Judgment and Honesty

On February 10, 2005, the National Security Archive posted a memo dated January 25, 2001 (five days after Mr. Bush’s first inauguration) from Richard Clarke to Condoleezza Rice. You should read it yourself: http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB147/index.htm. It requested an immediate meeting of the National Security Council’s Principals Committee to discuss strategies for combating al-Qaeda – the type the Clinton Administration held weekly. The Bush team response, according to Clarke’s sworn testimony, was “that in the Bush administration I should, and my committee, counterterrorism security group, should report to the deputies committee, which is a sub-Cabinet level committee, and not to the principals and that, therefore, it was inappropriate for me to be asking for a principals’ meeting. Instead, there would be a deputies meeting.” In other words, while the Clinton administration dealt with al-Qaeda at the principals (i.e., top) level, the Bush administration pushed it down a layer into the bureaucracy and did not deal with it… that is, until the first Principals meeting to address al-Qaeda was held on September 4, 2001 – some eight months later (compared to the Clinton’s weekly meetings). Bush’s month-long vacation at his ranch in August of 2001 didn’t help matters.

We ultimately choose our leaders for judgment, which is a function of intelligence and morality. I have long believed that if any Americans were partially responsible for 9-11 by being asleep at the wheel, they are George Bush and Condoleezza Rice, who, as you’ll recall, were focused on things like non-existence WMDs in Iraq and the Star Wars missile defense systems. Those who despise Clinton only had to close their eyes and replay those words, “I did not have sex with that woman” to visceralize their dislike. Those of us who feel similarly about Mr. Bush, especially in New York, need only close our eyes and replay the bodies falling from buildings to do the same. For starters! Then there are the lies about WMDs propagated to the American people and to the world (who had the judgment not to buy it), the false attempts to link al-Qaeda with Iraq, the disrespectful statements about the Geneva Conventions and international law that led to the Abu Ghraib prison and other abuses. Was it good judgment, moral or intelligent to wait five days after the tsunami before calling any of the leaders of the affected countries and offering condolences? For me, these moral wrongs show the true amoral character of this administration.

The response to the Clarke memo was the first in a string of bad judgments that make Clinton’s lapses, by comparison, look like driving 70 in a 65 zone. Those who were outraged by lies about sex, but sat silently and even applauded the lies about war and death – lies that have led to the deaths of 10,000s of civilians and a greater number of permanent disabilities – seem to have exercised judgment that lacks proportionality and places form over substance. It is no wonder our leaders lack judgment. In a democracy, the judgments of our leaders ultimately reflect our own judgments.