Posted on 12/02/2004 3:08:16 PM PST by RWR8189
WASHINGTON - President Bush (news - web sites) is awarding the nation's highest civilian honor to three men central to his Iraq (news - web sites) policy, the White House announced Thursday.
Bush has chosen retired Gen. Tommy Franks, who oversaw combat in Afghanistan (news - web sites) and the initial invasion of Iraq, former CIA (news - web sites) Director George Tenet and former Iraq administrator L. Paul Bremer to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom. The president will hand out the awards at a White House ceremony Dec. 14, press secretary Scott McClellan said.
Franks is a retired four-star Army general who commanded U.S. forces when Bush ordered the Iraq invasion in March 2003. He didn't decide until summer to endorse Bush's re-election, but then spoke on the president's behalf at the Republican National Convention and campaigned for Bush through the fall.
Tenet left the CIA in July after seven years as director. He was criticized for intelligence failures on his watch, including the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the never-proven prewar allegations that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
Bremer was the top U.S. official in postwar Iraq until he oversaw the transfer of power to an interim Iraqi government in June.
This fall, Bremer suggested the United States had paid a price in Iraq in the immediate aftermath of major combat operations because it did not have enough troops in place to stop the looting.
Those remarks gave Bush critics ammunition for their claims that the administration's postwar planning was inadequate.
Bremer tried to calm that controversy by saying he had constantly supported the president's strategy in Iraq.
The Medal of Freedom, established by President Truman in 1945 to recognize civilians for their efforts during World War II, was reinstated by President Kennedy in 1963 to honor distinguished service.
One each to:
1.) Micheal Moore
2.) Bruce Springsteen
3.) Barbra Steisand
Frank, great. Bremer, good... Tenet? Isn't he the one who said presided over 9/11, the 'slam dunk' WMD, etc.?
My thoughts exactly. Tenet should be given a "booby" prize instead.
Freedom medals. F#@$ YEAH!
When Tenet shows up for the medal, Bush should say "Despite being given slam dunk intelligence that the medal was here, we cannot find any medal of freedom" and send Tenet home.
Payback.
That would be too funny. :)
I still think he was right, and that the WMD were moved just before the war started. Of course, he could have been the victim of some intra-agency sabotage that wanted to make the President look bad, and used Tenet for the purpose.
That being said, I still think that there were WMD.
Bremer (and others) were responsible for dismantling the Iraqi army immediately after our victory. If those men had been kept and paid (even if many had nothing to do until vetted of Saddam ties), it may have kept the lid on insurgents and we wouldn't be trying so hard to stop them now.
Tenet and Bremer leave me cold. I don't trust them 100%. They did ok here and there, but they're not keepers.
I hope by getting the medals it will encourage them to keep their mouths shut in the future.
Leni
George Tenet??? Outrageous. An incompetant ass whose parting shot is to all but blame Condi Rice for 9/11? Will Bush give a medal to Ted Kennedy next year? I am so sick of the stupid "new tone".
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911 Remembered: RICK RESCORLA was a Soldier
http://www.Freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/978534/posts
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Good grief. Look at the contortions the writer takes.
I have been a Tenet supporter all along and I see I am in good company with President Bush.
I think I'm on the right side.
Believing media spin? Any freeper worth their salt should know better.
Frank, great. Bremer, good... Tenet? Isn't he the one who said presided over 9/11, the 'slam dunk' WMD, etc.?
=====
Bremer should get a box of dog biscuits. And, yes, he was in charge of the bad info that was fed to GWB. Bush could have made better choices...
I agree with you regardint the WMD---I have always thought they were moved to Syria and possibly some to Iran.
Having said that, and acknowledging that I am a huge Bush fan---
What the heck is he doing? I wonder if his FATHER picked out Tenet and Bremer. Papa George is the one that honored Ted Kennedy last year, and then Kennedy calls Bush another Saddam!! Now he is honoring Schwarzenegger, who hasn't exactly been the best of help to "W". That is the only excuse I can come up with that these two men would even be mentioned in the same sentence with the great Tommy Franks.
Tenet gets the Medal of Freedom for turning down the huge book contract from Viacom.
RICK RESCORLA Petition
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/978534/posts?page=7#7
Bremer made some bad comments that may have hurt Bush a little, right before the election.
Damn fool should have kept his mouth shut.
Presidential Medal of Freedom
On his last morning in office, President Lyndon B. Johnson awarded Presidential Medals of Freedom to twenty individuals, including Bob Hope. Bob Hope's citation noted that, "With his gifts of joy to all the American people, he has written his name large in the history of our times."
You basically captured my thoughts. Well said.
Excuse me, but what has Tommy Franks done since leaving the service to deserve a Medal of Freedom? If it is for something he did while in service, that should have been covered by his Army medals (three Defense Distinguished Service Medals, two Distinguished Service Medals, and four Legion of Merit awards among others). The Medal of Freedom is for civilian service.
He graduated from Midland Lee High School the same as the First Lady did? (Ha Ha Ha)
:o}
Not only did they go to the same school, did you know that according to Bush himself Franks actually dated her several times?
I really liked George Tenet and paid pretty close attention to the news when he spoke.
Just how is it he "all but blamed Condi for 9/11"?
Yeah .. I like the Franks and Bremmer choices, but Tenant? I don't get that one.
HOWEVER, he's a Democrat who doesn't understand business management. When your profit margin (in this case intelligence gems) is tanking you DO NOT get rid of the BEST people and keep the bureaucrat SUCKUPS. THEY'RE PART OF THE PROBLEM!
I'm not a big supporter of his, but neither am I one of his detractors. He deserves recognition for his long, uphill battle to keep his agency viable.
My thoughts exactly. Tenet should be given a "booby" prize instead.
What about Nobel Peace Prize ?
I doubt that very much. When we withdrew from Fallujah in the spring, we left a Baathist General in charge of mostly former Iraqi soldiers. That didn't exactly work out too well, did it? They simply handed everything over to the terrorists. Bremer was correct to disband the Iraqi Army. Imagine if the US had put the Wehrmacht in charge of 1946 Germany -- or perhaps a better analogy would have been putting the Waffen SS in charge.
Of course, the Joint Chiefs' plan was just their way of doing nothing by presenting the President with a ridiculous option. Classic bureaucratic inertia.
These three should get the Distinguished Medal of Boredom.
scratch other two....replace with:
2) Todd Beamer
3) Pat Tillman
But that is EXACTLY what Lord Mountbatten did in Indonesia with the Japanese troops that had surrendered. He re-armed them and British, Indian, and Imperial Japanese soldiers fought together to maintain order until enough the Japanese could be repatriated and enough British troops could arrive.
Between September 1945 and November 1946, up to 35,000 surrendered Japanese troops were assimilated into Lord Louis Mountbatten's South East Asia Command in the Netherlands East Indies. Although under the ultimate control of British officers, the Japanese retained their wartime unit structures, were led by their own officers and remained armed. The Japanese fought alongside the British despite the anger felt against them as the perpetrators of wartime atrocities and as a former enemy.
Gotta give it to Jimmy Carter. Again.
That's my opinion, too.
I'm so proud to be an American. I wonder if these guys are on the clock when they cook this stuff up?
Nice to 'see' you. :o)
My initial reactions:
Gen. Franks-- Hell yeah!
Paul Bremer-- maybe.
George Tenet-- WTF?
Can someone please help me understand why Tenet could ever be given any award much less the PMF?
Because Mr. Tenet would never understand a bunny with a pancake on it's head...just as I never understood why he was ever in that job, ever. Clinton/Reno/Tenet is the short answer to 9/11.
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