New York Times' top story, top paragraph, top secret!:
"A classified memorandum by President Bush’s national security adviser expressed serious doubts about whether Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki had the capacity to control the sectarian violence in Iraq and recommended that the United States take new steps to strengthen the Iraqi leader’s position."
This was classified? This is how Stephen Hadley and his "senior aides" at NSC spend their days? Shhhh. Don't tell anyone, Mr. President, mum's the word, but we're starting to think that maybe Maliki doesn't have things under control.
Remember now, this is supersecret brainwork, for your eyes only -- a product of national security thinking that only qualified professionals could unravel. So don't let on, lest the media start snooping around over there and discover ... problems.
Our professional recommendation? Maybe we should help the prime minister. He just might need it.
... Are the paychecks in yet?
"The memo questions whether Mr. Maliki has the will and ability to establish a genuine unity government, saying the answer will emerge from actions he takes in the weeks and months ahead."
One marvels at their perspicacity. Which probably derived from noticing the utter lack of any government in Iraq. But then again, only a qualified professional could make that determination. The chronology laid out in the memo derives from pure, qualified-professional brilliance as well. We can't say if Maliki now has the ability to create a government, but time will tell. These boys are indeed pros, that rare breed that understands answers to current questions lie only in the future. They point these things out in classified memos.
Based on Mr. Hadley's Oct. 30 meeting with the prime minister, further insights erupted: "Maliki reiterated a vision of Shia, Sunni and Kurdish partnership, and in my one-on-one meeting with him, he impressed me as a leader who wanted to be strong but was having difficulty figuring out how to do so."
Yes, there may be a couple internal contradictions in play here. May. Not sure. But there are hints. First, strong leaders don't generally struggle with strength. James Buchanan really, really, really wanted to be a tough guy, but his rather noticeable fecklessness led to ... let's see, what did they call it? Oh yeah. The Civil War.
Second, as the NYT paraphrased Mr. Hadley's professional findings: "the Iraqi leader’s assurances [of establishing a 'Shia, Sunni and Kurdish partnership'] seemed to have been contradicted by developments on the ground." Seemed to have been contradicted by developments. Not sure. But there are hints. And they're keeping an eye on "developments." Because they're professionals -- qualified professionals.
Now you're not a professional, but go ahead and take an amateurish stab at what you think the following in Mr. Hadley's memo seems to suggest: "Reports of nondelivery of services to Sunni areas, intervention by the prime minister’s office to stop military action against Shia targets and to encourage them against Sunni ones, removal of Iraq’s most effective commanders on a sectarian basis and efforts to ensure Shia majorities in all ministries."
Give up? Of course you do, you muddled dilettante. But qualified-professional Hadley saw that depriving the Sunnis of food, water and electricity; redirecting military assaults against Sunnis only; appointing Shia commanders merely because they're Shia; and packing the prime minister's cabinet with Shia -- "all suggest a campaign to consolidate Shia power in Baghdad." Just as Hitler's 1939 blitzkrieg "suggested" hostilities -- but of course only time could tell.
Here's where I stopped reading: "The memo also lists steps the United States can take to strengthen Mr. Maliki’s position. They include efforts to persuade Saudi Arabia to use its influence with the Sunnis in Iraq and encourage them to turn away from the insurgency and to seek a political accommodation."
That should do it. Take a memo: Re: from Saudis to Sunnis: Stop it. Just stop it. Come on, guys, stop all this tomfoolery. Please?
Yet jumping to another story failed to distract. In a Times' "News Analysis," I'm informed that "at a time of heightened urgency in the Bush administration’s quest for solutions, American military and political leverage in Iraq has fallen sharply."
Whence came this conclusion? You got it. Mr. Hadley's classified memo. The damned thing haunts.
Still, I tried another story. How about "Man Mistakenly Abducted by C.I.A. Seeks Redress"? Perhaps it has a happy ending -- some flicker of overdue governmental competence and fair play.
It seems a vacationing German man was shanghaied in Macedonia, whisked to Afghanistan, "shackled, beaten and injected with drugs" for five months, "told that he was in a place where he had no right to recourse for what happened to him," released after his captors realized they had the wrong guy, and was left on his own -- in Albania -- to get home.
The poor bastard sued -- mostly for a simple apology, not money -- but was denied a U.S. trial because the federal judge "was persuaded by the government that there was no way to even begin a trial without impermissibly disclosing state secrets." Like what? Like the state has unbounded dimwits in charge? Some secret.
The ball-busting superspooks and qualified professionals who ponder, write and then classify all this pristine crap do so primarily not to protect national security, but to hide from the public what thorough mediocrity, absolute mystification and downright haplessness reign in the uppermost circles of power.
Just "think" Professor Harold Hill.