Mark – I don’t disagree, I just wish that it were otherwise. I think you’d agree that the facts of the accusation are more important than the motives of the accuser. If I publicly accuse you of murder, the fact I’m doing it because you stole my Tonka truck when I five is much less important then question of whether or not you’re actually guilty. Hanna Arendt once claimed that it was the communists who introduced the tactic of attacking motives in order to dispute inconvenient facts. They’d call their opponents bigoted fascists as if that changed the fact that they were on Moscow’s payroll. Whether that’s true or not, it seems to me that going after motives rather than facts is a tendency of the left we usually don’t like.

As Rich noted earlier, I think Clarke could have written a thoughtful, serious and critical book about Bush. I wouldn’t necessarily agree with all of it, but this war on terro is a monumental and monumentally complicated undertaking. It would strain our faith in bith the fallibility of man and government to believe that Bush did everything perfectly. But Clarke’s criticism is so outlandish, so not constructive, and so contradictory to the facts as we know them that Clarke’s motives have to become an issue. Again, as Rich (and I) have noted — and as you would no doubt agree — that briefing Clarke gave is flatly incompatible with the tone, tenor and content of his book. If that weren’t the case, I’d say his motives don’t matter.