White House Braces For Insider Books

[w4rma]

Al Hunt says the White House "is nervous about two forthcoming books by former insiders. Ex-Bush Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill assails the president for a lack of interest in substantive policy in a book written by journalist Ron Suskind that will be trotted out with great fanfare on CBS's 60 Minutes this weekend."

"One Bush insider, however, ventures that no one really cares what a former Treasury secretary says. But, a book due out later by Richard Clarke, the White House's top terror expert under both President Clinton and President Bush, is another matter. Mr. Clarke is known to feel the Bush administration largely ignored the threat of terrorism and Osama bin Laden before 9-11, even after al Qaeda in June 2001 claimed responsibility for the bombing of the USS Cole, which killed 17 American soldiers."
http://politicalwire.com/archives/2004/01/08/white_house_braces_for_insider_books.html

 

[Pendragon]

I think we largely ignored terrorism because it used to be more like "crime" - they did stuff, people died, we would do a repsonse, etc.

They killed 17 of our sailors or so - that sucks and we should exact our 17lbs of flesh, but nobody really beleived that a 9/11 even was possible - that it could really happen, until it did.

I am more interested in the first book. GW has a lot of good qualities, but I do not see that he has a real understanding or interest in any policies as a strategic plan for the nation.

Everything he does seems like it is just positioning to make good in the upcoming polls or to get in with some group.

Maybe its better that he does not have a strong plan - I doubt it would be liberty centric if he did come up with one....

 

[Waitone]

I'm all eyes!

I can not wait to read insider accounts of how Bush came up with his amnesty program for illegal aliens. It could not have been carefully thought out because there is no evidence of logic.

 

[Beren]

Is the tide beginning to turn against Bush?

http://www.drudgereport.com/flash9.htm

FORMER TREASURY SECRETARY PAUL ONEILL SAYS INVASION OF IRAQ WAS PLANNED IN THE FIRST DAYS OF THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION LONG BEFORE 9/11, IN AN EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW SUNDAY ON "60 MINUTES"


Sat Jan 10 2004 09:12:37 ET


The Bush Administration began laying plans for an invasion of Iraq including the use of American troops within days of President Bush's inauguration in January of 2001, not eight months later after the 9/11 attacks as has been previously reported. That is what former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill says in his first interview about his time as a White House insider. O'Neill talks to Lesley Stahl in the interview, to be broadcast on 60 MINUTES Sunday, Jan. 11 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

"From the very beginning, there was a conviction that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go," he tells Stahl. "For me, the notion of pre-emption, that the U.S. has the unilateral right to do whatever we decide to do is a really huge leap," says O'Neill.

O'Neill, fired by the White House for his disagreement on tax cuts, is the main source for an upcoming book, "The Price of Loyalty," authored by Ron Suskind. Suskind says O'Neill and other White House insiders he interviewed gave him documents that show that in the first three months of 2001, the administration was looking at military options for removing Saddam Hussein from power and planning for the aftermath of Saddam's downfall, including post-war contingencies like peacekeeping troops, war crimes tribunals and the future of Iraq's oil. "There are memos," Suskind tells Stahl, "One of them marked 'secret' says 'Plan for Post-Saddam Iraq.'" A Pentagon document, says Suskind, titled "Foreign Suitors For Iraqi Oilfield Contracts," outlines areas of oil exploration. "It talks about contractors around the world from...30, 40 countries and which ones have what intentions on oil in Iraq," Suskind says.

In the book, O'Neill is quoted as saying he was surprised that no one in a National Security Council meeting questioned why Iraq should be invaded. "It was all about finding a way to do it. That was the tone of it. The president saying 'Go find me a way to do this,'" says O'Neill in the book.

Suskind also writes about a White House meeting in which he says the president seems to be wavering about going forward with his second round of tax cuts. "Haven't we already given money to rich people," Suskind says the president uttered, according to a nearly verbatim transcript of an Economic Team meeting he says he obtained from someone at the meeting, "Shouldn't we be giving money to the middle?"

O'Neill, who was asked to resign because of his opposition to the tax cut, says he doesn't think his tell-all account in this book will be attacked by his former employers as sour grapes. "I will be really disappointed if [the White House] reacts that way," he tells Stahl. "I can't imagine that I am going to be attacked for telling the truth."

Developing...

 

[Beren]

Referring to the above, gentlemen, I hate to say this, but:

I am now officially "undecided" on who to vote for in 2004. It would seem that Bush conspired to mug Iraq. While he eventually found a rationale to justify an invasion, it still does not excuse the prior criminal intent if he did indeed tell his staff to find a way to invade Iraq. It would be like my wanting to murder someone, plotting with others to commit murder, but in the end shooting the victim in self-defense. While the killing itself was legally justifiable, a prior criminal conspiracy to commit murder could still be sustained if evidence of the conspiracy was available!

Zel Miller & Ron Paul, PLEASE start your own Presidential campaign! I would tirelessly volunteer and support a Miller/Paul ticket. Your country needs you desperately!

 

[longeyes]

I was wont to discount these books as the usual whining, backstabbing, and sour grapes. I cast a vote for Bush, largely as a "protest" vote (my instincts are libertarian), but came to respect some of his policies.

That was until the Campaign Reform Act fiasco and now his proposal for "solving" 'the illegal alien problem. Certain unpleasant realities are becoming too hard to ignore, even when I ask myself the obvious: If not Bush, who then?

I think the circumstantial evidence is beginning to mount in terms of Bush's whys and wherefores. Crass political expediency, crafted by the Administration's Rasputin, Karl Rove, looms largest. Misguided "compassion" that is more plausibly a sop to a limited sector of American business interests is another. An "X-factor" that is pehaps best left to the Bush family psychiatrist.

Yes, I want to hear what the detractors have to reveal. Any of us would be foolish not to want to understand the heart and mind of the most powerful man in America who has our futures in his hands.

 

[Destructo6]

Mr. Clarke is known to feel

Nothing like feeling your way through complex problems.

Rest assured that there exist invasion plans, updated regularly, for every country the US is at odds with and some we are not.

 

[longeyes]

Apparently, judging from Bush's most recent pronouncement the "invasion" plan includes the U.S.

 

[Beren]

Rest assured that there exist invasion plans, updated regularly, for every country the US is at odds with and some we are not.

Absolutely, and I draw a distinction between proper military planning and conspiracy. It's said that a wise man smiles but has a plan to kill anyone he meets - but there's a difference between preperation and active conspiracy. There's a difference between "let's be ready to move on this if we have to do so" and "find a way for us to invade."

 

[aikidoka-mks]

Would a treasury secretary really be involved in meetings where national security issues are discussed?

Mark

 

[Beren]

Would a treasury secretary really be involved in meetings where national security issues are discussed?

From http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/

The National Security Council is chaired by the President. Its regular attendees (both statutory and non-statutory) are the Vice President, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of Defense, and the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs.

So, yes, as a "regular attendee" of the NSC, the Treasury Secretary would most definitely be involved in meetings where national security issues were discussed.

 

[aikidoka-mks]

Beren,

Thanks for answering my question.

Mark

 

[mercedesrules]

This is the most important thing that came to light today.

 

[jimpeel]

Gee, a tell-all book written by a disgruntled former employee. Has that ever been done before?

 

[Barrelmaker]

jimpeel
"Gee, a tell-all book written by a disgruntled former employee. Has that ever been done before?

One backed up with 19,000 pages of documentation.

 

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