Farewell to All That: An Oral History of the Bush White House
http://www.truthout.org/123008T
The threat of 9/11 ignored. The threat of Iraq hyped and manipulated.
Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib. Hurricane Katrina. The shredding of civil
liberties. The rise of Iran. Global warming. Economic disaster. How
did one two-term presidency go so wrong? A sweeping draft of history
-
distilled from scores of interviews - offers fresh insight into the
roles of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and other key players.
January 20, 2001 After a disputed election and bitter recount
battle in Florida whose outcome is effectively decided by the Supreme
Court, George W. Bush is sworn in as the 43rd president of the United
States. In foreign affairs he promises an approach that will depart
from the perceived adventurism of his predecessor, Bill Clinton, in
places such as Kosovo and Somalia. ("I think the United States must
be
humble," Bush said in a debate with his opponent, Al Gore.) In
domestic affairs Bush pledges to cut taxes and improve education. He
promises to govern as a "compassionate conservative" and to be "a
uniter, not a divider." He comes into office with a $237 billion
budget surplus.
On the day of the inauguration the White House chief of staff,
Andrew Card, declares a moratorium on the Clinton administration's
last-minute regulations on the environment, food safety, and health.
This action is followed in the coming months by disengagement from
the
International Criminal Court and other international efforts.
Nonetheless, the early presumption is that the administration's
affairs are in steady hands, though some disquieting signs are noted.
In the Oval Office on January 20 the first President Bush and the
new President Bush greet each other with the words "Mr. President."
Dan Bartlett, White House communications director and later
counselor to the president: It was a bitterly cold day. They got back
to the residence from the inauguration. The president was going over
to have his first moment in the Oval Office as president of the
United
States. And he called for his father because he wanted his father to
be there when it happened. If I recall correctly, George H. W. Bush
was soaking in the tub trying to warm up, because it had been so cold
on the viewing stand. Not only did the former president quickly get
out of the tub, but he put his suit back on, because he was not going
to enter the Oval Office without a suit. His hair was still kind of
wet.
Joschka Fischer, German foreign minister and vice-chancellor: We
thought we were going back to the old days of Bush 41. And ironically
enough Rumsfeld, but even more Cheney, together with Powell, were
seen
as indications that the young president, who was not used to the
outside world, who didn't travel very much, who didn't seem to be
very
experienced, would be embedded into these Bush 41 guys. Their
foreign-
policy skills were extremely good and strongly admired. So we were
not
very concerned. Of course, there was this strange thing with these
"neocons," but every party has its fringes. It was not very alarming.
Lawrence Wilkerson, top aide and later chief of staff to
Secretary
of State Colin Powell: We had this confluence of characters - and I
use that term very carefully - that included people like Powell, Dick
Cheney, Condi Rice, and so forth, which allowed one perception to be
"the dream team." It allowed everybody to believe that this Sarah
Palin-like president - because, let's face it, that's what he was -
was going to be protected by this national- security elite, tested in
the cauldrons of fire. What in effect happened was that a very
astute,
probably the most astute, bureaucratic entrepreneur I've ever run
into
in my life became the vice president of the United States.
He became vice president well before George Bush picked him. And
he began to manipulate things from that point on, knowing that he was
going to be able to convince this guy to pick him, knowing that he
was
then going to be able to wade into the vacuums that existed around
George Bush - personality vacuum, character vacuum, details vacuum,
experience vacuum.
Richard Clarke, chief White House counterterrorism adviser: We
had
a couple of meetings with the president, and there were detailed
discussions and briefings on cyber-security and often terrorism, and
on a classified program. With the cyber-security meeting, he seemed -
I was disturbed because he seemed to be trying to impress us, the
people who were briefing him. It was as though he wanted these
experts, these White House staff guys who had been around for a long
time before he got there - didn't want them buying the rumor that he
wasn't too bright. He was trying - sort of overly trying - to show
that he could ask good questions, and kind of yukking it up with
Cheney.
The contrast with having briefed his father and Clinton and Gore
was so marked. And to be told, frankly, early in the administration,
by Condi Rice and [her deputy] Steve Hadley, you know, Don't give the
president a lot of long memos, he's not a big reader - well, shit. I
mean, the president of the United States is not a big reader?
March 6, 2001 Secretary of State Colin Powell tells reporters
that the United States intends to "engage with North Korea to pick up
where President Clinton and his administration left off." The next
day, Powell is forced by the administration to backpedal. Other early
administration actions - abrogation of the Anti-Ballistic-Missile
Treaty, abandonment of the Kyoto Protocol on climate change - signal
that America's way of doing business has changed. In time, Defense
Secretary Rumsfeld will characterize traditional U.S. allies as "old
Europe."
Joschka Fischer, German foreign minister and vice-chancellor:
During the Kosovo war we had developed a format which was, I think,
one of the cheapest models for policy coordinating in the interests
of
the U.S. [Secretary of State] Madeleine Albright was in the driver's
seat, and the four European foreign ministers discussed with her on a
daily basis how the war develops and so on. This was U.K., France,
Italy, and Germany, together with the U.S., on the phone. We
continued
after the war, not every day, but this was the format, to discuss
problems and understand the positions. And suddenly it stopped. We
had
very, very few - I don't know, two or three times. Only for a very
short period when Colin came in, and then it stopped, because the new
administration was not interested any longer in a multilateral
coordination.
Bill Graham, Canada's foreign minister and later defense
minister:
My experience with Mr. Rumsfeld was: obviously an extremely
intelligent person, with a lot of experience. But compared to Colin
he
was cold in terms of his personal relationships. He could have a
sense
of humor. I remember being at the famous Munich Security Conference
that takes place every year. And I think Sergei Ivanov, who was the
Russian defense minister at the time, went after him about some
issue,
and how the Americans had altered their position.
And Rumsfeld's answer was "Well, that was the old Rumsfeld, and I
am now the new Rumsfeld." And of course it brought a great laugh. But
he was terribly determined to have his way; there was no question
about that.
One of his shticks - if I can call it that - at the nato meetings
was always about caveats. He would pronounce the word "caveat" the
way
you and I might speak of some sort of sexual deviation. You know,
people who had "caveats" were really evil, bad people.
Some caveats are not about an unwillingness to fight; some are
about fundamental constraints on what you can do as a country. But
Mr.
Rumsfeld was not about listening and being cooperative. Mr. Rumsfeld
was about getting the way of the United States, and don't get in my
way or my juggernaut will run over you.
May 16, 2001 A task force assembled and led by Vice President
Dick
Cheney unveils a blueprint for the administration's energy program.
The report, "National Energy Policy," which had been in the works
since shortly after the inauguration, calls for increased drilling
for
oil and more nuclear power. The energy task force becomes an
immediate
focus of controversy - and lawsuits - because its records and the
list
of advisers, mainly representatives of the oil and gas industries,
are
never divulged by the White House. The administration's environmental
policy is heavily politicized from the outset.
Rick Piltz, senior associate, U.S. Climate Change Science
Program:
Christine Todd Whitman, the E.P.A. administrator, was one of several
people in the Cabinet, along with Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill,
who
strongly supported a proactive position on climate change. And she
was, I think, in Europe telling European governments that the U.S.
position was to regulate carbon dioxide. And when she got back home,
she had an interaction with the president in which she was very
brusquely told that that was off the table. The turning point,
essentially, was that Cheney grabbed hold of this issue and took down
the whole notion of regulating CO2.
May 24, 2001 Vermont senator Jim Jeffords, a Republican, changes
party, and control of the Senate shifts to the Democrats, making Tom
Daschle the Senate majority leader and testing the administration's
public face of bipartisanship.
David Kuo, deputy director of the White House Office of Faith-
Based and Community Initiatives: I went to a communications meeting
the day after Jeffords switched. I remember feeling like I was
looking
at people who had won a reality-game ticket to head up the White
House. There was this remarkable combination of hubris, excitement,
and staggering ignorance.
Someone made the suggestion that perhaps the president should
call
the new majority leader. And it's like, Well, I'm not sure that's
really necessary. Margaret Tutwiler [assistant to the president and
special adviser for communications] was there, and I remember her
sitting at the head of the table, her eyes just sort of wide, and she
sort of lost it. She's like, Are you fricking kidding me? She goes,
The president of the United States calls the new majority leader. The
president of the United States calls the new minority leader, right?
The president does these things because, you know, these things have
to be done.
And, you know, people around the table - Karl [Rove], Karen
[Hughes] - all these people were like, Oh, well, do we have to? It
was
like an absolutely serious debate.
Noelia Rodriguez, press secretary to Laura Bush: In the first
weeks after he took office, I was in those daily communications
meetings, and the conversation I remember one morning turned to, you
know, Tom Daschle was going to be coming to the White House - should
we allow him to come in the door of the West Wing entrance, while the
camera's on, or should he come in on the side, so that cameras won't
see him? And I'm thinking, You know, the president should go out
there
and greet him just like he would if he was coming to his own house -
which, by the way, it is. But they ended up having him come in on the
side.
Mark McKinnon, chief campaign media adviser to George W. Bush: My
view is that civility was a heartfelt, well-intended objective that
went right off the rails the day of the recount. The recount poisoned
the well from the beginning. A good number of people in this country
didn't believe Bush was a legitimate president. And you can't change
the tone under those circumstances. There was a genuine effort, and I
think there was some early success with Ted Kennedy and the education
stuff. But it was acrimonious from the beginning.
Matthew Dowd, Bush's pollster and chief strategist for the 2004
presidential campaign: There is a toxic nature to Washington that
thrives on food fights and thrives on controversy and thrives on
people not getting along. But I don't think that's the biggest part
of
the problem. It's like the old argument of: somebody's thrown in
jail,
and then they blame it on their environment. You've got to bear some
accountability, even in a bad environment, for having a strength of
will and a capacity to bring diverse opinion and not be bubbled in.
We
too easily say, Blame it on the Washington culture. Well, Washington
is made up of people. It's not like there's this, like - you know,
it's not like some Star Trek episode where some room made me do it.
Ari Fleischer Bush's first White House press secretary: After the
recount, the disputed election, a lot of people said you needed to
start to trim your sails: What are you going to cut back on as a way
to show outreach to the other party? The president rejected that line
of thinking, making the case that mandates are created by presidents
with ideas, and he was going to follow through on the ideas that he
ran on.
May 26, 2001 With big bipartisan majorities, Congress passes
Bush's $1.35 trillion package of tax cuts, the centerpiece of the
administration's economic program. The tax cuts are skewed heavily
toward the affluent. Those making $1 million a year receive an
average
tax cut of $53,000. Those making $20,000 a year receive an average
tax
cut of $375. A second round of tax cuts will be enacted in 2003. By
2004 the budget deficit will exceed $400 billion.
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