State Of Denial

State of Denial, Bob Woodward’s new best selling book, will be the fodder of historians for generations. This is not due to its examination of sources but because everybody who has had anything to do with Iraq needs a confessor and Bob’s the man. As the fullness of the folly becomes part of the consciousness of the vast majority of the citizenry, those with even tangential connection to the massive blunder feel the need to thumb through the rolodex to `W’ and explain how they were the only ones who saw the freight train bearing down and tried to warn the president not to gun it through the crossing.

Sadly, bad people stood in the way of all these good folks. Naturally, we all know by now that the Darth Vader of this unhappy galaxy is Don Rumsfeld, but there are lots of other incompetents who stepped forward to assist the great man in bringing ruin to the presidency. Dick Cheney – who delivered Darth in a basket to the back doorstep of the White House, Scooter Libby, Gerry Bremer, George Tenet, and Condoleezza Rice get key speaking roles on the dark side.

But there are good folks who did their damnedest, too; Jay Garner, Richard Armitage, Andy Card, NATO Military Commander James Jones and many others net out positively, but they didn’t stand a chance when matched with Dick and Darth.

On the balance point, the tragic figure of Colin Powell who saw the train but still helped gun the truck through the flashing lights shares that side of the stage with lesser performers like Steve Hadley.

This is a book that will have no legs, most of the names and whisperings will be forgotten in short order when this sad chapter of history ends leaving only George, the ever in the shadows Dick, and the ever hovering Darth to share space in the history books as the villains.

While we won’t be talking about State of Denial ten minutes after the polls close in November 2008, what a tasty read it is. I loved it. Woodward, as other reviewers have noted, pounds away with endless delicious details. His writing style is plain and he never loses control over the long complex narrative, and only because I’m old was I able to put it down to get my beauty rest.

As Woodward drops the whispered bonbons that prove that what the bad guys said in public was more the anxious wishes of a single man in deep denial and the lamentations of a Greek chorus of his lackeys trying to support him.

But this is journalism – what, where, when, how and why. Woodward does very little editorializing for a man with sufficient facts to make solid judgments. He leaves it to Arthur Schlesinger to condemn the president for leading the nation in a preventive war. And he lets the other characters do the opining. As late as this summer he catches the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Peter Pace connecting the dots between 9/11 and our attack in Iraq.

Rumsfeld comes off as the arch villain. He emasculates the officer corps and hides behind his second to none debating style. The president and even Cheney come off as being unable to deal with the bureaucratic infighter nonpareil.

In the end, this is a sad book that does little other than to condemn the Bush administration for gross incompetence and not being square with America. It lets the president off by deflecting its laser onto Rumsfeld. To me this is a tragic error. The person responsible for this historic blunder is George W. Bush. In the book he comes across as uninquisitive and messianic as he does in most of the books pouring into the market. He operates on will power and it is not enough.

George Bush made the fatal error that sank his presidency when he took the advice of the head of his vice presidential search committee who could find no one better than himself to run with Bush. George Bush placed Dick Cheney on the ticket. Almost at that moment Bush came under the spell of a stronger intellect and personality. Cheney brought Rumsfeld along and the rest is tragic history.

Both opponents and supporters of Bush should read this book; there are cautions and opportunities for both. If the Democrats win the Congress next month and do not act responsibly, they may lose the prize on ’08.

Republicans can take heart from this mess and this book about it. Woodward can be read to see this not as a great policy blunder but rather a comedy of errors by the Keystone Kops. The kops will be gone on January 20, 2009, and with careful packaging, the GOP can claim to have done the right thing but with incompetent people. Both parties had better beware for the next two years and three weeks.

Read this book before it gets too old.

Blog on!

Wild Bill