Bush's Last Chance

Charles Krauthammer writes today about the opportunity the Baker commission has given President Bush:

WASHINGTON -- As a result of the Iraq Study Group, President Bush has been given one last chance to alter course on Iraq. This did not, however, come about the way James Baker intended. It came about because the long-anticipated report turned out to be such a widely agreed-upon farce. From its wildly hyped, multiple magazine-cover rollout (Annie Leibovitz in Men's Vogue, no less) to its mishmash of 79 (no less) recommendations, the report has fallen so flat that the field is now clear for the president to recommend to a war-weary country something new and bold.

The ISG has not just been attacked by left and right, Democrat and Republican. It has invited ridicule. Seventy-nine recommendations. Interdependent, insists Baker. They should be taken as a whole. "I hope we don't treat this like a fruit salad and say, 'I like this but I don't like that.'" On the basis of what grand unifying vision? On the authority of what superior wisdom? A 10-person commission including such Middle East experts as Sandra Day O'Connor, Alan Simpson and Vernon Jordan?

This kind of bipartisan elder-statesmen commission is perfectly appropriate as a consensus-building exercise for, say, a long-range problem such as Social Security. It is a ludicrous mechanism for devising strategic changes in the middle of a war.

I don't know why Washington and the press love these gatherings of ancients so much. Both the 9/11 and Baker commissions were treated within the Beltway as though they possessed the wisdom of the ages and their recommendations were writ on stone. I probably could have gathered up 10 conservative bloggers I know and come up with a better product.

Why is Washington so in love with committees? It's a committee town. Just look at how most things are done around there. The House, Senate, Supreme Court, and even the Cabinet are nothing more than big committees. Nearly every decision is the result of collective wisdom (or lack thereof) and only decisions made by committee make them all feel comfortable. There are even committees for the pressies who can't get their words of wisdom on Page 1 without the blessing of some editorial committee.

When the guy in the big white house at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue makes a decision on his own (or at least it looks that way), the committee-lovers break out into hives. It makes them terribly uncomfortable. That's why every committee or commission report is accompanied by feverish demands for compliance, lest we waste the wisdom of the prophets. Well, from my observation, Washington is pretty much a non-prophet town.

Based on Bush's unwillingness to leap to a particular course of action recommended in the Baker report, I can assume that he still considers himself commander-in-chief, regardless of that Jim Baker, the press, or the Democrats might think. Therefore, I believe Krauthammer is right in that this is Bush's chance to do something decisive in Iraq, regardless of the retreat proposed by the commission.

He's the decider, and one of the best ways to remind his critics of that fact is to take his time and develop his approach in Iraq based on a melding of the recommendations of many, and not just a hand-selected few.