Abstract

Bush's 'Rat List'

The author comments on attempts by the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush to deflect criticisms of Bush's leadership by former counterrorism czar Richard Clarke and other former White House officials, and on the implications for the U.S. occupation of Iraq of the grisly killings of four U.S. contractors in Fallujah. An extraordinary succession of career civil servants, policy-makers and former appointees has come forward in recent months to blab--that is, share the truth about Bush with the American people. The most injurious is Richard Clarke, the melodramatic bureaucrat who directed antiterrorism policy for both Clinton and Bush. Clarke's message (Bush was obsessed with making war on Iraq, never mind catching Osama) resonates sensationally because it confirms the same point we learned from the others: On the most important matters, Bush cannot be believed. These eruptions of truth-telling are not just the flap of the week from Washington. Taken together, they represent what may prove a momentous turn in the presidential campaign--one that could end up stripping Bush of his most valuable asset, his credibility as warrior President. The grisly deaths of four US contractors in Iraq on the same day that five American soldiers were killed in a bomb attack tell us what we already know: The American occupation is not working.