Charlie Rose Science Series
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Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution--and How It Can Renew America
by Thomas L. Friedman
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by Thomas L. Friedman
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Transcripts available through Voxant.
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Charlie: I recommend 1)you stop worrying about getting the next interview. Worrying makes you a cheerleading stenographer. 2)you use your bully pulpit to ask the hard questions. Shame on you for being soft on the liars Bush and Rice. About Tenet- forget him because he, like Powell, put self before country. You will not like this: The Bushies are an ongoing disaster trying to put the country in the garbage can so that they can steal it on the cheap! They tried the same with Iraq but have failed.
George Tenet came across as completely disingenuous. When C.R. asked him to explain how the decision making process among The President, Cheney, and Rumsfeld worked, and which ultimately led the nation to War; Tenet repeatedly answered, "I cannot presume to know what was in the mind of the President {Cheney, Runsfeld}". Is that possible? The man who led the C.I.A.?, and the person whose job is to provide analysis on complex global issues, telling us that he had no insight on the decision making process of the people he met with daily on a daily basis? I really hope that he *is* lying. If he isn't, then the alternative is far worse, i.e that those with whom we've vested our national security are far more stupid and/or incompetent than any of us could have possibly imagined.
My main disappointment was that the entire interview focused on just the topics of WMD and pre-war decision making. There are a lot of other things to talk about with an ex-CIA director including effective strategies against terrorism, torture etc.
Mr. Tenet, at the end of the day, proved to be a big disappointment. Not that I really expected him to confirm or deny some truly disturbing reports about the origins of the war in Iraq, such as the claim that the carpetbagger brigade was lining up like a holy plague of locusts for no-bid contracts BEFORE Bush was even elected, but somehow I was hoping for a bit more. Charlie did his best to ferret out the truth but Tenet has dug in, and I'd wager that not even a waterboarding session by the Inquision would make him reveal any more than he already has.
Dear Charlie: I can certainly understand the temptation to interview the President, but you should have passed up the opportunity. First, your format -- quiet, deferential, non-threatening conversation taking place in a gentlemen's-club setting on the President's turf -- is not suited to eliciting information from a man with a 28 percent approval rating whom most of your viewers want to see grilled, nailed and/or impeached. Better to wait until he's out of office and clearing brush down on the Ranch. I've seen the flurry of Tenet interviews and to date haven't heard a single interviewer ask the obvious: If Tenet, the CIA and every other intelligence agency in the world were convinced Saddam had WMD, yet admit they had insufficient "HUMINT," and if Tenet himself had concerns about the longterm unintended consequences of an invasion of Iraq, why not let the U.N. inspectors complete their work? Instead, we kicked the inspectors out so we could start the bombing. In his role of CIA director, Tenet would have been well within even his narrowly defined job description to advise this. Perhaps someone would have listened. Maybe a few hundred thousand lives would have been saved. Some of your programs have too many guests. Late last week, Ken Auletta, Jack Reed, Terry McCarthy and David Arnold and John Waterbury, the presidents of the American universities in Cairo and Beirut, respectively, were jammed into one show. I've always been curious about the two universities, so I was interested. I confess, though, that I almost choked when you asked Arnold and Waterbury if they think they can "help" Karen Hughes, whose diplomatic efforts have been roundly criticized in the Middle East. But what really gave me pause was something far more serious than Karen Hughes' clumsy, All-American cowgirl diplomacy. We know that for a number of reasons, some justifiable, some not, America's image in the Muslim world couldn't get much lower. We also know that much of the hatred directed toward the U.S. stems from our support of despotic regimes. We know that the mission of these universities is, to a great extent, to spread the best of American values and culture to the Arab world while preparing young men and women for leadership positions in their countries. Both Arnold and Waterbury are enormously proud of their institutions and should be. They boasted of their alumni. But I was stunned to hear Mr. Arnold mention that Mrs. Mubarek "received both her undergraduate and graduate degrees from AUC and both Mubarek sons attended AUC. There's a close family connection." Think about this. Hosni Mubarek, the leader of Egypt's police state, who just rescinded a few more of his citizens' paltry civil liberties, who rigs elections, and who only last week ordered police to break up pro-democracy demonstrations right on the university's doorstep, sent his boys to AUC. Not only that, he has designated one of his sons to be his successor. What a claim to fame. On top of that, we outsource torture to Egypt. I don't know if -- had you had an hour with them -- you would have asked these men about their roles in the wider Middle East -- how they operate within autocratic regimes, whether they are free to speak out or whether they play along to get along. Whether they are conflicted about what they do or have reservations about navigating the political waters in which they find themselves. But as an American -- and someone whose tax dollars help support these universities -- it worries me that we may be helping to groom a new generation of corrupt elites along with the doctors, engineers and entrepreneurs we are educating. And that, by extension, we are creating a new class of jihadists. I love your show, Charlie. I've been watching it for years and will continue to do so. But controversy can't always be avoided. Nor should we avoid it. But interviews that fall short leave us feeling empty. You are a gentleman and one of the world's best interviewers. Yes, you are wonderful at interviewing artists and actors and architects, but I think you can get more from the Arnolds and Waterburys of this world than you realize. Sincerely, Mary Connell
These comments are interesting. They indicate to me the level of sophistication of the average viewer for this show. I thought viewers here were more perceptive than they really are. Why did Charlie Rose have to give Tenet a difficult time during the interview? Was it because the war in Iraq was Tenet's fault? One would think so from reading these comments. The fact of the matter is that people mistakenly believed the war was justified based on WMD. That's the whole problem. It wasn't a good enough reason to go to war and Tenet said so himself. So what else is he supposed to say to placate these critics. That he lied about WMD when he thought there were none? That's simply not the case and he said so already. The American public shares the blame in believing the war was justified based on WMD and like public opinion, that is why the policy was so very wrong. The invasion of Iraq was not prudent even if there had been WMD and Sadam were about to hand them over to Osama Bin Laden himself. The real sad part of this is that Noam Chomsky was right. Osama's wish to start Jihad in Iraq in 1991 has been handed to him on a platter by the Neocons in the Bush White House.
I looked for this site today in order comment on what I thought was an interview with Tenet that did some good. I was immediately surprised at how many negative comments there were about the interview -- basically that it was too soft. But I think that some here miss the point. Tenet isn't going to come on Charlie's show and make sweeping and categorical admissions of guilt, and I think Charlie knows that. Even though Tenet deflected a lot blame to others in the administration and to the hyper-alarmist culture of the Whitehouse post 9/11, I think Tenet's tone and posture said a lot about what he really feels. We shouldn't expect the outcome of interviews like this to be an incriminated Tenet, but rather to allow another Whitehouse insider to 'admit' to have finally come to their senses.
There have been a lot of comments about Charlie Rose not asking the tough questions of guests-- especially President Bush-- that everyone wishes they could hear. The problem is that such an interview would be the last one he'd likely ever do with a President. Nobody goes on a show if they think they'll get burned, and presidential administrations are especially sensitive to this. There's a reason Bill Maher doesn't get to sit down with the President! Hardball journalism has its place, but a conversational show like Charlie Rose is built on perceived respect and rapport. If the Bush Administration felt like they couldn't trust Charlie, we'd never, for example, hear Richard Pearl say that regime change in Iraq was a priority prior to 9/11 as he did on the show a few years ago. No one would want to go on the show! It is a compromise, but one that has benefits. As viewers we need to be aware of it and accept it.
Why no questions about terrorism, in the 90's and now? How does the master-spy think that we should combat this threat? Too much time was spent on WMD and Iraq. It became clear that Tenet would stonewall all question on this. He did so to Terry Gross on Fresh Air (NPR). On both Fresh Air and Charlie Rose, I listened to the man talk for half an hour without saying anything.
Once you have proved a man is a liar, it is of little value to conclude the interview with a question that invites him to "tell us what we need to know". Liar! Liar! Pants On Fire!
No wonder everyone wants to be on his show. Soft. Soft. Soft.
Charlie... Why throw only pitifully weak softballs at one of the sleaziest war criminals of our time? Tenet has been getting a lot of free press to sell his book and tell his discounted side of this sorry story. None of his interviewers have recalled the fact that Hans Blix and more than 400 UN inspectors were in Iraq only months before the US invasion and could find NO evidence of any WMD. As well, IAEA inspectors said there was NO imminent threat from nuclear devices. Tenet along with the rest of the White House gang worked hard to discredit and marginalize Blix and the UN effort. I suspect they were all quite aware of the truth but it did not fit their plan.The pathetic American Press played along and still play nice. Now 3400 + Americans and 100,000 Iraqis dead, a Country in ruins and America much more vunerable. Very sad.
Most nights I learn and am entertained by Charlie's show; last night not so much. My take on the interview is that Tenet was making it abundantly clear that the job of intelligence gatherers is to gather intelligencs and pass it on to the people who then are responsible for making policy - deciding what should be done on the basis of the information which has been gathered for them and transmitted to them. Charlie kept trying to make Tenet admit that he hadn't done his job, because he didn't give Bush his personal opinion of what steps the administration should take - which might well have been "don't attack Iraq", advice which Charlie (and I) as non-gatherers of intelligence would have been quite willing to give. It's too bad so many people listening to Tenet weren't hearing what he was saying - and too bad that Charlie got so determined to hear what he wanted to hear that he couldn't stop needling his victim. And why is Charlie always seated higher than those he is talking to?
Dear Charlie - I was very disappointed in the interviews with both Pres Bush and George Tenet - You were much more aggressive with Tenent but all he seemed to do is make excuses and tell us what a wonderful man he was - come on- we deserve the truth - also I think you enabled GW to give the " same old same old" - I had hoped for some honesty and admissions of failure but I guess to succeed in DC you have do be a member of the "Bushy" Club and be lacking in conscience and backbone.
Yet another feckless, spineless softball interview between Charlie Rose and a major Bush administration official partly responsible for the Iraq War. A disturbing pattern here: Rose is an all-too-willing and -active participant in utterly flimsy revisionist narratives that Bush and company spin time and again on his show about the underlying history of this war. Is it too much to ask Rose to research basic facts and confront Tenet with them? For example: that CIA experts who entirely discredited bogus claims about aluminum nuclear tubes were deliberately silenced or ignored; that intelligence blatantly confuted Niger "yellowcake" claims in the State of the Union; that IAEA inspectors had extensive documentation plainly contradicting U.S. claims about WMD; that the British were disturbed by how blatantly Bush and Co. were fixing facts and intelligence around policy. In short, that there is massive evidence that the American people were deliberately lied to in the administration's selling of the war. Here's a lesson we should all learn: Rose's "lessons learned" sessions are nothing but pathetic attempts to whitewash the filthy history of this war.
Hello Charlie: I'm sure you must have been very confused at comments made by Mr. Tenet this evening. I re-read Richard Clarke's comments and it was clear that he AND Mr. Tenet agreed on the lack of weapons of mass destruction, and according to Mr. Clarke, they did tell the White House. Clarke and others (including the CIA) were asked to put a report together and the did, but the White House Administration would not accept it, as written. It's interesting after Mr. Tenet was so verbal on other talk-shows, including Larry King's, that he could not answer more than a few of your questions. What happened? I gave him more credit than he is apparently giving himself. You might find Richard Clarke's comments very interesting at this point. I am sure that no matter who said what, the decision was made by Rumsfeld, Pearl, Wolfowitz, Cheney, and others that Iraq would be invaded. I was very disappointed with the results of your interview with Mr. Tenet, but not that you didn't do your best. Sincerely, Diane Morris
Tenet worked at the pleasure of the president and Tenet knew that. He also was charged to find out what capabilites Iraq had in the aftermath of 9/11. So what if the CIA got it wrong? Even if there had been WMD in Iraq, it was the policy for unilateral action against Iraq that was to blame, not the lack of WMD.
Mr Tenet betrayed the trust of the American people by not speaking out and "telling the truth" as he said on his sixty minutes interveiw.If,indeed,he was an honorable person he would have done so before this terrible tragedy happened.If Bush had not kicked him to the curb,he would not be speaking out now.I certainly have no sympathy for him,only disgust.He has the blood of 3,244 American service men and women and countless inocent Iraqi civilians on his hands.He obviously has no consceince.He is a sad miserable excuse for a human being.He and Colin Powell will forever be remembered as the cowards that they are.