Reason for hope when it comes to Gates
Michael Barone has a long piece about Robert Gates, President Bush's nominee for Secretary of Defense. Barone bases his analysis on Gates' book, From the Shadows: The Ultimate Insider's Story of Five Presidents and How They Won the Cold War. He concludes:
The picture I get of Robert Gates from his book is that of a careful analyst, one who sees American foreign policy as generally and rightly characterized by continuity but one who sees the need for bold changes in response to rapid changes in the world–and doesn't look for answers from the government bureaucracies. He is very much aware that we have dangerous enemies in the world, and he was willing over many years to confront them and try to check their advance.
To be sure, most analysts/players look solid in their own telling, but Barone's assessment is very close to that of R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr., who has known Gates for years.
