Attn. Clarkies, and Others: Want A Diversion From All This?

I have always been a suporter of Wesley Clark, for many reasons. One of my favorite interviews of his was when Dan Rather interviwed him on 60 Minutes II in November 2003. I took time to write a transcript, with a few minor clarifications I put in. This is a man who should be president now, but if we have to wait till 2008, so be it. Better than 2020. I know and respect the fact that there are those of you who support others, and there are others I could support for president, but Clark is a good man, and I trust him, respect him, have confidence in him, and hope like heck he runs in 2008.
This is long, and I'm not computer savvy enough to make this a link, but here it is:

60 Minutes II 11-2003

Rather: If you want to be president, it might be helpful to be a general first.
Generals have become president eight times in our history. And
now, while the country is at war, another military man wants to move
into the White House. Wesley Clark is a retired Army 4-star general
who jumped into the race only two months ago, and moved right up to
the top of the pack. We caught up with General Clark this past
weekend in Washington, in between campaign appearances. We
got a revealing look at the Wesley Clark behind the impressive
resume, and learn why he thinks he should be the first general since
Eisenhower to be president.

Rather: If I ask you to say the one thing above all others,”This I believe . . .
What would it be?

Clark: Oh, this I believe, in accountability, responsibility, performance of
duty, and dedication. My profession has been a profession of arms,
and it has been a profession of duty.


(Voice announcing at Presidential Medal Of Freedom Ceremony):
Clark and Gert are shown at ceremony. Clark is receiving award from
President Clinton. “Respected for his military expertise, keen intellect,
and diplomatic skill . . .

Rather (narrates): Wesley Clark was not your average general. He is an
unusual mix of warrior and intellectual. First in his class
at West Point, and a Rhodes Scholar. Clark rose quickly through the
ranks to near the top. He was Supreme Allied Commander of NATO,
a four-star general who dealt with officers and diplomats, and led
NATO forces to victory in Kosovo. But even at those heights, he found
inspiration from very un-military sources.

Clark: Clark speaking at his retirement ceremony at West Point: And maybe it
was Bob Dylan who said it best in his song “Blowin’ In The Wind,”
when he asked “How many roads must man walk down before you
call him a man.” . . .

Rather (narrates): Clark quoted that anti-war anthem as he retired in 2000,
after a brilliant 34-year military career. He was a company
commander in Vietnam, shot four times in a firefight in 1970. He was
awarded a Silver Star for leading his troops, despite his wounds.
After Vietnam, Clark steadily climbed the Pentagon ladder,
promotion after promotion, to ever more important posts. But even as
a top brass, he was a hands-on commander who seemed to know
everything about what his troops were doing, and how they did it.


Clark: (Clark is shown with troops in the field.) "O.K., that’s that new sniper
rifle that you were telling me about. 50 caliber.."


Rather (narrates): Clark shown on the campaign trail: Candidate Clark favors
gun control, abortion rights, and a constitutional amendment banning
lag-burning. He wants to roll back some of President Bush’s tax cuts,
and would use that money to expand health coverage for children.
But Clark’s strongest messages are about how President Bush and
defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld have handled the war in
Iraq.

Clark: We went to war on the basis of misleading information. We hadn’t
exhausted all the diplomatic options. We didn’t have an imminent
threat. We didn’t even have adequate forces to handle the operation.
The armed forces are way overstretched for what they can reasonably
be expected to do, assuming that we continue to maintain a presence
in Iraq.


Rather: In the history of warfare, it’s hard to find anything that was more
successful, so what are the chances that Donald Rumsfeld was
right?

Clark: You have to plan for the aftermath. This plan didn’t consider the
aftermath. It didn’t work through to the political conditions that were
what the war was all about.

Rather (narrates): If elected President, Clark says he would try to make U.S.
troops in Iraq part of a NATO force, under American command, and
that he would put a non- American in charge of the Iraq reconstruction.
And he argues the war in Iraq has diverted resources from the overall
war against terror in Afghanistan and elsewhere.


Clark: (Speaking at an event): We have to take the lead in using our scarce
resources to focus on what the rel problem is with terrorists. And that
real problem is not in Iraq. That problem is still where it was originally,
and we didn’t finish it.

Rather (narrates): That’s not the first time Clark has differed with the
Pentagon. During the 1999 Kosovo War, he clashed with then
Defense Secretary William Cohen,and Joint Chiefs Chairman,
General Hugh Shelton. Even though he led the successful campaign,
with no American casualties, Clark was relieved of his command,
and forced into retirement a few months later. At the time, no one said
publicly why he was forced out, but two months ago, Shelton charged
Clark was fired over quote “character and integrity issues.”
Shelton has refused to explain his remarks. Clark says he was fired
because he argued that the U.S. should have been more aggressive
against ethnic cleansing in the Balkans.

Clark: Just turned out that we had different views about the importance of
preventing another round of genocide and how to do it. And I thought,
you know when you’re a senior officer, you have an obligation not just
to answer the mail, but to speak up,and to speak out until you’re told
not to any longer, until you're told we're just not going to do it.

Rather: So you think this with Hugh Shelton has to do with policy, that you . . .

Clark: Oh absolutely, it never had anything to do with character and integrity.

Rather: And military and foreign policy are what brought Clark into the
presidential race, but only after he overcame some opposition on
the home front. Tell me about your wife Gert. Did she want you to
run?

Clark: We’ve been married for 36 1/2 years, and we’ve gone through our full
Army career together. She was my partner, my friend, my advisor, my
coach, my love, but she didn’t want me to run.

Rather: What did she say to you?

Clark: Well, she laughed when people called the house in February of 2003,
and said “We want to talk to General Clark and ask him to run."
She would snicker, and finally it came down to the anger inside at
the way the men and women in the armed forces were being used
and abused by the administration. (Clark announcing his intention to
run for President of the United States. (*I think someone here at DU
has a pic of this scene for an avatar.) : And I am here to
announce that I intend to seek the presidency of the United States Of
America.

Rather: But Clark discovered that he wasn’t ready for the political combat of
a campaign. He stumbled right out of the gate. First he told
reporters he would have voted or the congressional
resolution authorizing President Bush to go to war against
Saddam. Then he said he wasn’t sure, and then said he would
have voted against it.

Clark: At the time I’d made this statement, I was having what I thought was an
informal,. I wasn’t clear whether it was on the.record or off the record
discussion. . . about the philosophy of sort of entering the presidency,
and somehow the Iraq question got thrown in.

Rather: Somehow,..., you knew that was coming.

Clark: No, actually I didn’t. But when it came, it’s the kind of . . .there’s no
question that it wasn't what I wanted to say.

Rather: Now Clark says he wouldn’t have voted for the resolution that
passed, but a different one that Congress never voted on. Whether it
was intended to be on the record, off the record, or in the background
I think you’d agree if not tell me, that on something as important as
whether you’d have voted to give the president the authorization
to support to go to war or not, is a situation where your yea should
be yea, and your nay should be nay.

Clark: I always said I would vote for a resolution that gave the President the
leverage to go to the Unityed Nations and then come back to the
Congress, for the authority to go to force.


Rather: Clark finally got some semblance of a campaign rolling, with
reinforcements from veterans of Clinton and Gore campaigns.
There’s the private jet, the motorcade, the nervous advance men,
waiting to brief the candidate, the speeches and photo-ops, and
oh yes, the voters. Still, Clark’s campaign schedule always
leaves time for a daily swim, something he’s been doing for years.
One day last week there was even time for an impromptu
calisthenics lesson for CBS news producer Bonnie Katt (sp?).


Bonnie: Says to Clark as he demonstrates push ups between chairs: How
many can you do in a row?

Clark: Says as he does push ups: Oh, I don’t know. I used to do 100.

Rather: Looked like tough push ups to me, between chairs.

Clark: Well, it’s the best way to do them because that way you don’t have to
get down on the ground and mess up your shoes, or get yourn hands
dirty, and so forth. So if you just got a couple of minutes, and you can
find 3 chairs that you trust, you put that together, and you get a great
workout.

Rather: Lately though, there are some signs his campaign is wobbling. Clark
is raising money, but he dropped out of the mid-January Iowa
caucuses, and is well back in the pack in New Hampshire. He's
strongest in South Carolina, where he has to win, and in other states
with primaries on February 3rd. But as the campaign has heated up,
so have the negative comments from former peers in the Army.
( To Clark): Somewhere along the line, Wesley Clark developed a
reputation among some others . . . Schwartzkopf Shelton, Tommy
Franks ,... just something about Wesley Clark that tees me off. Has
that been your experience?

Clark: Listen, Dan, I don’t know if we can ever set aside gossip. What I
learned in the military is that gossip starts early, and it stays forever.
And all you do is do your best to be who you are, and work through it.

Rather: For Clark, the negative talk just boils down to a policy dispute
stemming from Bosnia and Kosovo. Clark plans to testify
next month at the war crimes trial of Serb president Slobodan
Milosevic. And he believes strongly, as you’ll see i here, that the
U.S. should intervene, with troops, in genocidal civil conflicts.

Clark: I want so show you what a policy dispute’s all about. (Clark shows
Rather a photo album: ) This is Bedalina (sp?), in Bosnia,
Hertzegovina (sp?). in 1992.
This is what ethnic cleansing is, or was, in the Balkans. These are
Serbs, these are dead Muslims. This is the casualness, the
pornography, of violence against civilians. And, this is not real war.
This is war against unarmed people. I just couldn’t bear the
thought that the United States would stand by and allow this to
happen.

Rather: (Sees another picture in the album, and asks Clark): What is the
other picture you have marked?

Clark: (Clark gets quiet): In the summer of 1998, while I was in command,
another round of ethnic cleansing started, some 300-400,000
Kosovar Albanians were driven from their homes, and in the
mountains, this is what you saw. This is a five-week old
baby, who has died of exposure (Clark’s voice begins to break) and
the family is preparing him for burial.
When you can stop something like this, you should.

Rather: To hear you speak of this, it’s the first time I’ve seen you speak with
real emotion . . .

Clark: Yeah. . .

Rather: Deep seeded emotion. Tell me why that is.

Clark: Why? Because you’re dealing with people’s lives when you’re dealing
with things like this Dan.
You know there were people in this case who said “We don’t have
any interest here, I mean, there's no oil. If there were oil here, we'd
stop this.” (*Wonder who he’s talking about?)“So we’d rather fight for
oil than to save lives.” I don’t think so. I don’t think that’s what
this country really believes, or what we stand for, so I do get
amotional about this because when you can do good, you should.


Rather: But General Clark does not think the U.S. should have gone to war
with Iraw for humanitarin reasons, as some in the Bush
administration argue. While he acknowledges the brutality of
Saddam’s regime, Clark says he doesn’t feel the
situation justified the American invasion.