The Daily Background

One of the common threads running through this Administration is an inability to name mistakes they’ve made. Rumsfeld couldn’t name mistakes, and if you remember in President Bush’s final debate in the 2004 cycle he was asked by one woman to name three mistakes he had made and how he learned from them. He mumbled something about scheduling meeting in a more efficient manner in the future, but wasn’t able to answer it. To this crowd, to admit a mistake is to open themselves to attack. To most people, to admit a mistake is human. Two recent examples:

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was asked on CNN’s The Situation Room yesterday if he could name any mistake whatsoever which he’d made while serving President Bush. He mumbled something vague about recommendations but couldn’t name a single actual mistake he’d made. You can watch the video here.

Today, Condi Rice was asked in a television interview whether or not she could think of any mistakes– any mistakes — in what as been called the most flawed military blunder that the United States has undertaken in the past 100 years. Did she name any? Well, she didn’t name any, but said she might write a book someday after President Bush leaves office about “what we might have done differently.” ThinkProgress summarizes “In other words, Rice realizes that — as bad as things are in Iraq — the Bush administration must have made mistakes. But she refuses to think about them until she leaves office.” More details here.

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