Via “Matthew Yglesias”:http://yglesias.typepad.com/matthew/ via “Kos”:http://www.dailykos.com/, we have a “video”:http://www.dailykos.com/images/admin/President_Bush_Thanks_ISG.mpg of President Bush privately addressing the Iraq Survey Group (presumably some time in 2002-3). Kos hightlights Bush’s faltering delivery, but that’s not what concerns me. What concerns me (but does not surprise me) is the attitude exemplified in this statement:
. . . You’re truth-finders — you’re the folks we’re countin’ on to explain to not only our fellow citizens but to the entire world the true nature of evil . . .
It’s not “You’re truth-finders — you’re the folks we’re countin’ on to discover the truth about Saddam’s weapons programs.” For Bush, it’s “the true nature of evil.” Like I said, this isn’t _surprising_, but it does reinforce the sense that Bush pre-judged the situation in stark black-and-white terms that left no room for, as it turned out, the truth. And besides, how does someone concerned about ultimate evil pick Saddam over Osama bin Laden? Or Zarqawi, for that matter, whose assets were frozen — guess when? — “just yesterday”:http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=578&e=3&u=/nm/20041015/ts_nm/security_treasury_zarqawi_dc (hat tip to “TPM”:http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2004_10_10.php#003691).
3 comments
October 16, 2004 at 3:32 pm
Jeff
I’m reminded of a man who wept during the Nuremburg trials when one of the Nazi high commanders was being tried. When asked why he cried, he said that it was because he recognized himself in the man’s face. The darkness without was also the darkness within.
True evil exists, potentially or actually, in all of us. In that sense, Bush was right.
Well, half right, at least.
Let’s see if he ever realizes the other half.
October 17, 2004 at 3:54 am
Gary Farber
If we’re going by numbers, I can’t see how there’s any question. Saddam is responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths, including the Iran-Iraq war of eight years, and the invasion of Kuwait, as well as the slaughter of his own people. Zarqawi is a petty jay-walker in comparison, and bin Laden, even including every death of a Soviet he contributed to in Afghanistan, a trivial piker.
I have no problem with calling Saddam Hussein, and his regime, “evil,” any more than than I have trouble with calling Hitler evil, Lenin evil, Stalin evil, or Mao evil.
But that’s me. I don’t think it necessarily indicates any absolute black-and-white vision in anyone, although I wouldn’t argue that Bush doesn’t have that.
But I think Bush’s use of the term “evil” in regard to Saddam Hussein is kind of a trivial side-issue, myself.
Now if you want to make the case for being bothered by Bush’s world-view, have you read the Ron Suskind piece yet?
October 17, 2004 at 8:16 am
nate
Gary: Yeah, I read it only after I had posted this.
Good point about the number of deaths. I wouldn’t want to make that the only factor if we’re making an Evilness Ranking — a somewhat silly thing to try to do, admittedly. Responsibility for deaths from a war that you started don’t rank up with beheading someone and making a tape of it, for example.
Part of my point, which I failed to explain, is that the fact that this language comes up in a private message to the ISG shows that this isn’t just a public front for Bush, but how he really thinks about it. As is borne out by the Suskind piece.