Is it satisfying to have the former Treasury Secretary, who sat on the National Security Council, say many, many of the things I’ve said and thought about the Bush administration? You betcha. But what I’d really like is a month off from school and access to the 19,000 documents he gave Suskind.
Failing that, here’s a quick round up of the major stories:
1. Time magazine interview (via CalPundit).
Best quotation: Asked about fears that the White House will retaliate for his disloyalty, O’Neill makes the requisite statement about telling the truth being a higher form of loyalty, and adds: “I’m an old guy, and I’m rich. And there’s nothing they can do to hurt me.”
2. The write-up of the 60 Minutes interview. (It starts on 25 minutes on the east coast, so get your popcorn poppers warmed up.)
Best quotation: “The thing that’s most surprising, I think, is how emphatically, from the very first, the administration had said ‘X’ during the campaign, but from the first day was often doing ‘Y,’” says Suskind. “Not just saying ‘Y,’ but actively moving toward the opposite of what they had said during the election.”
Instapundit‘s got a quote by Governor GWB during debates saying Saddam needed to be taken care of. Longer quote:
MR. LEHRER: — how you would handle Middle East policy. Is
there any difference?
VICE PRESIDENT GORE: I haven’t heard a big difference right —
in the last few exchanges.
GOV. BUSH: Well, I think — it’s hard to tell. I think that —
you know, I would hope to be able to convince people I could handle
the Iraqi situation better. I mean, we don’t —
MR. LEHRER: With Saddam Hussein, you mean?
GOV. BUSH: Yes, and —
MR. LEHRER: You could get him out of there?
GOV. BUSH: I’d like to, of course, and I presume this
administration would as well. But we don’t know — there’s no
inspectors now in Iraq. The coalition that was in place isn’t as
strong as it used to be. He is a danger; we don’t want him fishing in
troubled waters in the Middle East. And it’s going to be hard to —
it’s going to be important to rebuild that coalition to keep the
pressure on him.
MR. LEHRER: Do you feel that is a failure of the Clinton
administration?
GOV. BUSH: I do.
This is hardly a clear statement of intent to invade. Later on, Gore says that “it seems a little early to declare that we should give up on the sanctions”, by which he apparently means “and go to war”. Lehrer misinterprets him and follows up with GWB, “You’re not calling for eliminating the sanctions, are you?”, to which he replies ” No, of course not. Absolutely not. I want them to be tougher.”
This is the same debate where GWB says that “I don’t think our troops ought to be used for what’s called nation-building”, which Jon Stewart used to humorous effect with his Bush vs. Bush debate. But I see now that this was unfair — it’s pretty clear from the context that Bush is referring to nation-building where there’s no clear American interest at stake. He does go on to say “I think our troops ought to be used to help overthrow a dictator that’s in our — when it’s in our best interests.”
So GWB certainly didn’t rule anything out, but neither did he clearly put an Iraq invasion on the table. I doubt the average listener would have come away with the impression that he wanted to send troops in.
OTOH, it pretty much lays waste to the idea put forth by O’Neill that Bush said one thing and then did the exact opposite, or even something substantially different.
You can think of it as a paradigm shift, or, if you’re completely obsessed with hating Bush at all costs, you could jump to the conclusion that he deliberately misled the public. Even though that’s not supported by any evidence whatever.
That’s not a discussion I feel like entering into — I was just reacting to Instapundit’s suggestion that that snippet of the debate showed Bush announcing his intention to invade Iraq. He didn’t really clarify how he’d do anything differently than the Clinton administration.
Point well made, Ken.