The Company Man

"Making tracks"

Mike Luckovich, Atlanta Journal Constitution

It's amazing. Everything that touches the Bush Administration seems to turn out exactly the opposite of what is said (or done). Mission Accomplished -- not. WMD -- none. Iraq behind 9/11 -- not really. No torture -- only kidding. We don't spy -- except when we do.

The latest casualty of opposite Bush effect is George Tenet, former CIA Chief. Wrote a book to repair his reputation and ended up looking more a fool than the Administration officials he claimed fooled him.

As Sidney Blumenthal wrote in Salon, George Tenet, spook for all seasons:

If former CIA director George Tenet's "At the Center of the Storm" were an intelligence operation, it would have to be assessed as achieving precisely the opposite of the results intended. Tenet hoped that his elaborate apology for his government service would cast him as honest, prudent and professional; his admission of his own mistakes would shine a light on his integrity; his disclosures of the machinations of Vice President Dick Cheney and the neoconservative cabal would show him as a truth teller; and his refusal to say nary a bad word about President Bush would demonstrate his respect for the presidency.

Maureen Dowd also takes on George Tenet in Better Never Than Late (also available at Rozius Unbound), with her caustic pen:

There should be a course on government called “The Ultimate Staff Guy.” A morality saga about how much harm you can do as a go-along, get-along guy, spending so much time trying not to alienate the big cheese so he doesn’t can you that you miss the moment where you have to can him or lose your soul.

If Colin Powell and George Tenet had walked out of the administration in February 2003 instead of working together on that tainted U.N. speech making the bogus case for war, they might have turned everything around. They might have saved the lives and limbs of all those brave U.S. kids and innocent Iraqis, not to mention our world standing and national security.

It would certainly have been harder for timid Democrats, like Hillary Clinton, John Kerry and John Edwards, to back up the administration if two members of the Bush inner circle had broken away to tell an increasingly apparent truth: that Dick Cheney, Rummy and the neocons were feverishly pushing a naïve president into invading Iraq with junk facts.

General Powell counted on Slam Dunk — a slender reed — to help him rid the speech of most of the garbage Mr. Cheney’s office wanted in it. Slam, of course, tried to have it both ways, helping the skeptical secretary of state and pandering to higher bosses. Afterward, when the speech turned out to be built on a no-legged stool, General Powell was furious at Slam. But they both share blame: they knew better. They put their loyalty to a runaway White House ahead of their loyalty to a fearful public.

Slam Dunk’s book tour is mesmerizing, in a horrifying way.

* * * *

Six former C.I.A. officials sent Mr. Tenet a letter . . . berating him for pretending he wrote his self-serving book partly to defend the honor of the agency . . . . One of the signers, Larry Johnson, told CNN that Slam “is profiting from the blood of American soldiers.”

“By your silence you helped build the case for war,” the former C.I.A. officials wrote. “You betrayed the C.I.A. officers who collected the intelligence that made it clear that Saddam did not pose an imminent threat. You betrayed the analysts who tried to withstand the pressure applied by Cheney and Rumsfeld.”

* * * *

They concluded that “your tenure as head of the C.I.A. has helped create a world that is more dangerous. ... It is doubly sad that you seem still to lack an adequate appreciation of the enormous amount of death and carnage you have facilitated.”

Thus endeth the lesson in our class on “The Ultimate Staff Guy.” If you have something deadly important to say, say it when it matters, or just shut up and slink off.

There seems to be no end to the ripples of damage that the reign of George Bush has strewn. From Iraq to New Orleans to our internal constitutional crisis. On a more personal level, he has damaged or destroyed our reputation as a country in the world, and he done the same for many individuals -- his political opponents and allies alike.

Every former Administration official who has dared to critcize the President has been swiftboated by the party faithful. Of course, Colin Powell is probably the sorriest case. Before Bush, Powell's reputation was universally held in high esteem, both here (by Republicans and Democrats alike) and abroad. I know that I was a supporter of his. Now? A sad spectacle.

However, Tenet seems to have ended up in the worst shape, due to his own doings. He seems to be the subject of scorn from all quarters. If he thought he looked bad after he left the CIA based upon the so-called "slam dunk" attribution, based upon the reception he's getting now, he's going to look at that time as the good old days.

An Open Letter to George Tenet by Larry Johnson & the other former CIA members is available at The Huffington Post. Johnson has more on Tenet at his blog, NO QUARTER.