Prez to Colin Powell: "Could you help a brother out?"
We are not alone who watch in horror as Prez morphs into Lyndon Johnson.
Somewhere, Colin Powell weeps.
Quiet as it is kept, if Alma had the stones of Michelle, the first black president would have been a Republican. The world might have been spared the nightmare that was George W. Bush.
Now it is time for Powell to redeem his enablement of “he by whom he was betrayed”. Only one man has the chops to corral the generals, the (bitter) experience of struggling thanklessly in quicksand, the stated doctrine which manifestly rules out the Clinton/Gates/McChrystal strategy, the gravitas to cow the crazies, and the martial prestige, frankly, to give Prez the cover he needs.
Meet (Five Star) General Colin Powell, Secretary of State & Defense, and theatre commander in Af/Pak.
As Lenny Bruce used to say of the trinity, “it’s like three in one oil.”
There’s something else, that I guess I should leave up to Bill Cosby to teach, but he won’t take my calls. That father Prez mentioned in the book title…the older black man who can advise him from inside his head…That guy is Powell, since pops is (and was from jump) gone,.
None of the Cheney Stormtroopers will look Powell in the eye and talk their shit., Alas, per contra to Prez they will. Thus he will give Prez something else that he needs.:
: An encouragement to limit his propensity for ingratiation via the promotion in his nterlocutor of stark amazement at the amount bullshit he will tolerate for the sake of politeness.
Colin Powell was also the first commissioned officer to try to whitewash the Mai Lai massacre. What a great guy he was, ay? NOT.
October 19, 2009 9:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
I didn't mean for my little pulbic relations fantasy to convey a personal encomium
Altho I am grateful for his endorsement of Prez back in the campaign.
October 20, 2009 7:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
Your last sentence is unintelligible, for me.
October 19, 2009 9:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
try reading it slowly, with a little vermouth and an acid twist
October 19, 2009 1:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
.
unintelligible
shortev version:
I'd like less Martin and more Malcolm.
October 20, 2009 7:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
I dunno, Jolly. Powell's pretty disgraced in my eyes. But I'm not a general.
Do you really think Powell's well-respected enough to run cover for Obama or will he just drag Obama down?
October 19, 2009 1:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
well-respected enough
Certainly not by me--but I am not the audience to whom the appointment would play.
I was perhaps too brief in my exposition. We have, (as Dr. Demento used to say in a different context) the democracy we have,not the one we would want...
I'm thinking of the unthinking centrists who prides themselves on being independent" (read:uninformed, uncaring, and easily confused).
They like Powell. Personally, I think he's a warm criminal squared (once for My Lai, once more for the UN speech.)
What he does have is a Doctrine. Not everyone has a doctrine (after all). As it happens, there has been enough lip service given to the Powell Doctrine in the war colleges over the years, that it provides a useful forensic tool for shutting the neocons up.
October 20, 2009 6:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
It is the president's job to set the mission. This fundamental point is missed by most of the media and all of the GOP. If the President's only role was to rubber stamp the plans of generals, the Constitution wouldn't have made him the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces.
Redefine the mission, and set your generals to the task of telling you how to accomplish it. If you don't have the balls to give an order to the guys wearing the stars, then we ARE living under a military junta, and all hope for our Democracy is lost.
October 19, 2009 3:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey I am with Dorn on this one.
Despite the fact that I think General Powell did a terrible job as Secretary of State, although he was facing some real power there, I think Colin Powell is a truly great American. I rec'd this early on but wished to see what reaction you might get on this.
October 19, 2009 6:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
did a terrible job as Secretary of State,
Somehow,I failed to convey my personal contempt for Powell--obviously he should have resigned long before he turned into Bush's butt boy.
That said, there are plenty of people who don't share my opinion.Those would be the target of the triple appointment.
October 20, 2009 7:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
This fundamental point is missed by most of the media
Precisely.
But since that is the playing field, at least the Powell Doctrine (which has a clear parameters including the strategic mandates ofoverwhelmiing force, exit strategy, etc.) would obviously rule out escalation in af/pak.
October 20, 2009 7:04 AM | Reply | Permalink