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Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: lurqer who wrote (40425)	3/26/2004 12:37:11 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 89467

Watch out! A shoe just dropped! talkingpointsmemo.com

To: lurqer who wrote (40425)	3/26/2004 12:50:49 AM
From: lurqer	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 89467

W.House Follows Long Tradition in Attacking Clarke By Steve Holland WASHINGTON (Reuters) - White House attempts to discredit opponents are a time-honored tradition, but attacks on former counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke have been particularly ferocious. Experts said President Bush has an acute need to discredit Clarke's charge that he ignored the al Qaeda threat until it was too late, given that Bush's re-election strategy is predicated on what he calls successes in the war on terrorism. "It (Clarke's charge) focuses on the issue that the president has decided is key to his re-election," said presidential scholar Stephen Hess. Bush campaigned in 2000 on his desire to raise the tone of debate in Washington from the usual mud slinging between Republicans and Democrats. But Clarke's accusations, including testimony on Wednesday before a commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, have pushed the Bush White House into using verbal counterattacks similar to those of previous administrations. White House officials defended the tactics by saying there are legitimate questions about Clarke given what they feel are contradictory statements he has made. "Mr. Clarke made assertions that we have said are flat-out wrong," said White House spokesman Scott McClellan. "And it's important for the American people to have the facts." Reflecting the sensitivity over Clarke's charges, the White House has sent out some of its most senior officials to try to rebut them, including Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin Powell and U.S. national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, who officials say is steaming over Clarke's claim that she was not doing her job. ANOTHER MEETING SOUGHT Rice on Thursday sought a second private meeting with members of the commission. The White House released a letter from White House counsel Alberto Gonzalez to the chairman and co-chairman of the commission, asking that she be given another opportunity to speak. "In light of yesterday's hearing in which there were a number of mischaracterizations of Dr. Rice's statement and positions, Dr. Rice requests to meet again privately with the commission," Gonzalez wrote. The letter also complains about what it termed the mischaracterization of the White House position by a couple of Democratic representatives on the Sept. 11 panel. Clarke has been described variously this week as a disgruntled ex-bureaucrat who did not get the promotion he wanted, whose motives are in question since his best friend is Democrat John Kerry's foreign policy adviser and who is simply trying to sell his new book, "Against All Enemies." Bare-knuckled attacks in U.S. politics go way back. In the early 1800s, gossipmonger James Callendar wrote columns critical of Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson's allies responded by accusing him of spreading syphilis and being unfaithful to his wife, prompting Callendar to claim Jefferson fathered children with slave Sally Hemings. More recently, there were attempts by Richard Nixon's supporters to cast doubt on Watergate whistleblower John Dean and efforts by supporters of Bill Clinton to describe White House intern Monica Lewinsky as a stalker. Democrats, who see an election-year advantage in denying Bush any benefit from the war on terrorism, have accused the White House of showing a pattern of character assassination. They pointed to efforts to discredit former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill over his kiss-and-tell comments in a recent book, and the leaking of the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame when her husband, former diplomat Joseph Wilson, accused Bush of hyping prewar intelligence on Iraq. "Please ask the people around you to stop the character attacks they are waging against Richard Clarke," the Senate Democratic leader, Tom Daschle of South Dakota, told Bush in a floor speech on Thursday. White House officials privately were outraged that Clarke had turned on the Bush administration that employed him. A senior administration official, who like Clarke also served during the previous Clinton government, said Clarke had broken an unwritten code among professional officials. "You don't do self-serving things like kiss and tell and betray the confidence of the president," said this official. "This is not a partisan remark. It bothers a lot of people around here, because he puts public servants in a bad light because he seems to be preening." reuters.com Now I'm more than a little bit bothered by that last paragraph. People that know me, know I'm loyal to a fault. But, perhaps beause of that trait, I'm kinda carefull about where I place my loyalties. Since this "senior administration official" was "like Clarke also served during the previous Clinton government", I'm betting he's on the public payroll. Even if he isn't, his overwhelming primary loyalty is to the country, not the president. If there is any confusioin about those priorities, then he doesn't belong where he is. It's that simple. JMO lurqer