Oliver North – Should He Be Wandering The Streets?
Ron DeYoung
October 19, 2005
As I scanned the content offerings of The Washington Times online this morning, I felt a name from the past reach out and touch me. Peeking out at me from the roster of opinion columnists was a name I hadn’t seen in years! It said “Oliver North!” I immediately choked as my coffee went down the wind pipe and then spit it all over my office!
This couldn’t be the same Ollie that we all came to know and love during the Reagan years could it? He was a soldier, and then kind of a spy, and then kind of a fall guy for the entire Iran-Contra affair. If my memory serves me correctly, he was better at shredding papers than writing them, so this had to be someone else. Oh, hell! As it so often does my curiosity once again got the best of me, so I clicked on “Oliver North,” tightly closed my eyes in preparation for an explosion or some kind of new computer virus, and then waited….
and waited….
There was no explosion so after a minute or two I opened my eyes and found a reminder of just how out of touch with reality Ollie was. He would have served well under Dubya I think, because if there was ever a yes man, Colonel North was it! But, as soon as I started reading the words on my monitor, I thought I might have been wrong about the Colonel.
The first paragraph of an article titled “Freeh at Last” from the October 16, 2005 issue of The Washington Times claimed that the “last few months have been instrumental in shaping the legacy” by which historians will remember President George W. Bush. “You got that right Ollie,” I blurted out unexpectedly! I realize he’s screwed up considerably over the past five years, but I had to agree that George really drove the nails into the coffin recently. I anxiously read on….BOOM!!! There’s the bomb! It took me no time to crash down to earth when the next portion of Ollie’s prose made it clear that he was saying that legacy stuff in a good way!
Even if I wasn’t schooled in the latest public relations tactics and methods of delivering rhetorical double talk, I would have quickly seen through North’s elementary attempt to put a positive spin on Bush’s recent displays of incompetence. A recurring question asked recently and often by me is, “How stupid do they think we are?” People are not going to believe it just because somebody says it….I hope! This is one case where perhaps it was best to say nothing at all.
First of all, he babbled about Iraq’s signing of their new constitution, and inferred that it had something to do with Bush, yet didn’t mention the President once. When I started reading the next paragraph is when I lost control and started laughing. When the tears began to subside I read, “Mr. Bush has been forced to react to Mother Nature’s fury and quickly marshal the resources needed” to rebuild New Orleans. Yep! George’s swift and decisive reaction is what I recall about Hurricane Katrina. Then the article goes on to give Bush credit for his initiative to save Social Security, if only he hadn’t gotten sidetracked by Katrina.
After taking another short break to allow the tears of laughter, shock and awe to subside, I read further…Damn! There’s just one good joke after the other! Next up was how fortunate it was that Bush got to choose not one, but two Supreme Court Justices.
To end the first half of the show, North summarized, “these issues – war and peace, retirement security, the future of the court and the reconstruction of New Orleans – are the kinds of weighty, meaningful issues on which a presidency should be judged.” Well in case it’s not clear to everyone reading this, I’ll go ahead and say it. He’ll be judged on those issues alright, Ollie. Apparently you’ve got a crossed wire or two in your mental faculties or you’d realize, like most of America has, that those haven’t been very successful issues and I’d bet George would rather be remembered for his military record or academic achievement.
All of a sudden, in a maneuver that was conducted at break neck speed and with no advance warning, the article was all about former President Bill Clinton! North wasted no time in establishing the fact that Clinton’s legacy was one of scandal, corruption and personal moral failings. I can’t dispute those allegations, but I will suggest our country was in much better shape than it is now. The economy was doing well, we weren’t embroiled in a war that is killing thousands of Americans and was started based on Bush’s high moral standards… I mean lies.
As a person who is anti-partisan who thinks most politicians are corrupt and scandalous, I anxiously read further, wondering what was next. That’s when the real purpose of the article was revealed. North was whoring his ink to promote a book by former FBI Director Louis Freeh called “My FBI.” North uses a couple quotes from the book about Monica Lewinski and something found on her dress to establish that Freeh and Clinton didn’t see eye to eye.
Freeh is quoted from his book discussing how uncomfortable he was working with Clinton because he was never sure what skeleton might fall out of the closet next. He also cited the 177 pardons Clinton issued prior to leaving office as testimony to his tendency to abuse executive privilege. “Bill Clinton and his lawyers seemed to be inventing some new executive privilege every 15 minutes or so,” he writes.
Despite the obvious exaggerations, the rest of the article is chock full of undocumented allegations and inferences that are worded in a manner that allows Freeh to deny culpability. In reference to the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, which killed 19 U.S. Servicemen, Freeh reports evidence was gathered “that almost beyond a doubt” indicated the bombing was “sanctioned, funded and directed by senior officials of the government of Iran.” Finally, he infers that Clinton’s National Security Advisor Sandy Berger devised a way to prevent whatever alleged evidence they had from leaking out.
Ollie concludes the article saying the “so-called mainstream media” aren’t giving Freeh a fair shake. “If they’re not attacking Mr. Freeh, they are ignoring him,” North whines. Boy, I can’t imagine why.
Colonel North has shamelessly wasted the space allotted to him by The Washington Times. As a new subscriber to that online publication, I am pretty disappointed in the quality, not to mention the credibility of who they allow under their banner. North’s backward logic and distorted view of reality are only shadowed by his sophomoric attempt at journalism. This man should be in the goofy bin, not writing an opinion column and offering commentary on FOX news. On second thought, not much else is really expected from FOX, so maybe that’s where Ollie is apt to do the least damage.
This couldn’t be the same Ollie that we all came to know and love during the Reagan years could it? He was a soldier, and then kind of a spy, and then kind of a fall guy for the entire Iran-Contra affair. If my memory serves me correctly, he was better at shredding papers than writing them, so this had to be someone else. Oh, hell! As it so often does my curiosity once again got the best of me, so I clicked on “Oliver North,” tightly closed my eyes in preparation for an explosion or some kind of new computer virus, and then waited….
and waited….
There was no explosion so after a minute or two I opened my eyes and found a reminder of just how out of touch with reality Ollie was. He would have served well under Dubya I think, because if there was ever a yes man, Colonel North was it! But, as soon as I started reading the words on my monitor, I thought I might have been wrong about the Colonel.
The first paragraph of an article titled “Freeh at Last” from the October 16, 2005 issue of The Washington Times claimed that the “last few months have been instrumental in shaping the legacy” by which historians will remember President George W. Bush. “You got that right Ollie,” I blurted out unexpectedly! I realize he’s screwed up considerably over the past five years, but I had to agree that George really drove the nails into the coffin recently. I anxiously read on….BOOM!!! There’s the bomb! It took me no time to crash down to earth when the next portion of Ollie’s prose made it clear that he was saying that legacy stuff in a good way!
Even if I wasn’t schooled in the latest public relations tactics and methods of delivering rhetorical double talk, I would have quickly seen through North’s elementary attempt to put a positive spin on Bush’s recent displays of incompetence. A recurring question asked recently and often by me is, “How stupid do they think we are?” People are not going to believe it just because somebody says it….I hope! This is one case where perhaps it was best to say nothing at all.
First of all, he babbled about Iraq’s signing of their new constitution, and inferred that it had something to do with Bush, yet didn’t mention the President once. When I started reading the next paragraph is when I lost control and started laughing. When the tears began to subside I read, “Mr. Bush has been forced to react to Mother Nature’s fury and quickly marshal the resources needed” to rebuild New Orleans. Yep! George’s swift and decisive reaction is what I recall about Hurricane Katrina. Then the article goes on to give Bush credit for his initiative to save Social Security, if only he hadn’t gotten sidetracked by Katrina.
After taking another short break to allow the tears of laughter, shock and awe to subside, I read further…Damn! There’s just one good joke after the other! Next up was how fortunate it was that Bush got to choose not one, but two Supreme Court Justices.
To end the first half of the show, North summarized, “these issues – war and peace, retirement security, the future of the court and the reconstruction of New Orleans – are the kinds of weighty, meaningful issues on which a presidency should be judged.” Well in case it’s not clear to everyone reading this, I’ll go ahead and say it. He’ll be judged on those issues alright, Ollie. Apparently you’ve got a crossed wire or two in your mental faculties or you’d realize, like most of America has, that those haven’t been very successful issues and I’d bet George would rather be remembered for his military record or academic achievement.
All of a sudden, in a maneuver that was conducted at break neck speed and with no advance warning, the article was all about former President Bill Clinton! North wasted no time in establishing the fact that Clinton’s legacy was one of scandal, corruption and personal moral failings. I can’t dispute those allegations, but I will suggest our country was in much better shape than it is now. The economy was doing well, we weren’t embroiled in a war that is killing thousands of Americans and was started based on Bush’s high moral standards… I mean lies.
As a person who is anti-partisan who thinks most politicians are corrupt and scandalous, I anxiously read further, wondering what was next. That’s when the real purpose of the article was revealed. North was whoring his ink to promote a book by former FBI Director Louis Freeh called “My FBI.” North uses a couple quotes from the book about Monica Lewinski and something found on her dress to establish that Freeh and Clinton didn’t see eye to eye.
Freeh is quoted from his book discussing how uncomfortable he was working with Clinton because he was never sure what skeleton might fall out of the closet next. He also cited the 177 pardons Clinton issued prior to leaving office as testimony to his tendency to abuse executive privilege. “Bill Clinton and his lawyers seemed to be inventing some new executive privilege every 15 minutes or so,” he writes.
Despite the obvious exaggerations, the rest of the article is chock full of undocumented allegations and inferences that are worded in a manner that allows Freeh to deny culpability. In reference to the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, which killed 19 U.S. Servicemen, Freeh reports evidence was gathered “that almost beyond a doubt” indicated the bombing was “sanctioned, funded and directed by senior officials of the government of Iran.” Finally, he infers that Clinton’s National Security Advisor Sandy Berger devised a way to prevent whatever alleged evidence they had from leaking out.
Ollie concludes the article saying the “so-called mainstream media” aren’t giving Freeh a fair shake. “If they’re not attacking Mr. Freeh, they are ignoring him,” North whines. Boy, I can’t imagine why.
Colonel North has shamelessly wasted the space allotted to him by The Washington Times. As a new subscriber to that online publication, I am pretty disappointed in the quality, not to mention the credibility of who they allow under their banner. North’s backward logic and distorted view of reality are only shadowed by his sophomoric attempt at journalism. This man should be in the goofy bin, not writing an opinion column and offering commentary on FOX news. On second thought, not much else is really expected from FOX, so maybe that’s where Ollie is apt to do the least damage.
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