March 25, 2004

Hi Friends,

I've had this cold so long now I've decided to name it. Duke. My cold's name is Duke and I've grown quite accustomed to it - like a pet almost. Folks in Chicago got to meet Duke earlier this month. I was in town to play on Rich Warren's "Folkstage" on WFMT. It was a two-hour show in front of a studio audience. The second hour  was broadcast live on the radio. My voice only lasted for  15 minutes of the first set.  Then Duke took over. Like a pet. A big friendly Golden Retriever. The kind that just can't help jumping up on you when you walk in the room. For awhile we even played fetch. I'd throw the note out there and then Duke would bring it right back to me all covered with Golden Retriever slobber. I'd clean it off and toss it out again. All I know is Chicago folks must be among the nicest I've ever played for because despite all the tricks old Duke did for them (everything except roll over and play dead... ) they took me to their heart. Truth is I took a few of them to mine as well. Thanks to Rich for the wonderful opportunity.  Also Nancy Emrich, Toni , Hermetta, Mike and Pat Nolan  and Pamela Anderson. I hope to be back to visit real soon.

I hope you got to watch the Clarke testimony yesterday. I taped it myself and have gone through it this afternoon. It's pretty sobering stuff. Please, if you can, watch it for yourself. Whatever you do, don't take Fox's word for it. Below they've cut and pasted the  testimony  so that Clarke's answer to one question appears as if it were made in response to a completely DIFFERENT question!

From FOXNews :

"You've got a real credibility problem," John Lehman, former Navy secretary under President Reagan, told Clarke, calling the witness "an active partisan selling a book."

Clarke responded: "I don't think it's a question of morality at all, I think it's a question of politics."
 

Although it was awfully kind of the the bastion of fair and balanced reporting to shorthand the whole thing for us, Clarke's  answer was actually in response to the following exchange:

THOMPSON: Mr. Clarke, in this background briefing, as Senator Kerrey has now described it, for the press in August of 2002, you intended to mislead the press, did you not?

CLARKE: No. I think there is a very fine line that anyone who's been in the White House, in any administration, can tell you about. And that is when you are special assistant to the president and you're asked to explain something that is potentially embarrassing to the administration, because the administration didn't do enough or didn't do it in a timely manner and is taking political heat for it, as was the case there, you have a choice. Actually, I think you have three choices. You can resign rather than do it. I chose not to do that. Second choice is...


THOMPSON: Why was that, Mr. Clarke? You finally resigned because you were frustrated.

CLARKE: I was, at that time, at the request of the president, preparing a national strategy to defend America's cyberspace, something which I thought then and think now is vitally important. I thought that completing that strategy was a lot more important than whether or not I had to provide emphasis in one place or other while discussing the facts on this particular news story. The second choice one has, Governor, is whether or not to say things that are untruthful. And no one in the Bush White House asked me to say things that were untruthful, and I would not have said them. In any event, the third choice that one has is to put the best face you can for the administration on the facts as they were, and that is what I did. I think that is what most people in the White House in any administration do when they're asked to explain something that is embarrassing to the administration.

THOMPSON: But you will admit that what you said in August of 2002 is inconsistent with what you say in your book?

CLARKE: No, I don't think it's inconsistent at all. I think, as I said in your last round of questioning, Governor, that it's really a matter here of emphasis and tone. I mean, what you're suggesting, perhaps, is that as special assistant to the president of the United States when asked to give a press backgrounder I should spend my time in that press backgrounder criticizing him. I think that's somewhat of an unrealistic thing to expect.

THOMPSON: Well, what it suggests to me is that there is one standard of candor and morality for White House special assistants and another standard of candor and morality for the rest of America. I don't get that.

CLARKE: I don't think it's a question of morality at all. I think it's a question of politics.

Fox is truly  to journalism what professional wrestling is to sport.  Watch out for the Atomic Pile Driver!

Peace,

John   



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