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De Amerikaanse auteur William Rivers Pitt schrijft: 'Changes. The beleaguered Bush White House has spent the last several weeks insisting that no major shake-up of the administration was necessary, and no reshuffling of personnel was in the works.
Hm.
The New York Times reported on Monday that James Baker III, the man who pulled George W. Bush's irons out of the fire in Florida during the 2000 recount, the Secretary of State and close confidant of the former president Bush, has been tapped to head up a "congressionally mandated, bipartisan effort to generate new ideas" regarding the chaos in Iraq. Baker will travel to Baghdad and the Mideast region on a "fact-finding mission," after which he will deliver to Mr. Bush "some advice and insights that might be useful to the policy makers in Washington."
Whatever else can be said about Mr. Baker, few can deny his effectiveness as a field-general during difficult situations, and his reputation as a power-player is legendary in Washington. A man like this will not be a cipher under any circumstances, and the fact that he is being brought in to deal with the weightiest millstone around this administration's neck is telling. At first blush, the tectonic plates appear to be shifting along Pennsylvania Avenue. The removal of Andy Card as chief of staff, and the placement of Josh Bolten in that position, further indicates that the administration, notwithstanding their denials, intends to start doing things differently. Bolten is looking to be far more hands-on than his predecessor, a significant departure from the insular status quo that has dominated administration deliberations since day one. These seeming changes may only be cosmetic, however. The core of this administration has always been centered around three men - Cheney, Rumsfeld and Bush - and this core remains, for the time being, intact. There is also the added dynamic of the relationship between Baker and Bush. Bush has never entirely welcomed advice from his father, and to have his father's most gifted fixer come swooping in to rescue him once again must be galling. Will he chafe at the intrusion? Will Cheney allow his own domination of administration priorities to be diminished? The Defense Secretary is the wild card in the scenario. Rumsfeld, of course, has dug his heels in after absorbing unprecedented criticism of his tenure from a battery of six retired generals. Were it his decision to make, Rumsfeld would remain in his current position until the last minute of the last day of this administration. Ultimately, however, the decision may not be his to make.' Lees verder: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/042606Z.shtml