| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: WoT |
| Rummy fields Woodward qestions - gets laughs from press |
| 2004-04-21 |
| excerpt from press briefing - Rumsfeld and Pete Pace Q Do you remember saying, "You can take it to the bank. This is going to happen." SEC. RUMSFELD: I don’t remember saying it, to be perfectly honest. But I have said that, that phrase, in my life. But I could have said it about a dozen different things. In other words, it may have been about some discussion we’d had about an interaction with another country, a third country. It may have been about a comment that in the event the president did make such a decision, that the action would be followed through sufficiently that the regime would in fact be changed. As opposed to the implication from your question -- which I have not read the book -- that the statement might have been made in connection with a decision having been made by the president. But my best recollection -- and I hate to use the word "certain" because no one’s memory is perfect, but I can’t believe the decision had been made by the president during that period. If it had been, I didn’t know it had been. Therefore, I would never have said what you said somebody said I said -- Q Well -- (laughter) -- SEC. RUMSFELD: -- with respect to that aspect of it, a decision having been made. Q Mr. Woodward says that you’re on the record on this point, and that he has mentioned several times that the Pentagon transcripts that are posted on the Pentagon’s website will back him up. Now, I have checked those transcripts and I see no reference to this incident. However, there are two transcripts posted. Did you meet with him more than twice, do you recall? SEC. RUMSFELD: No, I didn’t. Q You only met with him twice? SEC. RUMSFELD: I think that’s correct. Q So those transcripts are the complete record of what you told him? SEC. RUMSFELD: Except for where I said "ah" or "uh" or something like that -- (laughter) -- and some person transcribing might have taken that out, or where the transcription was in error. But I just -- here I am in a meeting in the vice president’s office. It is certainly not for me to communicate to someone from another country a decision by the president of the United States. That just doesn’t compute. -snip- later in the Q&A I’ve just been passed a note via my friend, General Pace, that goes back to the question I answered on the Woodward transcripts, where I said something to the effect that the ahs and uhs were probably deleted, and I’m advised now there is some banter -- not quite sure what that means, but -- and some discussion about a totally unrelated topic, and some items that were agreed between us to not be in there. But I can say -- that were off the record -- but I can say of certain knowledge that nothing was taken out that would naysay what I just indicated in my response to the question. Q No 18-minute gap? SEC. RUMSFELD: I beg your pardon. Q No 18-minute gap? (Laughter.) SEC. RUMSFELD: And you can take that to the bank. (Laughter.) Thank you very much. I’ll be here throughout the administration. Try the veal. |
| Posted by:Super Hose |
| #3 Even George Will doesnt defend Nixon. What aspect of Woodward's Watergate coverage was fraudulent? The current book is heavily based on interviews with Bush himself, and actually makes Bush look pretty good. In particular it makes Tenet look bad on WMD, and makes Bush look properly skeptical. |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-04-21 10:45:09 AM |
| #2 Love your plan, Anon4391! Woodward is a fraud and I still hold him responsible for bringing down Richard Nixon in a bloodless coup. Keep us informed about joining your action here at RB, would ya? |
| Posted by: Jen 2004-04-21 5:18:29 AM |
| #1 Woodward -- like all the other propagandists in the leftmedia -- makes up quotes, conversations, events, characterizations, etc to fit ITS agenda. I have purchased the book with the intention of SUING Woodward and the publisher for selling ME a defective product. I encourage others to do the same. Woodward can be sued into poverty. |
| Posted by: Anonymous4391 2004-04-21 5:05:24 AM |