Bush was on NBC’s Dateline yesterday with Tom Browkaw and while the interview didn’t generate any real news, there was one noteworthy exchange.
Brokaw: “Mr. President in the opening of his debate, Dick Cheney, your vice president, said that if I had it to recommend all over again, I would recommend exactly the same course of action for Iraq. Even if you knew that there was no storage of WMD in Iraq, even if you knew that the Republican Guard could fade into the north and the west with their weapons and mount a very effective insurgency against us, even if you knew that we didn’t have enough troops to secure all the sights in Iraq necessary to be secure at the time, you would recommend exactly the same course of action?”
Bush: “Well, Tom, the bigger question should we have removed Saddam Hussein in the first place?”
Brokaw: “But then the answer is what happens afterwards as well–”
Bush: “But, that’s easy to second guess. I’ve never known you to be a Monday morning quarterback like this. Of course we can look back, and history will judge whether we could have done something differently. But you have asked me the question in the context of really should we have removed Saddam Hussein in the first place? And the answer is. Yes, sir.” (emphasis added)
This is classic Bush. If you point out all the many, many mistakes Bush made about the alleged Iraqi threat, and then ask him to explain why he’d do the exact same thing all over again, you must be a “Monday morning quarterback.” No explanation, no justifications, don’t bother me with facts, I’m making my own reality here.
Bush used to prefer the “revisionist history” phrase. If you had the audacity to note that the White House was wrong about virtually everything when it came to Iraq, you were a revisionist historian. Then Bush seemed to get tired of his own Orwellian double-speak, and he’s since embraced the “Monday morning quarterback” tack.
He seems especially fond of it lately. He used it twice in one event in Dubuque, Iowa, last week, and three times at a rally in Cuba City, Wis., the next day. It’s just the latest way for Bush to distance himself from anything resembling accountability. If you point out facts, you’re just being unhelpful.
Also notice how Bush decided what the question was. Brokaw asked about all of the facts Bush got wrong, but Bush decided, “[Y]ou have asked me the question in the context of really should we have removed Saddam Hussein in the first place.” I don’t even know what this means. The “context” wasn’t about Saddam; it was about Bush’s mistakes, which the president still refuses to acknowledge.
I don’t imagine undecided voters were watching Dateline, so this bizarre exchange will have no practical effect on tomorrow, but it was nevertheless a chance to see the quintessential Bush on display. It wasn’t pretty.