[Peace-discuss] O'Neill's remarks and their weight

[C. G. Estabrook]

I have a tape of the 60 Minutes interview (surrounded by the football
playoffs and the Forsythe Saga -- thus three melodramas, but one involving
real people dying).

Today's Wall Street Journal has a long excerpt from the Suskind book,
which focuses on Cheney, who hired and fired O'Neill and dictated much of
the Bush economic policy, in O'Neill's account.  --CGE


On Mon, 12 Jan 2004, Randall Cotton wrote:

> Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill's criticism of Bush (and Cheney
> and, well, the entire administration) is making headlines around the
> world, especially the bit about plotting the invasion of Iraq starting
> immediately after he took office.
> 
> BBC's Washington correspondent called them "the most sustained and
> damaging criticism of the Bush administration from a former insider
> since the president came to power."
> 
> In today's AWARE meeting, it was suggested that O'Neill was writing a
> book containing these criticisms. The book in question is indeed
> called "The Price of Loyalty", but it is by Ron Suskind, not O'Neill
> himself. I think it's important to point out, though, that while
> O'Neill is the primary source for the book (which comes out Tuesday)
> and while he contributed greatly to this book (including over 19,000
> documents from his tenure, complete with National Security Council
> meeting transcripts) and while he is promoting it with interviews for
> Time and 60 minutes, he is getting no money from Suskind or the book,
> which makes his criticism that much more potent.
> 
> His motivation seems to be genuine distaste and concern about, among
> other things, the closely-held secrecy of the administration.
> 
> Did anyone tape the 60 minutes interview?
> 
> R
>