Bush’s responses to reporters’ questions yesterday about Donald Rumsfeld predictably dodged specific concerns and relied on the president’s expertise in psychoanalysis.
“Listen, I know how — I know Secretary Rumsfeld’s heart. I know how much he cares for the troops. … [H]e is — he’s a good, decent man. He’s a caring fellow.”
So, we’re supposed to tolerate a criminally inept Defense Secretary because Bush knows his “heart.” But at this point, can we really count on Bush as a qualified judge of character? Indeed, the rhetoric was eerily familiar.
Bush is, after all, the same guy who said Bernard Kerik is “a good man.” Bush also famously once looked into a Vladimir Putin’s “heart and soul” in order to determine that this former KGB agent, who is attacking the democratic institutions of Russia, is honest and trustworthy.
Now we’re supposed to be placated with the knowledge that Rumfeld’s a “caring fellow”? Fool me twice…