Amateurs and Zealots
By Richard Cohen
Thursday, September 11, 2003;
Page A23
"Never explain, never complain," Henry Ford II said after
wrecking a car that was not a Ford, accompanied by a lovely woman
who was not his wife. This mantra, not original with Ford and always
handy, could be the motto of the Bush administration. It has veered
from one policy to another, changed direction on a dime, said one
thing and done another -- all without complaining or
explaining.
Particularly on foreign policy, George Bush has been all
over the place. During the presidential campaign, he denigrated
nation-building -- he would do no such thing. Now we are up to our
eyeballs in building a nation in Iraq, where, it could be argued,
there never was one to begin with. The gun, not the ballot box, is
what held that nation together.
Bush and company disparaged the United Nations. Now we seek
its imprimatur for the occupation of Iraq. The administration told
our European allies -- the "Old" Europe of Don Rumsfeld's scorn --
to kiss off. Now we'd like their troops and money for the effort in
Iraq. Rumsfeld, in fact, became the face of a new, pugnacious
diplomacy -- our way or the highway -- which now has been muted. The
administration has gone from Jerry Springer to Dale Carnegie in a
wink -- from in-your-face to kissy-poo, just like that.
Pragmatism and politics go hand in hand. FDR championed a
balanced budget; so did Ronald Reagan -- and they both took the
government into debt. Bill Clinton personified big government and
then pronounced the era of big government over. Papa Bush asked us
to read his lips, no new taxes, and then hiked them. Presidents,
like parents, lovers and pension managers, sometimes break
promises.
But Bush is a different kind of president because he is a
different kind of man. No one, for instance, questioned Clinton's
intelligence or his knowledge. Bush, though, was widely viewed as
slight, particularly unschooled in foreign affairs, where, above
all, he was incurious, unquestioning and -- as we have learned --
unprepared. Always, though, he was certain.
That certainty was certainly misplaced. Bush's foreign
policy is a shambles -- a war against the wrong enemy (Iraq and not
worldwide terrorism), for the wrong reasons (where are those weapons
of mass destruction?), a debacle in postwar Iraq (who are those
terrorists?), a Middle Eastern road map to nowhere (wasn't Iraq
going to make it all so easy?) and a string of statements about
nearly everything (the cost of rebuilding Iraq, for instance) that
have proved either untrue or just plain dumb. To make matters worse,
truth-tellers have been punished while liars and fog merchants have
remained in office.
Who in the administration paid a price for having the
president tell the nation about nonexistent yellowcake uranium? No
one. Who got whacked for preposterous manpower numbers for the
occupation of Iraq? Funny you should ask. The guy who told the
truth, Gen. Eric Shinseki. Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz remain. In the
Pentagon, the truth will really make you free.
For Bush, the danger is that this sorry record will revive
the cartoon persona of a dummy -- not the steady custodian of our
national security, as he seemed in the aftermath of Sept. 11, but a
man without judgment, a naif who was manipulated by a cadre of
hawks. For the rest of us, the danger is that the caricature was
spot on, so obvious it was disregarded.
America is not a particularly ideological country. We
simply like the job done, and pragmatism is generally admired. But
foreign affairs is not Tom Edison's laboratory -- if this won't
work, maybe that will -- but an area where lives are lost and
nations suffer. It is not a field for amateurs or zealots -- and the
Bush administration is proving itself to have a surplus of
both.
George Bush won last time out because Al Gore lost. He won
at a time when the world seemed safe, when it was unimaginable that
the World Trade Center would become a hole in the ground. He won
because he seemed the more genuine man, an aw-shucks guy who we
could take a chance on. We took the chance.
But these recent changes in course -- the dash to the U.N.,
the revised costs of rebuilding Iraq -- may represent Bush's last
chance. In diplomacy, in foreign affairs, in the waging of war and
maybe in protecting America, he has made mistake after mistake. Like
Henry Ford II, he may never complain and he may never explain. But
when you look back, there's still a wreck in the road.
cohenr@washpost.com
© 2003 The Washington Post
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