Colin Powell was the kind of guy I’m supposed to like. Like myself, his roots are in Jamaica, he had an accomplished military career and when the Bush team was awarded the White House, he was supposed to be the sane moderating influence on the cabal of jackals. Instead, he carried water for the war in Iraq. He never wavered from his support of the president’s policy during the entire affair. He is now attempting to rewrite the historical record, but his supposed reluctance for war is nothing but cowardice. His British equivalent, Foreign Secretary Robin Cook had the intestinal fortitude to resign in protest of the war. Colin Powell was a silent, slithering snake of a man who cheerleaded one of the worst decisions in the history of the United States.
Hey, whaddaya expect? I mean he talked to Bush for a full TWO HOURS! No human being could be expected to do more than that!
This is man who could have called up any news outlet and been on the teevee in a hot second to explain to the American people that the stuff coming from the White House was a load of dingo’s kidneys. Did he do that? No. He sat in front of the UN with his dog & pony show and little pill bottles full of flour representing the scary anthrax. The same man who created the vaunted “Powell Doctrine”, having to do with not starting wars you don’t know how to get the hell out of.
Now he thinks he’s Robert McNamara, making his “You know, maybe this war wasn’t such a hot idea” mea culpa about 20 years early.
Screw him. I have no further interest in anything he or any of the other war pimps have to say. He will from this point on be remembered by history as a traitor to his own supposed principles and a coward for not speaking out when he above all would have been listened to and could have made a difference.
He is tragically flawed and hardly deserving of support after his tepid cave in to Bush. However, he is the next best hope for pulling off a brilliant military and State Department end game for our current sad state of affairs in another bout of military adventurism. Clean him up. Bring round his mount. Put the field marshal’s baton in his hand and follow him.
We could do much worse.
LB
Now, now, guys. Give him a little credit. Though I don’t support his methods nor his theatrics at the UN, he was a career-military guy who followed the orders of his commandant-in-chief. That sort of mentality is hard to break, even when you have a cabinet level position.
I seem to remember we used to not be so keen on the “I was only following orders” defense a while back…
Powell was directly involved in the Army cover-up of the My Lai massacre during Viet Nam. His behavior during the run up to and execution of the Iraq War has been, sadly, predictable. He deserves nothing but scorn.
I see Powell as a tragic figure. And when I say “tragic” I mean in the Greek-chorus-gouging-their-eyes-out kind of tragic.
I think he believed he could do some good in this administration, that he could represent the United States as a positive force for change.
Unfortunately, Mr. Powell’s fatal flaw is that he is loyal above all else. When this administration ordered him to push for the invasion, he swallowed his own judgment and did as he was told.
He’ll go down in history as a phony, a drone, and as the Bush administration’s cat’s paw. He could have been so much more.
I seem to remember we used to not be so keen on the “I was only following orders” defense a while back…
Well, yeah, there’s that.
I’m with quaker on this one.
well, 2 1/2 hours trying to tell the Worst President Ever would seem like an eternity but as David Corn put it, that’s not even as long as a football game.
(and aside to OW: you might wanna reword your first graf, unless you too had a distinguished military career. It reads a little funny first time through.)
Powell covered up My Lai? I wasn’t aware it *was* covered up. I realize Wikipedia is far from authoritative, but this sounds a lot like the other histories I have read/heard on this.
I don’t see a cover-up. It took a while for the news to get out, but I don’t see that as a cover-up so much as how news travels from the front-line to mainstream media an ocean away. Abu Ghraib was longer than a year ago and I see far less outrage over that, even with the convictions and the far more graphic evidence of brutality (posing with corpses, all smiles and “thumbs up”?)
“I don’t see a cover-up.”!?? Perhaps you mean to say, “I don’t see My Lai as a perfectly universally successful cover-up.” The people really responsible for that slaughter, like everyone from Bush on down to the generals, got off free.
It took more than a year for the shocking story of the My Lai massacre to reach the news stands. Efforts had been made to cover up the atrocity from day one… literally, day one. The cover up for what happened at My Lai began on the day of the killings…
Even after a few honorable soldiers managed to make My Lai public, Colin Powell reported back exactly what his superiors wanted to hear… [Even years later] Powell penned a partial justification of the… brutality. In a chilling passage…
To this day, most of the US thinks of My Lai, Haditha, Guantanamo, etc., each as an isolated freak event. Powell made a huge contribution to that delusion. Delusions hinder learning.
This is about as optimistic as one can be, and still be honest:
JURIST – Forum: Haditha and My Lai: Lessons from the Law of War
FORUM Op-eds on legal news by law professors and JURIST special guests… Haditha and My Lai: Lessons from the Law of War JURIST Contributing Editor Geoffrey S. Corn, Lt. Col. US Army (Ret.) and former Special Assistant to the Judge Advocate General for Law of War Matters, now a professor at South Texas College of Law, says that the killings of Iraqi civilians at Haditha, like the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War, illustrate critical aspects of the law of war even as they ostensibly manifest its failure….
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forumy/2006/06/haditha-and-my-lai-lessons-from-law-of.php
“I don’t see a cover-up.”!?? Perhaps you mean to say, “I don’t see My Lai as a perfectly universally successful cover-up.” The people really responsible for that slaughter, like everyone from Bush on down to the generals, got off free.
It took more than a year for the shocking story of the My Lai massacre to reach the news stands. Efforts had been made to cover up the atrocity from day one… literally, day one. The cover up for what happened at My Lai began on the day of the killings…
Even after a few honorable soldiers managed to make My Lai public, Colin Powell reported back exactly what his superiors wanted to hear… [Even years later] Powell penned a partial justification of the… brutality. In a chilling passage…
To this day, most of the US thinks of My Lai, Haditha, Guantanamo, etc., each as an isolated freak event. Powell made a huge contribution to that delusion. Delusions hinder learning.
This is about as optimistic as one can be, and still be honest:
JURIST – Forum: Haditha and My Lai: Lessons from the Law of War
FORUM Op-eds on legal news by law professors and JURIST special guests… Haditha and My Lai: Lessons from the Law of War JURIST Contributing Editor Geoffrey S. Corn, Lt. Col. US Army (Ret.) and former Special Assistant to the Judge Advocate General for Law of War Matters, now a professor at South Texas College of Law, says that the killings of Iraqi civilians at Haditha, like the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War, illustrate critical aspects of the law of war even as they ostensibly manifest its failure….
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forumy/2006/06/haditha-and-my-lai-lessons-from-law-of.php
Come on Oliver you know rule #1a in the Black Persons political handbook.
Black person Political Handbook
Rules
Rule #1 Never trust a Republican
Rule #1a NEVER EVER EVER trust a Black Republican.
If a Black person ignores rule #1. Which Powell is guilty of.
Rule #1A automatically comes into effect for that member of the Black Community who decides to ignore rule #1.
If you lie down with Dogs your bound to get fleas.
Why is this rule #1.
Any person of color that would knowingly attach themselves to
the Republican party knowing for years this group has accepted and promoted Racism needs to have there heads examined.
OW, say it ain’t so!!
I view your site from time to time to see what others are saying about topics relevant to Black people, but never would I have expected to read that you have now come to the same conclusion regarding that handkerchief head, sell-out Colin Powell many of us blogged about when you were so proud of him as a Jamaican.
Colin Powell has always been about Colin Powell and what’s best for Colin Powell. He joined the Republican Party because too many Blacks were a part of the Democratic Party. It was opportunism from the beginning. He went up the ranks of the military because he was a house negro, doing and saying what he needed to advance himself.
Why should you NOW open your eyes to the blatant manipulation of Colin Powell? He hasn’t changed, but now is attempting to distance himself from policies and actions he knew then and knows now were immoral and illegal. He went along to further his own ambitions and to curry favor with the powers that be.
If you hadn’t notice, most Blacks have been saying this from the beginning about Colin Powell. He is a complete sell-out and wouldn’t give the time of day about many Blacks and the dire positions we find ourselves.
He is now a changed man, please. As Public Enemy so eloquently said it “DON’T BELIEVE THE HYPE!”
Colin belongs to that elite unit 1001 Opportunity Brigade. Saying things and behaving in such a non threatening way to Caspar Weinberger kicked him up the Affirmitive Action Ladder for Conservative Coloreds where he became a showcase figure a Sidney Poitier in uniform who brayed the stab in the back song of the military higher ups in an eloquent manner. Further corrupted he didn’t lash out when a band of constipated Republicans said “he wasn’t conservative enough for their support at a run for president. Now relegated to the corner drooling a song of they didn’t listen His next autobiography should give a detailed account of what was said in that 2hr.+ face to face but knowing Bush doesn’t want unadulterated transcripts of his misdoings he’ll be open to lawsuits only fair since he opened the gates of idelogical mediocrity on the world.