Scrapbook
Scrapbook Panderer in Chief Gore In the mad dash leftwards that the race for the Democratic nomination has become, Al Gore is proving to be a hard man to beat. A few weeks ago, he promised to...
...troops are conducting three times the number of missions as during the Cold War, Commander in Chief Al Gore would turn the Joint Chiefs into the Village People and make "YMCA" the Marine Corps hymn...
...At the end of page 17, return to the second and third columns of type on page 15...
...They have no love and no joy...
...Why not...
...5. "I would insist before appointing anybody to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that that individual support my policy and, yes, I would make that a requirement...
...From there, the story continues on page 18...
...Abject apologies to readers and to author Leon Aron...
...Moving Day Last Tuesday, Jan...
...Yes, The Scrapbook imagines that he has...
...A few weeks ago, he promised to overturn his own administration's "Don't ask, don't tell" policy to permit open homosexuality in the military...
...When Bill Bradley matched that commitment, Gore was determined to best him, and in last week's Democratic debate Gore made ending the gay ban a "litmus test" for selecting members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff...
...or readers can piece together the original as follows: After the article's first column of text on page 15, jump to the top of page 17...
...Merrill McPeak, former Air Force chief of staff, told the New York Times, "Winning the nation's wars ought to be the primary qualification" for joint chiefs membership...
...They'd rather take pictures with black children than feed them...
...A press availability was hastily arranged with both Clintons, lest anyone get the idea that Mrs...
...4, the Clinton moving van (left) pulled up in Chap-paqua, N.Y, at the new official residence of Hillary Clinton, Senate candidate, bringing to an end the "buy one, get one free" era...
...Someone might want to ask the vice president precisely what "legal structure" his campaign manager wants to tear down...
...Gore's litmus test, though, reveals the kind of commander in chief he would be—one more concerned with pandering than fighting...
...These are the prerogatives of a commander in chief...
...Off Her Rocker John Rocker, meet Donna Brazile...
...It should make an interesting plank in the Democratic platform...
...The two have much in common—the same intellectual expan-siveness, the same tolerance for diversity of views, the same willingness, as they might say, to "reach out...
...It's worse still to undercut the legal and prudential requirement that members of the Joint Chiefs give unvarnished military advice to both the president and Congress...
...The implication of Gore's statement is that military officers who wanted to serve on the Joint Chiefs would have to dissemble to get the job, something perhaps more corrupting of the military than the policy of gays-in-the-military itself...
...It's been a rather interesting challenge over the holidays, but I've enjoyed it very much...
...The piece can be read in its entirety on The Weekly Standard's website, www.weeklystandard.com...
...It's one thing to embrace a policy that every senior officer opposes as detrimental to the military's well-being...
...They play that game because they have no other game...
...in his major defense speech last fall, George W. Bush threatened to fire senior commanders who would not work to implement his plans for transforming the military to meet new operational and technological challenges...
...Stating the obvious, Gen...
...The Wit of the Family With her language dial set to "Aca-demic-ese," Ernestine Schlant Bradley, wife of Bill, recently explained why you shouldn't go by first impressions: "You can't judge a text by a first reading...
...Sorry This was no doubt bound to happen once The Scrapbook started making fun of corrections in other publications: An article in our most recent issue ("Three Cheers for Russian Democracy," January 3/January 10, 2000) got badly scrambled...
...I think that I would require those who wanted to serve on the Joint Chiefs to be in agreement with that policy," said Gore on Jan...
...Less noted, in the same interview, were the campaign manager's comments about gay rights...
...Reaction from Powell and Watts was swift...
...Republicans," she thoughtfully observed, "bring out Colin Powell and J.C...
...If we have to tear down the legal structure to give gays and lesbians full equality and freedom, then let's do it...
...At a time when military preparedness has declined to the point where the majority of the chiefs now say they can no longer meet the requirements of American strategy, when U.S...
...Watts because they have no program, no policy...
...Everyone officially referred to it as "the Clintons'" new house...
...Yes, and remember also to never deconstruct a book by its cover...
...Last week, Brazile gave a revealing interview on the subject of race and politics to the news service Bloomberg.com...
...Brazile is the less known of the two, though if she keeps it up she'll be a household name in no time...
...Clinton was, in a sense, leaving...
...As official manager of Vice President Gore's presidential campaign, Ms...
...Both sent outraged letters to Gore, who issued limp statements of praise for Powell in hopes of calming the general down...
...We've been boxing things up," he said, "and figuring out what to leave here, what to move there...
...Obviously, presidents can select senior military officers who are generally in tune with their policy goals...
...E-mail The Scrapbook THE SCRAPBOOK is now reachable 24/7...
...To paraphrase Alice Roosevelt Longworth, if you don't have anything nice to say, e-mail it to Scrap-book@weeklystandard.com...
...The president waxed expansive on the joys of unpacking "their" furniture...
...Gore will likely have to do much more of this, so long as he keeps Brazile around the office...
...As is customary with the Clintons, the event was heavily spun...
...This is pretty mind-boggling...
...Referring to the gay University of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard, who was beaten to death in late 1998, she said: "Remove all barriers...
Vol. 5 • January 2000 • No. 17
