I’m sure some folks will assume that Sen. Ron Wyden may not have meant to imply that he actually trusted the Bush administration when he said he believed in the Reagan doctrine of “Trust but verify” in response to my question about whether he trusted the administration. It’s a line he seems to like — a lot — so it’s entirely possible that he just popped it out as a part of his usual spiel.
Apart from the obvious, literal interpretation of the phrase (the first word is fairly unambiguous) and Wyden’s words that followed (as I related in the original post), let’s consider it in the context of Tuesday’s Town Hall on Iraq as a whole.
Wyden brought up the Petraeus report due out in September at least two or three times in answers to questions about the war, saying that it was possible that it would have an effect on shifting the course of the war by convincing Republicans. Willamette Week‘s coverage of the meeting quotes him:
“I dont think that General Petraeus can prove that we are getting the job done,” said Wyden.
Comments like that were greeted with jeers at the town hall.
What Wyden said might be correct if the report conformed to reality, but nobody with any amount of skepticism really expected the report to do that even when it was first announced. Who could possibly have predicted this:
Despite Bush’s repeated statements that the report will reflect evaluations by Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, administration officials said it would actually be written by the White House, with inputs from officials throughout the government.
Perhaps people like Wyden should have been paying attention three months ago, when General “I lost 190,000 weapons in Iraq” Petraeus said this:
Baghdad Three months into the job, General David Petraeus says it is difficult to predict how well the surge of troops in Baghdad will succeed before the full number of troops arrive and that he would not have a definitive answer about prospects for stability by September, when he is to report back to Congress.
If Wyden doesn’t expect the report to be accurate, then he shouldn’t pretend it will have some transformative effect on the GOP. Maybe he thinks that when they see what a crock it is that they’ll throw their hands up in disgust, but that doesn’t excuse peddling it to the crowd in Hoffman Hall as if it had some sort of validity.
For myself, I take the senator at his word. I think that hope beyond hope he trusts the administration to finally get their act together and do the right thing. I think that his words about the Petraeus report changing the minds of Republicans were sincere. I believe the guy says what he means.
I just think he’s gullible.