend running forU.S. Senate; failed to show up for required medical exam, disappearedfrom duty.Ronald Reagan: due to poor eyesight, served in a non- combat role making movies. Bob Dornan: Consciously enlisted after fighting was over in Korea.Phil Gramm: did not serve.John McCain: Vietnam POW, Silver Star, Bronze Star, Legion of Merit, Purple Heart and Distinguished Flying Cross.Dana Rohrabacher: did not serve.John M. McHugh: did not serve.JC Watts: did not serve.Jack Kemp: did not serve. “Knee problem, ” although continued in NFL for 8 years as quarterback.Dan Quayle: Journalism unit of the Indiana National Guard.Rudy Giuliani: did not serve.George Pataki: did not serve.Spencer Abraham: did not serve.John Engler: did not serve.Dr. James Dobson: did not serveThe Rev. Mr. Jerry Falwell: did not serveSean Hannity: did not serve.Rush Limbaugh: did not serve (4-F with a ‘pilonidal cyst.’)Bill O’Reilly: did not serve.Michael Savage: did not serve.George Will: did not serve.Chris Matthews: did not serve.Paul Gigot: did not serve.Bill Bennett: did not serve.Pat Buchanan: did not serve.John Wayne: did not serve.Bill Kristol: did not serve.Kenneth Starr: did not serve.Antonin Scalia: did not serve.Clarence Thomas: did not serve.Ralph Reed: did not serve.Michael Medved: did not serve.Charlie Daniels: did not serve.Ted Nugent: did not serve. (He only shoots at things that don’t shoot back.)Not a lot of military service for such an impressive collection ofRepublican True Believers, eh? Now, compare and contrast that list tothese Democrats:Richard Gephardt: Air National Guard, 1965-71.David Bonior: Staff Sgt., Air Force 1968-72.Tom Daschle: 1st Lt., Air Force SAC 1969-72.Al Gore: enlisted Aug. 1969; sent to Vietnam Jan. 1971 as an army journalist in 20th Engineer Brigade.Bob Kerrey: Lt. j.g. Navy 1966-69; Medal of Honor, Vietnam.Daniel Inouye: Army 1943-47; Medal of Honor, WWII.John Kerry: Lt., Navy 1966-70; Silver Star, Bronze Star with Combat V, Purple Hearts.Charles Rangel: Staff Sgt., Army 1948-52; Bronze Star, Korea.Max Cleland: Captain, Army 1965-68; Silver Star & Bronze Star, Vietnam. Paraplegic from war injuries. Served in Congress.Ted Kennedy: Army, 1951-53.Tom Harkin: Lt., Navy, 1962-67; Naval Reserve, 1968-74.Jack Reed: Army Ranger, 1971-1979; Captain, Army Reserve 1979-91.Fritz Hollings: Army officer in WWII; Bronze Star and seven campaign ribbons.Leonard Boswell: Lt. Col., Army 1956-76; Vietnam, DFCs, Bronze Stars,and Soldier’s Medal.Pete Peterson: Air Force Captain, POW. Purple Heart, Silver Star and Legion of Merit.Mike Thompson: Staff sergeant, 173rd Airborne, Purple Heart.Bill McBride: Candidate for Fla. Governor. Marine in Vietnam; Bronze Star with Combat V.Gray Davis: Army Captain in Vietnam, Bronze Star.Pete Stark: Air Force 1955-57Chuck Robb: VietnamHowell Heflin: Silver StarGeorge McGovern: Silver Star & DFC during WWII.Bill Clinton: Did not serve. Student deferments. Entered draft but received #311.Jimmy Carter: Seven years in the Navy.Walter Mondale: Army 1951-1953John Glenn: WWII and Korea; six DFCs and AirMedal with 18 Clusters.Tom Lantos: Served in Hungarian underground in WWII. Saved by Raoul Wallenberg.Memo to all you Chickenhawks: the next time you feel the need to runyour mouth and run down those of us on the Left for being“insufficiently patriotic”, or “anti-American”, or even “not supportingour troops”, how about getting your own house in order first? He wholives in a gas tank would be well-advised not to play with matches.<<All done! Posted by Jack Cluth at 06:44 AM | Speak slowly; I'm a History major | 8496 Comments (4) | 8496 TrackBack (0) Governor Bell? I could get used to the sound of that. Strayhorn enters governor’s race as independent3 Republicans, 1 Democrat It’s time to shake Austin up. Governor Perry may bedoing the best he can, but after five years, we have learned he is notthe strong leader we need to put Texas above politics. Carole Keeton Strayhorn   Wife.Mother. Grandmother. Republican. Public Servant. Political Opportunist.Yes, Carole Keeton Strayhorn is many things, but in her wildesthallucinations, I don’t imagine that she EVER thought she mightpossibly end up being responsible for a Democrat being the nextGovernor of Texas. Her decision to enter the Texas Governor’s race asan independent may end up doing just that.Governor Goodhair, mediocrity though he may be, likely has a lock onthe Republican nomination. You’ve got to wonder if he has pictures ofTom Craddick caught in flagrante delicto with Dakota Fanningand Haley Jeol Osment. What must he have on the rest of this state’sRepublican leadership to have such a lock on the party’s nomination?It’s not as if he’s actually accomplished anything noteworthy over thepast five years.It’s difficult to imagine that anyone could possibly make George W.Bush’s tenure as Governor look like Texas’ version of Ronald Reagan,but Rick Perry has done exactly that. I’m not certain just what he’sspent the past five years doing, but apparently not doing nothing isthe ticket to re-election if you’re a Republican in this state. But, I digress. If we’re going to have two three Republicans in the general election, this has got to bode well for Democrat Chris Bell.Three Republicans (Oh, yeah, I almost forgot…Kinky Friedman’s in theresomewhere- he last ran for office as a Republican) and Bell. At thispoint, Bell’s strategy seems to be to wait for the Three Stooges tobeat each other up so badly that he can sneak in behind them.I like Chris Bell, but I’ve got to wonder why he is still waging astealth campaign. OK, so Election Day is still 10 months away, andBell’s campaign has got to allocate scarce financial resources in sucha way that he still has a chance in October and November. Still, Bell’sbeen presented with a golden opportunity. It’s quite possible that theRepublican vote might be split three ways, leaving no one with enoughvotes to defeat Bell. The only realistic way that this is going tohappen, though, is if Chris Bell gets busy letting Texans know who heis and what he’s about. And that needs to start happening NOW. Posted by Jack Cluth at 06:22 AM | Politics & other bad ideas | 8510 Comments (0) | |
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