The “Oh the Humanity!” edition continues…
On Meet The Press”. The George Tenet’s “Skeezers of Iraq World Tour” rolls on.
Cheney on Video: Slam dunk, bitches! Tenet said it! He came and hopped up on my lap and said “Slam Dunk, Unca Dick! Can we go to war now? Can we? Huh? CanweCanweCanwe?”
Tenet: Cheney represented to me..blah…blah…blah. My recollection of my reflection of our difference of opinion over...yadda…yadda…yadda
The man cuts the meat of his words with a laser cannon down to aspic to avoid taking any responsibility and avoid saying “Look, Cheney is a great lying Balrog who leads Dubya around and makes him caper like an organ grinder’s monkey.”
But inside Tenet’s head, this is clearly how he has digitally re-remembered the exchange…
Russert: Can you show us on this deontologically correct doll exactly where Cheney touched you?
Tenet: Augh! Augh! Bad touch! Bad Touch!
(Tenet then retreats to the corner, huddling, shivering and stroking his Presidential Medal of Freedom whispering “Precioussss. My Precioussssesss.”)
Russert: Mr. Tenet has gone away for a little while.
Later, more video of Cheney lying.
Shorter Tenet:
I did my best.
I did not always step up.
I did not correct every statement everyone made.
Buy my book.
Video of Dubya lying.
Shorter Tenet:
Well that was his judgment.
I can’t speak for him.
We cleared that speech.
Buy my book.
Russert: But you know exactly what that kind of speech does to the American people. Aren’t you an enabler?
Tenet: No. Shut up.
About halfway through the interview Tenet folds his arms and digs in. Behind the scenes he asserts he had crossed his “T”s and dotted his “I”s. He parsed his sentences very, very carefully so that he could not be held responsible for where he knew this runaway train was headed.
What is also clear was what Tenet’s real responsibility consisted of: Catering a lavish Intel Brunch Buffet for Preznit Drinky to graze on. Some salmon, minestrone soup, WMDs, a dessert cart of Al-Qaeda, tiny fruit cups of caution, a tossed salad of differing, dithering and highly qualified bureaucratese Iraq intel, bagels, oranges.
And waffles. Lots and lots of waffles.
He laid out a great, groaning table of “Everything That Might Possibly Be True… or at Least Faintly Truth-Flavored” and stood aside and let Cheney and Rove and Wolfowitz and Bush load up their plates with whatever they pleased based on whatever sated their vile, indiscriminate appetites.
If Cheney wanted something that wasn’t on the menu, Tenet would man the make-it-yourself omelet station and whip it up for him.
If what Dubya demanded wasn’t available in this locale – maybe a little yellowcake -- he’d just go Sinatra on Tenet’s ass.
Tell Tenet to fuck off, order out, have his personal chef deliver it to his table, pass it around under Tenet’s nose and call him a pussy.
Russert: Why didn’t you take the Niger/yellowcake lie out of the State of the Union Speech?
Tenet: We took it out of other speeches. We were vewwy forceful.
Russert: So how did this load of hogwhiz that you have allegedly told everyone is hogwhiz repeatedly manage to make it into the SOTU?
Tenet: I didn’t read the SOTU. I staffed it out and nobody caught it.
driftglass: Are you shitting me? Like Gonzalez, Tenet is either lying outright or is criminally incompetent. I mean, in the one constitutionally mandated presentation to Congress the President is required to make?
The one Presidential speech that is scheduled and planned months in advance every year?
That preempts network prime time every year?
The President’s Number One Product Placement Moment?
Made on the eve of taking this nation over the cliff and off to war by an Administration led by idiots and zealots and who has a massive hard-on for finding any excuse to conquer Iraq?
An Administration that had already repeatedly attempted to insert their nuclear lies into previous speeches?
And you didn’t even bother to read it? Didn’t even bother to fire up MS Word and do a search on “Niger” or “uranium” or “new-cue-ler”? And none of your staff bothered to either?
Either lying outright or the head of the CIA was so utterly criminally incompetent as to make lying the preferred alternative.
Either lying, or…
(Image of Tenet speeding off, late for his appointment with his tailor to be measured for a Medal of Freedom sash.
Something manly, classic, but sassy. You know; somthing classy.
He absently tosses his copy of the SOTU to the Polish cleaning lady on his way out.
“Check this out and let me know if there’s anything hinky,” Tenet.
“Vat iz dis ‘ihnkyee’?” Svetlana.
“Great,” Tenet, hurrying into the elevator.
Svetlana leafs confusedly through the huge sheaf of paper.
“Vat is dis ’ooo-ran-yum’?”
“That’s super. Thanks,” Tenet.
Elevator door closes.)
Russert: And after? After the President said this shit in front of a billion fucking people, all either freaked out or insanely gung ho that we’re about to go on a killing spree.
Tenet: I didn’t watch the speech.
Russert: But why did it take six months?
Tenet: No one came to my office…Look we took it out of a speech in Cincinnati. Out of another speech. We were vewwy, vewwy forceful. We talked to Hadley and everything.
Russert: Well if you were so adamant, then where the fuck would these people have gotten the idea to put it into the SOTU?
Shorter Tenet:
Precioussss.
My Precioussssesss.
Buy my book
On This Week: John Edwards… followed by a panel make up of
David Brooks.
George Will.
Donna Brazile.
Oh sweet Butter Brickle Yahweh; At this point, Lucy Liu plying me with ancient whiskey and modern sexual technique would still not be enough to bribe to me slog through this sour pall of mediocrity.
End Part 2 of 2
2 comments:
George Tenet's performance as head of CIA, as depicted by Kurt Vonnegut back in 1961:
The television program was suddenly interrupted for a news bulletin. It wasn’t clear at first as to what the bulletin was about, since the announcer, like all announcers, had a serious speech impediment. For about half a minute, and in a state of high excitement, the announcer tried to say, “Ladies and gentlemen – ”
He finally gave up, handed the bulletin to a ballerina to read.
“That’s all right –” Hazel said of the announcer, “he tried. That’s the big thing. He tried to do the best he could with what God gave him. He should get a nice raise for trying so hard.”
or in Tenet's case, a Presidential Medal of Freedom and a fat advance from the book deal.
Come to think of it, Vonnegut's depiction could just as readily apply to Abu Gonzales, or Heck-of-a-job Brownie, or I-had-other-priorities Cheney, or dumb-blonde Goodling, or any of the myriad low achievers that make up today's GOP.
Listening to Slam Dunk sprint away from his legacy at mach 10 is quite amusing. All the books and all the interviews won't erase those two words and his general subservience to his massah's will to find a reason to invade Iraq.
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