Colin Powell, according to
this article has admitted:
foreign policy mistakes and sought to assure the outside world that despite the US invasion of Iraq (news - web sites), the Bush administration's approach "is not defined by preemption."
/snip
"As to preemption's scope, it applies only to the undeterrable threats that come from non-state actors such as terrorist groups," he writes in the magazine's January-February issue. "It was never meant to displace deterrence, only to supplement it."
I think the administration really helps itself with centrist voters by playing up Powell and the foreign policy realists in the administration while downplaying the neocons and their fantasies of global empire.
If I believed that Bush actually embraced Powell's vision I would be a happier fellow. Having been lied to so many times by this administration and Powell in particular it is hard to take him or them seriously. On the other hand, I think events have overtaken the Bush doctrine. The unilateral invasion of Iraq is really a disaster for this country and the only way out is by bringing the international community in. That means bringing back the realists like Jim Baker and Powell, renouncing the more malignant features of the Bush doctrine like preemption and unilateralism and rejoining the international community. Given that Powell's position is also expedient I am inclined to give it more weight.