In his latest NYT op-ed,
"Mistakes Were Made," William Safire offers up a series of 10 potential "mea culpas" from various quarters, ranging from London's "amalgam of isolationists, pacifists and anti-Blair leftists" to Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, and George Tenet to Wesley Clark to "hawkish idealists" like himself (for believing Iraqi scientists would come forward to reveal where biological weapons were hidden).
Kos readers can sort out for themselves the different levels of disingeniousness on which Safire operates in this latest article, as he mixes a few genuine insights with several backhanded "mea culpas," while at the same time continuing the serial leakage of the Feith-based memo that "reveals" the "decade-long links" between Osama and Saddam (a memo, Safire writes, that is now "the subject of an automatic leak investigation -- yet another time-wasting mistake").
But was it forgetfulness, cold calculation, or yet another mistake on Safire's part that, out of all the mistaken people he cites, one name is curiously missing? In the spirit of helping him correct this chilly and subtractive mistake, perhaps we should add to Safire's Mistakes. Here are some initial additions:
- George W. Bush's campaign pledge that he'd be a "uniter, not a divider."
- George W. Bush's SOTU allegation that Iraq posed an imminent threat to the US on the basis of (forged) documents from Niger.
- George W. Bush's call to Iraqi insurgents to "bring'em on."
- George W. Bush's infamous "Mission Accomplished" photo-prance atop the USS Lincoln.
- George W. Bush's decision to deliver the world this ultimatum: "you're either with us or against us."
By adding this one name to Safire's list, we can also connect the dots to Bush 41, who as VP admitted that "mistakes were made" in connection to Iran-Contra, the Reagan-era scandal whose "government within a government" now appears quaint when compared to Bush 43's stovepiping, special planning, Halliburt'ing administration.