Obama's campaign responded this morning. 'Of course President Bush would attack the one candidate in this race who opposed his disastrous war in Iraq from the start. But Barack Obama doesn't need any foreign policy advice from the architect of the worst foreign policy decision in a generation,' said spokesman Bill Burton."Perfect.
Elsewhere in the interview, he defends torture.
BUSH: First of all, whatever we have done, was legal. And whatever decision I will make, will be reviewed by the Justice Department to determine whether or not the legality is is there. And the reason why…there’s a difference between what happened in the past and today is there’s new law. And um, and so to answer your question, whatever we will do will be legal. The American people have got to know that what we did in the past gained information that prevented an attack and for those who criticize what we did in the past, I ask them which attack would they rather have not permitted…stopped? Which attack on America would they have said, you know, well, maybe that wasn’t all that important? That we stopped those attacks. I’ll do what’s necessary to protect America within the law. That’s what you gotta understand. And um, [nods head]It wasn't torture then because it wasn't illegal. Now there is a law in place, but if you want it followed you have to choose which attacks you don't want to stop.
Someone said the other day that Bush is smarter than he appears. He would have to be, wouldn't he?
3 comments:
If I have mentioned this before, I apologize. The best analysis I have read on executive power and the decisions of this administration was by a lawyer for Bush's Office of Legal Counsel, Jack Goldsmith. The book is called, "The Terror Presidency: Law and Judgment Inside the Bush Administration."
The book does a nice job because it explains some of the history of executive power and also talks about the wartime decisions made by Lincoln and FDR. The author ultimately concludes that the decisions made by this adminstration were "deeply flawed" and harmful. Despite this, I thought the book was very even handed.
:) No, you may have heard about it here. Streak's Blog: Conservative? Or Authoritarian?
heh.
I am very hesitant to read books on this administration because of the rage and anger. :) But this one does look very interesting. I may have to pick it up.
I thought I may have heard of it here, but I was too lazy to go searching. I tend to avoid these kinds of books because many seem to be thrown together and poorly written. I am not interested in some 300 page rant.
This was one of the better books. In some ways, he is sympathetic to the pressure the administration felt after 9/11, but that ulimately doesn't excuse what eventually happened. The book also does a good job explaining executive power. I think it was only 250 pages, so I don't consider it a lengthy read.
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