Misbegotten Iraq War Ends

After eight years and nine months America is finally out of the Iraq War.  The last convoy of 110 heavily-armored vehicles and some 500 soldiers, churning through the desert under a heavy umbrella of attack helicopters and fighter jets, crossed the Kuwait border in the predawn dark yesterday.  After nearly nine years of trying to pacify the country and win hearts and minds, that description of the exit probably tells us all we need to know about the extent of our success. 

We have all heard of the human cost, including 4,487 American dead and 32,226 wounded, (90% of the total coalition losses), and between 103,000 and 159,000 Iraqi deaths.  In addition to this is the direct monetary cost of $802 billion, with the indirect costs perhaps bringing the total as high as $3 trillion over the years, considering such factors as 20% of the wounded have brain or spinal injuries or that 30% of the 1 million U.S. troops who served there have manifested serious mental health issues.  These are the kinds of costs that never seem to get factored into a decision to go to war, and that will endure and have to be paid for over a span of decades.

Just as important as these considerations, though, are the questions raised by this misbegotten adventure that Americans now say was a mistake by an overwhelming margin.  The United States for the first time initiated a war-attacking and invading a country-that had not attacked the U.S. or its allies first.  The American government at least exaggerated and arguably even manufactured the evidence justifying the war.  The decision for war appears to have been determined by the principals in the Bush Administration even before it took office based on ideological presuppositions, and was not spelled out to the voting public as a likely policy of the candidate upon which the electorate could in part base its election decision.  The press failed in its duty to investigate the facts and properly inform the American people about the veracity of the claims being made. Instead, much of it allowed itself to be cowed into silence or support by political pressure.  The estimates of the human and monetary costs of the war, its duration, and the reaction of the Iraqi people were all absurdly misrepresented by the top officials of the U.S. government and its spokespeople.  And the legislative branch cooperated in eviscerating fundamental Constitutional liberties that have yet to be fully restored.  

All these factors are crucial, because although they have at this point at long last achieved widespread acknowledgement by the American people, there is every reason to question whether or not the nation has learned a lesson that will last into the future.  Now that the national firewall against aggressive war has been breached, will a recurrence become less likely or more?  Now that an Administration has demonstrated the ease with which supposition and fear can be exploited to dupe and stampede the institutions of democracy and the American people into rash action, will this provide a cautionary check against or a road map for new abuses?  If the latter, then the thousands of fallen will truly have died in vain.       

Playing Politics with the Threat Level

The latest Bush Administration memoir, this one by the first Secretary of Homeland Security, Tom Ridge, will soon come out with intimations of an effort by Administration heavyweights to raise the terrorism threat level on the eve of the 2004 election in an effort to arouse public fear and boost the President's re-election chances. Here you can see a synopsis in the New York Times, and go to the U.S. News & World Report "Washington Whisper" item that originally broke the story.

Sources say Ridge's soon-to-be-released book, The Test of our Times: America Under Siege and How We Can Be Safe Again, details strenuous efforts by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Attorney General John Ashcroft to get Ridge to move the terror threat level up to "orange" the weekend before the November, 2004 election. This occurred despite unanimous opinion within the DHS that no intelligence existed to support such a finding, according to Ridge. He adds that the episode confirmed his inclination to resign immediately following the election rather than continue to be associated with those who played politics with the American people's security and fast and loose with the truth.

Ridge's book joins a growing list of tell-all revelations that have appeared from Bush Administration figures in the few months since he left office. Others have shed light on the case of the fired U.S. Attorneys, fabrications elucidated by former Press Secretary Scott McClellan and revelations that Ashcroft himself resisted pressure to approve unconstitutional actions from his sickbed in the hospital.

These confessions and accounts go far toward confirming what most on the left had been contending all along--that Bush and his team were a bunch of shamelessly manipulative liars who frequently subordinated constitutional and ethical standards to the exigencies of political gain. That is all to the good. But they also make me think about the tellers, too. It is well that the truth is finally getting out. It is something of note when men like Ridge and McClellan ostensibly give up insider positions of power as matters of conscience. But don't you wonder why they waited so long to come forward? They could have resigned and told their tales before the 2004 election. Perhaps a raft of these before the vote would have cost Bush a close election and saved the country from at least the last four years of W's misgovernance.

By coming clean, such figures act to assuage their consciences, add to the historical record and perhaps stand as cautionary examples to warn against the abuses of the future. But what they fell short of doing was acting with the complete integrity a democratic public must have in order to make an informed decision. The cold truth is that these men were more abettors than whistle blowers when it could have done the most good. And as a result, the whole nation suffered.

Prosecutions of Bush Administraton Figures?

The real question is not whether the U.S. government kidnapped people from foreign countries without extradition, tortured captives, turned others over to third parties for torture, engaged in illegal surveillance of American citizens on U.S. soil, held suspects without due process, and lied about what it was doing. No, none of that is even in question anymore. The real question is, what should we do about the Bush Administration's violations of treaties, laws and the Constitution?

Opinion is divided on the matter. It runs the entire gamut. Representative Henry Waxman would like to send people to jail. Senator Patrick Leahy, Chair of the Judiciary Committee, wants to hold congressional inquiries with the power to grant immunity to those who testify. President Obama says, "no one is above the law," but by saying he wants to, "look forward, not backward" he signals his preference not to delve into these matters. Speaker Pelosi said impeachment and presumably prosecutions are "off the table." They could derail the Democratic legislative agenda. That explains Obama's reluctance, too. They have a lot of big issues to solve and do not want to expend precious political capital. Most Republicans have made it clear they are vehemently opposed to any investigation or proceedings. Some, such as GOP congressional leaders warn it would become a partisan "witch hunt" that would take over our political discourse and irrevocably poison interparty relations. The former president and vice president and the hard core right feel that whatever was done was completely justified on an 'end justifies the means' argument.

Each of these is a valid argument from its own perspective. Congressional investigations would initiate a partisan cat fight. This might well delay or gum up the Obama administration's legislative program. It would certainly spark heated debate over the airwaves and throughout society. But to do nothing is to excuse, condone and perhaps encourage more wrongdoing. What is the right thing to do?

The right approach is to leave Congress and the President out of it and turn the Justice Department loose on it. If crimes have been committed then the place for them is court. Leave the politics to fall where they may.

If these depredations were committed by organized crime or common thugs, what would the response be? Would there be anyone arguing against prosecuting kidnappers, trespassers, peeping toms, identity theft hackers and sadistic torturers? Of course not. To argue the contrary is to accept Richard Nixon's famous dictum, "If the president does it, it's not illegal." The next step after accepting that is totalitarianism.

I felt for a long time that Gerald Ford's pardon of Nixon was warranted. The nation had been through a year and a half of debilitating fighting over Watergate. I felt it was time to get it behind us and let the healing begin. I felt being forced to resign was punishment enough for someone as compulsively ambitious as Nixon.

But today I feel I was wrong. Important people in his administration drew the opposite conclusion, that the President's power to do whatever he pleased, legal or not, had been compromised and needed to be restored. Twenty-six years later, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld came back to get to work on that. And George W. Bush fell right into line with them. After all, not even Nixon had to suffer the personal humiliation of prison. Immense power beckoned without personal risk. That is why criminal investigations must go forward. There has to be a personal deterrent for people contemplating serious crimes. Any conservative would normally agree with that.

So no, dispense with congressional investigations. They are toothless and can only detract from the critical reform and recovery legislation the country needs. Keep the current President out of this. Neither does he need distraction from his primary duties and responsibilities. Let the Justice Department under Eric Holder begin building criminal cases. If sufficient evidence turns up, file charges. If former officials are convicted, send them to prison. If the often self-proclaimed greatest democracy in the world shrinks from enforcing its own laws and Constitution against the powerful, then what is it, really?

Bush's Farewell Address

I think the most fateful decision of the past nine years may well have been George W. Bush's selection of Dick Cheney to head his vice presidential search team once W locked up the Republican nomination in 2000. If he had chosen another of his father's old hands, say somebody like Brent Scowcroft, the history of the past eight years would be considerably different. We would still have had some of Bush's "born again" domestic initiatives. We would still have had a corporate-friendly domestic slant. The fiscal foolishness would have been a bit more benign. Most importantly, the neoconservative foreign policy nonsense would likely never have happened.

Bush ran almost entirely on domestic issues. He had no foreign policy experience whatever. To the extent he spoke of it, he said he opposed "nation building," a reference to Bill Clinton's actions in such places as Bosnia and Kosovo, and talked of conducting a "humble" foreign policy, as he put it. He was about cutting taxes, rolling back environmental protections and expanding faith-based programs. The heck with foreigners.

The Cheney decision changed all that. Before long the veteran bureaucratic infighter informed his less than astute boss that he'd found a superbly qualified running mate--himself. Once the Supreme Court ruled Bush the general election winner, Cheney brought in the whole crew from the Project for a New American Century. Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Dick Cheney, Scooter Libby and company moved into the power vacuum created by Bush's ignorance. They convinced him of their millennial theory and flattered Bush that he was the anointed to carry it out. 9/11 expedited things by providing the useful pretext.

We heard yet another defense of this ridiculous and now demonstrably failed academic construct last night. As Bush would tell it, he had acted to bring democracy and freedom to the Middle East through the barrel of a gun. As a result the region is currently on track to usher in an era of lasting peace. If American constitutional principles had to be abridged, so be it. One could argue with his decisions, but not with the fact that he had the guts to make the tough calls, he told us.

It is astounding how the path of events have failed to disabuse Bush of his illusions. The attempt to occupy Muslim countries in the Middle East has not created stable, friendly, peace-loving nations there. The abandonment of the rule of law has not proven effective in garnering supporters or defeating enemies. People in the region do not like Israel or the United States. When given the vote they tend to elect people like Hamas, Hezbollah and Ahmadinejad and Iraqi Shi'ites who cozy up to Iran.

This was the vision he sold a frightened American public seven years ago. The majority bought it because they were scared and they presumed a president had to know what he was talking about. Very few people in the rest of the world bought it. The American people themselves stopped believing in it three years ago. Rather pitifully, Bush was still selling it last night in his last speech to the American people as President. These days, no one is buying and few are even listening.

One can foresee him appearing at future Republican conventions, every four years making one more effort to reclaim that day when he stood in the rubble at ground zero with his popularity at 91%. Retiring at the age of 62, Bush will be like Herbert Hoover, who haunted and embarrassed Republican conventions into the 1960s trying to peddle the absurdity that his Depression policy was working and that it had really been Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal that prolonged the suffering.

As a former president, Bush will be shown due respect for the office he held. His reputation, however, will never be rehabilitated. It is not enough to have made tough calls. A president has to get them right. That is his tragedy, and ours.

Bank Bailout: No Accountability

Even on those rare occasions when the Bush Administration makes the right call they bungle the implementation. After nearly eight years of gross incompetence this is hardly surprising, but here we go again. The latest bonehead blunder concerns the financial bailout. Of the $350 billion distributed so far, hardly any of the recipients either know or will say where the taxpayers' largess has gone, or if it is being used for the intended purposes of continuing to make loans or preventing foreclosures.

The total lack of accountability recalls earlier blundering performances such as Iraq and Hurricane Katrina. These dimwits never seem to learn from their mistakes. Or maybe as long as welfare is going to the rich they really don't care. The Associated Press conducted a revealing investigation. It's called "Where'd the Bailout Money Go? Shhhh, It's a Secret."

Given the financial meltdown and the burden of bad debt brought on by the subprime mess, a bailout to get money circulating again was needed. I myself agreed with the necessity of doing this, as you can check by referencing my earlier posts on the economy. What I did call for, however, was some strict accountability. But no such luck, apparently. The money no doubt is helping these firms in general, but no one can or will say how much is going to free up funds for intelligent loans and how much for mergers or executive bonuses.

JP Morgan Chase's spokesman said, "We've not given any accounting of, 'Here's how we're doing it.' We have not disclosed that to the public. We're declining to." The firm received $25 billion. Sun Trust Banks of Atlanta got $3.5 billion. They say, "We're not providing dollar-in, dollar-out tracking." Mellon Bank said of its $3 billion, "We're choosing not to disclose that." Comerica said of its $2.25 billion, "We're not sharing any other details."

Treasury Secretary Paulson's lame comment on the matter is, "What we've been doing here is moving, I think, with lightning speed to put necessary programs in place, to develop them, implement them, and then we need to monitor them while we're doing this. So we're building this organization as we're going." He wouldn't demand an accounting for every dollar as an up-front requirement before anybody got a single buck? And he's the Secretary of the U.S. Treasury? Unbelievable.

Now, after the fact, a bipartisan Congressional oversight panel is trying to get to the bottom of things. Chair Elizabeth Warren, appointed by the Democrats, will begin calling witnesses. Republican Scott Jarrett of Ohio remarks, "A year or two ago, when we talked about spending $100 million for a bridge to nowhere, that was considered a scandal."

Indeed, the more one finds out about this benighted gaggle of incompetents the more it seems they might indeed be the worst presidential administration in American history.

Not All Heroes Carry an M-16

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. (Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution)

The Bill of Rights, the first ten Amendments to the Constitution, are the primary legal bulwarks of our personal freedoms. The Fourth Amendment of these ten is the principal obstacle to the establishemnt of a police state such as exists under totalitarian governments along the models of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia.

It is therefore to the Constitution that all elected officials, military personnel and government employees take an oath of loyalty. It is not to a leader, political party or even the nation itself that the oath is directed. It is to a higher authority, the authority of the very ethical, legal and moral principles that animated the original Patriots and are expressed in our foundational charter that allegiance is sworn.

Thomas Tamm took his oath seriously. A former standout prosecutor and Young Republican County Chairman, the Justice Department Inspector with Top Secret clearance was tasked with overseeing surveillance on suspected terrorism. Upon noticing that American citizens were being spied on in direct violation of the Constitution and without recourse to the FISA Act provisions for oversight, he brought this to the attention of superiors. When told the practice was "probably illegal" and to "drop it" his conscience would not let him rest.

Unable to make any headway at Justice, he eventually went to a phone booth in a subway station and tipped the New York Times. The exposure of the Bush Administration's unconstitutional abrogation of its oath of office to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution" created a political storm. It has also cost Tamm his job and subjected him to constant harrassment and threats by the FBI. Michael Isikoff tells Tamm's story in Newsweek. You can see the article here.

Tamm may be charged with revealing state secrets. He explains himself with, "If somebody were to say, who am I to do that? I would say, 'I had taken an oath to uphold the Constitution.' It's stunning that somebody higher up the chain of command didn't speak up." Meanwhile, those at the top of that chain whose malfeasance he exposed are negotiating with publishers for seven-figure royalties for the rights to their memoirs.

Not all the heroes of freedom are in a desert toting an M-16.

The Bigger Picture

Reader Tom sent me an article by Frank Rich today. The New York Times op-ed luminary published a piece called "Two Cheers for Rod Blagojevich" in the December 13 edition of the paper of record. You can go to it here.

As the Times intro to the piece says, as bad as the corrupt Illinois pol is, he is but "a timely national whipping boy for an era of corruption and profound lack of accountability." Yes, the guy is a scum, if not literally crazy. They should impeach the rat and then throw the criminal book at him. But it's rather like Michael Vick or Scott Peterson. Kill some dogs or your pregnant wife or rob a liquor store and people are incensed. Kill thousands and squander billions and it somehow provokes less of a reaction. As Stalin once said, "Kill one person and it is murder. Kill a million and it is a statistic."

Blagojevich is a figure we can get at, unlike the seemingly invulnerable authors of the disasters that now place the national weal in peril. Where is our sense of proportion? As Rich points out, "Blagojevich's alleged crimes pale next to the larger scandals of Washington and Wall Street. Yet those who promoted and condoned the twin national catastrophes of reckless war in Iraq and reckless gambling in our markets have largely escaped the accountability that now seems to await the Chicago punk nabbed by the United States Attorney, Patrick Fitzgerald."

George W. Bush neglected his duty to get the enemy who attacked us and used fear of it as a pretext to start an unrelated war against a different power. He justified it with a web of intentional deceit. He still even this week blames "the intelligence," ignoring the accounts of former administration insiders that attacking Iraq was on the agenda in the first month of the Bush presidency. As a result, thousand of Americans are dead, tens of thousands are maimed, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis are dead and at least $600 billion of our money is gone. These have all become statistics. And the original enemy still plots, schemes and kills. Yet the votes are not there for impeachment. It would be inconvenient.

Stealing elections, abridging the Constitution, torturing prisoners, abrogating treaties, spying on citizens without cause, politicizing the Justice Department, falsifying scientific research, selectively revealing classified information and identities for political gain while keeping the basic workings of government secret - these are the kinds of practices for which tin-pot dictators from third world countries eventually wind up getting hauled in front of the International Court of Justice in The Hague. For the "greatest democracy on earth" they are business as usual if the offenders work at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

The financial malefactors will likely suffer no real consequences either. One would think the reputations of people like Phil Gramm, Robert Rubin and Alan Greenspan would be ruined. Instead, the damage they caused was so severe it became imperative for the people at large to come to the rescue of the institutions they destroyed in order to prevent the total crashing of the entire economy. Instead of being held to account they are, in effect, being rewarded. Make sure to see Rich's article for a fuller list of the miscreants. The bottom line is that this has got to stop. Some people need to go to jail.

We cannot afford this kind of dishonesty and self-delusion any longer, either morally or financially. In 1945 the United States stood like a colossus over a ruined world. It accounted for 50% of the world economy and alone possessed the ultimate military weapon. Those days are long gone. Institutions with the power to misdirect our entire political system or the wealth to short-circuit our entire financial edifice have to be watched like a hawk and held to account. Gov. Blagojevich is a useful example, and the example should not stop with him.

EPA: No Scientists Need Apply

There are a number of ways an Administration can act to cement its legacy in history. One is to set the nation on a course toward a herculean goal, like going to the moon. Another is to expand the blessings of liberty, as in freeing the slaves or extending the vote to women. Yet another is to improve the lives of millions of citizens, such as with introducing Social Security or Medicare.

The Bush Administration is moving in a different direction, trying to make sure that in enforcing the Endangered Species Act the Environmental Protection Agency need listen to no pesky scientific facts when it makes its rulings. As the Associated Press reports, "The draft rules would bar federal agencies from assessing the emissions from projects that contribute to global warming and its effects on species and habitats." The EPA, in other words, would be prohibited from compiling data about air pollution. This follows last month's announcement that the EPA had "decided it did not want to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act."

Under current law, experts at the Fish and Wildlife Service or the National Maritime Fisheries Service must be consulted "whether a project is likely to jeopardize any endangered species or damage habitat, even if no harm seems likely." Under the new guidelines developed by attorneys at Commerce and Interior without scientific review, the Agency head will declare whether habitat damage is likely before any scientific review takes place. If he or she says no, then no assessment will be made. If the verdict is yes, then scientific review must be completed in sixty days or the project will automatically be approved. Needless to say, very few reputable scientific studies can be completed in that length of time. And that, of course, is the point and the purpose.

These administrative rules can go into effect without congressional approval after a thirty-day public comment period. The next president could reverse them, though, or congress could take matters into its own hands and write new regulations. That, however, is a moot point if an Administration such as this one next occupies the White House and decides that laws mandating what the EPA exists for or that the Clean Air Act, Endangered Species Act or other consumer and health protections are simply things it wants to ignore. There apparently is little consequence to refusing to follow laws when your address is 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Instead the Orwellian house of mirrors goes on. We have an environmental agency that opposes protecting the environment. We consider scientific matters upon which scientists cannot be consulted. Up is redefined as down, and down up. Elections do have consequences, and their impacts can last a long time. The contributions of Washington, Lincoln and the Roosevelts continue to shape our lives even today. How will the actions and decisions of President Bush affect our lives in the future? How will we be remembered if we allow them to stand?

Worst Ever

When people ask me who is the worst president ever, I have always answered James Buchanan. He was the one before Lincoln. After Lincoln's election but before his inauguration, Buchanan did nothing as the Southern states seceded, seized federal property and arms, and began building their own army. That is pretty serious dereliction of duty. But I've finally gotten to the point where I must now answer George W. Bush. The lies he told today finally pushed me over the edge. The man's moral putrescence is the last straw. When combined with his blundering incompetence and assault on the Constitution I have to conclude he now stands alone.

You see, today he signed the new G.I. Bill. Senator Jim Webb's bill will guarantee a veteran four years of college expenses after three years of service, similar to what the G.I. Bill originally did after World War II. In his signing statement Bush congratulated Congress for working with him on the law. The truth is Bush opposed the law and repeatedly threatened to veto it. There was no work with him on it. Congress simply defied him and passed it anyway. He lied about this. Then, he named a few Representatives and Senators whom he felt deserved credit for the legislation. The last one he named was Sen. McCain. The truth is Sen. McCain loudly opposed the bill. When it passed the Senate 75-22 McCain was absent and did not vote. Bush lied about this, too.

Bush wanted to make sure he and the Republican nominee got credit for passing this popular Act, even though they both fought it and tried to defeat it. When it passed by a veto-proof majority over his opposition he then went ahead and signed it and tried to pawn it off as his own and Sen. McCain's idea. In case you were wondering, the reason they were against it was they were afraid it made the benefits too good and would make it more difficult to secure re-enlistments.

At any rate, you think the man would learn. With an approval rating at 28% it should be clear by now the American people no longer believe him when he lies to them. After Iraq, Katrina, Valerie Plame, global warming science, the deficit, the economy, the "Clear Skies" initiative, torture, wiretapping and all the other baldfaced lies he has told over the past seven plus years, you'd think he would be at least savvy enough to try to restore some credibility by being honest now and then. But no. He does as he has always done. He says what he wants people to think is the truth, even when he knows it is false and even when it should be obvious the lie will be easily exposed because of his own numerous prior statements on the topic.

I don't know whether this recurrent pattern of absurdly transparent lying comes from his privileged background, of living the kind of life where no one ever dared contradict him. I don't know whether he keeps doing it because it worked for him for his first four and a half years until the majority caught on. I don't know whether he is simply a sociopath who has no conscience or a psychopath who creates his own "reality" as he goes along. At this point, it no longer matters to me.

What matters is that this president has mismanaged everything with which he has been entrusted while systematically working to deprive the American people of their constitutionally guaranteed liberties. And what makes it intolerable is that he has done it while insulting our intelligence and common decency by telling the most childishly obvious lies about it from beginning to end.

I pray the country can survive another six and a half months of this tawdry hack until his riddance becomes official. His venality has finally driven me to the inescapable conclusion that yes, George W. Bush is the worst president ever.

Dear Mr. McClellan

Mr. Scott McClellan
Deputy Presidential Press Secretary, 2001-2003
Presidential Press Secretary, 2003-2006

Dear Mr. McClellan:

Thank you for setting the record straight about the despicable tapestry of lies the Bush Administration wove to mislead the American people into supporting an unnecessary war in Iraq, explain away its many other pathetic policy blunders and cover up its endemic criminality. The nation owes you a debt of gratitude.

Because of your new book, "What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception," you will stand in history as the first of Bush's inner circle to break ranks and tell the truth. What has up to now been informed conjecture has been exposed to the light of day by one who stood in the middle of events. Your conscience has placed you in the company of John W. Dean, whose honesty helped lead to the resignation of that earlier criminal president, Richard M. Nixon.

As one who was at the heart of crafting the Bush message, your description of a President who ran things according to "permanent campaign mode instead of the best choices for America," and who "convinces himself to believe what suits his needs at the moment," while engaging in serial "self-deception" have the ring of authority. These are the kinds of things citizens need to know when they are choosing their highest public servant. No doubt you had good reasons for not disclosing these traits as the President was running for re-election in 2004.

All Americans will applaud your forthright assessment that you knew the war in Iraq was "a serious strategic blunder" being foisted on the nation by a "political propaganda campaign" based on the President's "decision to turn away from candor and honesty when those qualities were most needed." Your observation that this campaign of deception was abetted by a compliant press too tame to ask the hard questions or investigate the truth of the rationales you propounded to them from the lectern in the White House Press Room while you smeared the patriotism of skeptics marks you as a man of courage. Certainly the families of the 4,500 dead and 32,000 wounded U.S. troops will thank you for revealing these facts now, five years later.

Historians, too, will be glad you set the record straight about the President relying on the counsel of Presidential Political Adviser Karl Rove for his response to Hurricane Katrina. That explains to us why "the White House spent most of the first week in a state of denial," until "One of the worst disasters in our nation's history became one of the biggest disasters in Bush's presidency. Katrina and the botched federal response to it would largely come to define Bush's second term." This is the kind of thing one can expect when a leader is more concerned about the political effects of problems than in actually preparing for them. Your candor will help writers of history better analyze why things went so wrong and will surely provide solace to the families of the 1,000 citizens who perished in the storm.

Your book will also contribute greatly to American justice and the principle that no one is above the law. By revealing that not only Scooter Libby but also Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card and the President himself were involved in obstructing the investigation into the outing of CIA undercover operative Valerie Plame Wilson you have shown your fearless willingness to tell all and name names. And now that the trial is over and President Bush has only a few months left to serve you have done so while sparing the taxpayers the expense of several additional messy trials and possible impeachment hearings. The families of the agents Wilson was running in Iran can also rest easy now, knowing who was responsible for the arrests or disappearances of their loved ones. Sometimes truth can be its own reward.

So for all these reasons, Mr. McClellan, I salute you. The American people will now know the full extent of the venal and corrupt character of this President from one who knows him best. Now that he is about to complete his second full term thanks in part to your steadfast defense of his record in hundreds of press conferences, your timely memoir will help cement his reputation as one of the worst presidents of all time. You are a great American.

Admiringly yours,

Steve Natoli

Tortured Logic

On Saturday President Bush vetoed legislation that would have prohibited the CIA from using waterboarding and other coercive interrogation methods beyond the 19 techniques approved in the Army Field Manual. On Tuesday the House of Representatives voted 225-188 to override the veto, a 37-vote majority but 51 votes short of the 2/3 necessary to overcome the president's veto.

Because of the bill's failure, the intelligence authorization contained in it will not go into effect. Television ads quickly appeared blaming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) for leaving America unprotected against terrorists. The ads called on citizens to contact their congressional representatives to urge passage of an intelligence bill without the restrictions.

In his Saturday radio address Bush explained, "I cannot sign into law a bill that would prevent me, and future presidents, from authorizing the CIA to conduct a separate, lawful intelligence program, and from taking all lawful actions necessary to protect Americans from attack."

Bush's logic is specious on two counts here. First, it was not congressional Democrats who scuttled the Intelligence Authorization bill. It was Bush's veto that did that. They passed a bill that continued U.S. intelligence efforts except for the banned practices. He decided he would rather have no bill than agree to one that does not let him torture.

Second, U.S. law already specifically bans waterboarding. It is not lawful. His use of the term "lawful" twice in one sentence does not change that fact. Congress passes the laws. Bush's opinion that something ought to be lawful does not make it so.

In terms of the presidential race, both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama supported the ban. John McCain, who was tortured himself as a prisoner of war and who used to oppose torture, sided with Bush. When told earlier in the Iraq War that Americans should torture captives because insurgents there sometimes did so, McCain famously said, "It's not about who they are. It's about who we are." Who we are has apparently changed, in his view.

As columnist Eugene Robinson points out, if Osama Bin Laden were to perform such dangerous and sadistic practices on Americans it would be regarded as evil. Bush asks us to believe, however, that if we do it it is moral. His tortured logic is as unpersuasive as it is hypocritical.

State of the Union

"And so long as we continue to trust the people, our nation will prosper, our liberty will be secure, and the state of our union will remain strong." Thus spoke President Bush as he neared the conclusion of his seventh and last State of the Union Address on Monday night. The three attributes he referred to in his lackluster performance are forlorn enough.

Prosperity? Inflation-adjusted wage growth has been flat for all but the most wealthy during his tenure, the savings rate is negative, six million more lack health insurance than when he took office, home foreclosures have jumped 79% to set an all-time record, and this year promises to be worse.

Liberty? With wholesale and deliberate violations of the 1st, 4th, 5th, 6th and 8th Amendments, habeus corpus set aside, the Justice Department politicized, the Executive Branch refusing to answer subpoenas and the president invalidating whole sections of laws without the use of the veto, the march of liberty has been decidedly backward these past seven years.

Strength? It is difficult to see how the addition of $3.5 trillion to the national debt, the diplomatic alienation of much of the world or the commitment of the bulk of American land forces to a senseless invasion and occupation in the Middle East for five years with no end in sight have made the nation stronger. America is weaker for these misjudgments, not stronger.

No, as bad as these are, they are only symptoms of a worse problem, the problem of ignoring his own advice in the first clause of the sentence quoted above. "...so long as we continue to trust the people..." That is Bush's most egregious shortcoming. He never has trusted the people, preferring instead to go with his oft-cited "gut," his preconceptions, and the advice of an inner circle that similarly ignores the popular will in favor of a reliance on ideological dogma spun in such a way as to make it seem compatible with that will.

Consider the popular will as ascertained by the polling partnership CNN/Opinion Research and compare it to the policies the president has advocated or adopted.

67% disapprove of Bush's conduct of affairs in Iraq. 28% approve.
59% do not believe removing Saddam Hussein was worth it. 32% do.
68% say the country is on the wrong track. 19% say it's on the right track.
69% believe waterboarding is torture. 29% do not think so.
58% say America should not use waterboarding. 40% feel we should.
57% believe a woman should be able to get an abortion if she wants one.
25% oppose abortion in most cases. 15% say it should never be allowed.
54% support civil unions with the same rights as married couples for gays. 43% do not.
53% favor federal money for stem cell research. 41% oppose it.
63% agree the government needs a warrant to spy on people. 33% do not.
57% oppose giving telecomm companies immunity for unwarranted spying. 33% do not.

Much of the public was, for a time, enamored of a president who knew his own mind and could not be swayed by popular opinion. He made a virtue of being undemocratic, as it were. But finally the public, driven by events, has come to appreciate the wisdom of its own judgment. That is why Mr. Bush's approval rating stands at 31%. That is why the Republican candidates running for president hardly ever invoke his name. And that is why the president can deliver a State of the Union Address...and no one cares.

George W. Bush's Worst Legacy

By any measure besides winning reelection, the presidency of George W. Bush has been a disaster. His economic policies have been disastrous. His foreign policies have been disastrous. His environmental policies have been disastrous. His approaches to science, education and unifying the American people have been disastrous. Even his management of disasters has been disastrous. I'll go into specifics and touch on all these topics in the future, but there is an aspect of his tenure that is potentially worse than any of these. That's because as bad as these other performances have been, they are all correctable.

A new administration could, for example, restore fiscal sanity and begin reversing the $4 trillion in federal debt Bush will have amassed by the time he leaves office. A new president could return to basing decisions on facts and scientific research rather than the fixed prejudices of ideologues. A reasonable president could extricate our forces from Iraq, act in such a manner as to regain the respect and friendship of most of the world, and get Congress to adopt sensible environmental and energy policies. But it will be much harder to correct the horrendous damage he has caused to our foundational principles. It is conceivable that this damage will not be undone. And if not, America will become something other than it has always been, and will stand for the same thing most powerful nations have always stood for, not right, but power itself.

Bush's most dangerous role has been to use fear to get the American people to do and support many things they would never otherwise have done or supported. Franklin Roosevelt said, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself," and Bush has brought the import of this warning home to us in our own time. He has used fear to subvert the Constitution and our civic morality. He has used it to aggrandize his power, start an unprovoked war and secure the suspension of inalienable rights. He has effectively fanned it to equate disagreement with disloyalty, and to scare millions of Americans into accepting these impositions as natural and necessary. The first danger is that these erosions may become the norm. The second is that they demonstrate all too easily the vulnerability of the American people and system to the power of fear, and may serve as a road map for further incursions by future like-minded authoritarians. The slippery slope beckons.

Consider what has already been given up. This president speaks of a permanent "generational" state of war without end. He claims that his therefore permanent war powers extend to arresting people without charges and holding them indefinitely without trial, access to legal counsel, the right to face their accusers and call witnesses in their behalf. The presumptions are wholesale violations of the 5th and 6th Amendments in the Bill of Rights. He has directed government agencies to spy on Americans and conduct warrantless searches without probable cause in violation of the 4th Amendment and the FISA Act. At first he lied about doing this and admitted it was illegal. Later he admitted doing it but said it is legal.

He has required Americans to sign a loyalty pledge to him in order to attend his speeches, and has directed that those wishing to peaceably assemble to voice their opinions can only do so in fenced areas far from his person. These are violations of the 1st Amendment.

He selectively cherry-picked intelligence and fabricated other intelligence to falsely identify a foreign country as a threat and stampede the American people into supporting an unprovoked invasion of that country, an invasion his vice president and other members of his administration had signalled their intention to launch some three years before he took office, and which was secretly discussed in his first cabinet meeting after taking office. His administration then bypassed normal procurement procedures and awarded secret no-bid war contracts to politically favored corporations, including one formerly headed by his vice president.

He procured a resolution from the United Nations to require the accused country to open itself to inspection for weapons of mass destruction. When the country complied and none were found he ordered the international inspectors out and attacked anyway. This is a violation of the U.N. Charter, to which the United States is a founding signatory.

He sanctioned the use of torture against detainees, a violation of the 8th Amendment and the Geneva Convention on the Treatment of Prisoners, which has been ratified by the United States.

He, his vice president, his domestic affairs advisor, and the vice president's chief of staff conspired to disclose the name of an undercover CIA operative for political advantage. This violates US statute. When the chief of staff was convicted of obstruction of justice for committing perjury about his involvement, the president commuted his sentence.

When he signs laws passed by Congress, he claims the right to issue signing statements which change the meanings of those laws. He has exercised this "right" over 800 times. Congress may pass any law, but the meaning of the law is what this president says it is. If this authority becomes accepted and established there will be no need for a Congress or a Supreme Court. This practice violates the Separation of Powers written into Articles 1, 2, and 3 of the Constitution by usurping the constitutionally mandated powers of Congress and the Judiciary.

It is of the greatest importance to American freedom that the next president disavows these practices, reverses them and works to foster a national consensus that such abuses are not justified and must never be repeated. The people must be watchful and insistent. If these practices stand the consequences will be dire indeed.