Obama's National Security Adviser departs.

Gen. James Jones is leaving a bit early, a couple weeks after the publication of Woodward's "Obama's Wars," which quoted Jones calling Rahm Emanuel and other Obama aides "water bugs" who "flit around." He was said to believe that they — said bugs — "did not understand war or foreign relations ... and were too interested in measuring the short-term political impact of the president’s decisions in these areas."

"According to Bob Woodward, National Security Adviser Jim Jones called Emanuel and his fellow political aides 'the water bugs.'"

Writes William Kristol:

“They flit around,” Jones said. “Rahm gets an idea at 10 a.m. and wants a briefing by 4 p.m., and I will say no,” because the work can’t be done that quickly. According to Woodward, Jones believed “the water bugs did not understand war or foreign relations .  .  . and were too interested in measuring the short-term political impact of the president’s decisions in these areas.”

But Emanuel turned out not to be particularly good at measuring the political impact of the president’s decisions. Or was his sage political counsel too often rejected by the president—as he has suggested on not-so-deep background to friendly journalists?

UPDATE: Jones goes.

Rush Limbaugh thinks Obama is icy cold — like Michael Dukakis... and Buck Turgidson.

Don't let the horrible photo chosen by Media Matters here stop you from listening to the audio. It's an excellent performance by Rush, including his approximation of the George C. Scott performance:



The transcript — along with the Dukakis and "Dr. Strangelove" clips — is here. He's talking about the new Bob Woodward book:

Woodward asks about terrorism, terror attacks, and so forth. Obama says, "We can absorb a terrorist attack. We'll do everything we can to prevent it, but even a 9/11, even the biggest attack ever, we absorbed it, and we're stronger." That, to me, is the equivalent of Dukakis being asked, "If your wife were raped and murdered, would you favor the death penalty?" So Woodward says, "What about terrorism?" Obama figures, "Ah, we can handle it. We can absorb it. We're even stronger." That's not cool. That is cold, and it reminded me of something. One of my all-time favorite movies is Dr. Strangelove. A Stanley Kubrick movie. And one of the characters in this movie is General Buck Turgidson....

And Buck Turgidson is one of these stereotypical generals. He just wants to nuke the world. He just loves war and hates the Russians, hates the commies. He just wants to nuke everything. And Buck Turgidson said, "Mr. President, we are rapidly approaching the moment of truth, both for ourselves as human beings and for the life of our nation. Now, truth is not always pleasant thing. But it's necessary now to make a choice: To choose between two admittedly regrettable but nevertheless distinguishable postwar environments, one where you get 20 million people killed, the other where you'd get 150 million people killed." Turgidson was saying, "Let's send more B-52s! Let's just wipe these people out while we're at it, since we can't call this one back. Let's just be rid of them. We'll kill 20 million of them and that's it. They can't kill any of ours. It's a livable situation, Mr. President."

Peter Sellers playing President Merkin Muffley says, "You're talking about mass murder, general, not war," and Turgidson replies, "Mr. President, I'm not saying we wouldn't get our hair mussed but I do say no more than ten to 20 million killed tops, depending on the breaks." Here's a guy totally cold and unaffected by the possibility of ten to 20 million people being killed in an accident and wants to say, "Let's go wipe 'em out even further." The president can't believe what he's hearing. You have Dukakis, "If your wife was raped and murdered, would you favor the death penalty?" "No, Bernard. As you know, I've long and consistently opposed the death penalty during all my life." Obama is asked, "Mr. President, what is your attitude on terrorism?"

"Well, we could absorb one of those, a terrorist attack. We'll do everything we can to prevent it but even a 9/11, but even the biggest attack ever we absorbed it and we're stronger. We can deal with it." All these examples are of leftists and they are cold, removed, unemotional, unaffected, uninvolved.

Did he just call Turgidson a leftist?

Anyway, you know how it must pain the average-citizen leftist to hear that Obama, like Dukakis, is cold and unemotional. It can't be true! Obama is about empathy.

[Click here for video of George Lakoff explaining Obama's "empathy campaign."]

Remember when Bill Clinton made us — some of us — think he feels our pain? Obama, aloof, observes that we have an excellent capacity to absorb pain. We're pain sponges, apparently, so there's nothing to get too worked up about.

I'm not saying we wouldn't get our hair mussed. But I do say no more than ten to twenty million killed, tops! Uh, depending on the breaks....

Obama to Bob Woodward: "We can absorb a terrorist attack... even a 9/11, even the biggest attack ever . . . we absorbed it and we are stronger."

From Woodward's new book.

Obama also said that of course, he's trying to prevent any attacks, but his point about absorbing whatever hits us and getting stronger... it's true, isn't it?

If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.

It's true, right?

Classier version of the same: "What does not destroy me, makes me stronger."

(Hey, check it out: "Twilight of the Idols" has a Facebook page.)

AND: Make the Althouse blog stronger. Use this link if you buy the Woodward book.

What's in Bob Woodward's "Obama’s Wars"?

The NYT reports in advance of the publication date:

The president concluded from the start that “I have two years with the public on [Afghanistan]” and pressed advisers for ways to avoid a big escalation, the book says. “I want an exit strategy,” he implored at one meeting. Privately, he told Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. to push his alternative strategy opposing a big troop buildup in meetings, and while Mr. Obama ultimately rejected it, he set a withdrawal timetable because, “I can’t lose the whole Democratic Party.”...

[T]he book describes a professorial president who assigned “homework” to advisers but bristled at what he saw as military commanders’ attempts to force him into a decision. Even after he agreed to send another 30,000 troops last winter, the Pentagon asked for another 4,500 “enablers” to support them.

The president lost his poise... “I’m done doing this!” he erupted....

And President Hamid Karzai suffers from manic depression.

IN THE COMMENTS: Palladian writes:

"I can’t lose the whole Democratic Party."

He doesn't mind losing the war or the country, however.

ADDED: My response to that quote — "I can’t lose the whole Democratic Party" — is: The President is saying — can it be true? — that there isn't even a small fragment of the party that would support fighting the war with a serious commitment to victory. How damning!

Bob Woodward "flashes a glimpse of what he knows, shaded in a largely negative light, with the hint of more to come..."

"... setting up a series of prisoner's dilemmas in which each prospective source faces a choice: Do you cooperate and elaborate in return (you hope) for learning more and earning a better portrayal — for your boss and yourself? Or do you call his bluff by walking away in the hope that your reticence will make the final product less authoritative and therefore less damaging? If no one talks, there is no book. But someone — then everyone — always talks."

George Stephanopolos tells how Bob Woodward gets his access to the White House.