When Richard Clarke speaks, it seems there is plenty to be wary of. Since a "60 Minutes" interview aired last Sunday and his tell-all book "Against All Enemies: Inside America's War on Terror" hit shelves this week and attempted to discredit President Bush's war on terror, Clarke is either Public Enemy No. 1 or Michael Moore's dream date - depending on your school of thought.
On one hand, when Clarke, former counterterrorism chief to Bill Clinton and Bush, says that the White House didn't see al-Qaida as an "urgent" threat until 20 terrorists hijacked American innocence forever, it seems consistent with what Bush opponents always believed in. The anti-Bush squad has seemingly always contended that the president's preoccupation with Iraq - and subsequent war - was predicated by Sept. 11, despite any factual connection between the two. A war of "fictitious reasons," as Moore said a year ago.
It's plausible that Clarke is the mouth Bush didn't expect to - or hoped wouldn't - talk. The flustered backtracking and scripted explanations that have reverberated around the White House since Clarke's allegations came to light indicate that something indeed is foul in Washington, but that the culprit is yet to be identified.
Which, on the other hand, suggests that Clarke is nothing but a brilliant businessman. His book has generated Capitol Hill commissions, his revelation comes as the presidential race is taking a particularly nasty turn and every blowhard pundit on cable is popping forehead veins to expound on what this all means. Is it all politically motivated? Is Clarke holding a grudge against the president and the Cabinet? Maybe he "wasn't in the loop," as the vice president contends.
But if a counterterrorism chief urges that extra attention be paid to the terror cell that would ultimately be responsible - if that's how it actually happened, of course - it needs to be investigated what else was missed. If the proper intelligence had been shared, former CIA director George Tenet said, "we might have had a chance" to prevent the World Trade Centers from toppling.
That's a lot to ask Americans to consider - the inevitability of the Sept. 11 attacks as compared to the alleged intelligence lapse that could have prevented it. Then the fallout, a war with Iraq that Clarke has only implied was manufactured by the Bush administration. What many Americans have honestly hoped would never be true is systematically being evaluated by a national cable television audience.
But to be sure, Clarke's allegations still are just that. Vice President Dick Cheney called Clarke out of the loop, but we're still dealing with the top .0001 percent of Americans who actually had a front-row seat in the Sept. 11 "Situation Room." The possibility of what Clarke is contending is very real, and another flat-out denial from the White House doesn't seem the appropriate response.
It will be difficult to gauge Clarke's allegations and assertions as we follow the commission's findings and investigations in coming weeks. What is said will be rebuffed, and denials will again be denied. But at this juncture, it's hard not to believe in one thing Clarke declared during Wednesday's testimony: In one way or the other, "your government has failed you."
