It's ironic that PJ Crowley went to MIT to talk about the power of new media on foreign policy issues only to find that a blog posting of his remarks ended his career as America's top foreign policy spokesman. It's also ironic that although Crowley's comments were immediately reported via twitter, Facebook and several foreign policy blogs, his boss, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton didn't immediately mind. It was only when the new White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley learned about Crowley's comments that the trouble began.
State Department insiders say Crowley's MIT comments about Bradley Manning and his tweets comparing the "Middle East tsunami" over the last several weeks with Japan's earthquake and tsunami were emailed around Foggy Bottom and the subject of many water-cooler conversations. "Nobody thought he would be fired over this," one State Department official told me.
But when ABC News' Jake Tapper asked President Obama about Crowley's comments during the president's press availability on Friday, Obama said, "(I) asked the Pentagon whether or not the procedures that have been taken in terms of his confinement are appropriate and are meeting our basic standards...(they) assure me that they are. I can't go into details about some of their concerns, but some of this has to do with Private Manning's safety as well." President Obama was being asked about inconsistent messages coming from his team and Daley was not happy about it. Daley was upset that while the Pentagon was saying that Manning was being treated fairly in response to claims from the liberal left, State's chief spokesman was questioning DoD's truthfulness.
The conflicting and ambiguous messaging from the White House and its' agency heads has up until now been part of the Obama administration's playbook. The president has time after time used contradictory statements to at once please his Democratic base and the far-left progressives that are growing increasingly disenchanted with his rhetoric.
Just last week, Hollywood actor Matt Damon spoke out about his frustration with Obama's hope and change message saying, "I'm disappointed in the health care plan and in the troop build-up in Afghanistan." And Damon is certainly not alone in his irritation with the president's action-deficit. The left is filled with frustration for the president because he has turned out to be nothing like they hoped. Barbara Streisand, Jane Lynch, Jon Stewart and MoveOn.org are all let down. Obama has consistently been inconsistent on healthc are reform, taxes, the budget and most recently on the military's Don't Ask-Don't Tell policy, the Egyptian President's future, support for the opposition in Libya, a Libyan no fly zone, off-shore oil drilling, Israel, jobs, the UN and even on being president of the United States (see "it would be easier to be president of China").
But now comes new White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley who is in charge of making progress. And getting anything done in Washington means getting comfortable with disappointing someone. Daley wants to stop the Obama administration's conflicting messages, empty rhetoric and personal opinion giving from staff members. Crowley, a career foreign service officer who served President Bill Clinton at the NSC, has been allowed to give his own opinions without repercussions from his boss, Secretary Hillary Clinton, since he started as State Department spokesman at the beginning of the Obama administration. He was shocked to learn that there were new rules this week. Crowley serves as an example of the new kind of White House we are getting with Daley in charge.
At the same MIT discussion where Crowley's "stupid" comment got him fired, he also said, "But the most important thing I do every day is read the New York Times -- it's the national paper of record." It's no wonder Crowley thinks punishing the WikiLeaker was "stupid". The most important part of his day has been spent reading New York Times stories on leaked cables and where Julian Assange is considered a hero. But thanks to Bill Daley, Crowley will now have lots of important things to do.
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The United States has no right to deny this man decent treatment. He is a citizen, he has the right to be treated fairly. His safety is only questioned at the hands of his captors, our military. Pj Crowley was right and moral to highlight this injustice. I applaud him.
Punishment usually comes after a conviction of some sort, even under UCMJ.
I think he was trying to be ironic, but I it didn't work.
As for Crowley having "lots of important things" to do now that he is no longer employed at State, I wonder if among those we could have him include running for President.
I would vote for him. I would be delighted to see a candidate with demonstrated integrity on the ballot.
Integrity has been a kind of low priority the last few presidencies, getting right down to near zero the last twelve years.
The presidential candidates we have had have been only painted over with washes of integrity, for their election races, after which the washes didn't stand up well. Obama's certainly hasn't been anywhere near as advertised.
If P.J. Crowley can be prevailed upon to run as a Democrat, first in the Democratic primary, I suspect he could win the nomination first round. The Democrats would like a candidate who could bring voters back, and probably win.
Suddenly there would a real challenge for the Republicans. A challenger with both feet not shot off for trying to shoot from the hip while doing a back-and-forth shuffle-waffle at the same time.
If P.J. Crowley could get P.J. O'Rourke to run with him. O'Rourke is "conservative" with integrity and insight. They'd be a shoo-in!
http://bit.ly/hFoHnB
All of this is not happening under Bush but under Obama!
http://thinkprogress.org/2011/03/13/crowley-manning-resignation/
Kind of like here...
First, I guarantee you there are plenty of disenchanted Obama voters who would not categorize themselves as "far-left". The President's inconsistencies have been notable because the end perception for a lot of us is reactive fence-sitting and re-election campaigning, not leading or governing.
Second, I find it amusing that your criticism of Crowley is in the method, not the content. Business as usual in Washington when voices speaking up with a POV that differs from the party line are squelched, and pronto. Remind you of a certain run-up to the Iraq war?
The door is wide open for a third party candidate, which even if they can't get elected will pose a problem for the President in 2012. Go Ron Paul.
They also said Pat Tillman was killed by enemy fire.
"We have met the enemy, and he is us..."
With almost two more years to go, we may see a reversal of these trends. But more than likely Barack Obama will face some serious rivals in state primaries in 2012. This cannot be good for the country or us Democrats.
I read in another of today's articles it's not unreasonable to expect he can raise a billion for the 2012 election. He's not exactly going to be getting that kind of dough from the individuals who supported him so remarkably in 2008, but not a problem, because there are plenty of huge corporations which will make up the balance.
Add the following and 2012 could be a rout for Obama:
1) Obama's repeated attempts to 'compromise' with the Republicans is making the case for why the voters should just go ahead and elect a Republican in 2012.
2) Romney already has the blessing of Republican establishment, and Rove and company are already working on how to craft the primary message for Romney because he polls best among independents. All the others except Newt Gingrich are effectively vying for who is likely to picked as the VP candidate.
3) If the economy does not significantly improve by next summer, the Republicans can effectively paint Obama as being ineffective on the most important issue to voters.
proverbial dark horse shows up. I doubt Romney is a threat, even with Rove's help--way too much baggage.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/01/manning-visitor-turned-away/
That's just cruel, expecting Manning's friends to comply with laws, just like every other visitor to the base must do!
But here's the kicker, incontrovertible evidence of torture coming from Manning's lawyer, David Coombs:
"Coombs says that a television is placed in front of Manning’s cell for anywhere from 1 to 3 hours during the week and up to 6 hours on the weekend (Manning’s visitors told me he has 1 hour of TV time per day), but he also said “the television stations are limited to the basic local stations.”
Poor baby: I can imagine that being forced to choose between the 'basic local stations' might be considered torture to someone who's been raised on cable and PPV channels.