Powell Vs. the Neo Cons

Colin Powell was long one of my heroes; and I havn't had many. When I served with the US Army he was the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. During the Persian Gulf War his leadership was impressive, to say the least.

I respected him greatly for resigning early into Clinton's presidency. He refused to sit by and be a part of Clinton's dumb-a$$ don't ask don't tell policy. He was a man of principle, not of politics.

I hoped he would run for president in '96. I saw him as our great hope at that time. And I thought it would be cool as hell to finally see our nation's first black president. He would be outstanding, I thought. A war hero and a man of peace.

He infuriated me when he stood before the UN and lied through his teeth for this uber-corrupt administration. How could his loyalty extend beyond our men and women in uniform and reside with this bunch of moral cowards? It's something I have still not shaken. Will his legacy ever be redeemed? That remains to be seen.

I came across this excellent article from GQ on the embattled Secretary of State. It's definitely worth reading.

Casualty of War
Four years into an embattled Bush administration, Colin Powell is hard at work at something he's never had to worry about before: salvaging his legacy.
By Wil S. Hylton

Arriving at the State Department in 2001, Powell was no stranger to the political battlefield; if it seemed inevitable that he would clash with neocons at the Pentagon�men like Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle, who had never been in uniform but were often eager to deploy troops�it seemed equally inevitable that Powell would squash such adversaries under the broad thumb of his experience.

Oh, he would say, it's easy to talk about "ending states" when you've never been sent to end one, when you've never watched a man split apart in a rain of shrapnel. But for an old grunt who's been on the front lines, who tromped through the elephant grass in Vietnam, who took a punji stake through the foot and saw ears cut off as trophies, who had slept beneath the aching odor of a fifty-five-gallon oil drum stuffed with burning human feces, for a man like Colin Powell, the path of diplomacy had a battle-born allure that no draft-dodging neocon could possibly comprehend, and he meant for them to know it.
us.gq.com... ation=none

[edit on 19-09-2003 by EastCoastKid]

Excellent article ECK! I've always liked Powell. He's the only one in the Administration I respect. I was shocked when he lied about the WMD in Iraq. Why? I believe he was a puppet on strings and still is. Maybe he was told to lie. Maybe he's being threatened that if he does not go along with Bush and the NeoCons he could loose his job and that could be very embarrasing for his family. I just don't think Powell is on the same side as the Bush Administration.

Good point, mrmulder. I wondered, too, if Powell may have been threatened. I'm not so sure, though. I just wish he had resigned. He may have thought he could do more good on the inside rather than on the outside, tho. That's possible. The article discusses other things he's been very successful at. Like dealing with China on Taiwan and on the North Korean issue. He's also been instrumental in staying the hand of the chickenhawks where Syria and Iran are concerned.

hold up East, i think you're seeing it wrong. you hate bush, i think that hatred is blinding you. you trusted, liked, whatever, powell. but you drop that and actually believed he, all of a sudden changed or was coerced into "lying" in front of the u.n. that defies logic. "oh hey this guy's great but oh no, once he says something disagreeing with my belief then it must mean he's being forced to or he's lieing." that's basically a summation of you and your beliefs. you ever think maybe you're hatred of bush is skewing what really is, that maybe powell wasn't lying, that he wasn't being coerced, that he, like so many politicians with him, believed the information the CIA (not bush) gave him?

The war in Iraq was inevitable. We knew that in the mid 90's. There was no stopping the war. Not even Powell could do it.

perhaps he lied to the UN because he knew the war was gonna happen inevitably. Perhaps he realized it could be the rope with which Bush and friends would hang themselves with. Who knows? It was well know that Powell had been out of favor with Bush for a long time. He probably knew the whole admin was going to go ahead regardless.

Powell, out of favor, decided, hey, why not let little chimp man have his war? Powell probably knew the war would end up in disaster, thus staining the Bush admin...and the whole crime family, for good.

Originally posted by astroblade
hold up East, i think you're seeing it wrong. you hate bush, i think that hatred is blinding you. you trusted, liked, whatever, powell. but you drop that and actually believed he, all of a sudden changed or was coerced into "lying" in front of the u.n. that defies logic. "oh hey this guy's great but oh no, once he says something disagreeing with my belief then it must mean he's being forced to or he's lieing." that's basically a summation of you and your beliefs. you ever think maybe you're hatred of bush is skewing what really is, that maybe powell wasn't lying, that he wasn't being coerced, that he, like so many politicians with him, believed the information the CIA (not bush) gave him?

Sorry, but everything you just said is laughable. Go check into who was in charge of the Mai Lai massacre investigation in Vietnam (Powell). You might be surprised to learn it was basically another Washington whitewash. I only learned about that at some point during this administration. And I was VERY disappointed by what I learned. Powell, it seems, has been an excellent team player for decades.