"As a known liar and murderer of hundreds of thousands, let me just say, Obama is the nuts."
- tom moody 10-19-2008 5:29 pm

powell has much to answer for but he did america a solid today, yo.

mccain got the crucial al haig endorsement so all is not lost.
- dave 10-19-2008 5:39 pm

- dave 10-19-2008 11:31 pm

"I like to drive muscle cars with Ted Koppel. How did I get there? Saying we had 'the army has the support of the Vietnamese' after My Lai, turkey shooting Iraqis for Bush 1, lying about WMD for Bush 2. As a get along, go along guy, I say, 'go along with Obama.'"
- tom moody 10-20-2008 1:03 am

David Sirota says it well:

what's far more intriguing - and potentially troubling - is what Obama's own embrace of Powell means in terms of policy. Obama used his own opposition to the war - the war that Colin Powell helped start - as a contrast point in the Democratic primary and in the general election. He is campaigning on a promise to end the war. What does Powell's endorsement of Obama say about those promises? According to newspapers this morning, it may actually say a lot.
The Associated Press reports that "Powell will have a role as a top presidential adviser in an Obama administration, the Democratic White House hopeful said Monday." Obama told NBC News Powell will "have a role as one of my advisers" and held out the possibility of a formal White House or Cabinet role. He also asked Powell to publicly campaign with him.

For the millions of Americans supporting Obama because of his opposition to the war, this is disconcerting, to say the least.

As CNN reported yesterday, Powell remains totally unrepentant both about his own critical role pushing us to war. For instance, he claims to have tried to stop the war, five years after giving the single most important (and discredited) speech in building the public case for war. He now claims he wants to see the war end, but it's difficult to trust the integrity of a man who denies even the most basic facts of his public involvement in creating the crisis in the first place. That Obama now seems to reflexively trust Powell suggests not foreign policy prudence from the Democratic nominee, but knee-jerk ignorance - and worse, a potential to abdicate the very antiwar themes he's run on for so long.

Clearly, Powell is in this for Powell. He sees that McCain is losing, he'd like to be relevant once again, and so he's glomming onto the Obama candidacy. And it's obvious that what's pushing Obama closer to Powell is the Establishment noise machine. Though polls show the public seeing Powell as superficially positive, there is no evidence he commands any serious grassroots following at all. That said, he is revered among professional pundits, reporters and politicians for his supposed Seriousness and Respectability (whatever that means). Indeed, the Wall Street Journal today has a good rundown of how the commentariat is celebrating Powell's foreign policy "credibility" and writing Powell's humiliating behavior out of history. Even worse, Democratic politicians are claiming - without evidence, of course - that Powell has some huge following in battleground states.

As a journalist, it sickens me that our power-worshiping press corps refuses to report the basic facts of Powell's record (though I give CNN's John Roberts credit - he made this point explicitly this morning). Really - once the Establishment graces a figure with the aura of "credibility," is there anything that figure can do (say, lead us into a war based on lies) to have that "credibility" revoked?

That said, as a progressive, I don't fault Obama for trying to capitalize on those fabricated memes about Powell, and use them in the context of the campaign. He's got 15 days until the election, and any short-term boost is a good thing.

What I worry about is the day after the election. I am concerned about a President Obama internalizing that Establishment fantasy about Colin Powell the Serious and Credible Voice - and ignoring the actual fact-based story about Colin Powell, the Most Discredited Foreign Policy Voice In Contemporary American History. We don't need another president who refuses to live in the "reality-based world" - we need a president who matches his campaign promises on critical issues like the Iraq War with an understanding of which voices will be the most reliable in making those promises a reality.

ill counter with juan cole although ill add that when he continued to shield himself by blaming the prewar intelligence came across as completely inauthentic.


- dave 10-20-2008 9:02 pm

I was surprised that Cole forgave Powell.
This is beyond getting Obama elected. Obama wants to put the hacktastic Powell in his administration!
- tom moody 10-21-2008 1:44 pm

but 1st hes got to get elected. and there are always concessions and major compromises in the promise of bipartisan government.
- bill 10-21-2008 2:59 pm

Powell didn't compromise, he capitulated.
- tom moody 10-21-2008 4:09 pm

im saying we would have to compromise to consider accepting him in an obama administration. even compromise to appreciate the endorsement. that bipartisanship involves compromise.
- bill 10-21-2008 4:12 pm

colin is admired within the military. if he can be coerced into capitulating to a progressive administration, he could be useful.
- mark 10-22-2008 5:58 am

the digby take.
- bill 10-22-2008 12:30 pm