Go Back To School, Rummy

Shortly before I read Arianna’s great post today on how Bushco is set to hyperdrive in its campaign to spin blame for the disaster of Iraq towards “the liberal media” (they’re good at propagandizing and absolutely nothing else except “feathering their own nest,” and people are definitely wise to the former by now and growing more and more repulsed by the latter), I stumbled across a column in the Bucks County Courier Times today by “distinguished fellow” William Rusher of something called The Claremont Institute (which is closely aligned with The Heritage Foundation, which should tell you all you need to know right there). Rusher does the same thing that Defense Secretary (still holds the job…) Donald Rumsfeld did as described by Arianna, only Rusher was ridiculously clumsy about it.

I have no intention to link to Rusher’s screed or comment on it, because it is total nonsense and he and his minions would continue to spout this drivel no matter how thoroughly I may demonstrate that they haven’t the slightest clue of what they’re talking about (and their hammerhead readership would duly ingest it without question). I only mention it to demonstrate that “the word has gone forth” far and wide through all channels of the right-wing echo chamber to chant this refrain ad nauseum.

Rumsfeld, though, being the combative, incompetent whack job that he is, takes all of this a step further, as Arianna noted below:

But Rumsfeld truly qualified for the absurdist pantheon when he put his media-trashing aside long enough to put the blame for the White House's Iraq troubles squarely where it really belongs: "I think the biggest problem we've got in the country is people don't study history any more. People who go to school in high schools and colleges, they tend to study current events and call it history... There are just too darn few people in our country who study history enough." There you have it, America's biggest problem when it comes to Iraq: lousy high school history teachers. Damn them!

I think that, sometimes, we accidentally stumble into the truth (or we get dragged kicking and screaming towards it and are forced to face it in “the cold light of day”), and I think that’s what happened here, only in reverse. By that I mean that it is not the high school students who need a history lesson in this case, but our defense secretary, and I will do my best to provide one for him (hey, I’m just that kind of a guy).

I also think that, given the abysmal record of failure on the part of this administration in its conduct of the Iraq War (a prominent part of which is what passed for strategy for Rumsfeld and his stooge, Gen. Peter Pace), our defense secretary needs to reacquaint himself with his job, and one way to do that is by reviewing the words and acts of his predecessors.

The first individual I’ve highlighted for review is Henry L. Stimson, the Secretary of War (the predecessor title for the cabinet position) during World War II under Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry Truman. I think these entries from this link are important for Rummy to consider:

As secretary of state at the beginning of the Great Depression, Stimson hoped to maintain American power without resorting to war. Though a strong partisan of army reform and military preparedness prior to both world wars, he energetically negotiated arms limitation treaties and took a hard line against perceived violations of international law, such as the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931. Under the Stimson Doctrine the United States refused to recognize any territorial change effected by conquest, but lacking British support, the doctrine remained a paper declaration.

Not surprising, since America did not truly rise to global dominance until after World War II. Also…

A committed internationalist, Stimson favored an early sharing of atomic technology with other nations, including the Soviet Union, with the objective of limiting further military development of the technology. In the Truman cabinet, he fought against punitive treatment of Germany and Japan. Stimson envisioned a stable, American-dominated postwar order that would permit free trade throughout the world.

Sounds like the beginnings of “détente” to me (another word that Rumsfeld should look up and report on to prove that he may actually have learned something).

Now, let’s jump ahead in time a bit to look at William Perry, the first defense secretary of the Clinton White House (yes, I know Bushco HATES anything and most anyone from that era, but I would say that they’ve made such a muck of everything that they should look for help anywhere they can get it). Here is an excerpt from the speech Perry gave at Stanford University’s 104th commencement on June 20th, 1995 (with text from an accompanying news article).

In his commencement address Perry wove historical trends with personal anecdotes to illustrate his belief in the need to remain engaged -- as a nation, and as individuals.

Noting that "the ending of the Cold War has opened a door and the future is out there -- waiting to come in," Perry emphasized that American security is "inextricably joined with that of other nations." He traced the decisions citizens had made at two pivotal points in American history -- to adopt a policy of isolationism following World War I, and to become engaged in world affairs after World War II.

When he earned his master's degree at Stanford in 1950, Perry said, his outlook was "dominated by world affairs and national security issues." As a result, his generation was "determined not to repeat the mistakes of the past." He and his classmates were committed to building the United Nations, to rebuilding Europe through the Marshall Plan and to creating the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

Today's challenge, Perry said, is for the United States to remain engaged in international affairs. He cited the examples of American military involvement in the successful international Persian Gulf campaign and current joint efforts with the former Soviet Union to dismantle nuclear weapons.

Talking about two visits he had made to Pervomaysk, the former Soviet Union's most important ICBM launch site, Perry said that he had seen nuclear missiles being removed from their silos and taken to a factory where they would be dismantled. "By next year this missile field will have reverted to a wheat field," he said to applause.

"Non-proliferation" is yet another phrase that Bushco would be well-advised to learn (I suppose the sale of nukes last week to India was meant as a great big middle-digit-raised-on-high towards Iran that is so typical of our red-state president, as well as a sap to a nation that's basically developing all of the software we use any more, but of course, in the process, Bush also kissed off the IAEA and the NSG which are, as the article explains, U.N. agencies, and Dubya also disregarded longstanding existing treaties as well.)

Perry ultimately urged graduates who were heading into the "global marketplace" to remain "engaged" in world affairs so that countries would never "fall back again to the tired old habits of war."

I read that passage and sighed with resignation over how much “the wheels have fallen off the cart,” so to speak (yes, that’s so “pre 9/11” of me, I know, but these goals have been totally abandoned in the name of lizard-brain-induced fear stoked by the current regime in power).

Perry’s successor under Clinton, William Cohen, gave an address to the American Legion Convention Center in 1997 and ended with this anecdote, which was more prescient than anyone could have realized:

Let me conclude with a quote from Churchill. George Jessel said: "If you don't strike oil within three minutes, stop boring." There is another quote: "A speech is like a love affair. Anyone can start one, but it takes considerable expertise to end it." And so I would like to end mine with the words of someone else. And it was a meeting that Winston Churchill had with one of our most distinguished journalists, by the name of Stewart Alsop, and they were spending the day together and indulging in libations that Winston Churchill was so famous for in consuming. They had dinner one evening, and they had several bottles of wine, and then a toast of champagne.

And then Churchill finally turned to Alsop and said, "America, America, a great and strong country. Like a horse pulling the rest of the world up out of the Slough of Despond." And then he looked very directly and coldly into Alsop's eyes, and he said, "But will it stay the course?"

As we ponder this (and we know the answer, don’t we?), I’ll jump WAY back for one last lesson, and that would be from our fifth president, James Monroe, who served as Secretary of War under his predecessor, James Madison.

In explaining my sentiments on this subject it may be asked, What raised us to the present happy state? How did we accomplish the Revolution? How remedy the defects of the first instrument of our Union, by infusing into the National Government sufficient power for national purposes, without impairing the just rights of the States or affecting those of individuals? How sustain and pass with glory through the late war? The Government has been in the hands of the people. To the people, therefore, and to the faithful and able depositaries of their trust is the credit due. Had the people of the United States been educated in different principles, had they been less intelligent, less independent, or less virtuous, can it be believed that we should have maintained the same steady and consistent career or been blessed with the same success? While, then, the constituent body retains its present sound and healthful state everything will be safe. They will choose competent and faithful representatives for every department. It is only when the people become ignorant and corrupt, when they degenerate into a populace, that they are incapable of exercising the sovereignty. Usurpation is then an easy attainment, and an usurper soon found. The people themselves become the willing instruments of their own debasement and ruin. Let us, then, look to the great cause, and endeavor to preserve it in full force. Let us by all wise and constitutional measures promote intelligence among the people as the best means of preserving our liberties.

Is any of this starting to sink in, Rummy? By any chance, are you somehow starting to realize just how far you fall below any reasonable measure when compared to your predecessors?

As I’ve said before, you and the rest of Bushco should be standing in a docket at The Hague facing a war crimes tribunal for your actions. You and your ilk have been blaming the media in this country for at least fifty years when your actions have been exposed, and this occasion is absolutely no different.

Churchill knew somehow that a bunch like this could someday take over our government. The fact that no leader of his stature exists or is likely to arise in this time is a source of eternal shame.

Update 3/9: Oh, so now maybe the media ISN'T making up the civil war in Iraq? Dumbass...