Quick, what's the one trait that will save you from jail, congressional inquiry or worse? Loyalty. Take it in the gut for a Bush, and you sir are a made man. Just ask Cap Weinberger...who could have been someones bitch at Allentown (or Atlanta). Keep the ol' head down, run interference and come out on top. It's the latest craze in DC these Daze...doing the Loyalty Shuffle (apologies to Tom Leherer).
Stephen Hadley, deputy National Security Advisor to Smirk and the top aide to Tanker-Queen Rice, "forgot" to raise his hand in class and remind President Making-a-list-and-checking-it-twice to please sir, remove those nefarious African Uranium Quotes from your constitionally mandated speech. Yeah, OK, Whatever. And OJ is still looking for the real killer. I'm convinced.
The controversial passage citing a British intelligence report "should have been taken out of the State of the Union," Hadley said. He said he was taking responsibility on behalf of the White House staff just as Tenet had for the CIA.
"There were a number of people who could have raised a hand" to have the passage removed from the draft of Bush's Jan. 28 address, Hadley said. "And no one raised a hand."
"The process failed," said White House Communications Director Dan Bartlett.
Still, Bartlett said that Bush, while perturbed by the developments, "has full confidence in his national security adviser, his deputy national security adviser and the director of central intelligence."
So now two folks screwed the pooch, neither of them named "Bush". Amazing.
One thing you can be sure of, if Dan Bartlett is involved and his lips are moving, the lies are about as fast and furious as they are ever going to be...he's the guy, who when asked why President 1st LT did not get his Required Air Force Flight Physical at Maxwell AFB, said it was because Smirky's physician was in Houston. It wasn't until the dumb reporters figured out that personal physicians could not do an Air Force Annual Aviator Physical that anyone called Bartlett on it, and by then he was dust in the wind, and never answered up. He'll have a great job one day in the Bush Empire...maybe Media Director for Subjegated Nations or something...or he'll be writing press releases for Chuck Colson's prison fellowship if there's any justice.
posted by Jo Fish on 07.23.03 at 12:00 AM
Comments:
Jo--
Give the devil his due! Lesser practitioners of the Caligulan arts (say, the CLinton Administration) would have made the actual responsible peon (in this case, if I'm not mistaken, a guy named Bob Joseph at NSC, who personally lobbied the other agencies to keep the thing in the speech and made sure Condi made sure to keep it there)fall on his sword.
But Bush II features the state of the art in damage control. Fuck going after the RESPONSIBLE peon-- go after people who tried to STOP the fuck up-- like George Tenet-- for not trying HARD ENOUGH! As to Steve Hadley, let's just say he's more guilty than Tenet-- but its of that caliber of not being able to STOP Bush from doing what he wanted (and was going to anyway).
By tradition, Condi herself should take the bullet, as Bob Joseph worked for her. But that's not how things work in the Bush Administration!
While George W. Bush does his damndest to make Strunk and White spin in their graves, Karl is now updating Macchiavelli!!!
Although 43 can't grasp a concept more complex than the time of day, it's clear his handlers can. Karl, et. al. have learned the key lessons of Watergate: 1. Loyalty only goes up. Everyone who works for 43 knows/should know that he/she/it is expendable; they are expected to take the rap long before it gets to the Prez; 2. But (the key lesson Rove learned from Watergate), while they are expected to fall on their sword, they know the sword is made out of rubber. When The Trickster starting throwing people over the side for real in '73, they quickly starting cutting the best deals for themselves they could to avoid jail. Now, however, there are no consequences (yet) for taking the fall -- 43 wrinkles his brow and refuses to accept their resignations. As if that wasn't the deal from the get - go.
Two conditions exist now which didn't during Watergate which have allowed this Rovian choreography to play out: 1. A Republican - controlled Congress, and; 2. A compliant media.
That's what so interesting about the Valerie Plame issue -- if this develops the way it could, we're talking "violation of the U.S.Code/jail time" talk. Just about all of Nixon's loyal soldiers (except for Liddy who is, after all, from the planet Skyron) drew the line at the jail house door. My bet is this bunch is no different.
posted by: fbg46 on 07.23.03 at 01:55 PM [permalink]
If you average 43 (W) and 41 (his daddy), the answer is 42 (Clinton). This proves that math doesn't always make sense.
W was touted as the first MBA President. But he had no significant business successes (and mostly losses) unless the Texas Rangers are included. What made the Texas Rangers a successful investment was the insider influence in getting Arlinton, Texas to pick up the tab at taxpayer expense for a new ballpark. Even further, several of the wealthy limited partners "gifted" portions of their shares to W to provide him with financial security so that he could enter politics full time.
As far as his CEO abilities are concerned, he has not surrounded himself with competent people. Perhaps Key Lay late of Enron was his mentor.
posted by: Shag from Brookline on 07.23.03 at 03:52 PM [permalink]
