Does anybody besides me see the failure/omission/REFUSAL of Sens. Spectre and
Skelton to swear Gen. Petreus in (as I assume is required by the rules), as a
deliberate dereliction of duty, part of a conspiracy to lie (once again to the
American public) and THEREFORE,
an IMPEACHABLE OFFENSE" ?
Hajja Romi
Published on Tuesday, September 11, 2007 by CommonDreams.org
Swear Him In! by Ray McGovern
Thats all I said in the unusual silence on Monday afternoon as first aid
was being administered to Gen. David Petraeus microphone before he spoke
before the House Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees.
It had dawned on me that when House Armed Services Committee Chairman Ike
Skelton (D-Missouri) invited Gen. Petraeus to make his presentation, Skelton
forgot to ask him to take the customary oath to tell the truth, the whole
truth, and nothing but the truth. I had no idea that my suggestion would be
enough to get me thrown out of the hearing.
I had experienced a flashback to a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in
early 2006, when Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) reminded chairman Arlen Specter
(R-PA) that Specter had forgotten to swear in the witness, Attorney General
Alberto Gonzales; and how Specter insisted that that would not be necessary.
Now that may, or may not, be an invidious comparison. But Petraeus and
Gonzales work for the same boss, who has a rather unusual relationship with the
truth. How many of his senior staff could readily be convicted, as was the
hapless-and-now-commuted Scooter Libby, of perjury?
So I didnt think twice about it. I really thought that Skelton perhaps
forgot, and that the ten-minute interlude of silence while they fixed the
microphone was a good chance to raise this seemingly innocent question.
The more so since the ranking Republican representatives had been protesting
too much. Practicing the obverse of killing the messenger, they had been
canonizing the messenger with protective fire. Ranking Armed Services Committee
member Duncan Hunter (R-CA) began what amounted to a SWAT-team attack on the
credibility of those who dared question the truthfulness of the sainted
Petraeus, and issued a special press release decrying a full-page ad in todays
New York Times equating Petraeus with Betray-us.
Hunter served notice on any potential doubters, insisting that Petraeus
capability, integrity, intelligence
are without question. And Ileana
Ros-Lehtinen (R-Florida), ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs
Committee, rang changes on the same theme, unwittingly choosing another
infelicitous almost-homonym for the charges against Petraeus-outrageous.
Indeed, Hunters prepared statement, which he circulated before the hearing,
amounted to little more than a full-scale duty-honor-country panegyric for
the general. On the chance we did not hear him the first time, Hunter kept
repeating how independent Petraeus is, how candid and full of integrity, and
compared him to famous generals who testified to Congress in the
past-Eisenhower, Macarthur, and Schwarzkopf. Hunter was smart enough to avoid
any mention of Gen. William Westmoreland, commander of U.S. forces in Vietnam,
who fell tragically short on those traits. (See Is Petraeus Todays
Westmoreland? http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/090707b.html )
If memory serves, the aforementioned generals and Westmoreland were required
to testify under oath. And this was one of the more embarrassing sticking
points when CBS aired a program showing that Westmoreland had deliberately
dissembled on the strength of Communist forces and U.S. progress in the war.
When Westmoreland sued CBS for libel, several of his subordinates came clean,
and Westmoreland quickly dropped the suit. The analogy with
Westmoreland-justifying a White House death wish to persist in an unwinnable
war-is the apt one here.
If Petraeus is so honest and full of integrity, what possible objection could
he have to being sworn in? I had not the slightest hesitation being sworn in
when testifying before the committee assembled by John Conyers (D-Michigan) on
June 16, 2005. Should generals be immune? Or did Petraeus masters wish to give
him a little more assurance that he could play fast and loose with the truth
without the consequences encountered by Scooter Libby.
With the microphone finally fixed, much became quickly clear. Petraeus tried
to square a circle in his very first two paragraphs. In the first, he thanks
the committees for the opportunity to discuss the recommendations I recently
provided to my chain of command for the way forward. Then he stretches
credulity well beyond the breaking point-at least for me:
At the outset, I would like to note that this is my testimony. Although I
have briefed my assessment and recommendations to my chain of command, I wrote
this testimony myself. It has not been cleared by, nor shared with, anyone in
the Pentagon, the White House, or Congress.
Is not the commander in chief in Petraeus chain of command?
As Harry Truman (D-Missouri) would have said, Does he think we were born
yesterday?
Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, the publishing arm of the ecumenical
Church of the Saviour in Washington, DC. During his career as a CIA analyst, he
prepared and briefed the Presidents Daily Brief and chaired National
Intelligence Estimates. He is a member of the Steering Group of Veteran
Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/09/11/3755
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