David Brooks: No Apologies 5 Years Later

Given the current tragedy in Iraq -- hell, given the past five years -- you would think the many pundits who agitated for an attack on Iraq, largely on false pretenses, would have take the opportunity of the arrival of the fifth anniversary of the war (or the 4,000 dead milestone) to drop to their knees, at least figuratively, and beg the American public for forgiveness. With more than 60 percent of their fellow Americans now calling the war a "mistake" and agitating for troop withdrawals -- and the president's approval rating still heading south, thanks to their war -- it would seem to be the right thing to do. We won't even mention the maiming of more than 20,000 young Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis.

Let's take David Brooks of The New York Times, for example, and what he wrote exactly five years ago when he was writing for The Weekly Standard. Ironically, he even attacked his present employer, The Times. The Weekly Standard, of course, was edited by Bill Kristol, who has an even worse track record on the war. Naturally, not one, but both, of them were later rewarded with key New York Times op-ed slots. Two for the price of -- two!

Brooks is among those who have long argued that they actually got the war right, but Donald Rumsfeld made it wrong. In other words, war good, Rummy bad. He has emphasized that he and many of his fellow pundits had it right at the time in urging more boots on the ground. They were "prescient," he relates. But Rumsfeld and his crowd "got things wrong, and the pundits often got things right."

He never cites any of his own views at the time, obviously hoping that readers will place him among those pundits that "got things right." And also: please forget that he was a strong supporter of the invasion to start with.

In fact, he bears special blame -- shame -- not only for his writing, but for serving as senior editor of the most influential pro-war publication, The Weekly Standard.

He may want you to forget what he wrote five years ago, but here's a trip down memory lane with Our Mr. Brooks.

From his column in The Weekly Standard, March 10, 2003:

"The American commentariat is gravely concerned. Over the past week, George W. Bush has shown a disturbing tendency not to waffle when it comes to Iraq. There has been an appalling clarity and coherence to his position. There has been a reckless tendency not to be murky, hesitant, or evasive. Naturally, questions are being raised about President Bush's leadership skills.

"Meanwhile, among the smart set, Hamlet-like indecision has become the intellectual fashion. The liberal columnist E. J. Dionne wrote in The Washington Post that he is uncomfortable with the pro- and anti-war camps. He praised the doubters and raised his colors on behalf of 'heroic ambivalence.' The New York Times, venturing deep into the territory of self-parody, ran a full-page editorial calling for 'still more discussion' on whether or not to go to war.

"In certain circles, it is not only important what opinion you hold, but how you hold it. It is important to be seen dancing with complexity, sliding among shades of gray. Any poor rube can come to a simple conclusion -- that President Saddam Hussein is a menace who must be disarmed--but the refined ratiocinators want to be seen luxuriating amid the difficulties, donning the jewels of nuance, even to the point of self-paralysis.

"But those who actually have to lead and protect, and actually have to build one step on another, have to bring some questions to a close. Bush gave Saddam time to disarm. Saddam did not. Hence, the issue of whether to disarm him forcibly is settled. The French and the Germans and the domestic critics may keep debating, which is their luxury, but the people who actually make the decisions have moved on to more practical concerns. . . ."

From his Weekly Standard column two weeks later:

"The president has remained resolute. Momentum to liberate Iraq continues to build. The situation has clarified, and history will allow clear judgments about which leaders and which institutions were up to the challenge posed by Saddam and which were not.

"Over the past 12 years the United States has sought to disarm or depose Saddam -- more forcefully since September 11 than before. Throughout that time, France and Russia have sought to undermine sanctions and fend off the ousting of Saddam. They opposed Clinton's efforts to bomb Saddam, just as they oppose Bush's push for regime change. Through the fog and verbiage, that is the essential confrontation. Events will show who was right, George W. Bush or Jacques Chirac.

"What matters, and what ultimately sprang the U.N. trap, is American resolve. The administration simply wouldn't let up. It didn't matter how Hans Blix muddied the waters with his reports on this or that weapons system. Under the U.N. resolutions, it was up to Saddam to disarm, administration officials repeated ad nauseam, and he wasn't doing it. It was and is sheer relentlessness that has driven us to where we are today.

"Which is ironic. We are in this situation because the first Bush administration was not relentless in its pursuit of Saddam Hussein. That is a mistake this Bush administration will not repeat."

Greg Mitchell's new book is So Wrong for So Long: How the Press, the Pundits -- and the President -- Failed on Iraq. It has been hailed by our Arianna, Bill Moyers, Glenn Greenwald and others, and features a foreword by Joe Galloway and preface by Bruce Springteen.

Comments

[johntal]

This whole business of being able to place just any person on TV , call them a "pundit " , (giving them an assumed credibility), without regard to their CV and/ or agenda is just another way that the "powers that be" use the MSM

[Kundera]

you know damn well it's not whether we fought the war or not, it's whether we won in a timely manner that's important. If we won and got out within 2 years, Bush would be hugely popular and McCain would be a shoo in.

[Durango]

Why is Brooks or any of the other pundits who were so disasterously wrong about the war in Iraq still employed? Why is anyone listening to his opinion?

Yet I turn on the TV and see the same fools spouting the same wrong opinion. Why is there no accountability?

In what other profession could you be so wrong so often and keep your job?

Only In America (media).

[surfcitysteven]

All the neocons and other war supporters and enablers (HIllary Clinton) cannot possibly come out now and say it was a mistake to go in. They need an excuse as to why it all went wrong, not that their bonehead decision was doomed from the start and immoral from the start. To admit they were wrong would be to admit they cause 4000 US soldiers deaths for nothing. 30,000 (maybe more if you count psychological) debillitating injuries to soldiers. 100,000 (lowball) deaths to innocent iraqis. They cannot possibly admit now. To ask David Brooks to admit "OOPSIE" is to ask him to look in the mirror and see the monster.

[knerd]

Exposing past hypocrisy does not work with hypocrites. Exposing present hypocrisy doesn't even work. Still, kudos for your book Greg. It will help history expose the tragedy and the hypocrisy of the Bush war.

[MizJ]

I have an idea: instead of doing their useless mea culpa's for us, send all those pundits and war cheerleaders over to Iraq, have them stand in the public square, and do the same for their citizens. And hand them a shovel while they are at it to start cleaning the mess they helped to create. Invading a country that had nothing to do with 9/11, destroying their livelihoods, infrastructure, safety, security, water supply, electrical grids, oil pipelines and not having a clue as to who they actually are or their history, was one of the dumbest moves ever made by the US. And I am quite certain that the Iraqis in turn will honor those humble apologies by turning them into media stars just like we do here in the good old USA!

[realpolitic]

Yes, Brooks opposed a Hamlet-like indecision on Iraq or even a Lady Macbeth like guilt regarding the aftermath. All that was important to Brooks was a head-long rush into war because Saddam is a bad guy. Brooks opines: "Meanwhile among the smart set, Hamlet-like indecision has become the intellectual fashion." I am always amazed the way conservative "intellectuals" like Brooks criticize liberals for being among the elite and smart set. After all, conservatives like Brooks and Kristol have probably not spoken with an average American in years.

Again, all that was important was a head long rush into war. Accordingly, Bush is such a great leader because he does not recognize nuance. As Brooks said: "Events will show who was right George W. Bush or Jacques Chirac." Here Brooks spoke the truth. History clearly sides with the former French President Chirac. On this anniversary of the war and the 4,000 American soldier killed there, Brooks writes a column critical of Hillary Clinton. Some things never change.

[Blackbird2004]

While I am not a conservative nor do I agree with the Iraq war, I do like David Brooks. He's one conservative that doesn't attack the left, he merely puts his opinions out there. Brooks, isn't as pro Iraq-war as he use to be. The fact that this war was so botched and had nothing to do with the War of Terror, has turned him as well as many other conservatives. There is nothing wrong with changing one's opinion or ideas. In fact, it's a sign of Brooks' intelligence and humility over him ego.

[Rachel36]

Well written.

[ibfamous]

are we talking about the same david brooks? about this tall... balding... constantly belittling liberal ideas no matter how right they prove to be?

[realpolitic]

Brooks is all ego. He acknowleges little about our mistaken Iraq policy except that the world is more complex than he thought. How consoling!

[Merlin7]

As Dick Cheney might say, So? In high U.S. political and media circles no one is held accountable for anything. Consider the war in Vietnam, which cost 58,000 American lives and killed perhaps a million Vietnamese, Laotians and Cambodians. And was completely unnecessary, it turns out. Those nasty commies weren't interested in invading Los Angeles after all, as some conservatives had warned. Were LBJ and Nixon, plus all their pro-war congressional cohorts, hauled before tribunals to pay for their crimes? Nope. Were the pro-war pols vilified in the press, lambasted from pulpits? Nope. In fact, everyone sort of forgot about the war and focused on the minor recession of the mid-'70s. What's 60,000 dead Americans and a million dead Asians anyway. So let's not be too surprised by the ongoing revisionism regarding the Iraq war. In a few years it will all be forgotten and Americans will be focused on the high price of quacamole or something -- and preparing for another war against the bad guys du jour.

[dadw5boys]

HEY; LET'S BLAME IT ON THE ONE WHO IS NOT HERE.

HE IS BOUND BY AGGREMENTS NEVER TO SPEAK OUT AS LONG AS BUSH LIVES.

[Boboday555]

Neo-con war mongers acting like adults by apologizing for their pro-Iraq Oil War mistakes?