Bill Bennett got schooled at his teach-in

[Cocoa]

I just found this amazing transcript from back at the beginning of the war.

You have Bill Bennett, James Woolsey, Paul Bremer before he was famous, and some other guy, lying repeatedly to college students.

The students, however, are really amazingly informed, and it pisses these PNACers off to no end. They get extremely snippy and sarcastic with them, at the end, Bennett takes a swipe at "senior thesis" questions.

Here's one of the first good exchanges, where Bennett calls himself a high-roller. I think the gambling thing broke out shortly after this. :-)

Notice how Bill Bennett indignantly dodges the Leo Strauss question, and Woolsey totally dodges it. Don't worry, later questioners press the issue. :-)


http://www.avot.org/stories/storyReader$141

<snip>

QUESTION: Thank you all for sharing your ideas. My question is to Mr. William Bennett. Your connection to this seems to be purely philosophical. A lot of people have a lot of interest which people might, for instance they might point a finger at Mr. Woolsey and say, well, he stands to benefit from this as advisor to the Booz Allen Hamilton, Inc., which had $680 million of Pentagon contracts, and so forth. Not to attack you, Mr. Woolsey, but just since your connection is strictly, it seems to be purely philosophical. My concern is, how do we know that as the rest of the followers of Leo Strauss, as you yourself are, the people like Perle, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, what they've been promoting militarily strikes me as somewhat incompetent.

So, my concern is, how do we know that this Straussian philosophy isn't leading us into sort of a quagmire of games and whatnot. I think as you, yourself, discovered, Strauss taught different things to different people. He was a friend of Karl Schmidt, the Nazi jurist. There just seems to be so many unclear things about Leo Strauss' philosophy that I would just like you to address that.

SETH LEIBSOHN: Thank you.

WILLIAM BENNETT: Sure. Me first, and then I think Jim Woolsey ought to be able to say something. I don't know who is doing your homework for you, I'm not a Straussian. I've met people who are Straussians. I went all through graduate school getting Ph.D.s thinking that Strauss was the last name of a Levi. I had no idea who he was. I was doing Aristotle and Kierkegaard and Plato. That was my work. In fact, Jim Woolsey can well defend himself better than I can.

One of the really extraordinary things about this group of people is, you know, college students should know that there are a lot of people running around with reputations and achievements who, to come to a college campus, students get on the phone and scrape up a bunch of money, get $5,000, $10,000, $15,000 for a fee. These men have come every time I have asked them to come. They come for free. We pay their expenses. And I bought them a $30 dinner at Palomino. High rollers we are. And that's it. And they come across country, and they're taking red eyes back. And there aren't a whole lot of people, not in abundance, not in oversupply who would do that.

And the reason they do it is, they care about these issues, as you can tell from what they said, and they care about coming to places like this and talking to young people. Look, it's not a terrible thing in the world to wonder about people's motives. But don't go through life assuming that everybody's motives are base and low, and that they're all ulterior. And that the only reason anybody does anything is for some kind of narrow notion of self-advancement.

I'll tell you one thing about Washington. I know

(Applause.)

I know honorable men and women in Washington. I know honorable men and women on both sides of the aisle. They're not in oversupply. We've got two of them here. And there are others. Are there knaves, are there fools, are there scoundrels? You bet. You've seen them live on television. And you've seen them in the highest offices of the land. But there are some honorable people Don't assume the worst, especially of good men like this.

(Applause.)

JAMES WOOLSEY: I'll go with Bill's answer.

more...

[Jacobin]

1. Pretty amazing, especially looking at it from this point in the future

[kainah]

2. I remember seeing this panel broadcast on C-SPAN

Or another one with Bennett & Woolsey where they said much the same thing. (I don't remember if Bremer was there because, yes, it was before he was "famous"). They got very haughty. It was a clear show of their arrogance at play. :scared:

[Cocoa]

5. I'm so impressed with the skepticism of the students

They were throwing the frauds' shit right back in their faces. I have to admit, at this point in the war I was partially believing the WMD stuff. I'm embarrassed about it.

Woolsey ridicules this person who turned out to be right on about WMD, and Bremer promises there will be proof.

QUESTION: The Niger connection was atomic bomb creation.

JAMES WOOLSEY: No, it was, as I recall, it was importation allegedly into Iraq of yellow cake uranium.

QUESTION: That's right.

JAMES WOOLSEY: Now, I don't know the answer to the question of why that was used. It was wrong and it's wrong. I have never thought that the Iraqi nuclear program, since it was destroyed in the Gulf War is the centerpiece of Saddam's violations. The centerpiece of his violations, which virtually all reasonable people agree on, is the maintenance of substantial chemical and bacteriological weapons. That's what the inspectors found. It's what the inspectors found. If you believe he destroyed them the way he said he destroyed them, then, again, like Chirac and Schroeder, I have a bridge in Brooklyn I'd be glad to sell you.

QUESTION: No, we don't know that, Mr. Woolsey.

JAMES WOOLSEY: We know it as well as one ever knows anything in international affairs.

QUESTION: I would love to see the proof. I want to see the proof.

JAMES WOOLSEY: That's what the inspectors said. All you have to do is look at the inspector's report of 1998.

PAUL BREMER: You'll see the proof.

[oasis]

3. Bill Bennett, that hypocrite was a total failure as "drug czar"

[kodi]

4. they dont understand the modern world, time has passed them by

its as if they still live in the 50's and dont realize that people have a lot more informnation available to them.

it shocks them to face the facts that there are average 20 year olds who know the score, and they can no longer act like the smug and superior assholes they are and hide behind the bullshit they used to preach about and can't deal with factual rebuttals from people their own children's age.

bennett reminds me of cartman from south park

"You must respect MY authoritay!"

fuck him and the goat he rode in on.

[pasadenaboy]

6. EVERYONE MUST READ THIS LINK

the hubris is frightening. These guys are so arrogant, and ended up so wrong.

[pasadenaboy]

7. BTW-Good work my fellow bruins!

that's why I support my alma mater, it turns out smart, questioning students. I'm so proud of them standing up to those neocon assholes.

UCLA class of 1993

[Cocoa]

8. your Bruins blindsided these fucks good!

you should be proud. :toast: