Bush Advisor Asked to Defend His Soul

The question was inevitable. A young man in a white T-shirt stood up during a U.C. Berkeley forum and faced the panel of experts. He focused on Matthew Dowd and Steve Schmidt, the two political consultants who had helped President George W. Bush win re-election in 2004 and had just finished a stint with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Schmidt and Dowd were at U.C. Berkeley to reconstruct the governor's race, but their role with Bush ripped a hole in the placid conversation.

"I was wondering," said the young man, who had eaten the free lunch and scribbled intensely in his notebook throughout the afternoon, "do you lose sleep at night knowing that you gave this country probably the worst administration we've ever had? And given the fact that Dick Cheney is calling for a war on Iran, and he is openly saying it's a war that's going to last generations … when you look into the eyes of young people who have to live in this country, what goes through your mind? I mean, have you thought about maybe trying to save your soul by calling for impeachment?"

Schmidt just looked at the young man and said nothing. A political expert with the Institute on Governmental Studies quickly tried to get things back on track, but Dowd wanted to answer. Looking intensely at the man, Dowd began with a lecture about making assumptions about other human beings, (and by extension even powerful and well-known ones who are treated as caricatures.)

"I think your assumption about where people have lived their lives, and what they've done, and why they've done it, what their intentions are, and what they're not, I think it's best that we ask people questions … instead of making allegations and judgments about people before you even know their story."

Then he told his story. "The second thing is, I have a 21-year-old son who's in the Army, and who is about to be deployed over there. Now … am I a person who stays up at night thinking about that? Yeah. I do stay up at night thinking about that." The young man tried to interrupt, but Dowd continued.

"Let me just finish. We all do things in life because we think they're the right thing. And I think it's better off in this country that we keep - even if I disagree with whoever you're supporting, if it's whoever it is, and whatever they're doing - do they make mistakes? Do we have hopes and dreams and disappointments and all of that thing in life? Yeah. But you know what? When you do something, and you do it for the right reason, and you think it's best for the country, and things don't always turn out the exact way that you think they're going to do, does not mean that you somehow have to walk down the street in a hair shirt, and with a sign that says, 'Forgive Me, Forgive Me, Forgive Me.' We move on, and we do what's best in life. And that's really what life's about."

The seminar moved on. But the scene this weekend reminded me of U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer telling Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that "you're not going to pay a particular price" for the Iraq war because she was childless. "So who pays the price?" she said. "The American military and their families." Rice accurately noted later that you don't have to have children to make good decisions. But as the Dowd family knows, it also can alter your perspective and keep you up at night.

(Photo: Laura Skelding / AP)