In the end, Carl Bernstein will have a lot less
explaining to do than Bob Woodward. Of course, that's
why Woodward has superstar status...The questions
Bernstein raises is very real and of course not heard
on the air waves...Do the Republicans care about
saving the Republic? Do they care about the familes of
the 800 US soldiers who have died so far in this
foolish military adventure? Do they care about losing
their majority in the US Senate? Are they willing to
forsake their own political futures in backing this
failed regime?
Carl Bernstein, USA Today: "What did the president
know and when did he know it?" a Republican senator -
Howard Baker of Tennessee - famously asked of Nixon 30
springtimes ago.
Today, confronted by the graphic horrors of Abu
Ghraib prison, by ginned-up intelligence to justify
war, by 652 American deaths since presidential
operatives declared "Mission Accomplished," Republican
leaders have yet to suggest that George W. Bush be
held responsible for the disaster in Iraq and that
perhaps he, not just Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld, is ill-suited for his job.
Having read the report of Major Gen. Antonio
Taguba, I expect Baker's question will resound again
in another congressional investigation. The equally
relevant question is whether Republicans will,
Pavlov-like, continue to defend their president with
ideological and partisan reflex, or remember the
example of principled predecessors who pursued truth
at another dark moment.
Today, the issue may not be high crimes and
misdemeanors, but rather Bush's failure, or inability,
to lead competently and honestly.
"You are courageously leading our nation in the
war against terror," Bush told Rumsfeld in a
Wizard-of-Oz moment May 10, as Vice President Cheney,
Secretary of State Colin Powell and senior generals
looked on. "You are a strong secretary of Defense, and
our nation owes you a debt of gratitude." The scene
recalled another Oz moment: Nixon praising his
enablers, Bob Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, as "two of
the finest public servants I've ever known."
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052904G.shtml
History Lesson: GOP Must Stop Bush
By Carl Bernstein
USA TODAY
Monday 24 May 2004
Will Republicans continue to defend their president
with ideological and partisan reflex, or remember the
example of principled predecessors?
Thirty years ago, a Republican president, facing
impeachment by the House of Representatives and
conviction by the Senate, was forced to resign because
of unprecedented crimes he and his aides committed
against the Constitution and people of the United
States. Ultimately, Richard Nixon left office
voluntarily because courageous leaders of the
Republican Party put principle above party and acted
with heroism in defense of the Constitution and rule
of law.
"What did the president know and when did he know
it?" a Republican senator - Howard Baker of Tennessee
- famously asked of Nixon 30 springtimes ago.
Today, confronted by the graphic horrors of Abu
Ghraib prison, by ginned-up intelligence to justify
war, by 652 American deaths since presidential
operatives declared "Mission Accomplished," Republican
leaders have yet to suggest that George W. Bush be
held responsible for the disaster in Iraq and that
perhaps he, not just Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld, is ill-suited for his job.
Having read the report of Major Gen. Antonio
Taguba, I expect Baker's question will resound again
in another congressional investigation. The equally
relevant question is whether Republicans will,
Pavlov-like, continue to defend their president with
ideological and partisan reflex, or remember the
example of principled predecessors who pursued truth
at another dark moment.
Today, the issue may not be high crimes and
misdemeanors, but rather Bush's failure, or inability,
to lead competently and honestly.
"You are courageously leading our nation in the
war against terror," Bush told Rumsfeld in a
Wizard-of-Oz moment May 10, as Vice President Cheney,
Secretary of State Colin Powell and senior generals
looked on. "You are a strong secretary of Defense, and
our nation owes you a debt of gratitude." The scene
recalled another Oz moment: Nixon praising his
enablers, Bob Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, as "two of
the finest public servants I've ever known."
Sidestepping the Constitution
Like Nixon, this president decided the
Constitution could be bent on his watch. Terrorism
justified it, and Rumsfeld's Pentagon promoted
policies making inevitable what happened at Abu Ghraib
- and Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. The legal justification
for ignoring the Geneva Conventions regarding humane
treatment of prisoners was enunciated in a memo to
Bush, dated Jan. 25, 2002, from the White House
counsel.
"As you have said, the war against terrorism is a
new kind of war," Alberto Gonzales wrote Bush. "In my
judgment, this new paradigm renders obsolete Geneva's
strict limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners
and renders quaint some of its provisions." Quaint.
Since January, Bush and Rumsfeld have been aware
of credible complaints of systematic torture. In
March, Taguba's report reached Rumsfeld. Yet neither
Bush nor his Defense secretary expressed concern
publicly or leveled with Congress until photographic
evidence of an American Gulag, possessed for months by
the administration, was broadcast to the world.
Rumsfeld then explained, "You read it, as I say,
it's one thing. You see these photographs and it's
just unbelievable. . . . It wasn't three-dimensional.
It wasn't video. It wasn't color. It was quite a
different thing." But the report also described
atrocities never photographed or taped that were,
often, even worse than the pictures - just as Nixon's
actions were frequently far worse than his tapes
recorded.
It was Barry Goldwater, the revered conservative,
who convinced Nixon that he must resign or face
certain conviction by the Senate - and perhaps jail.
Goldwater delivered his message in person, at the
White House, accompanied by Republican congressional
leaders.
Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee
likewise put principle above party to cast votes for
articles of impeachment. On the eve of his mission,
Goldwater told his wife that it might cost him his
Senate seat on Election Day. Instead, the courage of
Republicans willing to dissociate their party from
Nixon helped Ronald Reagan win the presidency six
years later, unencumbered by Watergate.
Another precedent is apt: In 1968, a few
Democratic senators - J. William Fulbright, Eugene
McCarthy, George McGovern and Robert F. Kennedy -
challenged their party's torpor and insisted that
President Lyndon Johnson be held accountable for his
disastrous and disingenuous conduct of the Vietnam
War, adding weight to public pressure, which,
eventually, forced Johnson not to seek re-election.
Today, the United States is confronted by another
ill-considered war, conceived in ideological zeal and
pursued with contempt for truth, disregard of history
and an arrogant assertion of American power that has
stunned and alienated much of the world, including
traditional allies. At a juncture in history when the
United States needed a president to intelligently and
forcefully lead a real international campaign against
terrorism and its causes, Bush decided instead to
unilaterally declare war on a totalitarian state that
never represented a terrorist threat; to claim
exemption from international law regarding the
treatment of prisoners; to suspend constitutional
guarantees even to non-combatants at home and abroad;
and to ignore sound military advice from the only
member of his Cabinet - Powell - with the most
requisite experience. Instead of using America's moral
authority to lead a great global cause, Bush
squandered it.
In Republican cloakrooms, as in the Oval Office,
response to catastrophe these days is more concerned
with politics and PR than principle. Said Tom DeLay,
House majority leader: "A full-fledged congressional
investigation - that's like saying we need an
investigation every time there's police brutality on
the street."
When Politics Topples Principles
To curtail any hint of dissension in the ranks,
Bush scheduled a "pep rally" with congressional
Republicans - speaking 35 minutes, after which,
characteristically, he took no questions and lawmakers
dutifully circled the wagons.
What did George W. Bush know and when did he know
it? Another wartime president, Harry Truman, observed
that the buck stops at the president's desk, not the
Pentagon.
But among Republicans today, there seems to be
scant interest in asking tough questions - or honoring
the example of courageous leaders of Congress who, not
long ago, stepped forward, setting principle before
party, to hold accountable presidents who put their
country in peril.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Carl Bernstein's most recent book is a biography
of John Paul II, His Holiness. He is co-author, with
Bob Woodward, of All the President's Men and The Final
Days.
-------
Jump to TO Features for Saturday May 29, 2004
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