W and Sadaam

I had a chance to watch the 60 Minutes interview with George Pero, the FBI agent who interrogated Saddam Hussein while he was in US custody. Good piece, watch it if you can.

I came away from it reflecting on how much trouble a couple of guys can get the world into if they make decisions based on their preconceived notions rather than the actual facts. Saddam told Pero that all of Iraq's WMDs had been destroyed in the 90s, most by the inspectors and the rest at Saddam's orders. But he put up the front that he still had WMDs, because he was afraid that he would be invaded by his neighbors or other outside forces if he didn't.

Of course, the main justification for the US invasion of Iraq was because Saddam had WMDs and that Saddam was in league with al quieda. The latter is even more ludicrous, and I won't go into that in this post It's now clear that our esteemed President relied on selective intelligence in deciding to invade. Sure, there was evidence that Saddam still had WMDs. But most of it came from people who had something to gain by leading us to believe that. There was Saddam himself, who shouldn't have been relied upon to tell us the day of the week with a calendar in his hand. The others were mostly folks who were paid for their information. There was very good evidence for the other side as well. While some of it came from people whose motives were mixed, the point is that it was a very close question. Yet, W, Cheney and that bunch took all the pro-WMD evidence as gospel and treated those who took the other view as disloyal apologists for Iraq. No thinking person believes that Bush should have seen through all the lies that Saddam and the others told. But deciding to invade another sovereign country at the risk of thousands of lives should be based on more than a 51-49 ro0ll of the dice.

But W went that way. Why? I think it's because (1) unlike most previous administrations (including daddy Bush's), he had a bunch of yes men and women, and wouldn't urge a serious debate of the issues before deciding, (2) much of his character is that of a "decider", in reaction to his father's inclination to take it slow, talk through the issues and reach a reasoned decision.

There is much more on this in Jacob Weisburg's new book, "The Bush Tragedy", which is excerpted in a recent Newsweek. Final thought for this post - what might have happened if someone like John McCain had been President rather than W? Although McCain is a supporter of the war now, I am convinced that he (or Bill Clinton, for that matter) would have required a vigorous examination of all the issues before committing us to war.

What's a raging moderate?

In my case, a raging moderate is someone who is fed up with the political state of this country. Over the past generation we have become dominated by extreme right wingers on one side and extreme lefties on the other. Both sides seem interested only in what is in their short term best interest rather than what is right for the country. Media outlets like O'Reilly and Limbaugh on the right and Air America on the left have had a lot to do with causing this. But the American people themselves are mostly at fault. The rise of a zillion cable channels followed by the blogosphere has allowed every possible point of view to be heard. In may ways that is a good thing. But it also has a terrible downside. Too many folks get their news fix (or think they are getting it) by tuning in Bill O'Reilly every night. Lots of others turn on Keith Olberman and rejoice as he blasts "Billo" every night. People, neither one of these shows is news. They are both opinion!! Whatever happened to getting the news from a reasonably objective source and then making up your mind?? There is entirely too much of first developing a political point of view and then filtering every current event through that point of view. There isn't nearly enough of listening to both sides carefully before making up one's own mind.