Published on Saturday, November 11, 2006 by CommonDreams.org
Robert Gates-Gate
by Ray McGovern
Full disclosure: I am in Defense Secretary Rumsfeld�s debt for TV notoriety on May 4, when my impromptu questioning of him elicited denials easily shown to be false. I have known Robert Gates, whom the president has picked to succeed Rumsfeld, for 36 years, starting when Gates was a journeyman analyst in CIA�s Soviet Foreign Policy branch which I headed.
As the occupation of Iraq chews up a more and more of our troops, President George W. Bush has jettisoned �stay the course� in favor of �necessary adjustments.� This week he showed how quickly he can adjust to the mid-term election results when he jettisoned Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, barely a week after telling reporters Rumsfeld was doing a �fantastic job� and that he wanted him to stay on for the next two years.
It had been clear for weeks that the election would be a referendum on the war in Iraq and that Republican losses would be substantial. And Rumsfeld and Bush saw a mutual need to avoid the acute political embarrassment that would inevitably attend Rumsfeld�s grilling by congressional committees chaired by Democrats. Besides, who better to try to blame for the �long, hard slog� in Iraq than the fellow who not only coined the expression but made it a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Rumsfeld may even have been willing to acquiesce reluctantly in serving as scapegoat for the Iraq fiasco. He would have seen merit not only in avoiding another acrimonious tangle with Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), but also in helping Bush project an image of flexibility and decisiveness in the face of the post-election sea change in Congress. And one cannot rule out possible pangs of conscience for the horrific human cost resulting from his supreme arrogance and his susceptibility to the illusory strategic dreams of �the crazies��the so-called �neo-conservatives� whom President George W. Bush brought back to Washington.
http://www.commondreams.org/views06/1111-22.htm
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