March 23, 2004 - There is one thing that is going unnoticed about “Against All Enemies”, the Richard Clarke book that pulls the cover off the Bush “War on Terrorism”. Anything that a former White House official published must first be vetted by the White House to insure that it does not reveal national security secrets. Clarke finished his manuscript last fall and sent it to the White House as the law required. Nothing contained in the book came as a surprise to the Administration. They had it in advance – well in advance. They knew what it contained. Only a naïve would believe that they did not note its factual assertions and plan the response that would be made when the book was finally published.

The Bush political operatives had lots of time to marshal evidence to refute the facts that Mr. Clarke asserted. But the response has not been to dispute the facts. It has been to launch a coordinated attack on the author’s credibility. The incongruous assertion by the Vice-President on the Rush Limbaugh show that Clarke was “not in the loop” is a case in point. That suggestion that Clarke was not in a position to know the facts runs smack up against the undisputed fact that while the White House was being evacuated and Dick Cheney was proceeding to an undisclosed, secure location; it was Richard Clarke that Condi Rice designated as crisis manager in charge of the US reaction. While others fled Clarke stood fast and directed the immediate response to developments as they occurred. He was surely in the loop then.

Long before the book came out the Bush team had it and has had plenty of time to prepare for its allegations. When Clarke claims that in the planning for the effort against the Taliban Secretary Rumsfeld complained that there were not enough targets in Afghanistan and that we should bomb Iraq, the Administration response is not to refute the claim but to attack the author. When he describes a conversation with the President pushing Clarke to find Iraq had a role in 911, the response is to spin the conversation to indicate that the President was only interested in getting all of the facts so that he could determine against whom to retaliate.

Facts are stubborn things. They won’t go away. Too many people are in possession of them and too few are willing to distort or deny their existence. Facts have a way of suddenly erupting into view like crocuses in the spring. Like the crocus they bloom out of a barren landscape and you can’t miss them. When the message is inconvenient, when the facts are unwelcome, the response of the powerful has been the same over the millennia. You can’t kill the message, but you can assassinate the messenger. The firing squad is taking aim.