September 4, 2007--"Your Leadership Is Apparent"

It has often been said that the winners write the histories. But in the case of this White House we are seeing attempts by the losers there to shape their own historical legacy. Condoleezza Rice is cooperating with three separate authors who are writing biographies about her. She is apparently, and understandably, trying to steer their attention to the hardships she overcame growing up and her role as Secretary of State, especially her efforts in the Middle East. The Middle East, of course, that does not include Iraq or her ineffectual efforts to serve as a strong National Security Advisor, knowing, as a sort of historian herself, that history will find much to fault. They may even recall her statement that the certainty of Iraq’s having WMDs would mean that the next smoking gun would be “a mushroom cloud” over Israel and Europe. And President Bush himself is thinking about history. His legacy. He has a longstanding interest in history, it seems. I know this because I was home sick yesterday and while resting listened to a little Rush Limbaugh on the radio. Karl Rove was one of his guests and he told charming stories about how he and President Bush, both inveterate readers, had an ongoing contest to see who each year could read more books. When asked what kind of books Rove said that in his boss’ case mainly histories because, “You know, he has an MBA from Harvard and was a history major at Yale.” “Who won?” Limbaugh probed. “The president,” Rove claimed. “How many did you read last year?” “Fifty-four,” Rove chirped. “And the president?” “One-hundred-fourteen,” the Brain said proud of his pupil. As such a serious scholar it is no wonder that the president would have a keen interest in the history of his presidency. Thus he, like Condi, is cooperated with Robert Draper for his forthcoming book about the Bush II presidency, the aptly-titled Dead Certain. He spent more than a dozen one-on-one hours with Draper to make certain he got it dead right. Among other things Bush went to uncommon lengths to set the record straight about the so-called deBaathification of the Iraqi army which pretty much everyone, even in the Bush administration, now sees to have been a mistake. To Draper, Bush insisted that though it didn’t work out well it was never his intention to dismantle Saddam’s army. The “policy had been,” Bush asserted, “to keep the army intact, but that it didn’t happen.” (See NY Times story linked below.) Anyone who has followed the syntax of the Bush administration is familiar with this passive voice, one that refuses to take responsibility for anything ever going wrong. You recall the famous “Mistakes were made” comments of late last year after the midterm elections. But almost as quickly as the ink dried on yesterday’s report in the Times about the upcoming book, Paul Bremer, the first administrator of post-Saddam Iraq, shared a letter he had written to the president, in advance of the army being disbanded, in which precisely that had been recommended. As evidence that Bush had in fact seen it, one day after he received the letter from Bremer, Bush himself shot a note back to him saying, without irony: Your leadership is apparent. You have quickly made a positive and significant impact. You have my full support and confidence. Brownie, where have we heard this before?