Comments on: The Wrong End?

By: Timothy Burke

Timothy Burke — Thu, 15 May 2008 13:21:27 +0000

I think part of this is trying to figure out which piece of the solution belongs to either the federal or state governments. I’m wary of letting them dictate too much, but there’s a role for them to set and enforce standards.

By: hestal

hestal — Thu, 15 May 2008 03:18:32 +0000

Your article asks many questions and raises many issues. Many problems have been identified, and they seem to be hopeless. As I read your questions one question of my own kept bubbling up, “Who, if anyone, is responsible for solving all these problems?” Are we waiting for that task to be assigned? If so, whose duty is it to make the assignment? If not so, what are we waiting for — a volunteer?

By: Carl

Carl — Wed, 14 May 2008 19:25:48 +0000

They don’t think they made mistakes. They’d do the same things again. And insofar as they did questionable things, they were driven to it by the actions of bad others.

And the questioners are sitting pretty in the liberties thus protected.

They say this stuff plainly enough. The problem is that we don’t believe them.

By: Timothy Burke

Timothy Burke — Wed, 14 May 2008 17:53:43 +0000

So depressing. Really, this IS the issue for me about Iraq. It’s not the war, it’s taking responsibility for mistakes. Cowboy up, guys.

By: Doug

Doug — Wed, 14 May 2008 17:09:29 +0000

Off topic: Philippe Sands in conversation with Bill Moyers, "If people like Doug Feith and Jim Haynes had said to me, "Look, Philippe. September the 11th came. The anniversary was coming. We were getting information that there were going to be more attacks. We had people that we were told had information that we need to do something about. And we therefore felt, in those circumstances, it was right to use all means appropriate and necessarily to get the information. But, with the benefit of hindsight, we realize we fell into error, we made a mistake. We accept responsibility for that. We will learn from those mistakes. We'll make damn sure it doesn't happen again." I didn't get that at all. There was not a hint of recognition that anything had gone wrong, nor a hint of recognition of individual responsibility. When you read these chapters, when you read my account with Doug Feith and with others, you will see the sort of weaseling out of individual responsibility, the total and abject failure to accept involvement. Read Mr. Feith's book. on how to fight the so-called war on terror. And it's as though the man had no involvement in the decisions relating to interrogation of detainees. And yet, as I describe in the book, the man was deeply involved in the decision making from step one. So it's about individual responsibility. And there's been an abject failure on that account." From Delong. Not much chance of that truth and reconciliation commission any time soon. Ok, sorry for the blogus interruptus.