To Sir With Love - A Wesley Clark Blog

Political Cartoon of the Week

Clark to Congress: "Send the $87B appropriation back to the drawing board"

Gen. Clark's hometown newspaper, the Democrat Gazette, has a direct pipeline to the campaign and is consistently providing background on the stories of the day with the candidate's spin. The D-G is a first-rate regional newspaper that provides the mainstream media context for the expanded remarks of Clark spokespeople. On Friday, Paul Barton covered the general's reluctance to hypothesize about the $87B.

Presidential candidate Wesley Clark, criticized for not taking a stand on the issue earlier in the week, Thursday called on Congress to "send back to the drawing board" President Bush's request for an additional $87 billion in Iraq-related spending.

With due respect, General, this is disingenuous. If there were both political and legislative tactics that could successfully push back the appropriation as the president has framed it, they'd be taken up with all the gusto with which we Dems oppose the majority of Bush's court appointees.

"Now that the administration is finally doing what it should have done all along and is making some headway at the U. N., there are new opportunities that the administration must seize to share the cost and the responsibility of Iraq more broadly," Clark said in a statement released by his campaign.

Gen. Clark, you probably know more off the top of your head about the horrendous Iraqi debt than most Republican politicians currently feeling their annex's pain could learn from reading the Financial Times for the next couple of years. Please let us, and the president, know which countries should be most prepared to forgive their debts to Iraq as a second-best alternative to cash subsidies to the American investment.

Clark also said Bush "should not be playing politics with the safety of our troops" and should divorce the issue of additional aid for Iraq from the need for additional funding for U.S. troops there. The two issues are tied together in the $87 billion request, which Congress began to seriously debate this week.

Good mainstream Dem thinking for the moment and not the way any strong president would go.

Clark campaign spokesman Kym Spell said Tuesday that Clark felt that many questions had to be answered about the request and about Bush's overall plan for Iraq before he could say whether he'd support the aid package.

Nice bob and weave.

Somehow I think questions on these issues are still taking the general by surprise, although they are certainly more predictable than a putative war on Syria. Again and again, the candidate seems to be thinking out loud, as opposed to thinking on his feet. Let's hope the team recently put in place can keep the nuts and bolts campaign on track and in the right place at the right time. So far, I think this month's plan of weekly policy speeches combined with local campaigning and fundraising is strengthening both the candidate and his candidacy.

But he needs someone besides Gert to throw it around with. Wes needs to be in debate prep mode every moment he isn't kissing babies. A Ted Sorensen is called for. Someone who is passionately devoted to the general's principles who can first help him forge them into an agenda, and secondly work closely with him to articulate it.

Some have already accused Wesley Clark of selling us short. Some have accused members of his team of selling the candidate short. What Wesley Clark needs most of all right now is a brother in political faith. Bobby Kennedy types preferred. War experience a plus.

Is Clark Electable? (Donkey Rising)

More good news from Ruy Teixeira, whose analyses of the poll tea leaves are proving to be must-reads. On his terrifc blog, Donkey Rising, Ruy emphasizes Clark's strength with men and independents relative to the other Dems. ". . . Evidence continues to mount that Clark could definitely beat Bush and is probably the Democrats’ best bet to do so."

We’ve already seen that Clark does very well among Democratic registered voters who are men. But he also does well among male registered voters in general. In a just-released Quinnipiac University poll of Pennsylvania voters, Clark is the only candidate who holds Bush under 50 percent (48 percent Bush to 43 percent Clark) in a prospective 2004 matchup. He does this by getting as much support as Dean among women (44 percent), but also receiving 42 percent support from men, in contrast to Dean’s 37 percent. As a result Dean runs much less well than Clark, losing to Bush 51 percent to 41 percent.

. . . Too bad there’s that pesky nomination business. . . .

Well, that's sort of up to us, isn't it?

clark04.com posts record of WKC's military career online

Where have you gone, Colin Powell?

The DNC blog, sanguinely named "Kicking Ass," shares my disappointment that Colin Powell appears to have been reduced to a mere tool of the military-industrial complex.

Commenting on Scott Pelley's interview with 60 Minutes II, in which Pelley called Powell's Feb 5 '03 speech to the UN, "one of the low points in his long, distinguished service to the nation," Jesse Berney goes on to say: "All Americans should mourn that loss, and view it as one of the greatest failures of the Bush administration. Powell had the potential to be a great Secretary of State, had he served under an administration that wasn't set on squandering the world's good will toward America."

Personally, Colin Powell, along with John McCain, is one of the very few Republicans I would even consider voting into high office, partly because I believe that like WKC, they are relatively non-partisan in their vision of America's highest values and goals. Mrs. Powell must have a very difficult time at administration social functions.

I hope this doesn't mean we can't believe Colin Powell was sincere when he wrote in 1992 "[Clark] will be one of the Army's leaders in the 1990s. . . . Wes Clark has been a superb battalion commander and will be a superb brigade commander. He is an officer of the rarest potential and will clearly rise to senior general officer rank."

Clark Has "Red State" Appeal

A Political Wire reader dug into the Meetup numbers and found Howard Dean is drawing heavily from blue states (those which voted for Al Gore in 2000), while Wesley Clark seems to be doing better than Dean in the red states (those that voted for George W. Bush in the last election).

As to be expected, both Democrats have the majority of their support in the blue states: 65 percent of Dean's Meetup supporters compared to 57 percent of Clark's backers. But Clark draws more heavily than Dean from the red states: 43 percent of his Meetup supporters live in states that voted for Bush, compared to 35 percent of Dean's.

WKC doesn't have a dog in the fight over the $87B

Way back on Sept. 20, I complained in a blog post: "Why is the general trapping himself in a plane for 90 minutes with four journalists on the first full day of the campaign? . . . . He should heed the observation of Paul Begala regarding Pres. Bush: "One of the things that makes Bush such a disciplined politician is that he never answers hypotheticals. . . ."

The Washington Post editorial staff doesn't evidently share my regard for Begala's strategy: they are among the most indignant of several commentators critical of Clark for not taking a position on the $87B appropriation in Congress.

In an editorial today entitled "The Responsibility Gap," the Post takes Kerry and Edwards severely to task for their decision to vote against the appropriation as Bush has presented it. "This righteous position may make them, or their voters, feel better," the Post piously intones, "but the security of U.S. troops and the long-term interests of both Iraq and the United States still depend on improving Iraqi daily life."

Dean is accused of being disingenuous for tying the appropriation to a roll back of the tax cuts, while Clark is basically condemned for cowardice, of all things: "Most astonishing is the response from retired Gen. Wesley K. Clark, whose position is that he's taking no position on the grounds that he's running for president, not Congress. . . . Mr. Clark's press secretary, Kym Spell, says, 'Just as he would not ask John Kerry how he would have commanded troops in Kosovo, we don't think it's in John Kerry's interest or anyone else's to be demanding of us how he would vote in the Senate.' This is leadership?"

I think Ms. Spell's answer, for this particular point in time, is spot-on and worthy of Begala himself. Opinions are like assholes; everyone has one. One of Clark's problems is that he has taken positions before his platform has been articulated. As a result, the press is pouncing on sound bites that have no context in policy and, given WKC's predilection for nuance, sometimes appear to be self-contradictory. Quite understandably elected officials usually take a position relative to the perceived attitudes of their constituencies. Clark has no constituency, per se, in this fight to serve as a compass and needs to avoid purely academic pronouncements.

Because thus far his policies are sketchy, getting them out must be Priority Number One. The next three weeks of policy announcments are crucial to taking the dialogue to the next level, where hopefully discussion of the issues will replace speculation on his Democratic Party bona fides and opinions expressed by his former commanders.

Those opposed to Clark, most especially his rivals for the nomination, would like nothing better than to keep him on the defensive on side issues. The Post is entitled to hold members of Congress to high accountability regarding the re-construction of Iraq, particularly if they voted for the war as Kerry did. However, to insist that Clark's staying on message is somehow a failure of leadership is a cheap shot in a situation that shows he is rapidly gaining essential political skills.

"Civilian Reserve" Speech, 10/14/03, NYC

Clark04.com has posted the first of WKC's upcoming policy speeches, and a very fine one it is, especially deft in working in the candidate's specific acknowledgement of locals who represent the "new American patriotism."

Here's the meat:

The Civilian Service

"But, as important as these steps are, it's not enough. It leaves us short of what we need to bring a new generation into public service and to meet the uncertainty and challenges of the 21st Century. That is why today I am proposing a bold new vision for national service.

". . . The American people have a huge variety of tools and talents that can also be brought to bear - from foreign language speakers, to welders, to microbiologists. Often, those skills are as needed as the immediate lifesaving ones.

". . .Here's how it would work: Every American age 18 or over will have the opportunity to register for the civilian reserve. If you register, you'll be asked to list your abilities and the types of service that interest you.

"By registering, you commit that those skills can be called on at any time - domestically or internationally -- for the next five years. Every five years thereafter, you will be given the opportunity to re-register.

"Should something happen during your five-year commitment that demands your skills, you can be offered the opportunity to serve for a period of up to six months.

"Your service could be here in the United States, in the aftermath of an earthquake, a forest fire or a severe storm. Or you could also serve in distant lands, where the struggle for social justice and equality demands our immediate aid. . . .

"You could be biologist, a truck driver, or an accountant. Under this program, you'll be offered the opportunity to get involved when your skill set is needed, working with professional staff, lending your talents to the task at hand, making a difference.

"For example, members of the Civilian Reserves could be deployed to help to fight forest fires.

"Members of the Civilian Reserves could also aid overseas in response to our ambassador's calls for assistance in helping nations deal with environmental disasters, political and legal development, and economic growth.

". . . Under my plan, the President will have the power to call up to 5,000 civilian reservists by Executive Order, and with an act of Congress, would be authorized to mobilize even more.

"Members would be offered the opportunity to serve as the need for their skills arose. And the call to serve would, in almost all cases, be voluntary. For the most part, Civilian Reserve members could choose whether or not to accept the call to action.

"Under circumstances of grave national emergency, the president would have the authority to issue a mandatory call-up. But this would be exceedingly rare.

Still, if called, this service will not necessarily be easy.

Those who serve may be asked to give up to six months of their lives. In return, they will receive health care, a stipend, and the same rights accorded all our national guardsmen and women - the right to return to their jobs when their service is done.

"This bold plan would not create a big, new government bureaucracy. Rather, it would use technology to register the skills of those who volunteer to serve, working largely through existing organizations . . . .

"And by organizing the Reserve in advance, my proposal will improve efficiency and potentially save money by reducing the inevitable duplication, waste, and delay that plague ad hoc responses to crises.

". . .And most importantly, the Civilian Reserves gives Americans the opportunity to volunteer now. To begin to step forward and accept the responsibilities, the duties, and the joy of the New American Patriotism. . . ."

Familiar trail of Democrat hopeful (telegraph.co.uk)

Interesting perspective from the UK on WKC's years at Oxford as a Rhodes scholar and how they helped to form his character.

"Like Mr Clinton, Gen Wesley Clark, studied at Oxford in the late 1960s, against the background din of the Vietnam War.

"But there the parallels end. Mr Clinton's Oxford years drifted by in a haze of self-indulgence. He experimented with drugs, attended at least one anti-Vietnam war rally, and honed his flirtation skills, all the while failing to take any final examinations. In contrast, Gen Clark's Oxford contemporaries paint a picture of a young man weighed down by duty.

"Gen Clark's years at Magdalen, from 1966 to 1968, were successful. He won a swimming Blue and took a degree in Politics, Philosophy and Economics."

". . . At Oxford, Gen Clark threw himself into the Vietnam debate, defending the US position in arguments with classmates, and at the Oxford Union.

"Stew Early, a fellow Rhodes scholar and Gen Clark's oldest Oxford friend, thought a mixture of personal loyalty and ambition drove him.

". . . Mr Early argues that party labels do not fit his friend.

"'To the extent that you might have thought he was a Republican, I don't think he identified with the business establishment, or great wealth,' he said. 'That wasn't where he came from. He wanted to become a great general.'

"Mr Early, a management consultant, still recognises the competitive, driven Oxford student in his friend - the pair still jump in the nearest swimming pool whenever they meet, to test who is faster.

Oxford marked Gen Clark forever, Mr Early believes.

"'He's not an ideologue. Studying abroad, you learn there are some very bright people who think differently from you. If you go to Oxford saying "There's only the American way" you're going to lose a lot."'"

Soldiers can be liberal (Miami Herald)

Joy-Ann Reid articulates what I believe to be Clark's greatest double win as a former general: not only is he the embodiment of the (Teddy) Roosevelt doctrine, "Speak softly and carry a big stick," but he has both benefited from and helped to create the modern volunteer army as a democratic, small "d," institution.

She says, "To me, the U.S. military represents some of the best values of the party: advancement without advantage, patriotism, multilateralism, shared sacrifice and diversity.

". . . Believe it or not, not every black kid can get an athletic scholarship. So the military is one of the ways people without trust funds can pay for college, learn a trade, even see the world. The daughter of one of our family friends, Nigerian immigrants who struggled to give their kids a good, middle-class life in Denver, is now an officer in the U.S. Army, having graduated from West Point, just like Clark.

". . . In the military, integration thrives alongside meritocracy. When the University of Michigan's affirmative action program came under assault from the Bush administration, it was the armed forces that stepped forward to defend the idea of diversity, citing the vastly improved military that resulted when the forces sought to make their ranks reflect America."

Democrats Drop the Lunch Pail (washingtonpost.com)

In a WAPO op-ed column E.J. Dionne Jr. shares some insights into why running a campaign that's a clone of Clinton's in 1992 might not work this time. ". . . here's the secret of the Democratic primaries: They are no longer dominated by millworkers and milkmen. Steadily, the Democratic Party is becoming the party of the educated upper middle class."

"Just look at last week's recall vote in California: The strongest opposition to tossing Democratic Gov. Gray Davis from office came from voters with postgraduate degrees. . . Where Davis got clobbered was in the middle range -- effectively the great middle class Democrats talk about so much."

Though Dionne reserves his greatest admiration for John Edwards' burden-shift theme, as filtered through his self-made personna, he makes an encouraging point about WKC's candidacy: "The class war could play itself out in the Democratic primaries. Ruy Teixeira, a senior fellow at the Century Foundation, says his analysis of recent Gallup polls finds that while former Vermont governor Howard Dean's constituency is rooted among "upscale, antiwar social liberals," retired Gen. Wesley Clark "does really well among middle- to low-income voters."

I think that's not only because Clark appeals to lower-middle class voters who like their candidates to be strong on defense, but also because somehow he's presidential without being senatorial. He just looks like a guy who never made any real money and probably wouldn't spend all that much of it on himself if he had.

The general seriously needs some new clothes: suits that fit and drape his athletic build, and some shirts with french cuffs. May I recommend his local Oxxford retailer: Bauman's, 8201 Cantrell Road, Little Rock? But don't buy a new wardrobe just yet, sir. Cheap and cheerful is probably the way to go for the primaries.

"Nervous Nellies": Amy Sullivan on why Bush's Millions don't ensure re-election

I have a friend who's been taunting me since I first came out for WKC. Most recently he struggled to make his email postcard from Japan relevant to my concerns:

Larry thinks I might enjoy hearing:

They hate Wesley in Tokyo.

So I hope you are doing well. What did you think of Arnold? Is it a new
day in politics or just a new pair of socks.

Now here's a guy who will never vote for Bush but he's completely cynical about politics, much like my 83 year old father who also never votes Republican, but whose idea of political dialogue is, "A plague on both their houses." Friend Larry is a small businessman dependent on his wife's 401K for any security in the future. Dad is trying to make his money last and is mighty upset that the government has called in his bonds to avoid paying yesterday's interest rates, which were his primary source of fixed income. Only three years ago, he felt flush enough to buy a Jaguar when his 25 year old Caddie finally died.

Amy wonders why it is that "Every time one of my glass-is-half-empty Democratic friends (you know who you are, ahem, Jake) wails about how Bush can't lose, how he'll spend hundreds of millions of dollars attacking his Democratic opponent in the general election and distracting the voters and playing on patriotic sentiment instead of rational thought, I argue back that it doesn't matter one whit what the man says -- Americans are going to vote with their pocketbooks."

". . . I insist that all of the campaign rhetoric in the world cannot convince a worried mom that her children's education is totally under control, even if school parents now have to sell their plasma to pay the salaries of some teachers."

" . . . When Americans are standing at the polls next November, I'm betting that they will care most about their ability to put food on the table, a roof over their heads, buy little Hannah the retro Strawberry Shortcake dolls she wants for Christmas the next month. And on that point, it's Advantage Democrats."

As we speak the market is up and unemployment is very slightly down. The best October surprise Bush can hope for is a robust economy despite the voodoo tax cuts. Stay tuned.

Nice local newspaper recap of story thus far from an obvious fan

Feature in the Orlando Sentinel focuses positively on WKC's complexity of character and reputation. Good piece to introduce Wes to others.

""FORT DODGE, Iowa -- Wesley Clark, retired four-star general and newest enlistee in the campaign for president, strides onto a basketball court in front of 250 curious Iowans. Loudspeakers pump the lyrics of Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire."

"If it's a ring of fire, by God, let's bring it on," Clark declares. "Let's take that ring of fire all the way to the White House. Let's put that current administration inside the ring of fire, and let 'em leave."

The newcomer to this ring is a compact combatant with a pointed chin and ready smile. He is humorous about past exploits and pranks. But he is humorless for the mission ahead, with a fire to win that has consumed him for much of his life."

"On Message" from MSNBC embed Marisa Buchanan

The policy speech schedule has been outlined by the campaign. Probably so we will all get off their backs about the fact he hardly has any policy positions yet. According to Reuters, the first speech is Oct. 14 in New York on the "new American patriotism." The second speech, scheduled for Oct. 20, will focus on health care; the third on Oct. 27 will be about the economy and the fourth on Nov. 4 will deal with national security. Venues have yet to be announced.

What Does $87B Look Like Anyway?

"It is 100 feet tall, 250 feet long, and 125 feet wide. A stack of singles would be 28,998,000 feet, or over 5,492 miles, or a round-trip between Washington DC and Los Angeles, California. (2,650 miles, one-way)." The specks in the foreground are a car and driver. You had to ask.

Clark May Give Dean a Run for His Money (washingtonpost.com)

Some scorecard highlights:

Early in his campaign, Clark has demonstrated considerable fundraising prowess. From Sept. 17, the day of his announcement, to Sept. 30, Clark raised $3.5 million, substantially more than Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) raised during the three months of the third quarter. But Dean is expected to report he raised $14.8 million during the quarter that ended Sept. 30, the most of any Democratic candidate.

The former Vermont governor has been more successful than his rivals in using the Internet, raising about half of his third-quarter total that way. But Clark may prove equally adept. Before he even announced his candidacy, the Draft Wesley Clark operation on the Web had gathered $1.9 million in pledges. Although campaign officials do not know how many of those pledges became actual donations, two-thirds of the money that Clark raised in the past quarter came via the Internet.

The Clark campaign has signed up about 100,000 supporters, half of whom enlisted through the Draft Clark Web site, according to John Hlinko, who ran the site and now runs Internet operations for the campaign. Hlinko said the campaign is trying to overtake Dean, who as of yesterday had enlisted 461,206 people through the Internet.

. . . On a recent swing through Los Angeles, Clark was the beneficiary of a $2,000-a-head fundraiser hosted by Lear and his wife, Lyn, Larry and Lauri David, and Mary Steenburgen. Lear, who gave Dean $2,000 in April, said, "Both Dean and the general are the ones closest to what needs to be said." After spending time with both candidates, Lear said, "I'm inclined to the general," adding, however, "I want them both out there."

In what many California activists described as a significant development, Eli Broad, a businessman and major philanthropist in the arts and education in the state and nationally, is supporting Clark and indicated he is likely to raise money for him. Broad, the activists said, gives Clark access to the California business community, which is substantially more moderate than the liberal entertainment community.

. . . One of Dean's early achievements on the West Coast was lining up movie director Rob Reiner, who has helped turn Dean into the Democratic candidate virtually certain to emerge with the strongest California financial backing when reports are filed with the Federal Election Commission on Oct. 15.

In Clark's case, in addition to enlisting Broad, and possibly Lear, the candidate has lined up a solid commitment from Peter Morton, founder and chairman of the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino Inc.

Despite his early fundraising success, Clark has a long way to go to become fully competitive with Dean. Dean broke Democratic records for fundraising in a single quarter, with $14.8 million at the start of the year, and led in the second quarter, with $7.6 million.

Josh Marshall's take on the campaign team

Marshall rightly puts the responsibility for a tight ship on its captain, Wesley Clark. "The big picture here is that there's a vacuum of authority in the campaign operation. Because of that, all the various currents in the Dem party -- out-of-power Clinton-Gore types, new-fangled Internet types, etc. -- are trying to fill that vacuum. Bottom line: Clark has to assert himself over his campaign back office."

True enough; it seems as if the general is making too many assumptions about the efficiency of his team, as he might be justified in doing if he were still commanding an army. But as I asserted in my previous post a nit-picking, second-guessing boss is not what anyone needs, particularly when this candidate is particularly dependent on them to fill in the blanks of his own political inexperience.

I think everyone needs to get together over coffee and donuts with Gert and maybe some of the family's old friends from Little Rock. Mrs. Clark knows better than anybody what brings out the best in her man, and I'd bet more white-glove inspections from the general himself are not what she'd be recommending.

A reasoned perspective on the Fowler resignation from TNR's Franklin Foer

"Small Loss" is the headline of Foer's objective assessment of the campaign team shake-up. While I have no way to evaluate Fowler's professionalism, Foer points out, "he's hardly run a perfect ship. He didn't get Clark's party registration papers down to the country registrar. His press operation has been anarchic." Not to mention possible conflicts of interest from paid speaking engagements (and this is really disappointing, because had Clark announced from day one he was going to fulfill outstanding commitments but forego payment, he would have seemed like a stand-up guy instead of a campaign tyro, let alone a potential sleaze.)

". . . Donnie Fowler's decision to quit the Clark campaign might not be the disaster that newspapers have portrayed," Foer writes. ". . . Apparently, [Fowler] regards the operation as too Washington-centric and unwilling to tap the Draft Clark grassroots movement. This argument is ridiculous. Clark has only a few months to whip out a winning campaign. He can't afford to run his operation as an exercise in radical decentralization and deliberative democracy. Nor he can he afford to fumble by handing important tasks to inexperienced underlings."

The last thing the campaign needs is for Gen. Clark to start micro-managing it. He needs to apply his talent for detail to studying the issues, communicating a wealth of specific, accurate data about them, and, well, appearing "in command." At the meet-and-greet following WKC's Tom Harkin Town Hall in IA, he seemed to have only one handler and that one was seemingly more concerned about security than about taking notes on to whom the general was speaking for possible follow-up.

Wes is used to having a large and completely professional staff at his disposal, culled from the brightest and best-trained officers in the corps. His own lack of experience in electoral politics should not be exacerbated by amateurism within his fledgling campaign team.

Ever the optimist, Foer closes with, "One last point. Yes, there are lots of Gore people around Clark. But why is that such a bad thing? They haven't been trying to force the template of the Gore campaign on the man. And they haven't sent their candidate to dwell on K Street begging for donations. In fact, I think they've done a pretty good job, as magazine covers, endorsements, and $3.5 million in donations show."

Flash: Stirling Newberry calls Sklar on the button!

In his clarksphere jeremiad SN buried a hint of good things to come that most here seem to have overlooked:

Dick Sklar and Wesley Clark became friends in Bosnia. Clinton appointed him to run the civilian side of the Bosnian reconstruction, and by any measure, he exceeded all expectations. With long experience in construction, he is known as "a detail guy" with a tremendous grasp of facts and schedules and the ability to deliver. However, he was also the energy Czar in California during the power crisis - where he failed to realize what the underlying problem was, and, in some measure, contributed to the spiraling out of control of the political situation there. With a long and distinguished career in public service - capped by being a special Ambassador to the UN - he is the perfect man for Clark to appoint as his man to "get a handle on things" and get things structured. He's been mentioned in that role by two people who have been following the campaign - though, of course, that is speculation.

And then when Stirling really got going:

There is one thing that can be done, and must be done: the big man needs to get to the microphone, say that "This has never been done in the history of America, a draft movement not run by insiders. Washington had Alexander Hamilton, Eisenhower had Senator Henry Cabot Lodge - there was the first time a draft wasn't a campaign looking for a candidate. We need to get a handle on this, it is unfortunate that tensions have reached this point, I'm sorry that Donnie is angry about the differences inside the campaign, I've appointed [ ] to deal with getting things in hand and making sure we retain the right people." The man I would nominate is Dick Sklar. Then he has to do it.

Let's give Stirling both a break and a hand: this is fan fiction. However, the man does his homework and draws between the dots.

This evening, Inside Politics reported Dick Sklar would assume the role of chief operating officer, although I prefer chief of staff. They still need captains and majors on the ground. Stay tuned.

The Clark Sphere looks at "The Players" in WKC's campaign team

According to Stirling Newberry of theclarksphere.com, Donnie Fowler's departure from WKC's campaign team and its attendant re-organization may challenge the general's leadership cred far more seriously than his Democratic rivals or jealous army colleagues have been able to thus far. For the mainstream media take on the shake-up see the AP story.

Newberry provides the first in-depth profile of the current Clark team, which he criticizes for taking the draft movement for granted. The next cycle of Clark meet-ups (there are four next Monday in New York City alone) looks to be held under the auspices of draft leaders either uncertain or unhappy about their role in the coming weeks. And both Newberry and Fowler are already being accused by Clark Right or Wrongers of airing dirty laundry and personal grievances.

As Newberry has it, the main players here are:

Mark Fabiani - who brought his people, including Kim Spell, and his friend's wife - on board to manage communication. He is a respected man inside the beltway because he runs a great set piece. The Democratic National Convention of 2000 is his work at its best - a tightly scripted informercial which delivers the good in sound bite form. . . However, Fabiani is also the person who allowed Albert Gore to be well, Gored. . . Fabiani does not deal well with life, unscripted.

Clearly, Newberry's sympathies are with Fowler:

Donnie Fowler, got his inside track from being the son of legendary Don Fowler - one of the men who, bluntly, brought the Democratic Party into the television age. However, Donnie Fowler is well liked in his own right, and was described, often, as "one of the young, rising, stars of the Democratic party". . . It was Fowler who "got" the new politics - and he, personally, put his neck out for Wesley Clark. His departure in anger - and clearly being given the boot by the campaign with their platitudinous "don't let the door hit your ass on the way out" smiles about what a great job he has done - is not a good sign, and is not being taken as one by objective Democratic observers.

Eli Segal was the Chief Executive for Clinton's 1996 campaign, and chief of staff in 1992. He is respected in environmentalist circles, and is considered a strong manager. . . He is in Little Rock and wants to organize the campaign along different lines, though he is not unware of the importance of activism - he is old media politics. . . .

Dick Sklar and Wesley Clark became friends in Bosnia. Clinton appointed him to run the civilian side of the Bosnian reconstruction, and by any measure, he exceeded all expectations. With long experience in construction, he is known as "a detail guy" with a tremendous grasp of facts and schedules and the ability to deliver. However, he was also the energy Czar in California during the power crisis - where he failed to realize what the underlying problem was, and, in some measure, contributed to the spiraling out of control of the political situation there. With a long and distinguished career in public service - capped by being a special Ambassador to the UN - he is the perfect man for Clark to appoint as his man to "get a handle on things" and get things structured. . . .

Mickey Kantor - former trade representative for Clinton - has been a policy advisor to Wesley Clark for some time according to sources - he has been influential in linking foreign relations to trade in the Clark program, and the policy work that is being done bears marks of his design.

Ron Klain is the man who Fabiani nominated for chief of staff, and it is he who worked out the economic plan which was released earlier. It is typical Klain work - he was Chief of Staff for Gore - solid, plays well inside the beltway and in publications such as Business Week - without promising either too much or too little. Klain has been pushing, according to two inside sources, to move the campaign from Little Rock to Washington DC. . . .

John Hlinko, founder of DraftWesleyClark.com, was just appointed internet strategy. He was retained by Donnie Fowler, and his team kept on board directly by Fowler. If they leave it will be the sign of a sweep of the inside by old politics, and will be taken as such. Voluble and tireless - Hlinko was the man who drove traffic into the Draft, and found, created or devised, a stream of stories to keep the Draft movement covered. . . .

Mark Nichols - long time Clark stalwart, who worked for Wesley Kanne Clark and Associates, and acted as the chinese wall between the Draft Clark movement and Clark the unCandidate. A difficult job at best, he is a trusted advisor, and it soon got out that he was the man that people who wanted specific roles in the campaign needed to talk to. Willing to listen - but often gruff from being short on time - Mark Nichols was one of the men who acted as a buffer between Clark and the turmoil outside. It was, and is, one of the most thankless tasks in politics, but also a vital one that he performed with distinction. . . .

So what is the upshot of all of this? Can Clark just ride the wave of good appearances? Not if he is being hounded by an FEC investigation, questions about who was in and who was out, stories of brutal infighting and leaving behind a cloud of flackery which will convince reporters they aren't getting the full story. The man who raised a large chunk of the gaudy 3rd quarter total was hired by Fowler, the individual who was rumored to be in line to go to New Hampshire to take things in hand there was picked by Donnie Fowler. It was Fowler who spoke directly to Draft field coordinators, assuaged their fears, and got them to stay on board the difficult process of integration. Now, all of these people are up in the air - will they be kept? Or will they, like Fowler, be told to accept ignominious demotion or leave?

Fowler didn't just resign - he quit in disgust. This is a sign that, once again, the message people have not been doing their work. There are right ways and wrong ways to do things, and this, again, was the wrong way. For a candidate who is running on having allies, an awful lot of Clark allies seem to leave in disgust, or decide they don't even want to be considered for the campaign. . . .

Now a respected insider is out because of these problems. They have had a consequence.

. . . If this were the Bush campaign, then Clark could plead being out of touch: but Clark is famous as a micro manager, a man who takes every detail in hand. It becomes impossible to believe that he did not make the decisions that lead to this. Hence, he must be seen as taking responsibility, taking ownership, and taking leadership. It is what Clark has always done - particularly in the three worst moments of Kosovo - the Chinese Embassy bombing, the bombing of trucks with civilians, and the Pristina airfield. Each time, he kept things moving.

There is one thing that can be done, and must be done: the big man needs to get to the microphone, say that "This has never been done in the history of America, a draft movement not run by insiders. Washington had Alexander Hamilton, Eisenhower had Senator Henry Cabot Lodge - there was the first time a draft wasn't a campaign looking for a candidate. We need to get a handle on this, it is unfortunate that tensions have reached this point, I'm sorry that Donnie is angry about the differences inside the campaign, I've appointed [ ] to deal with getting things in hand and making sure we retain the right people." The man I would nominate is Dick Sklar. Then he has to do it.

He also needs to bring on board - or bring to higher profile - several very pro-Clark individuals associated with the previous Democratic campaigns - dating back to JFK in one instance. There are three in particular whose being brought to the front now would go a very long way to dispel the impression that this is "a Gore operation with some Clintonistas thrown in".

Otherwise, the truth will be that this is a cozy little inside operation, and that Wes Clark's success is success for a small group of people who ran Gore's campaign into the ground. And if you want to watch the energy level drop, that will do it.

This is a defining moment for Clark and his campaign. It can be proof, to the press and the world, that Clark makes problems go away. Or it can be proof to the press, and the world, that Clark is drunk on high poll numbers and big donations - and doesn't give a damn about the little people that are getting crushed under.

Which story the journalists write, is up to one man at this point, the man we've placed our faith in: Wesley Kanne Clark.

Bill Maher's Blog: "Rushing to Judgement"

So far I only have two issues on which I disagree with WKC. The other is the Israeli fence,which I'm not prepared to discuss for lack of research. But the free-speech pov seems to support Limbaugh over his ESPN gaffe. How weird is it, that his drug habits have come to light at the same time? Well, to paraphrase a certain gubernatorial candidate, "I can admire Rush as a public speaker without subscribing to his opinions."

Bill Maher said: Rush Limbaugh had to resign from his ESPN NFL broadcasting job for suggesting his fellow sportscasters overrated Philadelphia quarterback Donovan McNabb because they wanted to see a black quarterback succeed. Limbaugh also didn't help himself when he outted McNabb's wife as a CIA operative.

But, this time, Rush Limbaugh isn't the big, fat idiot. He wasn't implying that we'd all be better off if society were segregated, as Trent Lott did, or that blacks don't possess the "necesseties" to be baseball managers, as Al Campanis did. He was simply suggesting that some sportscasters, recognizing a historic glass ceiling for African-American quarterbacks, may have been practicing a kind of "accolades affirmative action."

But, as we all know, in this country, when anybody makes anyone uncomfortable ever, they must lose their job. Sports Center is next.

Think globally, act locally - "Few voters in AR list party affiliation"

Backstory to Wes' failure to register as a Democrat is Arkansas specific, as it should be. WKC has a strong states-rights position that will resonate with those Republicans who remain adherents to local rule, as they seem to be in CA.

It isn't unusual that Democratic presidential candidate Wesley Clark didn't list a political affiliation when he registered to vote. Only 4.4 percent of Arkansas' 1.5 million voters have declared a political party, according to Janet Miller, the secretary of state's deputy for elections. "Voter registration by party affiliation is an optional choice, and we have found that a very, very small number of registered voters declare," Miller said. "And if you do declare, it isn't binding. They just ask you which ballot you want when you show up at the polls."

Clark's Democratic rivals have attacked the retired general's party credentials since he entered the race Sept. 17. "A piece of paper doesn't make you a Democrat," said Kym Spell, Clark's press secretary. "Wesley Clark is a real Democrat, and this is simply a tactic that the other guys are using to distract Americans from the real issues."

Wes Clark's War - Michael R. Gordon in the New York Times 10/3/03

A balanced view of the general's conduct of the Kosovo war provides objective and first-hand evidence to refute claims that Clark's misguided intransigence brought about his dismissal.

You can tell a lot about a politician by the way he handles a crisis. . . It is no secret that General Clark's relationship with the Pentagon was strained during that [Kosovo] conflict. . . But it is worth taking a step back and taking a fuller look at General Clark's record. The larger story is this: General Clark believed the stakes were so high for NATO that the alliance needed to be prepared to confront Mr. Milosevic militarily.

. . . NATO's military campaign was not perfect by any means. But the general's judgment on those critical issues seems pretty solid when viewed in perspective: a humanitarian wrong was righted and NATO won its first and only war.

So far, General Clark appears to embody a Democratic vision of what a military man should be — a cerebral West Point graduate who believes that building the United States' military might is just one of the nation's priorities; a multilateralist respectful of the United Nations; and pro-active on humanitarian intervention.

Since General Clark announced his intention to run for the presidency last month, a number of partial and even misleading accounts of the war have emerged. Some have suggested that his strained relationship with the Pentagon reflects badly on his skills as a leader. What is often overlooked in these accounts is that important issues were at stake in deciding whether and how to go to war.

"There was giant resistance from the Pentagon to deepening the commitment to the Balkans," General Clark told me in a 2001 interview. He said the Balkans had not figured in "the Pentagon view of its national military strategy, which is to prepare to fight in the Persian Gulf and in Korea, and that short of that, the maximum amount should be spent on the procurement account."

I'm hoping that WKC will continue to emphasize that the military is about people, planning, and coalitions more than it is about technology.

It was important for NATO to take a stand in the Balkans and foolish for the alliance to go to war with one hand tied behind its back. Conventional air power had never previously won a war single-handedly and there was no guarantee that it would succeed in Kosovo in a reasonable time frame. General Clark's insistence on preparing a ground option was sound military doctrine.

Not for nothing was Wes Director of Strategy for the Joint Chiefs.

Another notion about General Clark's record is that he was reckless when he proposed occupying the Pristina airfield in Kosovo after the war to preclude the Russians from rushing in troops. . . General Clark's recommendation was not rash; it was a judgment call that had been discussed in detail in Washington and that was initially supported at senior levels of the American government.

One lingering question about General Clark's résumé is why his NATO tour came to an abrupt end in 2000. . . "Our belief at the White House was that General Clark had effectively led NATO forces to victory in Kosovo," Samuel R. Berger, Mr. Clinton's national security adviser, told me this week. "What we understood we were approving, after the war, was a succession, not a termination."

The Kosovo campaign had its flaws. There was too much wishful thinking among allied officials at the outset that a few days of bombing would do the job. . . But the record also indicates that the general had very difficult questions to contend with and that his judgment on some of the crucial issues was sound.

"Clark Says White House Twisted Iraq Facts"

Quote of the day from WKC:

"This administration is trying to do something that ought to be politically impossible to do in a democracy, and that is to govern against the will of the majority," he said. "That requires twisted facts, silence, secrecy, and very poor lighting. That's why you need night-vision goggles to see what's going on over there."

Clark vs. Bush - Newest Democratic candidate rips into President Bush in Winning Modern Wars: Fred Kaplan in Slate

It's been clear to me that since WKC declared, few mainstream journalists have found the time to read any of his extensive newspaper columns, let alone his first book. The right of course is exhuming home videos of old speeches and gleefully conflating Clark's polite acknowledgement of the present Bush team with sincere praise of the first President Bush and Reagan (thanks to the Wall Street Journal for webbing the entire speech, an often touching fly-over of WKC's military career). Clark's writings provide positions aplenty, with more consistency than some of his spoken remarks, backed up by a consistent vision of how our military might, used correctly, can enhance our legitimate mission as the world's principle exporter of democracy.

Slate's Fred Kaplan is less than taken with Clark as a literary stylist, but suggests it will be too bad if the general's newest book is ignored because "once the book gets going, it's as searing an indictment of George W. Bush's foreign policy as any tome out there."

Clark notes, says Kaplan, "that even Donald Rumsfeld's vision of military 'transformation'—the precision-strike weapons and air-ground coordination that led to such a rapid battlefield victory—'was not a new vision' but rather 'the product of five U.S. presidents' and a 'process that actually accelerated after the 1991 Gulf War,' i.e., (though Clark doesn't say so explicitly) after the Democrats swept Bush's father out of the White House. This supports Al Franken's description of the victorious U.S. armed forces as "Clinton's military."

"At this point," Kaplan goes on, "Clark finds his bearings, homes in on his targets (Bush, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, the whole lot of them), and blasts them to bits with the precision of an F-16 dropping JDAM smart bombs on a squadron of Republican Guards."

By Page 183: The general is in carpet-bombing mode. The end of the Cold War, he writes, created an opportunity for the United States to resolve some nasty contradictions in its foreign policy, to strengthen alliances without having to prop up dictators for anti-communism's sake. "But 2001," he intones, clearly referring to the election of W., "marked a profound departure in U.S. foreign policy." Then he blasts Bush's "aggressive unilateralism," which would "hamper counterterror efforts," turn an effective alliance system "upside down," prompt "an outburst of worldwide anti-American sentiment," and leave our country "poorer, more isolated, and less secure."

Kaplan concludes, there is much evidence that Clark's endorsement of a foreign policy based on shoring up alliances and seeking the legitimacy of international institutions is authentic and long-standing. Clark, after all, was U.S. supreme allied commander, Europe, and, in that post, coordinated NATO's 1999 bombing campaign over Kosovo. In his 2001 book, Waging Modern War, he details the frustrations of fighting a war through an alliance—the endless squabbles over tactics, strategy, even which targets to strike. Yet the result—the success of a unified alliance—brought "significant strategic benefits" beyond mere military victory, benefits, he wrote at the time, "that future political and military leaders must recognize." His earlier book concluded: "Shared risks, shared burdens, shared benefits"—it's not only a good motto for NATO, it's also a good prescription for America's role in the world.

Given the mess that Bush has made for himself, it might also be a good campaign slogan for Gen. Clark.

Talking Points Memo: WKC interviewed by Joshua Micah Marshall

Yesterday, Wesley Clark came to DC to make the rounds on Capitol Hill.

I got the opportunity to interview him during the car ride from Dulles Airport back to Washington.

So yesterday morning I grabbed an airport shuttle out to Dulles, waited for Clark to arrive, hopped in the car, and the following was the result ...

(We'll be posting a PDF version of the interview later this afternoon.)

TPM: Well let's start with--there's obviously a tradition in the officer corps of generals -- all officers -- having an apolitical stance when they're in the service. But people who vote in primary elections are very political people. Obviously you were in the Army for 34 years and you said that you were non-partisan during that time and then you came out and started thinking about your views and so forth. I think, again, for people who vote in primaries, that's a little hard to understand: You know, how can you be a man in your fifties and have put aside politics in that way? So how do you explain that? Again, for people who have really lived politics for most of their life and think about it a lot.

CLARK: I think it's a wonderful thing that people have dedicated their lives to politics because without that we wouldn't have a democracy. In our country, political parties perform an essential function. But for people in the military it's very hard to participate in party politics because you're always on the move and you don't have the time, the energy, the opportunities -- deployments and night maneuvers and so forth would screw up anybody. Sometimes some of the wives have been involved. But generally the men couldn't be. And there's also the Hatch Act, which says that you can't participate in uniform. So you can give money to a party or to a candidate, if you want, as an officer, but you can't do anything that indicates an official endorsement by people in uniform for someone in a political race.

It's a good thing. Because we don't want our military involved in partisan politics. Our military should be loyal to the commander-in-chief no matter who he is, no matter what party. Their job is to raise the professional military issues, and the big policy decisions ultimately have to be made by the people's elected representatives or their appointed representatives. That's civilian control of the military. It's the essence of democracy.

The old military tradition was that people in the armed forces didn't vote at all. Guys like George C. Marshall, they made a passion of not voting. The reason is, they said, "It's really up to the people, the electorate, to choose the president. I'll work for whoever, I don't want to get involved in trying to pick sides. Whoever the president is, I support him."

In the 1950s it became acceptable and expected -- well I shouldn't say expected because no one ever knew -- but acceptable to vote. And there were efforts made to make sure that soldiers got to vote through absentee ballots. We know after Florida that a lot of these ballots probably were never counted. There's no telling whether they were ever counted, and in most races they probably weren't. For me, I had served under a Republican president as a White House fellow. I was in the Office of Management and Budget--

TPM: This was President Ford?

CLARK: Ford. And I knew Dick Cheney and Rumsfeld -- I didn't know them personally or well; I was 30 years old and they were very important people. I was just a sort of special assistant to the director of OMB. But I knew him, and Paul O'Neill and other people, and respected them. Then I worked around with the Clinton administration when I was the J5 on the Joint Staff. I knew people there, high level officials, and respected them. And when I got out, I went into business and obviously I voted.

I voted for Al Gore in the election of 2000. I had voted for Bill Clinton previously. For me, the issue was: make sure before you pick a party -- you don't have to pick a party in Arkansas to vote, you just vote, and I voted in the Democratic primary, but that didn't mean becoming a member of the Democratic party. Before you pick a party, make sure you know why you're picking a party. Make sure you understand what the partisan political process is in America. What does it commit you to? What does it mean? How does it affect the rest of your life? What is it all about? And so I thought I'd take a look at both parties.

I was fortunate. I was well-enough known that both parties invited me to consider them. The Republican party invited me to participate in a fundraiser and run for Congress. The Democratic party invited me to be their nominee for governor of the state of Arkansas. I was tremendously honored by that. And it was clear as I looked at the parties, looked at the culture, watched the dialogue, it wasn't just that I had voted for Al Gore, I really believed in what the Democratic party stood for. And so when it came time to choose a political party, I chose the Democratic party.

TPM: Obviously, President Bush has been in office for more than two years, and a lot of Democrats, at least, think he's governed in a very ideological, very conservative way. A lot of the divisions among Democrats have been pushed aside because there's unity created by being in the opposition--sort of a beleaguered opposition, some would say. But those differences are still there in the Democratic party, and they would certainly come to the fore with another Democratic president. You have -- just the most obvious one -- in the '90s, Clinton who had a more New Democrat, pro-free trade, fiscal discipline message; the people in congress were more traditional Democrats, more leaning to the left. So, especially since your experience is more on the foreign policy side, which advisors are you listening to? Who are you gravitating towards in the context of the Democratic party?

CLARK: I read books and I listen to a lot of different people who talk to me. Laura Tyson's been a friend. She's helped me. On the policy team with me now are guys like Ron Klain. These are people who've got a lot of experience, they've seen a lot of issues go by. Gene Sperling, Bob Rubin have participated. Some of the former speechwriters have helped me.

But when you run it all through, it's really me. It's my views that have been shaped by a lifetime of public service, traveling across this country, putting a child through school, worried about how much--or how little--money I made, how to survive on very middle [income] wages while moving every two or three years. The wife would come in and say, "Ah, the towels don't match the bathroom and you've got to buy new bathroom mats. And now what are we going to do for curtains? The curtain rods don't fit in this kind of the house." You know, all these expenses of moving on top of not making very much money. It's just a question of who you are.

I have strong views. I have strong feelings about what's right and what's wrong in the way of policy. I taught economics at West Point, I taught political philosophy. I worked in the South Bronx in 1966 for three or four weeks in the neighborhood youth corps as part of the Johnson administration's anti-poverty program. So I had seen urban poverty. I worked as a counselor at the Little Rock Boys' Club back in the late '50s, early '60s, ended my last staff member position at the Little Rock Boys' Club in 1965, meeting kids from not the most affluent backgrounds. You get a certain feeling for America. And that's the feeling for the America I know. That's the America I want to-you know, I want to give everyone in America equal opportunity, including those people that are like I grew up with.

TPM: There are all sorts of critiques about the present administration's domestic policies. What's the central one? What's the central problem, the central flaw in this administration's domestic policy?

CLARK: There's an underlying ideological drive that overrides pragmatism. The American people want government to fix the things they can't fix themselves. The American people are basically individualists. They like each other; they're very charitable and generous; they're bound together in a hundred different ways -- they're not a big-government country. They're not socialists. But they recognize there are things they can't fix, like healthcare, or education--public education.

And this administration comes in with an ideology that blocks its ability to see, articulate, and resolve those problems. It's an ideology that's a sharpened sort of right-wing Republican party ideology. It has no real intellectual base to it. It's just the ideology of a party. By intellectual base, I'm talking first, trickle-down economics. No reputable economist stands up and says, "Trickle down economics really works." Because we know the marginal propensity to consume of people who are making $100,000 a year and less is much higher than the marginal propensity to consume of people who are making $350,000 a year and more.

So therefore when you say you're going to give money to the rich so they'll make jobs for the poor -- that's not a very efficient way of producing jobs in the American economy. We know that, all things being equal, that the lower the tax rate at the margin, the greater the incentive to earn the extra dollar. But we also know -- it's just human nature to figure that out -- that in a society where you've got a lot of people that are struggling to pay the electricity bill and the telephone bill and you've got a few people who don't care what the electricity and telephone bill is, that the few people who don't care about these things ought to pay a higher proportion of their income to help the rest of the country than the people who are struggling with the necessities in life.

I mean this is just sort of basic principles. I think most Americans understand and appreciate it. For some reason, this administration can't. This administration has crafted an ideology that basically is designed to roll back the institutions that have helped this country. They promote the ideology through sloganeering, through labeling, name-calling, talk radio. But when you really get down and scratch it, there's not much there.

For example, take the idea of competition in schools. OK now, what is competition in schools? What does it really mean? Well, competition in business means you have somebody who's in a business that has a profit motive in it. It's measured every quarter. If the business doesn't keep up, the business is going to lose revenue, therefore it has an incentive to restructure, reorganize, re-plan, re-compete and stay in business.

Schools aren't businesses. Schools are institutions of public service. Their job--their product--is not measured in terms of revenues gained. It's measured in terms of young lives whose potential can be realized. And you don't measure that either in terms of popularity of the school, or in terms of the standardized test scores in the school. You measure it child-by-child, in the interaction of the child with the teacher, the parent with the teacher, and the child in a larger environment later on in life.

So when people say that competition is-this is sort of sloganeering, "Hey, you know, schools need this competition." No. I've challenged people: Tell me why it is that competition would improve a school. Most of them can't explain it. It's just like, "Well, competition improves everything so therefore it must improve schools."

If you want to improve schools, you've got to go inside the processes that make a school great. You've got to look at the teachers, their qualifications, their motivation, what it is that gives a teacher satisfaction, what it is a teacher wants to do in a classroom. We've got to empower teachers. Give them an opportunity to lead in the classroom. Teachers are the most important leaders in America. All that is lost in the sloganeering of this party. And the American people know it's lost. So you asked me to give you one thing about this party that's in power -- it's the sort of doctrinaire ideology that doesn't really understand the country that we're living in.

TPM: In the primary process, one of the things that you bring to the table is your foreign policy resume. You spent a career working with national security issues -- obviously being a general and so forth. It seems in many ways, though, that the threats that this country faces in the medium-term or maybe even the long-term are more asymmetric threats rather than the conventional military threats that we thought of in the Cold War period. How does your background suit you to guiding a country and a world where those are the threats.

CLARK: Because in foreign policy and foreign affairs you have to work with allies. It doesn't matter what the threat is. And in the world that I learned to work in, international law trumps diplomacy. And, except under the most extreme circumstances, diplomacy trumps force. Force is the ultimate action, but improperly applied, force only kills people and breaks things. It gets you into something. It doesn't give you your success. I've had the experience of putting together the complete packages.

TPM: Let me just touch on a couple of issues. Iraq is the major issue now, but there are a few others sitting there that could rise to the surface at any point. On the Korean Peninsula, is there a line that we have to say they cannot cross? And if there is, where is it?

CLARK: Well there was a line, we already set it, but this administration let it go by. This administration thought it was better for the country to permit North Korea to go ahead with the nuclear development program rather than to talk to it. In other words, this administration was more worried about embarrassing itself in front of its right-wing base by talking to the North than it was in preventing the emergence of another nuclear-armed power that could proliferate nuclear weapons. It was a tragic--it will be, it's possible that it could be, a tragic miscalculation. And like much I see in this administration, it's an administration that's put politics over sound policy. People on both sides of the aisle understood that the way to resolve the North Korean problem was to talk to North Korea--honestly talk to them.

TPM: Which is what the previous administration was in the process of doing.

CLARK: It's what the Clinton administration had done. Is North Korea wily, tough, paranoid, nasty? Sure, it's all those things. Has to be. It's a twenty-three- twenty-four-million population impoverished country in Asia--in the land of super-giants. Its survival as a separate state is an historical anomaly and nobody knows it better than the North Koreans. And that's why they're hyper and paranoid. That's why they built up an arsenal of weapons and forces that defies all rational explanation but is ultimately highly rational from their perspective. And so why can't we talk to that regime? We talked to them in the past.

TPM: Given that we let them--we sort of gave them--a tacit green-light, and now they're clearly moving ahead with the plutonium process, the uranium process is probably not quite so far along, but they probably have--we at least assume that they have--some nuclear weapons, but how do we deal with it now?

CLARK: It's not too late to talk to them.

TPM: How about Iran?

CLARK: Iran needs to be worked through the international community. But it's difficult to work Iran through the international community when you have alienated much of the international community by your policy in Iraq. Iran was always a greater threat than Iraq.

TPM: Why is that?

CLARK: There was an odd--Iran is larger. Had more power, more wealth, more independence, more maneuver room. It was not under UN sanctions, was not under an imposed inspection regime. Been a much tougher problem. And, my friends in the Israeli Defense Forces would have been the first to acknowledge it.

But, in the odd kind of geopolitical chess board game this administration seemed to want to play, they seemed to assume that you could get your forces into Iraq, and, like a game of checkers, you could skip across the Middle East--plop, plop, plop--as though in some metaphysical sense, it was easier to come ashore up through the Euphrates and Tigris valleys into the heart of the Middle East and southwest Asia, and then cross into the mountains of Iraq--excuse me, of Iran--or pivot and go towards Syria. It was analytically, geometrically satisfying, even though those of us who understood the situation at the time said it made little sense. It was old-think. It was 19th century geostrategy--

TPM: So, the Great Game? A sort of a new version of the Great Game?

CLARK: It was the Great Game with modern equipment, and hypermodern risks. And, in reality, the problems with Osama bin Laden were not problems of states. They were problems of a supranational organization which alighted in states, used states, manipulated elements of states, but wasn't going to be contained and destroyed by attacking and replacing governments.

TPM: I noticed that Doug Feith, who's obviously the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, had a statement a while back saying that the connection between terrorist organizations and state sponsors was, I think he said, the principal strategic thought behind the administration's policy.

CLARK: It's the principal strategic mistake behind the administration's policy. If you look at all the states that were named as the principal adversaries, they're on the periphery of international terrorism today. Syria -- OK, supporting Hezbollah and Hamas -- yeah, they're terrorist organizations. They're focused on Israel. They're getting support from Iran. It's wrong. Shouldn't be there. But they're there. What about Saudi Arabia? There's a source of the funding, the source of the ideology, the source of the recruits. What about Pakistan? With thousands of madrassas churning out ideologically-driven foot soldiers for the war on terror. Neither of those are at the front of the military operations.

TPM: Well, those are our allies, our supposed--

CLARK: Mentioning those two countries upsets the kind of nineteenth century geostrategy and the idea--this administration is not only playing that game, but they're more or less settling scores against the Soviet surrogates in the Cold War in the Middle East.

TPM: That being Syria, Lebanon

CLARK: The proxy states, Syria, Lebanon, whatever. These states are not -- they need to transform. But, why is it impossible to take an authoritarian regime in the Middle East and see it gradually transform into something democratic, as opposed to going in, knocking it off, ending up with hundreds of billions of dollars of expenses. And killing people. And in the meantime, leaving this real source of the problems -- the states that were our putative allies during the Cold War -- leaving them there. Egypt. Saudi Arabia. Pakistan.

TPM: Obviously, the big, really the foreign policy issue right now is Iraq. And, there was all the debate that went on before last March and April, which is sort of moot now. But the question is, what do we do now? We're in there, we have almost 150,000 troops -- that's an expense in itself -- let alone the reconstruction stuff. What do we do now?

CLARK: Well, I support our troops, and I want to see this be successful in Iraq, and that's a national imperative, that we be successful. What we've got to do is realistically look at the situation, put the right number of troops on the ground, hopefully, they'll be Iraqi troops. Secondly, there'd be international troops. Last resort, we may need more American troops, but that's not clear yet, to me.

I haven't been invited over there to take a look. I'd like to, but they haven't invited me to do that. Then the second problem is going after al Qaida. You must go after al Qaida. You know, let's not give them a free ride, re-forming in Pakistan, and penetrating into Afghanistan, and sending its messages around the world. Number three: if you're going to be successful in Iraq, you're probably going to have to change the dynamic in the Middle East. Right now, we've given Iran and Syria the strongest possible incentives to work against our purposes in Iraq, because we've let them know that they're next. So, from their perspective, they don't want to get invaded. They don't want to get knocked off because they're against the United States. It's only natural that they'd be working to make sure there's enough resistance in Iraq.

TPM: To keep us pinned down there?

CLARK: Exactly, exactly.

TPM: What is victory in Iraq?

CLARK: Well, I think that's an important question that we'd like to see the administration define. The elements of it might be the following: What kind of government? A unitary Iraq? Maybe a federalized Iraq? A common language, common currency, common -- no customs problems inside Iraq. Common schools, common flag, all the symbols of nationhood. So, you want to hold Iraq together. And, a country that doesn't threaten its neighbors, and a government that has enough security wherewithal to be able to protect itself and not become a recruiting base for al Qaida. And an Iraq that's able to be integrated into the modern world. So if you lay out those five criteria in some way, you probably could come up with a definition of success.

TPM: As we mentioned before, in different capacities you worked for a number of different administrations. Whether it was Ford, working directly in the White House, or for the last 15, 20 years in various capacities at a fairly senior level. You've seen these different presidents conduct foreign policy. What are your opinions of the different ones?

CLARK: Well, you know, nobody gets to be president of the United States without conspicuous strengths. But the ability to conduct foreign policy draws not only on the president himself but on the leadership of the administration. If you were to start here and work backwards, you'd say this administration was doctrinaire. You'd say that it didn't have a real vision in foreign policy. It was reactive. Hobbled by its right-wing constituency from using the full tools that are available -- the full kit-bag of tools that's available to help Americans be in there and protect their interests in the world.

Clinton administration: broad minded, visionary, lots of engagement. Did a lot of work. Had difficulty with two houses in congress that [it] didn't control. And in an odd replay of the Carter administration, found itself chained to the Iraqi policy -- promoted by the Project for a New American Century -- much the same way that in the Carter administration some of the same people formed the Committee on the Present Danger which cut out from the Carter administration the ability to move forward on SALT II.

TPM: This being the same neo-conservatives that people hear about in the press today?

CLARK: Right, some of the same people. And then, you know, if you go back to the Bush administration, they were there when the Berlin Wall fell. I think there was some artful maneuvering -- which the Clinton administration followed through on -- to extract Russian forces from the rest of Eastern Europe. That began in '89-'90, it was carried on, actually didn't finish until I think '94 when the last Russian forces pulled out of Latvia.

So both administrations get credit for that. I think the Bush administration as they worked the problem of [the] post-Cold War had difficulty understanding the significance of NATO and the role that Europe could play. They opened -- they were part of the fissure that emerged -- the Europeans, especially the French, were also part of that. But there's that famous quote from former Secretary [of State] Jim Baker about the problem in Yugoslavia saying, "We don't have a dog in that fight" or something. And I think that if you critique it from the standpoint of 15 years post, the first Bush administration's beginning, you say it was a time of revolutionary transformation and what we had to do at a time of transformation like that is hold even closer to our friends and our allies around the world.

Lord Palmerston in the 1830s, I think, in the UK, later quoted by Count Gorchakov, the Russian foreign minister in the 1880s, later quoted by Prime Minister Primakov in 1998, it was, at the original saying, "Britain has no permanent friends, only permanent interests." It became transformed into Russia. But it's the sentiment that we want to avoid in a modern world. What we wanted to have done, what we should have done in the late '80s was said, "Look, even though now we've eliminated the Soviet threat, we have permanent friends. You in Europe, you're our permanent friends. We will make our interests converge so that we strengthen our friendship. The friendship is more important than the interests, if you work this right over time, you can work to smooth off the sharp edges of conflicting interests. And I think that's still a recipe for moving forward.

As for Ronald Reagan, there were some things done well, some things done poorly, but one of the biggest things was it was the administration in which inflation came under control as the result of a lot of tough policies, some of them begun by Reagan's predecessor to attack the expectations that had built up in this country as a result of trying to do guns and butter during Vietnam. And it took years to drive these expectations out of the business community, out of the financial community. But as they disappeared and people began to accept core inflation rates of less than two and three percent and they didn't build cost escalators into everything, you established a much firmer sense of purpose and success in America. That's a bipartisan effort. I loved Reagan's speech at Pointe du Hoc. I was at the Pentagon, I was at the Pentagon as a colonel when he gave it on D-Day.

TPM: This is the forty-fifth anniversary I guess?

CLARK: Fortieth anniversary. Communications is really important for a president. We've had a few presidents in the twentieth century who were great communicators. Most aren't. But in terms of foreign policy, we went through a lot of shocks in the 1980s with our European allies. But ultimately it was Russia itself that broke. The Soviet Union fell apart. A combination of circumstances and pressures dating back to Franklin Roosevelt's and Harry Truman's early visions of how to win this competition, finally came to fruition.

TPM: We just crossed the Potomac River a few minutes ago. So that both means that my time is running short but also we're coming into Washington -- we've just come into Washington, DC. And obviously for the last two or three days there's been one story in this town. And that's about this beginning investigation. We don't know what the facts are, but it seems at least -- there's evidence out there -- that some high level officials in the administration, seemingly just for political reasons, exposed the cover of a CIA agent, a covert operative in the CIA, whose husband obviously, Joseph Wilson -- people know the background story. Obviously having been a four-star general, retired now, you've dealt with all sorts of classified and top-secret information. Just how does that strike you? That that could have happened? What was your reaction to that?

CLARK: Well, I'm mystified as to how it could have happened. I don't understand how people in the White House -- if that's where it came from -- in the political operation, would have had any knowledge about the qualifications, or the activities, of a retired ambassador's wife. They just wouldn't have -- how would they know that? That's why I've called for an impartial commission of inquiry, not associated with the executive branch, to go back into this, because there are enough charges and counter-charges out in this issue, in this very political administration. You have to take the intelligence community, especially the protection of censored sources, out of the political process. And that means you need an independent commission, which is not part of this administration, to look into the full circumstances and issues surrounding this case.

TPM: Now, obviously this particular case of whether this CIA employee's cover was blown, and so forth, gets back into this other issue of the uranium claims and forged documents, and you can sort of trace that back into the whole larger debate about intelligence--the quality of intelligence, the political uses of intelligence. Obviously, you've talked a lot on CNN and stuff like that -- what is, looking back, what are the key mistakes? Not on the formal, not on the operational plan of the war, key mistakes getting in? What weren't they thinking? What didn't they prepare for?

CLARK: Well, we don't know why they chose to go to Iraq in the first place. There's a lot of circumstantial evidence, but even Paul Wolfowitz admitted that the weapons of mass destruction issue was just the one issue that they could get most consensus on. Meaning, I suppose, that Colin Powell would have had more difficulty arguing against it then, let's say, a visionary scheme to transform the Middle East by playing hopscotch with military forces from country to country. So, that's the first question, is, why did they do it? And secondly is, why then? Why, when? Why, at that point in time, did they have to do that?

We don't know. And then you ask, well, when they took it to the United Nations, and when they got UN Security Council Resolution 1441 passed, why, at that point, didn't George Bush ask Karl Rove and say, "Karl. I've won the elections. I've done everything we wanted to do. [Inaudible] I'm a great wartime leader. Tell me again, why do we have to invade Iraq? What's in it for us, as America? Why can't we find another alternative? Why don't we just string this thing out? Let the international community fumble with it --we've got them going. We could, you know, knock out the critics and say, 'Look, I did go to the United Nations.'" You undercut the old whole unilateralist approach [argument], you argue that you're only using force as a last resort, let the half time play out. Why the rush? Don't know why.

TPM: You must have some sense.

CLARK: I think that it's really hard to understand it, but it goes back to the sort of doctrinaire, rigid, ideological approach that the administration's following. When you're looking at the facts in a pragmatic way, it was hard to construct the argument as to why you had to go in right away. It was so hard that we couldn't persuade our allies to come in with us. We couldn't even persuade the American people. Until it came time that the troops were actually there, and people said, "Well, you know, you've got the troops there, how long are you going to hold them there, this is getting embarrassing. Just go ahead and do it." At that point the polls started to raise--

TPM: So, sort of creating a situation [which] forced our hand on that.

CLARK: Exactly. I mean, the President went around, apparently, speaking around the country in February and March. I didn't hear him, but the quotes I've seen from then suggest that he went around saying, "If we're forced to go to war." Well, the only people that forced him to go to war was his own advisors. They forced the situation and the timing of it. It defies a good explanation. It needs to be -- it warrants an explanation. Even an investigation.

TPM: We're about to come up to Capitol Hill right now, and obviously I'm sure that -- you just flew in to Dulles. I'm sure that you've got a schedule of meetings with various [people]--how are you enjoying campaigning?

CLARK: I love it.

TPM: Yeah? How is it compared to being SACEUR [Supreme Allied Commander in Europe]?

CLARK: It's a lot more fun.

TPM: A lot more fun?

CLARK: Yeah. Because as SACEUR, I had life and death issues at risk. If we were to be successful in this campaign, those responsibilities will settle in again, even heavier. But right now, it's about reaching out. It's about communicating. It's about helping other people capture a vision, share, grow, experience, learn. It's an incredibly exciting thing to go around America and talk to people and have them tell you what they're thinking.

I was in New Hampshire on Saturday morning. I went to the YMCA. It was seven o'clock in the morning. There were already two ladies at work there, checking admissions passes. One of them told me that she works eighty hours a week. She works seven days a week. She works in the police station doing traffic tickets or something like this--you know, collating is her normal job, and then she works at the Y as an additional job. She works from eight o'clock in the morning to ten o'clock at night, six days a week. I was in awe of her. She has two children. She's a single mom. She puts those two children through school. Amazing. People share those kind of stories; we can get a real feel for what this country's about. And, a real determination. We can do more and be more and help more.

TPM: Thank you very much. I appreciate your time.

CLARK: Thank you, Josh.

End of Interview ...

Is Wesley Clark the One?

Is Wesley Clark the One? | The Rolling Stone Interview 10/16/03

Interestingly this 2-hour interview was conducted on 9/11/03, six days before the announcement, yet it combines policy specifics with very fiery rhetoric.

Some highlights:

Why was going into Iraq a mistake?

We made a historic strategic blunder. We attacked a state rather than going after a terrorist. Iraq had no connection to the war on terror. Of all the states in the Middle East to give chemical, biological or nuclear weapons to terrorists, least likely was Iraq. Saddam's a control artist. He wouldn't have given bioweapons to Osama bin Laden unless Osama's mother, four wives and fifteen children were in one of his prisons so he could rip their hearts out if Osama screwed up. But we didn't want to face the tough task of going after bin Laden, so we did a bait-and-switch and went after Saddam instead. And now, look at the headline on today's New York Times: bin Laden seen with aide on tape. We're less secure now than we were before. Spending $80 billion and putting half the U.S. Army in Iraq has provided a supercharger to Al Qaeda recruiters.

We helped bin Laden. The only thing we could have done that would have helped him more is if we had invaded Saudi Arabia and captured Mecca. We've also squandered the support that brought 200,000 Germans out after 9/11 two years ago. They're not coming back out again -- not for this administration. You won't get any support out of the Germans and the French until you get a regime change in Washington.

When you were in the Army, you had a lot of contact with various White House staffs. Did you ever have any dealings with some of the people who now serve in the Bush administration?

When I was a thirty-year-old Army major, I was sent to Washington, where they put me in the Ford White House. This was 1974. Nixon had just resigned. They said, "How would you like to be staff secretary to this executive committee -- it'll have Henry Kissinger," who was then secretary of state; James Schlesinger, the secretary of defense; the director of the CIA and the counsel to the president. Well, for someone who'd just come to Washington, you can imagine how I felt. Pretty impressive, right? What I discovered was that the White House was full of paranoia and suspicion -- a real Watergate mentality. I'd bring something up, and they'd say, "Wes, if you ask a question like that, you can't work here." The reason the White House was that way was not only because of Watergate but because of the two guys in charge: Donald Rumsfeld, who was Gerald Ford's chief of staff, and Dick Cheney, who was his assistant.

Let's talk about issues beyond the war. What's your position on the environment?

People are going to look back in 100 years and ask, "What did you leave behind in this country?" We will leave two legacies. The first is the Constitution, which implements the will of the majority while protecting the minority. The second is the environment. And if you want to protect it, you've got to start now. Unfortunately, this administration has rolled back the legacy we will leave for our children and our grandchildren. I believe in clean air. They believe in letting power plants modernize without pollution controls. I believe in clean water and preserving wetlands. They believe "shit happens." I don't believe in opening up old-growth forests for logging in the name of fire prevention.

The president is urging Congress to grant him wider powers to wage war on terrorism at home.

Come on, give us a break. The Patriot Act, all 1,200 pages of it, was passed without any serious congressional discussion. There was no public accountability, and now he wants more? What does he think this country is? We shouldn't do anything with the Patriot Act until it's unwrapped. I'd like to see what violations of privacy it entails, and whether those violations are in any way justified by their preventing terrorism in this country. And we need to do it now before we take another step forward and pay for that.