For writing a memoir that is essentially one big steaming pile of dishonesty:
Rumsfeld's memoir isone big clean-up job, a brazen effort to shift blame to others -- includingPresident Bush -- distort history, ignore the record or simply avoid discussingmatters that cannot be airbrushed away. It is a travesty, and I think therewrite job won't wash.
The Iraq War isessential to the understanding of the Bush presidency and the Rumsfeld era atthe Pentagon. In the book, Rumsfeld tries to push so much off on Bush. That isfair because Bush made the ultimate decisions. But the record shows that it wasRumsfeld stoking the Iraq fires -- facts he has completely left out of hismemoir.
*****
When all the records are available, the othermemoirs written and the history complete, this failure to accept responsibilitywill likely be his legacy.
Woodward has his own failings -- he too often trusts his sources unthinkingly, his analysis is often lacking, or non-existent, and he rarely connects the dots in any satisfactory way -- but he is undeniably a well-respected and generally non-partisan reporter of the historical record. There is still much blame to go around -- Cheney deserves his fair share, too, along with the various other warmongers in and around Bush's bubble, as well as those pushing for war generally -- but clearly Rumsfeld was a key architect of the disaster that was (and to a certain extent still is) the Iraq War and Woodward should be applauded for holding him to account.
One just wonders if this isn't part of some anti-Rumsfeld smear campaign conducted by those on the right -- those in or around Bush's bubble -- who see him as an easy scapegoat, a convenient fall guy for all that went wrong. You wouldn't think it could be Rumsfeld's pal Cheney, but what about someone else?
Okay, maybe not. Maybe Woodward just had to respond to Rumsfeld's blatant dishonesty? Maybe. (It is, after all, at the estimable Tom Ricks's blog.)
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