The Unknown Known

It seems that George Bush has graduated from dogs to portraits of world leaders. I have to admit his painting of Vladimir Putin is pretty good, but not sure whether he is quite ready to take his one-man show on the road. You can view it at his Presidential Library in Dallas.

Meanwhile Donald Rumsfeld has been given the Errol Morris treatment, a full length documentary in which I assume Morris was hoping to get out of Rummy what he got out of McNamara some years back in Fog of War. Instead, it sounds like a very unapologetic Rumsfeld offering up his explanation of The Unknown Known. You do get the sense that Rumsfeld has studied The Art of War and has a pretty good head for this sort of thing, but for him it is largely about tactics, and he sized up Morris pretty quickly and never let his interlocutor get the better of him.

If Rumsfeld wasn't comfortable with George Bush as President he never showed it. By this stage in his political career he seemed to accept his role as one of the men behind the curtain, despite having once had presidential ambitions of his own. He often provided the most engaging sound bites during the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, with Bush deferring to the elder statesman on the logistics of the two wars.

You get the sense that Bush's passion for painting started in the White House, as it seemed he all too often deferred to Rumsfeld and Cheney, and later Condoleeza Rice on pressing issues. He gives no date in this WP blog other than to say he was inspired by Winston Churchill and hired an instructor to bring the "Rembrandt" out of him.

Whenever it started, it has kept Bush occupied, who purportedly spends up to four hours a day painting. He has kept a surprisingly low profile these past five years, never once to my recollection criticizing Obama. It seems Laura and Michelle have a genuinely friendly relationship. While the two couples were touring Africa on separate itineraries, they met at a memorial service in Tanzania, which again implied a cordial relationship between the two couples.

This is in sharp contrast to Rumsfeld, who has been very critical of the President. Most recently Rumsfeld questioned the President's leadership in foreign policy, saying a "trained ape" would have better management skills than Obama. Beyond the obvious racist implications of such a statement is the bitter reminder that it is the Obama administration drawing down the two wars he orchestrated while Secretary of Defense under Bush.

If nothing else the documentary gives us a very lucid reminder of the pompous ass that Rumsfeld was during his years as Secretary of Defense, which ended in a rather ignominious resignation early into Bush's second term because of his mismanagement of the two wars. I would think that Robert Gates would be a good subject for Morris' next documentary, as I'm sure Gates would have a few choice things to say about Rummy's competence.

Meanwhile, I'm waiting for Bush's Presidential Cabinet cycle to see how he paints Rummy.

O Pioneers!

It is hard not to think of Nebraska without thinking of its greatest writer. Here is a marvelous piece by Capote, Remembering Willa Cather . I remember seeing a stage production of O Pioneers! and being deeply moved by its raw emotions. I had read My Antonia before, and soon found myself hooked, like Capote was by the simple elegance of her prose and the way she was able to evoke so many feelings through her characters. Much of it came from the fact that she had lived those experiences herself. Her father dragged the family from Virginia to Nebraska in 1883, when it was still a young state, settling in the town of Red Cloud. named after one of the great Oglala chiefs. Red Cloud was still alive at the time, living on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, in the aftermath of the "Great Sioux Wars" of 1876-77. I don't know whether Cather took any interest in the famous chief, although it is hard to imagine not. Upon his death in 1909, he was eulogi

The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire

Welcome to this month's reading group selection. David Von Drehle mentions The Melting Pot , a play by Israel Zangwill, that premiered on Broadway in 1908. At that time theater was accessible to a broad section of the public, not the exclusive domain it has become over the decades. Zangwill carried a hopeful message that America was a place where old hatreds and prejudices were pointless, and that in this new country immigrants would find a more open society. I suppose the reference was more an ironic one for Von Drehle, as he notes the racial and ethnic hatreds were on display everywhere, and at best Zangwill's play helped persons forget for a moment how deep these divides ran. Nevertheless, "the melting pot" made its way into the American lexicon, even if New York could best be describing as a boiling cauldron in the early twentieth century. Triangle: The Fire That Changed America takes a broad view of events that led up the notorious fire, noting the gro

Colonel

Now with Colonel Roosevelt , the magnum opus is complete. And it deserves to stand as the definitive study of its restless, mutable, ever-boyish, erudite and tirelessly energetic subject. Mr. Morris has addressed the toughest and most frustrating part of Roosevelt’s life with the same care and precision that he brought to the two earlier installments. And if this story of a lifetime is his own life’s work, he has reason to be immensely proud. -- Janet Maslin -- NY Times . Let the discussion begin!

Dispatches from Vilnius

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