How Do You Measure Success in Iraq?
Amy Proctor points out another rod by which to measure:
Cross-posted at Flopping Aces
How do you know things are going really well in Iraq? The State Department doesn’t have to threaten to draft employees to fill positions in Iraq anymore. All 300 jobs are now filled with willing volunteers.Recall how in Kenneth Timmerman's The Shadow Warriors, the author describes how State Department officials, as well a some in the CIA and political appointees held over from the Clinton Administration, have worked to undermine the Bush Administration out of political partisanship over professionalism and patriotism.
FP: Shed some light for us on the shadow warriors at the State Department. How much have they hurt Bush administration policies?
Timmerman: Let me answer with an anecdote I describe in the book. After President Bush was elected to a second term in November 2004, Secretary of State Colin Powell called a town meeting at the State Department in Washington . Faced with a sea of Kerry-Edwards stickers in the parking lot, Powell decided to confront the problem head on. “We live in a democracy,” he said. “As Americans, we have to respect the results of elections.” He went on to tell his employees that President Bush had received the most votes of any president in U.S. history, and that they were constitutionally obligated to serve him.
One of Powell’s subordinates, an assistant secretary of state, became increasingly agitated. Once Powell had dismissed everyone, she returned to her office suite, shut the door, and held a mini town meeting of her own. After indignantly recounting Powell’s remarks, she commented: “Well, Senator Kerry receive the second highest number of votes of any presidential candidate in history. If just one state had gone differently, Sen. Kerry would be President Kerry today.” Her staff owed no allegiance to the president of the United States , especially not to policies they knew were wrong, she said. If it was legal, and it would slow down the Bush juggernaut, they should do it, she told them.
Here was an open call to insubordination, and, I might add, it was not an isolated incident.
Cross-posted at Flopping Aces
Labels: Iraq, pro-victory
posted by The WordSmith from Nantucket at 9/21/2008 05:31:00 PM
5 Comments:
You hear about this stuff, but to read the words.......wow.
Timmerman's good; we'd be a lot better off if we listened to him on Iran, Iraq, etc. I hope McCain is.
I wonder how much POwell meant what he said, but I like to think he's patriotic enough to at least know he SHOULD say those words.
That woman needed to be fired on the spot.
If Bush had lost and she had these sentiments against Kerry, she would have been.
I agree with Z, she should have been fired on the spot, along with most if not all of the poeple at the meeting. While we're at it, let's clean out the CIA also.
Word, the real answer to the question concerning success in Iraq also depends on which side of the political spectrum we are talking about.
The real reason that Iraq has dropped off the news radar is because it is a literal success and the war is virtually won. This is the meaning of success to those of us on the right, (both philisophically and literally), side of the political equation.
To those on the left, the media included success in Iraq is death destruction and defeat because it best fits with their philosophy and their political agenda.
As such Iraq has now become a secondary issue in the election because the win in Iraq eqautes to defeat for the left so they no longer wish to talk about it.
In direct comment to your post, the underlings in the State Department have always been so far left that they have undermined any GOP administration. I have always thought that when a President appointed a Secretary of State in order to insure that his foreign policy is adheared to that the Secretary of State should clean house and bring in staffers much like a President changes a cabinet.
Terrific post. Timmerman is a voice of reason. Well, to some of us, anyway. Powell may cheer for Obama but according to campaign donation records, he has only contributed to McCain's campaign.
One can only imagine a professional diplomatics corps attempting 'If you ain't wit me,
youse agin me' on the world stage.
Then again, there was some success in installing yes-men over at Interior:
http://www.businesspundit.com/interior-department-parties-its-way-through-oil-and-gas-revenues/
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