A Genius for Incompetence

Everyone has a purpose, they say. No doubt George Bush's is to serve as a negative example for future presidents and voters. It can't be denied that the man has a real genius for incompetence. It still astounds me though, how he managed to assemble such a truly foolish leadership in the Pentagon. Some bits extracted from Thomas E Ricks Fiasco

Doug Feith wound up overseeing the rebuilding of Iraq. Jay Garner, who as head of postwar mission in Iraq reported to him for a few months (before his replacement by the hopeless Paul Bremer) said of him:

I think he's incredibly dangerous. He's a smart guy whose electrons aren't connected, so he arc lights all the time. He can't organize anything.


Not too precise an analogy, but I get the idea - in fact I know people like that.

Feith, you may recall, was also the guy pumping out all that intelligence about Iraqi WMDs that turned out to be crap.

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