Zogby: Obama / Powell a Winner!
Today, Zogby International released a poll indicating that of all potential VP picks for Barack Obama, Powell is clearly the selection of choice. But given that he was a willing enabler of the Bush administration’s policies for over four years, isn’t that enough to disqualify him from consideration?
There are some things that I just don’t understand. In 2003, then-Secretary of State Colin Powell went before the U.N., and basically lied his ass off in making the Bush administration’s case for a preemptive invasion of a sovereign nation. Later, he claimed he was duped (or at least words to that effect) by George Tenet and others in the administration.
But he never bucked the Bush administration, in particular, Cheney and Rumsfeld. He’s never come completely clean on his own role in the Iraq fiasco. And while some may see him as a sympathetic figure whose opinions were constantly overridden by the sycophants around the real architects of the war in Iraq, there are many more of us who feel that he’s just as complicit - or possibly more so, because he didn’t publicly ring the alarm bells - in the quagmire that followed.
Today, Zogby International released a poll indicating that of all potential VP picks for Barack Obama, Powell is clearly the selection of choice:
I swear, I don’t understand it. I clearly recall watching Powell’s speech to the United Nations, and saying to myself that a first year law student could pick apart his circumstantial case. Yet no one called him on it in either in the media or the U.N. itself.
If nothing else, Powell was a significant, willing enabler of the Bush administration’s policies for over four years. Isn’t that enough, in and of itself, to disqualify him from consideration as Obama’s VP?
I really doubt the accuracy of that poll, 42% of Democrats back Powell — really? Maybe the 42% of Republicans pretending to be Democrats back Powell as Obama’s VP pick.
Zogby’s still not accounted for crappy the polling his org did in 2004… he offered the same half-assed excuses as the other pollsters … people lied to the exit pollsters and skewed the result…
I’ll bet this poll is another attempt at “shaping the narrative”, and an attempt by the PTB to push one of their “acceptable choices” on the rubes.
And no Richard, I don’t believe much of what the “regular sources” put out any more… they’ve been proven time and again to be pushing pure crap.
I think a lot of persons have a lot of respect of Colin Powell because of the entirety of his career and because they believe, as I believe, that he was bamboozled as were most of the rest of the American citizenry in the run-up to the war.
The deal breaker for me is that he was involved in planning the “extreme interrogation techniques.” But a lot of folks have no doubt missed that.
I suspect that would also be the deal-breaker for any veep nomination.
Frank, if you take a look at the entirety of his career you will find that he’s been carrying water for the higher ups since his involvement in the Mai Lai massacre coverup. He proved himself useful and was promoted up accordingly.
The public never gets a complete picture, just the parts that play well on TV… and the “unfortunate bits” from the past are never talked about….
for more of this see McCain, John: pilot extraordinaire.
Perhaps. Nevertheless, Powell’s public image is pretty much unassailable, however you or I might view his career, and I don’t quite share your cynicism.
It is the job of military officers to carry water for their superiors.
Let me tell you why I say that.
I used to work for a Colonel, USA, Ret., an honorable man and an okay (but not a great) boss.
He told me that one of the lessons the army teaches you is when to fight for your position and when to stop fighting–and the latter point is the point at which your superior officer makes the decision; furthermore, he told me that you make that fight in private and do not show conflict in the chain of command to the troops in public.
I’m not saying that’s a valid position, but that it is part of the military culture. And I think it helps account for the failure of so many officers to protest the situation in Iraq. The decision was made in spring 2001.
Now, you and I might argue that they should have resigned. On the other hand, the subservience of the military to civilian authority is deeply ingrained in the US military–and that’s by and large a good thing: the danger of a military coup pretty miuch doesn’t exist here.
At the same time, it’s a good thing so long as the civilian authority has at least a shred of decency and good sense. Right now, it doesn’t.
Anyhoo, General Powell’s direct, personal involvement in torture is still the deal breaker for me.
The fact that the media didn’t call Powell on it means citizens won’t, Richard. That’s who was polled here. Citizens. Stupid citizens, but citizens all the same.
There’s nothing in this article that indicates Obama is considering Powell.