Near the end, Hersh reports:

As to what the experience taught them, in terms of future covert operations, the [former Iran-Contra] participants found: “One, you can’t trust our friends. Two, the C.I.A. has got to be totally out of it. Three, you can’t trust the uniformed military, and four, it’s got to be run out of the Vice-President’s office”—a reference to Cheney’s role, the former senior intelligence official said.

It’s reasonable to say that ‘the Aspens’ learned and applied their lessons well. They may have been a strong virus back in Iran-Contra; this time around they’re like a Superbug and our previous methods of dealing with evil this dangerous no longer work.

Aspens probably involves the media, political, corporate, military mix that attends conferences there; international interests much larger than ‘daddy issues’ of Scott McClellen are involved.

Scott McClellan’s one piece of a huge puzzle, but let’s hope he’s an important one. You are not nuts; this is an organized operation that has probably taken years to plan and build.

The biologist Lewis Thomas once pointed out that most really deadly organisms are able to create damage because the body doesn’t recognize them — they’re familiar enough so that the immune system doesn’t whack them. Thus disguised, they are able to escape detection and that’s how they are able to wreak havoc.

Same with political toxins.
You are not nuts. We’ve been overtaken from within.
Whether Congress has the political will, whether the FBI has enough committed resources, and whether the media can explain it simply and clearly enough to the public remain in serious doubt.

Just my humble opinion but a group of people were acting in unison to lie us into war. Why is it so far fetched that like the mafia, when they saw a threat to “the plan” they decided to “off” the threat?? Each of them participated in this lie and had at the very least some culpability in sending our nation into an unneccessary war. Wouldn’t they all have motivation to keep the opposition quiet?

Therefore, even Colin Powell found himself in the unenviable position of having to defend himself. (at least for a period of time) That’s a big weight on the old shoulders from my humble opinion. It certainly would give motive for all of them to maintain the story and not break rank. We actually have some facts that support that quite a few people knew about this. What if it was more like a 2 x 6 operation. Bush/cheney says “let’s make this happen and spreads it to several people over the course of several days (let’s just call them branches) and they spread out from there?

Are there facts that would make this implausible or impossible? Am I totally nuts here? Should I put this thought totally to bed?

I think his final behavior that will make his “changeover” complete would be to aknowledge that the pres was flawed. I agree with the statement about “man crush” because he didn’t have a strong father figure. Hell, even Dr. Pill thought Bush was a “better” father than Kerry. I suspect that Dr. Pill and McC have similar father issues. Folks without fathers are often drawn to the authoritarian types. Bush did a lot of “fatherly patting” of scottie as he was leaving. I kept thinking “awe” and then “ewww”.

… that’s beyond me in the chain of command and above my pay-grade, as Caproni would put it (did put it in answers to Whitehouse, unfortunately, although she caught up a little later). Actually, it was klynn @ 49 on Christy’s thread who caught that:

Oops. Have to correct myself: that was Caproni in an exchange with Durbin, not Whitehouse, as perris tells us on the next thread.

I appreciate this comment. Change is difficult and the humane lessons that are symbolized in various institutions and precedents must be relearned by each generation though the time binding effects of language and a good educations can sometimes ease this process. What with EW’s attention to textual detail and the “personal narrative”/”cognitive dissonance” framework she outlines and your neurological modeling and sensitivity to denial/addiction cycles I might yet learn somethings about the nature of political communication. And to think that mere decades ago we were stuck in the ruts of selective LSD therapy under the guidance of Freudian analyst and Reichian bio-energetic principles to push ahead into insight.

In any event I find it odd that its not only the so-called MSM who are failing to give Kucinich much attention but neither the Huffington Post or TPM, for instance, seem to make even passing mention to Kucinich’s articles of impeachment either. I understand the overriding political view that often sees Kucinich as “marginal.” But this too might be part part of a denial/acceptance cycle, with Kucinich having fearlessly inventoried even as a lone voice on the institutional level, the truth about the Bush administration and implicating the larger failings of the general dominant political culture including the underlying patent disdain for truth, due process, justice and Congress as well as the dependency of these movements upon the usurpation of multi-national corporations as a principle constituency in lieu of the “people.” Its almost too much to handle cognitively in the face of the national mythos of “democracy,” “freedom” and “justice”. Still Kucinich should be praised for diligently outlining and characterizing the facts of these deviant movements and advancing these elements in the institutional context. If history is any teacher, it is narrative which in the end will not suffer impunity.

Our effort to hold the Bush/Cheney Administration accountable has taken another dramatic step forward. Last night, Congressman Dennis Kucinich introduced the first Articles of Impeachment ever to be introduced against President Bush. It includes, in total, thirty-five Articles detailing this Administration’s blatant abuse of power. Today, I enthusiastically co-sponsored this vitally important bill.
I am grateful for Dennis’ leadership on this issue and for the steadfast support that countless Americans have given to both of our efforts to redeem our government and expose the crimes of Bush and Cheney.
I will now expand my efforts to secure impeachment hearings in the Judiciary Committee for these new Articles of Impeachment against President George W. Bush.
Many of the charges against President Bush are well known – and would shock the conscience of everyday Americans if only the national media would be willing to report on these stark facts.
The Articles present a stunning narrative of offenses that have go well beyond previous crimes committed by any US chief executive. In fact no President or Vice President in history has done more to undermine our constitution.
These charges are broad, with 35 separate allegations including the deliberate lies regarding WMDs that led us to war and the approval of illegal wiretapping of American citizens. The Articles also include new allegations of high crimes – including the explicit approval for high Administration officials to violate treaties and US law banning the use of torture.
The Democratic Party gained a majority in the House and Senate due in large part to our promises to end the corruption of the Republican majority and to hold the Administration accountable to the law. This courageous bill is a crucial step towards fulfilling this promise, but – like the Articles against Cheney – they require your support to convince Democrats and open-minded Republicans to support this bold but necessary action.
Time is running out so we must work together to spread the message and apply pressure.
First, please encourage your friends and family members to sign up at WexlerWantsHearings.com – as it will allow us to keep in touch with you and speak to a wider audience. If you haven’t yet put in your phone and address, please sign up again, as we will be doing telephone town halls in the near future.
Second, call your representative and urge them to support Impeachment hearings.
Finally, contact newspapers, news stations, and your favorite bloggers and urge them to report on this movement. We need to keep Impeachment a significant news story until the Democratic leadership sees the value in it.
McClellan Agrees to Testify:
I was pleased to inform you yesterday that Judiciary Committee Chairman Conyers met my call to have Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan testify under oath. I am thrilled to inform you that McClellan has agreed to testify on June 20th at 10AM. This will be the first step in what we hope will be ongoing and deepening examinations of the stark evidence and charges against both President Bush and Vice President Cheney.
Thank you for your continued passion and advocacy. Your support means so much to me.
Sincerely,
Congressman Robert Wexler

He clearly doesn’t have the grasp on the chronology that you do. I think your analysis would be more interesting by drawing conclusions about what McClellan was still blocking emotionally when he wrote the book that he might be willing to acknowledge when he testifies.

You give him too little credit for how far he’s come. The WH crew underestimated McClellan by assuming he was just a stooge. He’s not stupid, but he is a poor judge of character (for us D&D nerds, it’s not his Int that’s low, it’s his Wis). He’s still working through a lot of deductive reasoning that conflicts with his assumptions of who the people he worked with were. In his interview last night with Olbermann, he was much farther down the path than he was in his first interview.

Scott McClellan’s brain is ‘rewiring’: some synapses are becoming stronger, new dendrites are forming on specific neurons in specific neural networks. In turn, those newly formed dendrites then create synaptic connections with other other neurons. At the level of the cells involved, this requires a fair amount of metabolic energy, and as with any biological process it requires time. It’s not a linear progression: it involves progress, regression, more progress… all of that takes a lot of energy and time for adaptation.

Whenever I misunderstand something, I figure that I have a bunch of ‘weedy dendrites’ that need pruning somewhere inside my brain. Scott McClellan is still ‘weeding’ out old habits, confused thoughts. A weedy garden is an apt analogy in this instance; he’s pruning and that takes time.

IIRC, the brain takes up only about 2% of the body’s weight, but is thought to use as much as 20% of our biological energy. Assuming that ratio to be roughly correct helps explain why so few people are able to really make important changes – learning, growing and changing can be exhausting because they require so much metabolic energy. The kinds of changes we’re seeing McClellan make are very difficult (because they involve so many difficult emotions). The changes he’s making require a lot of emotional, and intellectual energy, but that is based on metabolism (and probably related to depth of motivation).

Anyone who’s had to learn a new, complex task knows this — you need extra sleep, and some exercise to keep enough oxygen flowing to your brain. McClellan must be a fairly self-disciplined person to have been able to organize his time and stay focused enough to find the energy that he needed to make the kinds of changes we are observing.

In addition, the fact that both KO and Jon Stewart had read his book carefully and thoughtfully has produced some really good interviews.

Another factor, I suspect, is what I call ‘the POWER of forgiveness’.
It must have taken a great deal for McClellan to admit his own role in damaging Richard Clarke’s reputation several years ago, and then experience being ashamed, and then ask for forgiveness. That is actually a fairly complex set of interactions, and it doesn’t sound like anyone’s idea of a good time.
And for Clarke to be a big enough person to forgive appears to have had some kind of healing, energizing effect on McClellan.

Change requires a lot more biological energy and time than we tend to respect or acknowledge.
I think Wm O has really hit the bulls-eye here.

It would be fascinating to get a good sports psychologist’s perspective on McClellan, because he sure appears to be exhibiting facets of what is sometimes described as ‘high performance’ — making a difference by managing his time and energy so he can achieve his objectives. It’s actually a fairly complicated set of behaviors, and it’s inspiring to see it in the political realm. Really admirable, IMHO.

But it’s also a ‘group effort’ in the sense that interviewers who are well prepared and care about the toxicity in American politics are really asking some good questions, and there’s a genuine conversation starting to happen this week that really wasn’t present a short two weeks ago.

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BTW: At the level of 35,000 feet looking down on this mess, all the poor decisions this WH has made, the lack of attention on climate change is coming home to roost in very odd ways. Snow on the Cascade Passes in Washington State — might be melted before readers click on this link, but as I post the link the June snow is still visible: http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/Traffic/passes/snoqualmie/