In Defense of Colin Powell 0

General Powell’s endorsement of Senator Obama fell upon Left Blogistan with a resounding thud, as witness here and here and here, just to pick a few.

Some persons cannot forgive his hack sales job for the Great and Patriotic Glorious War for a Lie. Others think he has become, because of that, irrelevant.

Mithras injects some rationality into the discussion here.

Many years ago I worked for a retired Army bird colonel. I was chatting with him shortly after he lost a particularly bruising bureaucratic battle (he was on the side of the angels, by the way). He said, “I forgot what I learned in the Army. You fight like hell for your position, but, when the decision’s made, you shut up and follow orders.”

General Powell is a General, USA, ret. No doubt he learned the same lesson as Chuck. And no doubt this had a lot to do with his making his presentation at the UN.

I have a separate, unrelated story.

Well, not exactly unrelated, maybe tangentially related.

I used to work for a man–a good and honest man, the second-best boss I have ever had–who had been a very successful Sergeant in the Army, until he suffered an on-the-job (non-combat) injury and had to leave for medical reasons. He had the highest security clearance and knew persons in places the rest of us don’t know are places; indeed, he knew about First Son’s promotion to Sergeant before either First Son or I did.

He and I were standing out back in the designated smoking area chatting as the movement of men and material for the Great and Patriotic Glorious War for a Lie was just beginning.

“[Boss],” I said, “I don’t have a good feeling about this.”

He looked at me and said, “Frank, it was going to happen anyway.” And, indeed, the warmongers had set the course for war from the beginning of the Current Federal Administration.

Now, you can argue that General Powell, rather than stage his dog-and-pony show, ought to have resigned, as Mithras argued last night.

And I will not disagree with you.

We cannot know, until and unless General Powell tells us, to what extent he was duped by the warmongers, to what extent he duped himself, or to what extent he he was consciously duplicitous.

How many of us have done something, perhaps something truly vile, by accident, to realize later that we should have done something else?

Persons in powerful positions are persons whose errors may have powerful consequences.

Here is my point: It is not right to dismiss the rest of General Powell’s truly distinguished career because of one powerful error.

Hold him accountable for his mistakes, but also give him credit for his accomplishments.