SCOWCROFT SPEAKS….Steve Clemons has a long series of excerpts posted today from Jeffrey Goldberg’s New Yorker article about Brent Scowcroft’s unhappiness with the current Bush administration. Since Scowcroft is a close friend of George Bush Sr., it’s a significant piece. Here’s Scowcroft on Dick Cheney:
“The real anomaly in the Administration is Cheney,” Scowcroft said. “I consider Cheney a good friend ? I’ve known him for thirty years. But Dick Cheney I don’t know anymore.”
As for W himself, Goldberg reports that he has no time for guys like Scowcroft:
According to friends of the elder Bush, the estrangement of his son and his best friend has been an abiding source of unhappiness, not only for Bush but for Barbara Bush as well. George Bush, the forty-first President, has tried several times to arrange meetings between his son, “Forty-three,” and his former national-security adviser to no avail, according to people with knowledge of these intertwined relationships.
And Scowcroft doesn’t think much of W, either:
When I asked Scowcroft if the son was different from the father, he said, “I don’t want to go there,” but his dissatisfaction with the son’s agenda could not have been clearer. When I asked him to name issues on which he agrees with the younger Bush, he said, “Afghanistan.” He paused for twelve seconds. Finally, he said, “I think we’re doing well on Europe,” and left it at that.
Read the whole thing. If the New Yorker puts up a link to the full piece later, I’ll let you know.
