Pumping Up the Anxiety

So was this an example of top-level people not knowing what lower-level people were doing? Or was it active deception? Could it be that the White House was more intent on seeing the Kurds and an oil company rewarded than it was on encouraging Iraqi unification -- or on telling the public the truth?

James Glanz and Richard A. Oppel Jr. write in the New York Times about how this is anything but an academic question: "The release of the documents comes as the administration is defending help that United States officials provided in drawing up a separate set of no-bid contracts, still pending, between Iraq's Oil Ministry in Baghdad and five major Western oil companies to provide services at other Iraqi oil fields."

From Waxman's letter to Rice: "You and other Administration officials have denied playing any role in these contracts. In the case of Hunt Oil, however, similar denials appear to have been misleading."

Agreement in Doubt

Alissa J. Rubin writes in the New York Times: "Declaring that there will not be 'another colonization of Iraq,' Iraq's foreign minister raised the possibility on Wednesday that a full security agreement with the United States might not be reached this year, and that if one was, it would be a short-term pact.

"American officials, speaking anonymously because of the delicate state of negotiations, said they were no longer optimistic that a complete security agreement could be reached by the year's end."

Torture Watch

There has been less of a reaction than I expected to Scott Shane's shocking report in the New York Times yesterday that a chart used by trainers at Guantanamo Bay was copied verbatim from a 1957 Air Force study of Chinese Communist techniques used during the Korean War to obtain confessions from American prisoners.

The Tacoma (Wash.) News Tribune editorial board writes: "In effect, interrogators at Guantanamo were being taught to use precisely the same methods as the Chinese communists did during the Korean War -- to extort false confessions. The Chinese employed these techniques primarily to turn American POWs into propaganda tools. After being subjected to cold or sleeplessness or muscle cramping long enough, most human beings will sign anything just to end their torment.

"The Chinese didn't invent these techniques. They were perfected by the NKVD -- the predecessor of the KGB -- in the Soviet Union after the Russian Revolution. The NKVD turned torture and the coercion of confessions into a fine art; it mass-produced hundreds of thousands of 'enemies of the state' who had done nothing worse than, say, travel abroad or fall into the cross-hairs of a malicious secret accuser.

"The Gestapo as well as the Chinese communists studied the NKVD's practices closely. And somehow -- with the benefit of historical amnesia, rationalization and skewed moral compasses -- people at high levels of the Bush administration came to view some of these methods of coercion as perfectly legal.

"There is something worse than losing to your enemy: It is becoming your enemy."

The Roanoke (Va.) Times editorial board writes: "A White House in the habit of shutting out unpleasant truths remains blind to this one: People being tortured eventually will say anything, true or not, to stop the torture.

"Proponents would hang the nation's security on that thin thread, and betray all that it is supposed to mean to be American."

Andrew Sullivan blogs: "Nothing more accurately exposes the classic moral error of the Bush administration and its enablers in war crimes. If the enemy tortures, it defines their moral evil and all intelligence gleaned from such coercion is self-evidently false propaganda. If we do it, it isn't wrong, and it leads to good intelligence.

"Got that? And these people have the gall to describe their ideological opponents as moral relativists."

Jay Bookman writes in his Atlanta Journal and Constitution opinion column: "The narrative that is emerging suggests that to [top Bush officials], torture was not something they felt forced to do, but rather something they wanted to do against those they blamed for Sept. 11. And while an instinct for such vengeance may be natural, it is an instinct that civilized nations refuse to sanction."

Torture Watch, Cont'd.

The Miami Herald editorial board looks back to last week's testimony by two chief architects of the administration's torture policies, vice presidential chief of staff David S. Addington and former Justice Department official John Yoo and concludes: "This is why Congress must keep asking questions about the origin of torture policies, until it gets real answers."

Josh Getlin writes in the Los Angeles Times: "The photos of Iraqi prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib shocked millions when they were leaked to the media in 2004. But have they sparked meaningful changes in U.S. policy, and did they fundamentally alter the nation's political landscape?

"For Philip Gourevitch, the answers are discouraging. And as he fielded a reader's question this week about the U.S. response to the scandal, the writer who set out to document and explain it in his new book, ' Standard Operating Procedure,' seemed momentarily stumped.

"'I don't have a great answer for you,' he said after a brief pause. 'I actually think that people don't mind torture that much. I don't think there's a great public hue and cry over this, I haven't seen it. There's a general feeling that it's all right.' . . .

"Gourevitch displays an indignation -- and disappointment -- that are unmistakable.

"'As a population we haven't been entirely helpless, but we have been acquiescent,' he said. When the grotesque photos of Iraqi prisoners were first revealed, 'we learned this policy came from the very top [the White House], and the top has to be accountable. But that's not what happened. Somewhere along the way we lost some sense of purpose. We were upset but it wasn't clear what you were supposed to do with these feelings and as a result we tuned it out.'"

The Next Surge?

Ben Feller writes for the Associated Press: "Grappling with a record death toll in an overshadowed war, President Bush promised Wednesday to send more U.S. troops into Afghanistan by year's end. He conceded that June was a 'tough month' in the nearly seven-year-old war. . . .

"'We're going to increase troops by 2009,' Bush said, without offering details about exactly when or how many."

But again, then came Mullen with a reality check.

Josh White writes in The Washington Post: "The nation's top military officer said yesterday that more U.S. troops are needed in Afghanistan to tamp down an increasingly violent insurgency, but that the Pentagon does not have sufficient forces to send because they are committed to the war in Iraq. . . .

"'I don't have troops I can reach for, brigades I can reach, to send into Afghanistan until I have a reduced requirement in Iraq,' Mullen told reporters at the Pentagon."

FISA Watch

Eric Lichtblau writes in the New York Times: "A federal judge in California said Wednesday that the wiretapping law established by Congress was the 'exclusive' means for the president to eavesdrop on Americans, and he rejected the government's claim that the president's constitutional authority as commander in chief trumped that law.

"The judge, Vaughn R. Walker, the chief judge for the Northern District of California, made his findings in a Northern District of California ruling on a lawsuit brought by an Oregon charity. The group says it has evidence of an illegal wiretap used against it by the National Security Agency under the secret surveillance program established by President Bush after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001."

But as Bob Egelko writes in the San Francisco Chronicle, Walker actually dismissed the lawsuit, because a key document "remains a government secret and can't be used to prove that the onetime charity was affected by the surveillance program."

Transition Watch

Yochi J. Dreazen and Siobhan Gorman write in the Wall Street Journal: "The Bush administration and the two major presidential campaigns are beginning an unprecedented attempt to prevent the transfer of power in January from disrupting defense and counterterrorism efforts.

"The Obama and McCain campaigns are working to compile lists of potential nominees for dozens of national-security and counterterrorism positions so would-be policy makers can be vetted and confirmed as quickly as possible.

"Given the inevitable gaps, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has asked senior Pentagon officials to be prepared to stay in their jobs for the first few months of 2009. . . .

"The push reflects the challenges posed by the first wartime political transition in more than 40 years and fears of a possible terrorist strike or major crisis in Iraq or Afghanistan during the next president's first months in office."

Karl Rove Watch

Adam Nagourney writes in the New York Times that John McCain has put Steve Schmidt, who worked closely with Karl Rove, in charge of day-to-day campaign operations.

"The move of Mr. Schmidt is the latest sign of increasing influence of veterans of Mr. Rove's shop in the McCain operation. . . .

"Mr. Rove, who was Mr. Bush's senior political adviser until he left the White House last year, was said by Mr. McCain's advisers to have offered advice in recent days to Mr. Schmidt and others on how to get Mr. McCain's campaign on track, but has stayed mostly on the periphery. Mr. Rove is aware, his associates said, that his own legacy could be helped should Mr. McCain win the presidency."

You Call This a Strong Dollar?

Reuters reports that Bush "reiterated on Wednesday that his administration believed in a strong dollar, and said the currency would reflect the relative strength of the economy.

"'We're strong dollar people in this administration, and have always been for a strong dollar, and believe that the relative strengths of our economy will reflect that,' Bush told reporters at a news conference ahead of his trip to Japan for a meeting of the Group of Eight rich nations. . . .

"In an interview with Japanese reporters that Reuters attended, Bush said he had heard concerns in Europe about the dollar during a trip last month. 'I heard concern about our dollar and I believe they support the U.S. strong dollar policy,' Bush said. . . .

"'The best way to reinforce our strong dollar policy is to keep taxes low in the United States, ease regulatory burdens, become less dependent on foreign sources of oil and make it clear that we're for free and fair trade,' Bush told the Japanese journalists."

The "strong dollar" talk is arguably the most meaningless of all of Bush's mantras.

As James G. Neuger writes for Bloomberg: "The dollar's 41 percent drop against the euro during Bush's term writes the economic epitaph of an administration that set out to restore American preeminence."

The Japanese Interview

Here is the transcript of Bush's interview yesterday with Japanese journalists, in parts one, two, three, and four.

There wasn't a whole lot new. But Bush did offer insight into his odd notion that war is fundamentally about prevention and that law enforcement isn't, saying: "In terms of the war on terror, step one is to recognize we're at war. Some in our country don't believe we're at war. If you don't believe we're at war, that this is a simple law enforcement matter, then what you do is you wait until something happens and then react. You know, law enforcement is there is an action, there's a crime, and then there -- law enforcement acts.

"In war, what you do is you prevent the enemy from hitting in the first place. That's why Iraq and Afghanistan are very important theaters in the war on terror."

And after a bunch of questions about North Korea, Iran, Afghanistan, and climate change, Bush blurted out: "So -- is anybody going to ask me about Bobby Valentine? (Laughter.) You don't even know who Bobby Valentine is. He was the old coach of the Rangers who's a manager of one of the Japanese baseball teams, and he's done very well in Japan. People like Bobby, don't they?"

The Frivolous Ditherer

U.S. News reports: "Some of President Bush's allies tell the Political Bulletin they are embarrassed and angry that the White House seems to be wasting Bush's time on frivolous events when much of the country is suffering through economic hard times. 'Look at the schedule for Monday,' says an outside Bush adviser. 'A highlight of his day was witnessing a tee ball game. . . . He is being reduced to child's play.'"

Daniel Benjamin writes in a Washington Post opinion piece: "Conventional wisdom holds that George W. Bush's foreign policy failed because the president -- who famously called himself 'the decider' -- is too, well, decisive. . . .

"But you can't fully comprehend the Bush record without understanding another Bush problem: a chronic failure to reach decisions or implement those that are made. On one key issue after another, from the Middle East to North Korea to the Department of Homeland Security, Bush has proven himself to be a dawdler, a foot-dragger who can't make fundamental choices or press his team to follow his commands. Call him the non-decider.

"This image of Bush the ditherer is obviously hard to reconcile with his long-cultivated image as a strong executive, a self-described 'gut player' with unyielding determination and unfailing clarity of purpose. . . .

"But as many veterans of the Bush administration have made clear, the president's CEO style has more to do with a fanatical punctuality (he once locked Powell, his first-term secretary of state, out of a Cabinet meeting because he was running late, according to McClellan) than true resolve. . . .

"For all his insistence on moral clarity, Bush has failed to bang heads and create clear policies."

Bush's Basement

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch editorial board writes: "Anyone who has moved out of a home knows the embarrassment of cleaning out the basement and the attic, hauling years of accumulated junk into the light of day, wondering why that sofa or lamp ever seemed like a good idea.

"As George W. Bush enters the last six months of his presidency, something similar is taking place on a larger stage. Hardly a day goes by that some dreadful policy, pronouncement or scandal doesn't resurface in comments by the presidential campaigns, or for long-delayed review by congressional committees, or in a book by some former staff member who suddenly has seen the light.

"There's a staggering amount of junk in this yard sale. Pity anyone who has to convince people to buy it."

Live Online

We had a lively Live Online yesterday. Come read the transcript.

Froomkin Watch

I'm off tomorrow -- and all next week. The column will resume on Monday, July 14. Happy Independence Day!

Cartoon Watch

But I leave you with a banner collection of political cartoons. John Sherffius on the Manchurian president; Daniel Wasserman on the torture techniques; Mike Luckovich on Bush as a loopy beagle; Walt Handelsman on McCain's Bush problem; Adam Zyglis on Bush's real benchmarks; Jim Morin and Steve Sack on the surge; Ann Cleaves on Cheney's dreams; Rob Rogers on the other Bush twins; Clay Bennett on the search for leadership; and Bob Gorrell on the Bush legasee.