Love Story

Those of us of a certain age recall the quote from Love Story: "Love means never having to say you're sorry."

I think the guiding principle of the Bush Administration is the quote : "I don't remember means never having to say I was wrong."

The latest evidence of that principle relates to Bush's recent the discussion about the disastrous decision to dismantle the Iraqi Army after the invasion;

Mr. Bush acknowledged one major failing of the early occupation of Iraq when he said of disbanding the Saddam Hussein-era military, “The policy was to keep the army intact; didn’t happen.”

But when Mr. Draper pointed out that Mr. Bush’s former Iraq administrator, L. Paul Bremer III, had gone ahead and forced the army’s dissolution and then asked Mr. Bush how he reacted to that, Mr. Bush said, “Yeah, I can’t remember, I’m sure I said, ‘This is the policy, what happened?’ ” But, he added, “Again, Hadley’s got notes on all of this stuff,” referring to Stephen J. Hadley, his national security adviser.

This via Mike Kuykendall, in Bremer Disputes Bush Comments on Dismantling Iraqi Army,
who also points out that Bush's remarks were refuted by Bremer:

Now Mr. Bremer has provided the NY Times with hard evidence disputing the President's account:

A previously undisclosed exchange of letters shows that President Bush was told in advance by his top Iraq envoy in May 2003 of a plan to “dissolve Saddam’s military and intelligence structures,” a plan that the envoy, L. Paul Bremer, said referred to dismantling the Iraqi Army.

Mr. Bremer provided the letters to The New York Times on Monday after reading that Mr. Bush was quoted in a new book as saying that American policy had been “to keep the army intact” but that it “didn’t happen.”

For the NYTimes piece, see Envoy’s Letter Counters Bush on Dismantling of Iraq Army.

Just remember what it means the next time a Bushie utters the words "I don't remember."

Tags: Bush, News, Quote of the Day, Iraq