The hot news today is that Colin Powell warned Bush not to invade Iraq, according to Bob Woodward's new book, Plan of Attack.

It has been well known that Mr. Powell was the most skeptical among Mr. Bush's senior advisers about the wisdom of invading Iraq. But the new details described in the book, at a time when the American occupation has met with new perils, add considerably to a portrait of a secretary of state who expressed private reservations about the administration's policy but never issued a public protest about the administration's course. [Douglas Jehl, "Powell Said to Have Warned Bush Before War, a New Book Says," The New York Times, April 17, 2004]

I'm all out of sympathy for Colin Powell. He could have stopped it, you know, or at least slow it down. A year ago Powell still had some political chops. If he had threatened to resign in protest, I believe the Bushies would have held off the invasion. It would have been worth a try, at least. Instead, he dutifully carried water for the Regime and lied to the UN on Bush's behalf.

 

Also, today in the NY Times the cognitively challenged David Brooks admits "I never thought it [Iraq War] would be this bad." But he goes on to say that "in 20 years, no one will doubt that Bush did the right thing. To his enormous credit, the president has been ruthlessly flexible over the past months and absolutely committed to seeing this through."

 

What's with "ruthlessly flexible"? Am I the only one who thinks this makes no sense? (Or the rest of Brooks's column for that matter ... )

 

The Values War

 

The Real Wonkette

 

Youths Feel a Draft

 

Love and Death in Afghanistan

 

Colbert King: Bush's Credibility

 

Anti-Bush Sentiment Busts Out All Over

 

Adlai Stevenson III: Intelligence Failures

 

Nicholas Kristof: Why Didn't We Stop 9/11?

 

Eleanor Clift: Bush Lives in Alternate Reality

 

Bush Is No Leader; He Just Plays One on TV

 

White House Behind Frist's Attack on Clarke?

 

Rove Regrets "Mission Accomplished" Banner

 

Let's look at just a handful of the 5% of civilian casualties the Americans concede they have inflicted.

These include the mother of six-year-old Haider Abdel-Wahab, shot and killed while hanging out laundry; his father, shot in the head; Haider himself, and his brothers, crushed but dug out alive after a US missile struck their house. They include children who died of head wounds. They include an old woman with a bullet wound - still clutching a white flag when aid workers found her. They include an elderly man lying face down at the gate to his house - while inside terrified girls screamed "Baba! Baba!" They include ambulance crews fired on by US troops - and four-year-old Ali Nasser Fadil, wounded during an air strike. The New York Times reporter who found the infant in a Baghdad hospital described him lying in bed, "his eyes wide and fixed on a spot in the ceiling". His left leg had been crudely amputated. The same reporter found 10-year-old Waed Joda by the bedside of his gravely wounded father. "American snipers shot at us as we were trying to flee Falluja," said Waed.  [Ronan Bennett, "Who Will Speak Out?" The Guardian, April 17, 2004]

The Bush Ministry of Truth demands that we not equate Iraq with Vietnam, because it "sends the wrong message." What message does the war itself send?

I fervently hope that the reports of a Fallujah massacre are not true, but if it is true, it's important to understand why. First, war is unspeakable brutality, and those who start wars must understand this. Second, it's a fact of nature that soldiers -- young men mostly -- under the terrible stress of mortal danger, 24/7 -- not knowing who the enemy is, not knowing when death will come -- will react. Ultimately, the fault lies not with the soldiers but with those who sent them.

You can't let slip the dogs of war and expect them to heel.

Sgt. Hall will live, and we all hope he lives a meaningful life, but it won't be the same life. Ms. Hall must have thought about the way her own future has changed, how she will be caring for this son for the rest of her life. And in the depths of her heart, I suspect she grieved for the grandchildren she will probably never have.

I think about these things because right-leaning blogger James Lileks wonders why there aren't any good movies about Iraq yet. "There’s been enough time," he writes. "'Wake Island' came out in 1942. 'Bataan' came out in 1943. 'Casablanca' came out in 1942, for heaven’s sake."

Yes, let's keep Bush's War in perspective.

Hollywood hasn't designated me to speak for the film industry, but seems to me an Iraq War film would be an iffy investment. For example, a film about the triumph of taking of Baghdad last year would look damn foolish now.

Remember the Flight Suit?

And we're still arguing about what the underlying theme of our war will be. The warhawks want a glorious little war, World War II in miniature, good for back-slapping and chest-thumping. Others of us see shadows of the national nightmare that was Vietnam. But in the end it'll be up to those with intimate experience of this war, like Pfc. Maupin and Kim Hall, who will write the plot. It's too soon to know what that plot will be. 

Different wars inspire different films. I believe the only World War I films I've seen are "Sargeant York" (1941), "Paths of Glory" (1957), and "All Quiet on the Western Front" (1930). The latter two films are unabashedly anti-war. "Sargeant York," is more sentimental, but does touch on the moral compromises demanded by war (who can forget Gary Cooper on the mountain with his dog and his Bible?). I've never seen "Gallipoli," but I understand it is a fine film that doesn't over-glorify its topic. World War I had a definite "War Is Hell" theme.

World War II, on the other hand, was so glorified in film that I'm sorry I missed it. From "Victory at Sea" to "From Here to Eternity" to "The Longest Day," the theme of World War II was "Our Finest Hour." World War II was an unusually unambiguous war, and consensus settled on a plot while it was still in progress -- brave defenders of democracy battling the fascist forces of evil. As the war waged, Hollywood did its part by churning out films to inspire the nation onward to victory.

But then there was Vietnam. In 1968 John Wayne tried to make a World War II-type movie about Vietnam, "The Green Berets," which had its fans but which was hooted out of theaters. We Boomers were raised on World War II nostalgia, but we knew our war was not our parent's war. The most successful Vietnam films are about stupidity and brutality -- "Apocalypse Now," "Full Metal Jacket," "Platoon," "Good Morning Vietnam."

What Mr. Lileks really wants is a film about 9/11. 

It’s the most dramatic day of modern times. The story lines are clear; it writes itself. You don’t have to make up heroic characters; every minute has a dozen. No Hollywood falsities need intrude – no star-crossed lovers, no cheerful archetypes, no swelling music (take a cue from “A Night to Remember,” which didn’t introduce an orchestral score until halfway through, to great effect.) Just tell the story as it happened that day, and people would cram the theaters by the millions. Just like they went to see “The Passion.” And with the same emotions, I’d bet: from the opening moments the audience would have the same sick clot in their stomachs, the same old throb of dread we all felt during “Schindler’s List” and “Saving Private Ryan.” This wasn’t pleasant, but it was important to see it, and know.

Sorry,  but no. I was there. I saw the WTC towers collapse. No film can capture that experience, the realization that thousands of lives were just snuffed out before one's eyes. Viewing "Saving Private Ryan" was hardly the real experience of landing on Normany Beach under fire. "Schindler's List" couldn't recapture the experience of being herded into a gas chamber to one's death. And don't get me started on "The Passion."

Of course, I'm sure a Peter Jackson or Steven Spielberg could make a 9/11 film to make you laugh and weep and thrill at the special effects. And if Lileks is really lucky, maybe there'll be a 9/11 thrill ride at the Universal Studios Florida theme park. Even better, Lileks could go to Iraq and get himself kidnapped -- now, that would be thrilling.  

The White House is weighing whether to pre-empt the Sept. 11 commission's final report this summer by embracing a proposal to create a powerful new post of director of national intelligence, administration officials said on Thursday.

Under the proposal, management of the government's 15 intelligence agencies, and control of their budgets, would be put under the direction of a single person. That authority is now scattered across a number of departments and agencies.

The plan, drafted more than a year ago by a presidential advisory panel headed by Brent Scowcroft, the former national security adviser, was given little White House attention until now. It is being reviewed, the officials said, as a possible answer to the Sept. 11 commission's preliminary conclusion that the current organization of the government's intelligence agencies has left no one truly in charge on intelligence matters. [Douglas Jehl, "Administration Considers a Post for Intelligence," The New York Times, April 16, 2004]

IMO you don't fix a flaw in bureaucratic structure by adding another layer of bureaucracy, but let's go on ... here's a sentence that lept out at me from the April 13 staff statement of the September 11 Commission:

"Rice and Hadley told us that, before 9/11, they did not feel they had the job of handling domestic security."

Yeah, that's Condi Rice and Stephen Hadley, her deputy. Condi Rice, the National Security Adviser. The National Security Adviser who did not "feel" she had the job of handling domestic security. Instead, upon assuming her position in January 2001, she delegated issues of domestic security to Richard Clarke and his Counterterrorism and Security Group (CSG). But she reduced Clarke's staff and made sure he didn't get to meet with principals, because that was her job.

You see the problem? Condi wasn't interested in domestic security, and because she was playing Queen Bee power games with her staff, she saw to it that those in charge of domestic security had to work in the basement, so to speak, without access to the real decision makers.

I don't care how many layers of bureaucracy you add; as long as flaming incompetents such as Condi are in charge, then nobody's in charge. And you know that as long as Bush is in the Oval Office, the bureaucrat chosen to be "in charge" will be another of Bush's political cronies who can't find his ass unless there's money stuffed in it.

And speaking of President Slacker, the princeling who never had to break a sweat in his life and who doesn't understand that spending 40 percent of his time on vacation is not normal -- Sidney Blumenthal wrote in Salon,

Bush, in fact, does not read his PDBs, but has them orally summarized every morning by CIA director George Tenet. President Clinton, by contrast, read them closely and alone, preventing any aides from interpreting what he wanted to know firsthand. He extensively marked up his PDBs, demanding action on this or that, which is almost certainly the reason the Bush administration withheld his memoranda from the 9/11 commission.

"I know he doesn't read," one former Bush National Security Council staffer told me. Several other former NSC staffers corroborated his habit. It seems highly unlikely that he read the National Intelligence Estimate on WMD before the Iraq war that consigned contrary evidence and caveats that undermined the case to footnotes and fine print. There is no record that he raised any questions about the abuse of intelligence. Nor is there any evidence that he read the State Department's 17-volume report "The Future of Iraq," warning of nearly all the postwar pitfalls, that was shelved by the neocons in the Pentagon and Vice President Cheney's office. "He probably didn't even know of 'The Future of Iraq,'" said a former NSC staffer.

I don't care how many bureaucrats you hire. If they're serving at the pleasure of this waste of human protoplasm of a President, nobody's going to be in charge. And wasn't the "Office of Homeland Security" supposed to fix the problem of miscommunication between the intelligence agencies? Whatever happened to that?

When George W. Bush faced the nation in a rare prime time news conference, he was responding to a crisis of confidence among his Republican supporters. His recent difficulties in dealing with adversity had planted serious doubts among party leaders. The president's performance Tuesday night eased their anxiety about an imminent loss of support by his base ...

One wonders what they found reassuring. That Shrub didn't pick his nose? That his pants stayed up?

 

But Novak concedes that Republican leaders are worried:

Congressional Republicans I reached, while unwilling to be quoted by name, were harshly critical that the president and his aides had failed to evoke the impression of strong leadership. They could not believe that Bush stuck to his plans to be at his Texas ranch as violence spiked and death tolls mounted in Iraq. They grumbled that there was no effective White House response to rising criticism and that beleaguered Bush spokesman Scott McClellan was a disaster. They cited Bush adviser Karen Hughes, hawking her book on ''Meet the Press'' two Sundays ago, as the only effective voice for the president.

The time was past due for Bush to go to the nation. For a president who only twice previously in more than three years had held a prime time televised news conference, Tuesday's venue seemed odd. Dropping in the polls while Iraqi insurgents launched a shooting war, Bush chose to face predictably harsh questions from an unsympathetic press corps. Congressional Republicans asked why he did not go public with a full-length prepared speech. It was too late for that, it was decided at the White House. Now, Bush had to face news media questioning that he detests.

For a comparison, click here and browse through transcripts of President Kennedy's press conferences. Then reflect on Shrub's pathetic effort that the GOP found reassuring, and weep.

Eric Rauchway is sitting in for Eric Alterman at Altercation:

My heart sank when the President said, "I'm sure something will pop into my head here in the midst of this press conference, with all the pressure of trying to come up with [an] answer, but it hadn't yet."  Has ever a President uttered more demoralizing words in the course of seeking to reassure Americans and the world?  ("I am not a crook," maybe.)  ... the President cannot even come up with an answer to a question he said, mere seconds before, he has "oftentimes [thought] about" over the last couple of years:  "You've looked back before 9-11 for what mistakes might have been made.  After 9-11, what would your biggest mistake be, would you say, and what lessons have learned from it?"  The President replied, "I wish you'd have given me this written question ahead of time so I could plan for it."  And then he then explained about the pressure of press conferences.

Honestly, I was truly astonished to feel so saddened at that moment.  I hadn't supposed any appreciable confidence in the President's ability remained in me.  But it turns out I am enough of a Pollyanna to have held out some secret hope, at least till then.  There are more worldly people out there; apparently a Sky News reporter drily remarked of the President's answer to this question, "By his standards this was a relatively assured performance."

David Broder softened his recent tone on Bush a bit by praising his "genuine idealism," but then goes on to explain why, in the end, Bush's Iraq "plan" will fail. See also Joe Hagen's excellent commentary on the "press conference" in The New York Observer and "Bush Blows the Press Conference Show" by Richard Goldstein in The Village Voice ("His remarks made Casey Stengel sound like Lincoln.").

Bush rips up the road map.  I rarely comment on Israeli-Palestinian issues because, frankly, I think both sides are wrong and suspect the only solution would be to convert the lot of them to Buddhism. But I understand that's not practical.

However, I suspect Bush's announcement yesterday during a joint press conference with Ariel Sharon may prove to be, um, bad.

President George Bush swept aside decades of diplomatic tradition in the Middle East yesterday, saying it was "unrealistic" to expect a full Israeli withdrawal from lands occupied during the 1967 war or the right of return for Palestinian refugees.

In a significant policy shift, Mr Bush relaxed Washington's objections to Jewish settlements in the West Bank, and attempts by Israel to dictate the terms of a final settlement with the Palestinians. ...

Israeli embassy officials said the US had backed a plan requiring Israel to withdrawal from only four token settlements in the north-west sector of the West Bank with a total of 500 settlers.

They said diplomats had prepared four versions of withdrawal proposals, only for Washington to accept the initial one, which was least generous to the Palestinians.

The agreement is bound to ignite anger in the Arab world, especially Mr Bush's rejection of a Palestinian right of return, which will have a direct impact on countries such as Jordan, Syria and Lebanon which have substantial populations of refugees. For many, the right of refugees, and the descendants of refugees from the 1948 war, to return to what is now Israel is a sacred tenet. [Suzanne Goldenberg, "Bush Rips Up the Road Map," The Guardian, April 15, 2004]

I'm sure they're rejoicing over at Little Green Footballs, a site dedicated to the pleasures of roasting Palestinian children on spits. But considering the impact this decision will have on an already dicey Middle East -- what the hell was in Shrub's head?

My guess is that Bush and his handlers decided to support Sharon as a pander to Bush's base, both the religious nutters who want to pave the way for the Second Coming of Christ and the anti-Muslim bigots who want to roast Palestinian children on spits. And of course, as Dana Milbank and Mike Allen write in the Washington Post, Bush's "Move Could Help Bush Among Jewish Voters."

For more and better commentary on this issue, see Josh Marshall and Billmon.

And speaking of rips, Fred Kaplan rips Bush a new one in Slate:

National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice has made a big point of the fact that Tenet briefed the president nearly every day. Yet at the peak moment of threat, the two didn't talk at all. At a time when action was needed, and orders for action had to come from the top, the man at the top was resting undisturbed....

Someone might have added 2 + 2 + 2 and possibly busted up the conspiracy. But the president was down on the ranch, taking it easy. Tenet wasn't with him. Tenet never talked with him. Rice—as she has testified—wasn't with Bush, either. He was on his own and, willfully, out of touch.

Lots of juicy stuff in this article; please read it all the way through. Then read Robert Scheer:

Why won't they just admit they blew it? It is long past time for the president and his national security team to concede that before the Sept. 11 attacks, they failed to grasp the seriousness of the al-Qaida threat, were negligent in how they handled the terrorist group's key benefactors, and did not take the simple steps that might well have prevented the tragedy. While they are at it, they might also explain why, for more than two years, they have been trying so hard to convince us that none of the above is true.

Most recently, we learned that President Bush decided to stay on vacation for three more weeks despite receiving a briefing that told him about "patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks" by Osama bin Laden's thugs, who were described as determined and capable enough to pull off devastating attacks on U.S. soil. We also now know that the Bush administration coddled fundamentalist Saudi Arabia and nuclear-weapons-dealing Pakistan, the only nations that recognized the Taliban, both before and after the Sept. 11 murders.

But what is perhaps even more astonishing is that, because the Bush administration's attention was focused on the "war on drugs," it praised Afghanistan's Taliban regime even though it was harboring bin Laden and his terror camps. The Taliban refused to extradite the avowed terrorist even after he admitted responsibility for a series of deadly assaults against American diplomatic and military sites in Africa and the Middle East.

But Bush did not act, possibly because he was so weary of swatting flies ... see also Joe Conason, "Bush Must Explain Why Washington Slept" in The New York Observer.

Marie Cocco: Tough Talk

Richard Cohen: America's Ayatollah

Molly Ivins: Oh, the Memo They'll Write

Joan Vennochi: Bush's Deepening Dilemma

Katrina vanden Heuvel: President on Probation

Sidney Blumenthal: Bush Faces a Revolt from the Military

The event felt more like an intervention, with a psychoanalytic press corps trying to goad the president into admitting that he had made a mistake, if not in the run up to 9/11, then in his administration’s cheerful prediction that coalition forces would be met with cheers or that there’d be weapons of mass destruction turned into ploughshares when the U.S. pulled into Baghdad. They tried to make the press conference a presidential 12-step program. But Bush wasn’t going to go down that road. Sure, he said he’s thought about what he might have done differently. But when my colleague John Dickerson asked the president if he could think of any mistake he’d made since September 11, a tongue-tied Bush couldn’t think of one. “Maybe I’m not as quick as I should be,” he said. [Matthew Cooper, "Sizing Up Bush Press Conference," Time (web), April 14, 2004]

It was a bit like watching adults questioning a child, wasn't it? "Jeffrey, did you eat the last cookie?" "Now, Jeffrey, are you sure you didn't eat that last cookie?" "Jeffrey, the cookie is gone and there are crumbs on your face. What do you have to say?"

The question is, when someone states something that clearly is contrary to fact, how do you know if that person is psychologically compromised or just stupid? This fellow, for example, may just be stupid:

President Bush was too smart to fall into the trap of apologizing or admitting to mistakes. He struck the right tone and gave important information to the American public. Too bad reporters did not rise up to his standard. [Jeff Crouere, "Bush Press Conference Passes Test, Reporters Fail," Louisiana Bayou Buzz, April 14, 2004]

Information? Like this:

QUESTION: Mr. President, who will we be handing the Iraqi government over to on June 30th?

BUSH: We'll find that out soon.

Bush's deadline is two and a half months away, and we still don't know who will be taking charge of the Iraqi government? If we don't know, doesn't this mean we don't have a plan? And if we don't have a plan, how do we know a plan can be carried out on June 30?

This is Bush's pattern, btw. His idea of "governance" is to state a lofty goal and expect the little people (i.e., those who are not Bush) to make it happen. He doesn't know how to actually do anything.

But back to the crazy vs. stupid question. It's difficult for us laypeople to tell the difference. And sometimes the answer is, neither. For example, let's look at Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard:

WATCHING PRESIDENT BUSH'S PRESS CONFERENCE Tuesday night, you could see why he drives the press crazy. No matter what they asked, his answer was invariably the same: We're staying the course in Iraq. It's important to gaining freedom for Iraqis and winning the war on terror.

Not only that, he began the session with reporters by gobbling up 17 minutes of time they consider theirs. He devoted it to an opening statement--it was actually a speech--in which he said basically one thing: We're not flinching in Iraq. He was heroically on message, relentlessly repetitive, but effective in his own way.

This is what's called "putting lipstick on a pig." Deep down inside, Barnes may know that's what he's doing. If he doesn't, however, then he's just nuts. Or stupid. Or both.

The question that really appeared to stump Mr Bush, however, was: "After 9/11, what would your biggest mistake be, would you say, and what lessons have you learned from it?"

Whatever was flashing through the visibly disconcerted president's mind, he could not come up with a direct answer.

After an agonising wait, Mr Bush appeared to admit defeat, saying: "You know, I just - I'm sure something will pop into my head here in the midst of this press conference, with all the pressure of trying to come up with an answer, but it hadn't yet." [George Wright, "Media Turn Heat on Bush Over 9/11," The Guardian, April 14, 2005]

Four times during his prime-time press conference Tuesday, George W. Bush was asked whether he has made any mistakes in his presidency, whether there was anything -- his decision to invade Iraq on what turned out to be false pretenses, his failure to take decisive action in response to a memo that warned of terrorist attacks in the United States -- for which he might apologize.

Three times, Bush gave rambling responses that addressed everything but the questions presented. The fourth time, the president took a deep breath, blew it out, looked at the ground, looked at the ceiling, stalled for time, then said: "You know, I just -- I'm sure something will pop into my head here in the midst of this press conference, with all the pressure of trying to come up with an answer, but it hadn't yet."

It apparently never did. While Bush has found time to visit his ranch in Crawford 33 times in the last three and a half years, he has given only 12 solo press conferences. Tuesday night, it was easy to see why. The president -- who won't testify before the 9/11 commission unless he can do it in private and only if his vice president can come with him -- presided over a press conference that left him looking like a high school kid surprised by a pop quiz on a book he didn't read.

Bush had words to say -- "tough week," "historic opportunity," "free Iraq" -- and he said them so often that he began to sound like one of those tape-loop parody songs that make the rounds on the Web. What he didn't have was answers. [Tim Grieve, "Not Ready for Prime Time," Salon, April 14, 2004]

Did you notice how after the president refused to answer Mike Allen's question about why he and vice-president insist on appearing together before the 9/11 Commission he waived off a bunch of other questions saying "I've got some must-calls. I'm sorry."

He then called on Bill Sammon (of the Washington Times and Fox News) who rewarded the president by helping him regain his balance with this laughable strawman question: "You have been accused of letting the 9-11 threat mature too far, but not letting the Iraq threat mature far enough. First, could you respond to that general criticism?"

Clearly a must-call. [Josh Marshall, Talking Points Memo, April 14, 2004]

But his responses to questions were distressingly rambling and unfocused. He promised that Iraq would move from the violence and disarray of today to full democracy by the end of 2005, but the description of how to get there was mainly a list of dates when good things are supposed to happen.

There was still no clear description of exactly who will accept the sovereignty of Iraq from the coalition on June 30. "We'll find out that soon," the president said, adding that U.N. officials are "figuring out the nature of the entity we'll be handing sovereignty over" to. In Mr. Bush's mind, whatever happens next now appears to be the responsibility of the United Nations. That must have come as a surprise to the U.N. negotiators and their bosses, who have not agreed to accept that responsibility and do not believe that they have been given the authority to make those decisions. ["Mr. Bush's Press Conference," The New York Times, April 14, 2004]

Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (Del.), ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was outspoken in expressing his disappointment at Bush's performance. He said the president had offered "platitudes every American agrees with, yet there wasn't one hint that I could detect of a plan of how to accomplish the goal."

In a telephone interview, Biden continued, "This is a guy who doesn't pass the buck, right? Yet he waits for the general to tell him whether he needs more troops. He's waiting for Brahimi to tell him who to turn over power to. He's waiting for the U.N. to tell him whether he needs a new resolution. He's got to lead." [Dan Balz, "President Is Long on Resolve but Short on Details," The Washington Post, April 14, 2004]

But there is a jarring disconnect between the world as George W. Bush sees it and the world as it is. It seems increasingly unlikely that Mr. Bush will be able to will a democratic government to life in Iraq. And instead of making Americans more secure from terror, the war in Iraq has stirred up anti-American feeling around the world and left an American army vulnerable to the guerrilla attacks of terrorists and nationalists. ... it seemed as though Mr. Bush was simply stating and restating the same tenuous argument over and over again. The president almost seemed out of touch when he continued to hold out the possibility that weapons of mass destruction might still be found in Iraq.

After repeatedly declining entreaties that he apologize for not moving more strongly against al-Qaida before Sept. 11, 2001, Mr. Bush was unable to think of a mistake he had made as president. The sound of dozens of camera shutters was audible as the president searched his memory for a single mistake. He brought this uncomfortable interlude to an end by saying, "I don't want to say I haven't made a mistake." ["George W. Bush: Wishful Thinking," The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, April 14, 2004]

Bush has sought to change the question from his competence to his intent. "Had I had any inkling whatsoever that the people were going to fly airplanes into buildings," he said at his press conference last night, "we would have moved heaven and earth to save the country." But of course no serious person is saying Bush deliberately ignored the threat. It's as if former Boston Red Sox manager Grady Little responded to questions about his baffling failure to relieve Pedro Martinez in Game 7 against the Yankees by insisting that of course he wanted to win the game. [Jonathan Chait, "Tragicomedy," The New Republic (web only), April 14, 2004]

Long on goals and short on means, his performance left even some supporters wondering whether he had found a formula to reassure the growing number of Americans expressing doubt in polls about his course.

"I was depressed," said conservative strategist William Kristol, one of the war's most vocal proponents. "I am obviously a supporter of the war, so I don't need to be convinced. But among people who were doubtful or worried, I don't think he made arguments that would convince them. He didn't explain how we are going to win there." [Ronald Brownstein, "Looking Past Means, Focusing on Ends in Iraq," The Los Angeles Times, April 14, 2004]

Unfortunately, much of the president's prime-time rhetoric was the same historic indictment of Saddam Hussein's ills that Bush offered before going to war. Too many questions have been raised since for pat responses.

If Bush wants the mantle of "war president" he adopted in a televised interview earlier this year, he needs to be more forthcoming with the American people about how he plans to win the war, not just say that it will be won. Missing, too, was an explanation of how Iraq will be ready to take its own reins on June 30. ["Bush Answers," The Detroit Free Press," April 14, 2004] 

 So the Emperor went in procession under the rich canopy, and every one in the streets said, “How incomparable are the Emperor’s new clothes! what a train he has to his mantle! how it fits him!” No one would let it be perceived that he could see nothing, for that would have shown that he was not fit for his office, or was very stupid. No clothes of the Emperor’s had ever had such a success as these.  

“But he has nothing on!” a little child cried out at last. “Just hear what that innocent says!” said the father: and one whispered to another what the child had said. “But he has nothing on!” said the whole people at length.

That touched the Emperor, for it seemed to him that they were right; but the thought within himself, “I must go through with the procession.” And so he held himself a little higher, and the chamberlains held on tighter than ever, and carried the train which did not exist at all. [Hans Christian Andersen, "The Emperor's New Clothes"]

Bush's Plea of Ignorance

Bush's Secret Tax on Democrats

Bush's Lies About Kerry's Record

Bush's Tax Cuts Pay Off--for Bush

Bush's Press Conference, Condensed

Bush's (Backward) New World Order

Bush's Apologist Sean Hannity Is an Idiot

Here is the reason that it is idle to make half-baked comparisons to Vietnam. The Vietnamese were not our enemy, let alone the enemy of the whole civilized world, whereas the forces of jihad are our enemy and the enemy of civilization. ... In any case, there never was any question of allowing a nation of this importance to become the property of Clockwork Orange holy warriors.