1. Here, I think the message is much more important than the messengers. I believe him too. What mystifies me is that after four years, and with the "new way forward" not working, when is our President going to honor the wishes of 70% of America and leave Iraq.

Phil at 12:18PM on Apr 30th 2007

2. 500.00 PHIL.

steve england at 3:06PM on Apr 30th 2007

3. It just goes to show you it is best to clean house occasionally.

Rather than allowing this Clinton hold-over to keep slurping at the public trough, Bush should have canned Tenet and his crowd on his (Bush's) first day in office. It is no surprise that Mr. Tenet (a Democrat appointee) is now trying to cover his own backside by trashing the Republican who did not appoint him.

It is also not surprising how Democrats have long chanted that in order to have a more broad view of the world, that Bush should appoint more Democrats to serve in his administration.

In any case, it is worth noting that since much of the information that CIA types use in covering their collective derrieres is classified, nobody can tell if they are lying or not.

In fifty years, the freedom of information act will de-classify the documents on which Tenet is making his claim of innocence (and indeed martyrdom), but by then he and those who actually paid money to buy his book, and spent time reading it will either be spent forces or dead.

Ken Berg at 5:29PM on Apr 30th 2007

4. Ken Berg,

I think you're right to question Tenet for two reasons:

1) He's clearly a drama queen. Watching him over-emote on camera is agonizing.

2) Bush gave him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the government's highest civilian award. Bush wanted Harriet Miers in the Supreme Court, so Tenet was probably a secret slave trader or something.

lil_turk at 6:33PM on Apr 30th 2007

5. Ken Berg,

I think you're right to question Tenet for two reasons:

1) He's clearly a drama queen. Watching him over-emote on camera is agonizing.

2) Bush gave him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the government's highest civilian award. Bush wanted Harriet Miers in the Supreme Court, so Tenet was probably a secret slave trader or something.

lil_turk at 6:33PM on Apr 30th 2007

6. Ken,

It amazes me why you dislike Clinton so much or so wish to drag him through the mud.

Sadaqat at 10:46PM on Apr 30th 2007

7. It's hard for me to understand the spell the Bush Administration puts people under. During his confirmation hearings, Gates seemed to be a rationalist, who honestly assessed Iraq and admitted it wasn't going well. But we got another story later. A Bush-Satan tainted story. How did it happen? What words did they use? Were there tasty carrots interspersed with big sticks?

I can, however, understand the delusion under which George Tenet operates. I do believe that Cenk was right, and that Tenet telegraphed his number from a mile away. Tenet seems to live in a rarified world where powerful people watch each others' backs. It doesn't take too much imagination to think of it as one big cocktail party with favors being passed out with martinis. Ah, so very many "men of honor" with so much power. What could go wrong?

Well, it's as obvious as security kittens with glasses. He was not dealing with men of honor. He wasn't even dealing with the usual men in power whose honor comes and goes with profits and passion. This was an entirely new kind of cowboy, with a totally different set of values. And they just bent him over and he took it.

But that isn't why I despise Tenet. Sure, he's a fool, but so many of us are. I hate him because he's an elitist. He's profoundly wounded by the back-stabbing he got from men he assumed had honor, but can't be bothered to spare a moment to think about the people he should have honored.

American troops. The Iraqi people. Hardworking Americans.

I hope he chokes on that medal.

Ammie at 12:03AM on May 1st 2007

8. Ken Berg,

In "A Personal Disappointment" the 10th comment (by BT) refutes your nonsense claim that Republican "politics stops at the water." Are you conceding that you're wrong, or just avoiding the conversation the way you avoided the one about the obvious correlation between science and secularity?

Man, what does it take for an (R) to admit he's wrong once in a while? Everyone is, but even when (R)'s are, they aren't!

Keep the faith,

lil_turk at 2:04AM on May 1st 2007

9. Your question as to why Tenent would have made a 'Jackass' out of himself is, unfortunately, a tautology.
I watched his performance, as well, and was beyond dismayed. It is apparent, as most agree, that despite the fact that he has a teaching position at 'George Washington' and despite the fact that he headed the CIA, he's sorely lacking in cognitive functionality. Perhaps, it occurs to me, that that's precisely the qualification that Bush's people had in mind when they continued his appointment into their administration. After all, if anything went wrong, as it did, then it was, once again, Clinton's fault.

drbehavior at 3:01AM on May 1st 2007

10. FYi Sadaqat - In fact I did sort of like president Clinton. I like his personal charm and style, and I think that - scandal aside - on balance he did a reasonable job. The economy was decent, we basically won in Kosovo, Clinton did enact reasonable welfare reform from which we still benefit, and the 90's were generally good times. While his scadal was great, I always sympathized with Clinton for bearing up under the cross otherwise known as his wife.

That having been said, Bill Clinton - like George Bush - made mistakes. Pointing them out does not mean I hate the man. In any case, I do not think I have spent much time pointing out Bill Clinton's mistakes.

Because I think Bush should have canned Tenet, who was in fact appointed by Clinton, does not mean I dislike president Clinton. I certainly have never dragged his name through the mud.

Where do you come up with this sort of thing?

Oh an lil turk, I stand by my recollection of the war in Kosovo. The reaction of Republicans and the media to that war was very, very different (i.e., it was less negative and was at a lower volume) than the reaction of Democrats and the media this war.

Ken Berg at 11:47AM on May 1st 2007

11. Ken Berg,

So, in other words, you didn't actually read the quotes provided you or the statement you made that engendered them? Standard Ken Berg. So sad. Still can't figure out that politics have never stopped at the water's edge and scientists are super-secular.

lil_turk at 6:12PM on May 1st 2007

12. Regarding Mr. Tenet and his book, I like how Christopher Hitchens put it:

http://www.slate.com/id/2165269/nav/tap1/

Ken Berg at 7:37PM on May 1st 2007

13. At http://davidcorn.com/ you'll hear a great take on Tenet.

lil_turk at 8:57PM on May 1st 2007

14. TYT,
I think you are dead wrong about Tenet, he's not stupid, he's just playing the game. He emphatically states that he warned Rice about 9/11. When the reporter asked him why he didn't just tell the president himself(he meets with him every day) his response was classic That's not the way it's done! Think about that what would you have done in that situation? The only real reason not to "tell the President" is plausable deniability. Nobody told the boss, so the boss is protected, medals and promotions all around.
Notice the "fake" outrage over the Plame case. If he was that angry why didn't he go public then. When accusations concerning her "covert" status were raised why didn't he end the speculation with a little press conference? He let them hang her and know complains when it doesn't matter? What kind of loyalty or honer is that. Where was he in the last election when Tora Bora was an issue?
Accepting medals after his failure on 9/11, writing books to make a profit. Everyone wondered why Bush didn't replace him. Because Tenet's real loyalty is to the almighty dollar. Integrity like that is hard to come by. Everybody in that administration is or was on the take, even Colin Powell (it was just uncovered that he was given a Jag by the price of Saudi Arabia).
People of true character cannot turn a blind eye to the deaths of innocent civilians both here and abroad. The deaths of tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis and thousands of our troops lie at the feet of this man. He has no shame, because his God (money) has no honor.

fell76 at 6:57AM on May 2nd 2007

15. For those who find following links as tedious as I do, here is part of Hitchens' article "Tenet's Disgraceful Book", from Slate:
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"...In his latest effusion, he writes: "I do know one thing in my gut. Al-Qaeda is here and waiting." Well, we all know that much by now. But Tenet is one of the few who knew it then, and not just in his "gut" but in his small brain, and who left us all under open skies. His ridiculous agency, supposedly committed to "HUMINT" [human intelligence] under his leadership, could not even do what John Walker Lindh had done—namely, infiltrate the Taliban and the Bin Laden circle. It's for this reason that the CIA now has to rely on torturing the few suspects it can catch, a policy, incidentally, that Tenet's book warmly defends.

So, the only really interesting question is why the president did not fire this vain and useless person on the very first day of the war...."
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I could not have said it better myself!

: )

Ken Berg at 10:27AM on May 2nd 2007