By all accounts, Condoleeza Rice appears to be a smart woman. Smart in the book sense, that is.
Not smart when it comes to foreign policy. Not smart when it comes to evaluating national security. Not smart when it comes to admitting mistakes, because after all, that's a fruitless exercise. She'll tell you herself.
And she's especially not smart when discussing Iraq.
Immediately after Lawrence O'Donnell's interview with a combative, pushy and defensive Rice, the right-wing media proudly proclaimed her "a winner." For 10 minutes, Rice obfuscated, lied, embellished and did everything you would expect a Bushie to do when confronted by facts.
I was stunned that an obviously frustrated Rice could be held up as "smacking down" O'Donnell. I wondered if I was watching the same thing the other wingnuts were. Then I realized that I can't win. And you can't either.
Give it up, liberals: you won't win. You can't win. They won't let you win.
Neocons won't let you have this. In the wake of Osama bin Laden's death, we rightly took a look back on what happened in Iraq, the nation's biggest foreign policy blunder in 40 years. Some of the neocons have begun straying from their defense of Iraq. Sometimes reality becomes too hard to ignore, even for the most strident, dedicated neocon who gave the loudest, most full-throated defense of The Invasion That Had Nothing To Do With Osama bin Laden.
Sheesh, even ole Condi herself is saying what the Reality-Based Individuals have been saying. She admitted to O'Donnell that the intelligence was wrong. She said we didn't invade Iraq to install democracy anymore than we invaded Germany to install democracy.
Yes, she actually said those things. She also said Canada was a member of Bush's Coalition.
It wasn't.
What's a wingnut to do when confronted by those admissions from Dr. Rice? What they do when any problem arises that is a square peg to their round hole ideology -- stick their fingers in their ears and say LA LA LA LA CAN'T HEAR YOU WMD LA LA SADDAM KURDS LA LA.
This is what they cling to. The world knows Saddam didn't have the capability of doing anything to the United States. The world knows Saddam and bin Laden would never, ever co-exist. Hell, THEY know that.
But it doesn't matter because being a Republican means never admitting you were wrong. The ITHNTDWOBL (see above) is the neocon's signature on 21st century foreign policy. Even if Iraq descends into another apocalyptic nightmare, it won't matter. Neocons will not let you have this, liberals. You can bring up every fact you want. You can cite every document ever that demolished the idea that there were WMD, or that Saddam posed a serious threat to the United States -- so serious that it required a large-scale invasion that cost 4,500 soldiers and trillions of dollars in waste.
If you're wasting your time -- like O'Donnell did with Dr. Rice -- well, I feel sorry for you. Nothing will change their minds.
Not even the Borg were this united.
Dr. Jeff Gilooly is a fellow at the American Center for Halperinism. He has published several essays documenting the decline of America's media due to Halperinism and looks forward to the day when he could kick Mark Halperin in the leg while he's sipping a frappuccino from Starbucks. Also, too, Joe Scarborough.