Rumsfeld's new crisis rapid response communications team responds to the forthcoming Army Times editorial tomorrow calling for Rumsfeld to go:

...Attack on Secretary Rumsfeld

CLAIM: “Rumsfeld has lost credibility with the uniformed leadership, with the troops, with Congress and with the public at large. His strategy has failed, and his ability to lead is compromised. And although the blame for our failures in Iraq rests with the secretary, it will be the troops who bear its brunt.”

FACTS: Defense Secretaries in times of war are always subject to sometimes harsh criticism. The Secretary has helped oversee two conflicts while also transforming a mammoth bureaucracy, overseeing sweeping humanitarian missions across the globe, and helping to protect the American people at home.

When Rumsfeld has to get his staff to go on the defense department's website to defend him from the military newspapers (which, "for the record" reminds us, are owned by a private company, Gannett -- there goes your next trip with Rummy, USA Today), it is hard not to see the whole exercise as deeply pathetic.

Posted by Laura at November 5, 2006 04:34 PM