Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

Hack Attack

For any of you devious Rovian trolls out there who think you can use David Hackworth’s “Perfumed Prince” accusations against Wesley Clark, think again.

Reporting for Duty: Wesley Clark

By David H. Hackworth, 9/22/03

With Wesley Clark joining the Democratic presidential candidates, there are enough eager bodies pointed toward the White House to make up a rifle squad. This bunch of wannabes could make things increasingly hot for Dubya – as long as they don’t blow each other away with friendly fire.

Since Clark tossed his steel pot into the inferno, I’ve been constantly asked, “Hack, what do you think of the general?”

For the record, I never served with Clark. But after spending three hours interviewing the man for Maxim’s November issue, I’m impressed. He is insightful, he has his act together, he understands what makes national security tick – and he thinks on his feet somewhere around Mach 3. No big surprise, since he graduated first in his class from West Point, which puts him in the super-smart set with Robert E. Lee, Douglas MacArthur and Maxwell Taylor.

Clark was so brilliant, he was whisked off to Oxford as a Rhodes scholar and didn’t get his boots into the Vietnam mud until well after his 1966 West Point class came close to achieving the academy record for the most Purple Hearts in any one war. When he finally got there, he took over a 1st Infantry Division rifle company and was badly wounded.

Lt. Gen. James Hollingsworth, one of our Army’s most distinguished war heroes, says: “Clark took a burst of AK fire, but didn’t stop fighting. He stayed on the field till his mission was accomplished and his boys were safe. He was awarded the Silver Star and Purple Heart. And he earned ‘em.”

It took months for Clark to get back in shape. He had the perfect excuse, but he didn’t quit the Army to scale the corporate peaks as so many of our best and brightest did back then. Instead, he took a demoralized company of short-timers at Fort Knox who were suffering from a Vietnam hangover and made them the best on post – a major challenge in 1970 when our Army was teetering on the edge of anarchy. Then he stuck around to become one of the young Turks who forged the Green Machine into the magnificent sword that Norman Schwarzkopf swung so skillfully during Round One of the Gulf War.

I asked Clark why he didn’t turn in his bloody soldier suit for Armani and the big civvy dough that was definitely his for the asking.

His response: “I wanted to serve my country.”

He says he now wants to lead America out of the darkness, shorten what promises to be the longest and nastiest war in our history and restore our eroding prestige around the world.

For sure, he’ll be strong on defense. But with his high moral standards and because he knows where and how the game’s played, there will probably be zero tolerance for either Pentagon porking or two-bit shenanigans.

No doubt he’s made his share of enemies. He doesn’t suffer fools easily and wouldn’t have allowed the dilettantes who convinced Dubya to do Iraq to even cut the White House lawn. So he should prepare for a fair amount of dart-throwing from detractors he’s ripped into during the past three decades.

Hey, I am one of those: I took a swing at Clark during the Kosovo campaign when I thought he screwed up the operation, and I called him a “Perfumed Prince.” Only years later did I discover from his book and other research that I was wrong – the blame should have been worn by British timidity and William Cohen, U.S. SecDef at the time.

At the interview, Clark came along without the standard platoon of handlers and treated the little folks who poured the coffee and served the bacon and eggs with exactly the same respect and consideration he gave the biggies in the dining room like my colleague Larry King and Bob Tisch, the Regency Hotel’s owner. An appealing common touch.

But if he wins the election, don’t expect an Andrew Jackson field-soldier type. Clark’s an intellectual, and his military career is more like Ike’s – that of a staff guy and a brilliant high-level commander. Can he make tough decisions? Bet on it. Just like Ike did during his eight hard but prosperous years as president.

Priorities

I still believe in the dream of a progressive, liberal nation in which everyone has opportunity and security, freedom and equality. And, I would love to see our politics move beyond the canned soundbite and the market tested message so people can debate civilly and sincerely about policies and philosophy, vote their conscience and elevate the discourse, secure in the knowledge that no matter what, America as we know it will continue to thrive.

But, right now I am scared to death that things are changing so fundamentally that not only will I not see any more progress in my lifetime, but that this country is undergoing a radical and perhaps irreversible, right wing revolution that will reverse most of the progress of the last 100 years.

I wish it were 1972 again or even 1992 again and I could feel sanguine that the United States was going to toddle along, for better or worse, under a basic bipartisan consensus that recognized certain constitutional boundaries and limits that could not be breached. I wish that we had an independent media that was less focused on entertainment values and instead recognized that it had an intrinsically important role in democracy. I wish that we were not in the grip of a revolution in technology and communications at the same time as a radical group of idealists have seized power. I wish we had the luxury of choosing candidates purely on the basis of their commitment to a bottom-up revolution of the people and progressive ideas.

Unfortunately, it is not that time. The modern Republican party presents a clear and present danger to everything we hold dear — the social safety net, the rule of law, civil liberties, consumer protection, a clean environment, international legitimacy — everything. They envision a one-party state. They mean to completely and thoroughly change the way this country works.

It’s important to recognize that major revolutionary change can happen slowly at first and then all at once in a civilized democratic society through sophisticated propaganda and by undermining the principles of democracy. History provides an instructive example and one that I’m no longer going to shy away from.

One of the least appreciated aspects of the Nazi rise to power is that it is the only fascist government that came to power through legal means. After the Beer Hall putsch, Hitler realized that he would best be served by a combination of some street action for intimidation purposes, but mostly by growing the Nazi party and building legitimate support. He had some success through the 20’s but it wasn’t until the great depression that his support grew significantly and the Nazis won large numbers in the elections of 1930 and 1932.

However, the communists and the social democrats also saw significant gains. The traditional centrist liberal democratic parties had by now been marginalized to such an extent that politics in Germany were now totally polarized. (In the 1928 elections in Germany the social democrats (SPD) had formed a government with broad parliamentary support. It was a broad coalition that included most of the middle parties, and moderate right party the DVP.) By 1930, the country (for many complicated reasons) had become significantly radicalized.

Despite their gains in 1930 and 1932, the Nazis never gained a majority and ended up seizing power through a quasi-legal parliamentary maneuver rather than forming a legitimate coalition. And one of the main strategic reasons they were in a position to effect such a maneuver was that the newly empowered communist KDP had decided that their main enemy was the more moderate social democrat SPD rather than the Nazis. The Communists claimed that the SPD was a more dangerous enemy because it “looked” like a leftist party and therefore undermined the true Marxist vision and enabled capitalism.

They called the social democrats “Social Fascists.” During the period leading up to the fateful deal that made Hitler Chancellor, when the KDP weren’t arguing amongst themselves as to whether they should concentrate on staging a mass revolution or using the democratic system to gain power, they were consumed with subjugating the social democrats who offended their radical sensibilities.

There are many reasons for Hitler’s rise, but it is clear that he would never have been in a position to do so if the opposing parties had coalesced to fight him from 1930 on. And again, there are many contributing factors – including, but not limited to, economic crisis, Nazi collusion with big business, a willingness on the part of various Weimar leaders to whittle away at democratic principles and Hitler’s masterful grasp of propaganda that appealed to the German sense of exceptionalism.

However, the radical left could have stopped him by seeing the danger clearly and aiming its fire at their real enemy rather than moderates in their midst in a self-defeating endless debate about strategy and ideological purity. Sadly, they paid a huge price when Hitler did assume dictatorial powers and manufactured a crisis that enabled him to clamp down on communists in his first act of brutal repression.

History never repeats itself exactly the same way and I don’t suggest that it is now, but sometimes you have to shake your head and wonder if human motivations are biologically programmed to be dumb in exactly the same ways, over and over again.

Required Reading

The freelancing Dwight Meredith has written some excellent pieces for the fine blogs Lean Left and Body and Soul that everyone should read. (Don’t read the second unless you are prepared to bang your head against the wall in total frustration…)

Bush’s Little Black Dress and

Justice For All

Hey Dwight, where’s mine?

Roll Tape, Please

Pilger uncovered video footage of Powell in Cairo on February 24, 2001 saying, “He (Saddam Hussein) has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbours.”

Two months later, Rice reportedly said, “We are able to keep his arms from him. His military forces have not been rebuilt.”

LINK

Bring it on.

Barney Fife at the UN

I sure am glad them dumb ferriners cain’t read.

In words written as much for a domestic audience as for an international one, Mr. Bush is expected to make limited concessions giving the United Nations more control in Baghdad, as the allies would like. But he will keep real authority in American hands.

“There’s a feeling that you have to assert that the United States is still in control, if nothing else for domestic concerns,” said a senior administration official, who, like most of those interviewed, requested anonymity.

“We’re going into an election year and the president has to project an image of power and authority,” the official added. “There will be a lot of language implying that we’re not going anywhere. We’re asking for help, but not for anyone to take over.”

LINK

The General Has Been Terminated

Joan Walsh says that Clark’s candidacy is being foisted on the Democratic party by Democratic Big Shots. Cool. I should definitely get a slot on the DNC blogroll, now.

The rest of her screed is simple snottiness worthy of Lucianne Goldberg. She’s “tempted” to call Clark’s candidacy “doomed” after one day because:

…it would just feel good, in a way. A dead-in-the-water Clark candidacy would be a great rebuke to party big shots who are trying to foist him on Democrats because he’s more “electable” than Howard Dean or John Kerry. We’re going to see about that. It should be interesting.”

We’re just going to see about that, my pretties … heeheeheeheehee!

It’s funny. Today, I’m hearing very nasty things about Clark — all of them from Democrats, none of them candidates. Walsh points to a letter in the Note from an “angry democrat” who says:

I am not a Dean supporter — but I am angry that our party’s leaders have anointed an alternative to him who seems even more ignorant and unprepared — and that this supposed ‘anti-war’ candidate turns out to have been in favor of both the war resolution and Richard Nixon!! And let’s not even talk about the Clintons. Today I am embarrassed to be a Democrat.”

Interestingly, I got a handful of similar e-mails today striking a similar theme, one of them from somebody named “Sal” who said:

How can you support Wesley Clark when he’s even stupider than Bush? I’m don’t support any candidate yet, I’m keeping my options open. Howard Dean never voted for Richard Nixon at least! How much does the DLC pay you, anyway?”

I haven’t had this much fun since I argued with Nader voters in 2000. (Oh, and did I mention that I’m a Democrat who, nonetheless, believes that George W. Bush is the messiah?)

Joan figures Clark’s toast. One day in and it’s over. He’s just another Schwarzenegger — nothing but a lazy, Austrian, weightlifting moron without the women problems (although the day is young….)

But, at least we won’t have to endure that nasty campaign we are convinced he must have been planning with those horrible Clinton people.

Maidenly Vapors

Sullywatch catches the Prince of P-Town using a bad, bad phrase to describe a fine fellow traveler, Drudge. Oh my, my. And after calling me a “leftist homophobe” for saying the same thing about Sully himself, along with Lesley Stahl and Howard Fineman, for drooling and simpering over Junior’s manly profile (the first time — when he dressed up in fireman’s suit.)

I really wish that Miss Manners would start a blog so we could have someone to consult about the appropriateness of certain political discourse. It gets so confusing.

I had been under the misapprehension that once Republican members of Congress called President Clinton a “scumbag” a “pervert” and a “rapist” among other things, that the GOP had joined the ranks of rappers and cast members of The Sopranos as far as crude, insulting language was concerned. Even the esteemed cheerleader frat-boy himself was seen on television calling a reporter a “major league asshole” and had been quoted saying he and his father talked about “pussy” on the golf course. This newfound willingness to say in public what Richard Nixon had only said in the privacy of the Oval Office, seemed to signal a loosening of the old fashioned edict that elected officials should be civil, at least in public.

Apparently I was wrong about that. Lately, I’m seeing a large number of middle aged Republican men blushing and fidgeting on television over what they say is very inappropriate language on the part of elected Democrats. They are working themselves into a complete tizzy over it.

Ed Gillespie was on CNN the other day practically having to call for the smelling salts he was so upset by the shocking phrase “miserable failure” being applied to the President. He could barely look at the camera he was so embarrassed to have to say such a thing in public. He held back a sob as he whispered, “it’s political hate speech.”

And just today, the shy and virginal Tom DeLay said “it is disturbing that Democrats have spewed more hateful rhetoric at President Bush then they ever did at Saddam Hussein.”

But the brave, young debutante soldiered on. He looked the Democrats right in the eye and said, voice shaking, his little chin trembling, “I call on all the vociferous Democrat critics, from Kerry to Dean and from Daschle to Pelosi, to have the courage to tell their hero Ted Kennedy that he went too far.”

I’ve heard that burning feathers will bring a tightly corseted maid out of a swoon. I would suggest that all the television anchors keep some at the ready, along with a large supply of tissues. The delicate debs of the GOP are likely in for a rough ride over the next few months.

I wonder what the American public is going to make of this newfound delicate sensibility on the right. Certainly, they have forgotten all about that unpleasant impeachment matter and the press are hardly likely to bring up such an unseemly topic. But, you still must wonder how this newfound diffidence and sensitivity will comport with the masculine, fighter jock image that has so captivated Kate O’Beirne and her hot flashing lunch bunch.

Is George W. Bush “Top Gun” or Blanche DuBois?

At the risk of sending Robert Novak to his boudoir with a migraine, I offer a taste of things to come Republicans.

Get out your handkerchiefs.

Jay Leno: “Today, retired General Wesley Clark announced he is running for president of the US. Pretty amazing guy. Four star general, graduated first in his class at West Point, supreme commander of NATO, served combat in Vietnam. What, he won the bronze star, silver star, the purple heart. Wounded in battle. See, I’m no political expert, but that sounds pretty good next to choking on a pretzel, falling off a scooter and dropping the dog.”

Why, I never…

Rock the Donkey

Buzzflash and I both have hurt feelings that we weren’t included on the “Kicking Ass” DNC blogroll, but I’ll give them a plug anyway. (Me, I can understand … but Buzzflash???)

Join the Carville/Begala $500,000 challenge.

Round Two

As I was pondering this problem with the cheese eaters last night, I remembered that our good friend Michael Ledeen was way out ahead of Tom Friedman in recognizing that the French are now an official enemy of the United States.

Last March, when the vin guzzlers first had the ineffable gall to stand in the way of an immediate invasion — one which which we insisted was imperative because Saddam was blatantly lying about his massive cache of WMD and was preparing to use them any minute (ahem) — Ledeen set forth his theory about France’s cunning plan to destroy America:

How could it be done? No military operation could possibly defeat the United States, and no direct economic challenge could hope to succeed. That left politics and culture. And here there was a chance to turn America’s vaunted openness at home and toleration abroad against the United States.

So the French and the Germans struck a deal with radical Islam and with radical Arabs: You go after the United States, and we’ll do everything we can to protect you, and we will do everything we can to weaken the Americans.

The Franco-German strategy was based on using Arab and Islamic extremism and terrorism as the weapon of choice, and the United Nations as the straitjacket for blocking a decisive response from the United States.

[…]

If this is correct, we will have to pursue the war against terror far beyond the boundaries of the Middle East, into the heart of Western Europe. And there, as in the Middle East, our greatest weapons are political: the demonstrated desire for freedom of the peoples of the countries that oppose us.

Radio Free France, anyone?

I’m surprised that Mr. Friedman hasn’t yet made the connection that Ledeen made lo those many months ago. France is not just any old enemy of the US. It is protecting its terrorist partners in their mutual plan to destroy the United States.

(Just as obvious are the French people’s desires for freedom. Dr. Rice drew the obvious comparison when she observed that we liberated the German people from Hitler in WWII. It may be time to open a can ‘o whoop ass on the dictator Jacques Chirac and give those Frenchies a whiff ‘o freedom fries.)

Luckily, according to the NY Times today Colin and Condi also have a cunning plan in place — the same plan, as it happens, that worked so spectacularly during the last UN negotiations.

Last winter, in the face of a threat by France to wield its veto power, the United States tried to line up 9 of the 15 Security Council votes to pass a resolution authorizing the use of force to overthrow Saddam Hussein. American officials said that if they had won the votes, France might have abandoned its veto threat.

President Bush then maintained that the United States did not need the resolution to go to war.

The big difference this time is that even French officials say France will not veto a new resolution.

“Powell is upset about the French, but the fact is they are not in a combative mood on this,” a senior European diplomat said. “Behind closed doors, the French are saying they would never dream of vetoing. There is no fighting spirit here.”

[…]

American officials discussing the strategy of trying to isolate France said it reflected mounting concern among administration officials that in their view, virtually every policy adopted by France in recent months has seemed to try to thwart American policies in Iraq and elsewhere.

“There are just a lot of bad feelings toward the French,” an administration official said. “Every time they talk about multilateralism, we know that it’s nothing more than a euphemism for constraining the United States.”

Earlier this year, the administration was surprised when Russia sided with France over the war resolution. Germany’s opposition had been well known. The other surprise was the American failure to enlist African and Latin American nations.

After that diplomatic setback, the administration adopted a policy of punishing France in symbolic ways.

In effect, administration officials say, the policy now is to enlist the Germans in negotiating a possible compromise resolution and to offer Russia a chance to take part in Iraq’s reconstruction — as well as get a share of the lucrative contracts to be offered. Mr. Powell has repeatedly praised Russia and Germany for trying to work out a compromise.

A diplomat familiar with administration thinking summarized the American policy as “talk to the Germans, buy off the Russians and isolate the French.”

Another was less polite, saying Condoleezza Rice, the White House national security adviser, had characterized the approach as “ignore, reward and punish.”

Now why is the administration leaking such things to the NY Times and gullible useful idiots like Tom Friedman? And why would we adopt the same exact strategy we used last time with such spectacularly bad results?

Well, perhaps it’s because the results we are seeking are not the ones we claim they are. Maybe we don’t really want the UN involved in Iraq (especially now that we’ve found out they aren’t going to pony up much more than Dick Cheney’s annual Hallibuton stipend.) Perhaps we are after the same results as last time for the same reasons: buying time, scapegoating, delegitimizing the UN and domestic politics.

Those damned French are refusing to do what is needed to reconstruct Iraq and that is why it is not succeeding. If Rove plays his cards right, in a matter of months the administration should be able to convince a majority of Americans that the French are paying terrorists rewards for every American they kill in Iraq.

But, Colin and Condi will bear any burden, take any amount of time necessary to ensure that we do everything we can to force France to stop supporting terrorism and live up to its obligations. It could take months, but they will not give up — at least until things calm down enough for President Flightsuit Arbusto to triumphantly parachute into Baghdad with his harness cinched up so high that G. Gordon Liddy pops a Viagra and propositions Chris Matthews on live television.

They’re looking at around October, 2004 to officially declare victory over the Iraqi terrorists and their French partners.

At which point Wolfie and the Dicks will open up that bottle of Dom Perignon they’ve been hoarding in the basement of the Pentagon and privately declare Operation Elect the Moron a success.

Of course, there’s always the possibility that things will not magically improve in Iraq over the next year, in which case we will have to declare war on the Syrians.

France will not have anyone but itself to blame if that happens.

Crazies

As I have said many times, the neocons have always been wrong about everything. Until now, they were kept in a little corner where they couldn’t do any catastrophic harm:

AMY GOODMAN: And you worked directly under George Bush

RAY MCGOVERN: I did when he was director for CIA and later I saw him every other morning for a couple of years in the 80’s when he was Vice President.

AMY GOODMAN: Doing what?

RAY MCGOVERN: I was one of the briefers who prepared the President’s daily brief and delivered it and briefed people one on one with the senior officials downtown.

AMY GOODMAN:Now one of the things we are talking about a lot and seeing a lot is that the same people that were there during the Reagan-Bush years and even before, the Wolfowitzes the Rumsfelds, Cheneys were there then. What was George Bush’s view of these people then?

RAY MCGOVERN: Well, you know it’s really interesting. When we saw these people coming back in town, all of us said who were around in those days said, oh my god, ‘the crazies’ are back – ‘the crazies’ – that’s how we referred to these people.

AMY GOODMAN: Did George Bush refer to them that way?

RAY MCGOVERN: That’s the way everyone referred to them.

AMY GOODMAN: Including George Bush?

RAY MCGOVERN: Well, when Wolfowitz prepared that defense posture statement in 1991, where he elucidated the strategic vision that has now been implemented, Jim Baker, Secretary of State, Brent Scowcroft, security advisor to George Bush, and George Bush said hey, that thing goes right into the circular file. Suppress that thing, get rid of it. Somebody had the presence of mind to leak it and so that was suppressed. But now to see that arise out of the ashes and be implemented. while we start a war against Iraq, I wonder what Bush the first is really thinking. Because these were the same guys that all of us referred to as ‘the crazies’.

This is what happens when you allow a spoiled, stupid prince with a daddy complex to take control of the most powerful country in the world. It’s worth remembering how Lil’ Cap’n T-Ball came to bring this entire group of nutballs into the highest reaches of decision making:

From Salon, How the neoconservatives conquored Washington by Michael Lind

They [the neocons] supported the maverick senator John McCain until it became clear that Bush would get the nomination.

Then they had a stroke of luck — Cheney was put in charge of the presidential transition (the period between the election in November and the accession to office in January). Cheney used this opportunity to stack the administration with his hard-line allies. Instead of becoming the de facto president in foreign policy, as many had expected, Secretary of State Powell found himself boxed in by Cheney’s right-wing network, including Wolfowitz, Perle, Feith, Bolton and Libby.

The neocons took advantage of Bush’s ignorance and inexperience. Unlike his father, a Second World War veteran who had been ambassador to China, director of the CIA, and vice president, George W was a thinly educated playboy who had failed repeatedly in business before becoming the governor of Texas, a largely ceremonial position (the state’s lieutenant governor has more power). His father is essentially a northeastern moderate Republican; George W, raised in west Texas, absorbed the Texan cultural combination of machismo, anti-intellectualism and overt religiosity. The son of upper-class Episcopalian parents, he converted to Southern fundamentalism in a midlife crisis. Fervent Christian Zionism, along with an admiration for macho Israeli soldiers that sometimes coexists with hostility to liberal Jewish-American intellectuals, is a feature of the Southern culture.

The younger Bush was tilting away from Powell and toward Wolfowitz (“Wolfie,” as he calls him) even before 9/11 gave him something he had lacked: a mission in life other than following in his dad’s footsteps. There are signs of estrangement between the cautious father and the crusading son: Last year, veterans of the first Bush administration, including Baker, Scowcroft and Lawrence Eagleburger, warned publicly against an invasion of Iraq without authorization from Congress and the U.N.

It’s Shakespearean. The question is whether it’s tragedy or farce.