Ten more questions he didn't ask:
Readers Suggest More Follow-ups for Bush
Offering the press a helping hand with their own questions.
(February 10, 2004) -- Greg Mitchell's "Pressing Issues" column (Feb. 8) proposing "10 Questions Russert Didn't Ask" President Bush during his "Meet the Press" interview on Sunday, brought dozens of letters, many with proposals for even more follow-up questions. Here is a sampling:
Russert did not ask: If you believe Tenet is competent why did your administration reject the CIA's conclusions and instead draw its own?
Rosamond Fogg
Hermosa Beach, Calif.
Specifically, how do you (Mr. President) respond to Paul O'Neill's allegation that your Administration was planning for "post-Saddam Iraq" within 10 days after your inauguration?
Joe Vecchio
Another big one I think Russert missed, is why the mandate of Bush's new commission, as described by the president, will assess differences between the pre-Iraq intelligence and what has since not been found -- but not the question of whether administration officials spun, oversimplified, misused, or disregarded the intelligence. Russert could have asked whether that too should be a valid area for investigation.
David Ruppe
Washington
One other question Russert should have asked when Bush said that Saddam had the capacity to produce chemical and biological weapons: "Mr. President, then why didn't Saddam produce any of these weapons? If he had the capacity and was such an uncontrollable madman, he certainly would have produced these weapons if he had the capability, right?"
John Clement
Don't you feel that the president should have been asked about the Pakistani nuclear mess? If Saddam was a madman, Pakistan is a more chaotic nation that is either exporting nukes (and related technology) to the "Axis of Evil" or unable to control the proliferation.
Dhar Naurmanchi
Mr. President, you say you have faced an economy under "tremendous stress" due to the Iraq war -- but wasn't it your decision to launch this war?
Richard Newton
Birmingham, Ala.
You say that if Congress was wise with spending, the deficit could be cut in half in five years. In what areas of spending are the savings to come, since national defense seems to be off the table?
Erik Sherman
The one question that really stuck out for me that Russert didn't ask was a follow-up to a question that came in the context of Bush's National Guard service. Russert asked whether he agreed with his government about Vietnam and Bush gave a pregnant answer about the lessons learned in Vietnam to let the military do what it thinks it needs to do. Russert moved on. But he should have pounced: "Do you think, Mr. President, that the U.S. could have won the war in Vietnam?"
His answer there would have contained far more information in it for Americans who must make a choice over him than anything he could have said directly about Iraq.
George Kenney
Russert let the President dissemble during the questions surrounding Bush's National Guard duty. On two occasions the President asserted that it was terrible people were putting down the National Guard and the people who serve in it. No one said such a thing, yet Russert let it pass both times. The question on the table is whether the President disrespected the Guard in 1972 and 1973 by putting his personal life above the defense of his country.
Nathan Rudy
Frankly I was just grateful that Russert didn't ask The Brain-Dead One how his faith has sustained him. The way the press kowtows to this poseur never fails to astonish my family and me.
Nancy A. Jackson
Monroe, Mich.
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