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All the entries posted on December 12, 2006.
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Home > Window on Washington > Archives > 2006 > December > 12
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Aggie Loyalty
Secretary of Defense-designate Robert Gates, confirmed last week by the Senate, won’t officially take the job until next Monday.
Why the delay? Aggie commencement this weekend.
Gates, still the president of Texas A&M University, says he doesn’t want to miss it. In a “Special Message to Aggies,” Gates said he will resign as president on Monday as he takes the oath as defense secretary.
“My last official act as president will be to preside at the commencement ceremonies on Dec. 15-16,” Gates said. “You already know that I am leaving this incredible university reluctantly and with a heavy heart. By the same token, Aggies - more than anyone else - understand why I must do so.”
Gates is spending much of this week in Washington in high-level meetings about Iraq. Tomorrow, he will be at the Pentagon when President Bush drops by to get input on a new way forward in Iraq.
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Upon Further Review
Q-and-A on Monday with White House Press Secretary Tony Snow when he was asked about the Holocaust denial conference now underway in Iran:
Q: Do you have any words of wisdom about this Holocaust conference in Iran? Anything you want to say about that?
Snow: No, I just…
A moment later:
Q: Can I spend a little more time on the Holocaust conference?
Snow: No, because I have not spent any time studying it, and I don’t want to, I just, I don’t want to talk about it.
Snow went on to label the Holocaust “one of the great horrors in human history,” but declined to pass judgment on the conference in Iran.
Today, this from Snow:
“The United States condemns the conference on the Holocaust convoked by the Iranian regime on Monday in Tehran. While people around the world mark International Human Rights Week and renew the solemn pledges of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, which was drafted in the wake of the atrocities of World War II, the Iranian regime perversely seeks to call the historical fact of those atrocities into question and provide a platform for hatred. The gathering of Holocaust deniers in Tehran is an affront to the entire civilized world, as well as to the traditional Iranian values of tolerance and mutual respect. The United States will continue to support those in Iran and elsewhere who seek to promote human rights and dignity, and will stand with them in their efforts to overcome oppression, injustice and tyranny.”
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Hired Help
Improbable though it might seem, President Bush on Monday huddled in the Oval Office to seek confidential advice on Iraq from two men who get paychecks from network TV news organizations whose job it is to ferret out information about such private meetings.
Among the five “outside experts” the White House brought in to chat with Bush were retired Gens. Barry McCaffrey (above) and Jack Keane. McCaffrey is a paid consultant for NBC, often appearing on the peacock network’s and and cable operations to opine about the war. McCaffrey also is a client of the Washington Speakers Bureau, which lists him as a “fee code 4” speaker ($15,001-$25,000) Ex-Gen. Keane does similar duty for ABC.
Wayne Downing, the third retired general at the session, is a former ABC consultant.
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