From the NYT.
In a wide-ranging interview here, Mr. Dowd called for a withdrawal from Iraq and expressed his disappointment in Mr. Bush’s leadership.
He criticized the president as failing to call the nation to a shared sense of sacrifice at a time of war, failing to reach across the political divide to build consensus and ignoring the will of the people on Iraq. He said he believed the president had not moved aggressively enough to hold anyone accountable for the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, and that Mr. Bush still approached governing with a "my way or the highway" mentality reinforced by a shrinking circle of trusted aides.
"I really like him, which is probably why I’m so disappointed in things," he said. He added, "I think he’s become more, in my view, secluded and bubbled in."
In speaking out, Mr. Dowd became the first member of Mr. Bush’s inner circle to break so publicly with him.
For someone whose worked so closely with the President, going all the way back to Texas in 1999 - Dowd's rebuke of the Bush administration is stunning even in the wake of inner-circle revelations made by David Kuo that the Bush Administration had used it's Faith initiatives to further political ends.
Rove: "Just get me a Fucking Faith-Based thing. Got it?"
And especially since Dowd was a principle "architect" of the flip-flopper meme which helped sink John kerry's presidential aspirations.
Mr. Dowd, a crucial part of a team that cast Senator John Kerry as a flip-flopper who could not be trusted with national security during wartime, said he had even written but never submitted an op-ed article titled "Kerry Was Right," arguing that Mr. Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat and 2004 presidential candidate, was correct in calling last year for a withdrawal from Iraq.
"I’m a big believer that in part what we’re called to do — to me, by God; other people call it karma — is to restore balance when things didn’t turn out the way they should have," Mr. Dowd said. "Just being quiet is not an option when I was so publicly advocating an election."
As most of us here realize, Kerry was clearly sandbagged. The claim that he had "Voted for the Troops before he voted against them" was clearly bogus. Simply put: There were two different versions of the bill - one included a way to pay for the funding of the war and the other (the one he voted against) did not.
Needless to say, the White House couldn't let Dowd's remarks go unchallenged. From Face the Nation this Sunday via Thinkprogress.
The New York Times noted Dowd’s distancing from Bush came at the same time one of his "premature twin daughters died, he was divorced, and he watched his oldest son prepare for deployment to Iraq." Bartlett latched onto these difficulties in Dowd’s personal life in an effort to undermine his substantive concerns about Bush’s Iraq policy.
Bartlett said Dowd has been on a "long personal journey...in his private life" and that he had become too emotional over the war. CBS host Bob Schieffer interrupted to ask: "Are you suggesting he’s having some kind of personal problems and this is just what has resulted?" Bartlett denied that’s what he was doing, but then returned to his talking point, suggesting Dowd’s views should be evaluated in light of the fact the he was going through "personal turmoil."
This sounds a lot when some right-wing Christo-activists tried to claim that David Kuo was the newest member of the Axis of Evil for criticizing Bush.
Thinkprogress goes on to note...
What is even more disturbing than the treatment of those who criticize the Bush White House is the fact that those who have been criticized most harshly — people like Gen. Eric Shinseki, Richard Clarke, and Paul O’Neill — have in fact been proven to be more right than wrong. Dowd’s case is no different.
With Sens Feingold and Reid responding to Bush's Veto threats with an even more agressive Iraq pull-out bill than the one which has already passed the House and Senate, it's seems that the clock has finaly run out for those in the Bush Administration and it's enablers who have been consistently and repeatedly wrong about this War, from WMDs through the Insurgency, to the ability of Paris Hilton to ride through Baghdad on a bicycle in a bikini despite the rapidly escalating Civil War.
As Bill Maher has suggested, Democrats have finally learn to Ante Up.
Let just see if Bush has learned when to hold 'em or finally fold 'em.
Vyan
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