Bush Admits Mistakes

[Gravitymaster 0]

Bush Admits Mistakes, Apologizes


(2004-04-14) -- In response to increasing pressure from White House reporters and Democrats, President George Bush today released a written statement admitting he has "made mistakes" and apologizing to the American people and the people of Iraq.

During last night's nationally-televised presidential news conference, Mr. Bush said he was unprepared for questions about his mistakes in office. He steadfastly refused to apologize for the 9/11 terror attacks, instead he again advanced the now-discredited theory that terrorists, not U.S. government officials, were to blame for the terrorism.

However, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said that "after much soul searching" last night, the president wrote the following confession and apology:



"I have made mistakes during my time in the White House. I frittered away months trying to convince the United Nations that it should free the Iraqi people from a brutal dictator who never fulfilled the terms of surrender from the Gulf War and who continued to fire upon Coalition aircraft patrolling the no-fly zone.

It was an error in judgment to think that the U.N. Security Council would ever do anything more than talk in moralistic platitudes. My desire to build an international coalition from nations like France and Germany only served to delay the inevitable liberation of Iraq. I apologize to the people of Iraq and others in the Arab world, yearning to breathe free, who have placed their hopes in the only superpower that has the will and the way to set them free.

This confession is good for the soul, so I would also like to admit that it was a mistake for me to keep Bill Clinton's counter-terrorism chief on my staff. I know now that Richard Clarke's presence in the White House was a knife hovering behind the shoulder blades of not only my staff, but of the American people who would later be betrayed by Mr. Clarke's desire for self-aggrandizement. I'm sorry for that.

I'd also like to admit that it was a mistake to think that I could make friends with the Democrats by pouring funding into their top political agency, the National Education Association, or by creating a huge new medicare prescription drug entitlement. I can see now that no matter how often and how much you feed an alligator, he's always looking past the food in your hand and hankering for your arm, your heart, your head. My mistake...and I'm truly sorry.

One last thing: In hindsight, it appears that I was premature in declaring an end to major combat operations in Iraq. I thought we had toppled the dictator. But as long as vermin like al-Sadr seek to glorify themselves, using false religion to oppress the people, the dictator lives on. He lives on in the hearts of the radical clerics who killed and then mutilated the bodies of Americans as surely as if their own hands were stained black from the charred flesh. I'm sorry that my statement caused some to believe that the war in Iraq had ended. It has continued for more than a decade and will not end until evil men like al-Sadr are purged and the cowl of fear is lifted from the face of the Iraqi people."

[quade 4]

Hey, if he said that -- I'd accept it. Too bad it's only satire.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[Gravitymaster 0]

Quote

Hey, if he said that -- I'd accept it. Too bad it's only satire.

I posted that for you Quade

[Gawain 0]

Dude you scared me for a minute...

So I try and I scream and I beg and I sigh
Just to prove I'm alive, and it's alright
'Cause tonight there's a way I'll make light of my treacherous life
Make light!

[quade 4]

I was pretty sure you had, but didn't want to assume.

Anyway, seriously, I'd accept a statement like that from The White House.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[Gravitymaster 0]

Quote

I was pretty sure you had, but didn't want to assume.

Anyway, seriously, I'd accept a statement like that from The White House.

I'm sure you would. Ain't gonna happen.

[TheAnvil 0]

For you quade :

Apologize for what?
Cal Thomas

April 14, 2004

Can anyone imagine reporters during World War II asking President Franklin Roosevelt if he'd like to apologize for the number of American dead and wounded, or Harry Truman if he'd like to repent for dropping bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which forced Japan to surrender? Those were different times - when "psycho" meant you were crazy and "babble" meant you didn't make any sense.

Both psycho and babble were on display at President Bush's news conference Tuesday night (April 13). Four times, by my count, reporters tried to get the president to admit he had done something wrong. What they really wanted was a huge headline: "President Admits Fault for 9/11" or, even better (from their perspective), "President Admits Mistakes in Iraq War."

Frustrated by their inability to pry such words from the president, Don Gonyea from National Public Radio tried another tactic. Rather than asking a question, Gonyea made an accusation. He charged Bush with being a failure as a communicator because he uses the "same phrases" a lot and his speeches "don't vary from one to the next" and maybe that's a major reason "for your falling support." Reporters' questions don't vary a lot, either. If you didn't know the guy was from NPR, you might have guessed from the tone and ideology behind his question that he works for Al-Jazeera or the John Kerry campaign.

The question may have produced the best and most persuasive response of the evening. The president said he doesn't make decisions based on polls and that he hopes "I have communicated my convictions." He added that people should know by now that "when I say something, I mean it."

Why should this president apologize for toppling a murderous dictator responsible for the deaths of perhaps more than 1 million people and the rape and torture of unknown thousands of others? Why should Bush admit mistakes when he didn't start the war? That dubious honor goes to the likes of Saddam Hussein, Yasser Arafat, Osama bin Laden and terror-spawning groups named Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Why should Bush take responsibility for an intelligence apparatus that was dysfunctional when he inherited it less than seven months earlier and, by law, was designed to continue misfunctioning until disaster struck?

An apology isn't necessary because Americans are not the ones blowing themselves up and trying to take others with them. Americans don't seek territorial gains. Americans are not depriving others of humanity's most basic right - freedom. If any apologies are due, they should come from the warmongering religious fascists who fear freedom and pervert the name of God. If a mistake has been made, it is by the insurgents and terrorists who believe that the United States learned nothing from Vietnam and Mogadishu. The Bush administration knows we can't afford a replay of those conflicts.

From the comfort of the East Room and the security of their mostly high salaries and many privileges, these pampered and in many cases egotistical reporters throw around words like "quagmire" and wonder if the president accepts any "personal responsibility" for 9/11. Bush declined to enter their trap.

No wonder this president doesn't like prime-time news conferences. They are not used by reporters to transmit information to the public. Rather, they serve as fronts for the Kerry campaign (most journalists vote for Democrats in case you didn't know), and they are used as a platform for reporters to preen and pretend they are doing the people's business.

Reporters haven't asked Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry to apologize or admit error for any of his votes in the Senate. I guess he doesn't have to because on this war, as well as so many other issues, he voted on both sides, so he can claim he was right at least once.

The presidential news conference is necessary so the public can see and hear George Bush, unfiltered by some of these same sound-bite journalists who care more about how they look than about what the president says. But it is frustrating - to the public as well as the president - that in serious times too many in the media continue to play "gotcha" games.

©2004 Tribune Media Services

Vinny the Anvil
Post Traumatic Didn't Make The Lakers Syndrome is REAL
JACKASS POWER!!!!!!

[pajarito 0]

What a great article...so true.