I have an email group where we talk politics and someone who I went to high school with is doing some work in Iraq. I have no idea what he does and he wouldn't say. He is playing it down the middle, not trying to make enemies on either side, but he did say he is wearing cufflinks given to him by Condoleezza Rice.
Here is my response to him.
Chris,
You may be in a unique position and one that includes business allegiances to the administration and friendships that we don't have. However, I feel as though you're playing it right down the middle.
Isn't it possible that those so close to the action are out of their league, like Condoleezza Rice? It's a very Big League and many would fall short in ability at such a high level. Rice didn't seem to know anything about al-Qaeda. Remember when she said that, "..nobody could imagine that al-Qaeda would fly planes into buildings," when they did it a bunch of time before? That was a terrible response from a National Security Adviser. If she was so good and so smart, why didn't she jump on Bush to pay some attention to the pre 9/11 warnings?
Imagine if the laziest person you knew in high school, a guy who wasn't very smart but his parents were loaded, he was an arrogant punk type and a heavy drinker who kept stepping in sh__ and his father got him out. Imagine he had a 78 average and he got into Yale, to the drop-dead shock of everyone at school. Turns out this guy who has messed up everything he's ever done in life. Yet with all his failures, he ironically didn't think he needed anyone's opinion and didn't care what anyone had to say once he made up his mind after 20 seconds of deep thought...imagine if that almost comic strip kind of guy became president.
How safe would you feel with him at the helm after he and his "elite" team did NOTHING to look into the warnings before 9/11? Would it cross your mind even once that this guy was a putz all his life, a lazy arrogant jerk who started trouble but was never their to cover your back....would you ever think this kind of guy should not be in charge of the welfare of the world?
You know, this is what a lot of us think about Bush. We didn't make it all up. Many of us were saying the same things about him before he was installed into the White House and we can't understand how anyone can feel safe with this guy as president.
This afternoon, I told Paul that I think lots of people feel like Bush is not equipped for this job but they don't like ragging on the president until the very last minute...on November 2nd, when the have to. So I picked Kerry by 3% for a dollar bet.