When retired Gen. Barry R. McCaffrey criticized the Bush administration's handling of the Iraq war three years ago, he was lambasted as an armchair general and deemed an adversary by the Pentagon. So even McCaffrey was surprised to find himself in the Oval Office this week giving President Bush his thoughts on Iraq.
A White House long accused of squelching internal dissent and ignoring outside viewpoints has been reaching out lately to prominent figures who have disagreed with the president. Bush just hired a Treasury secretary who opposed his policy on global warming and a press secretary who dismissed his domestic agenda as timid and listless.
How much such moves reflect a genuine opening up for an insular White House remains uncertain. Symbolically, at least, the White House is eager to rebut the longstanding public impression of a president in a bunker listening only to like-minded advisers. Substantively, Bush has hardly signaled a major course change in the direction of his presidency, and skeptics recall past instances when nonconformists within the administration were shut out.
New willingness to budge?
Yet some Washington veterans detect signs of a tentative new willingness by the administration to heed the advice of others rather than sticking stubbornly to its position. Just this week, under pressure from European allies and U.S. foreign policy elders, the administration reversed itself and agreed to join talks with Iran if it suspends nuclear activities. And last week, Bush temporarily sealed documents seized from a congressman's office in response to complaints from Capitol Hill.
"It's a positive sign for going forward," said former congressman Robert Walker (R-Pa.), an outspoken critic of the FBI raid on the office of Rep. William J. Jefferson (D-La.). Walker attributed the shift to Joshua B. Bolten, the new White House chief of staff. "What you're seeing is a reflection of Bolten's belief that policy has to be multifaceted."
Others are more dubious. "I want to see the proof," said retired Col. Larry Wilkerson, who was chief of staff at the State Department until last year, when he emerged as a vocal critic of the administration. "I can hope, as I imagine 60 to 70 percent of Americans are hoping, . . . we are going to see some moderation and it's going to bear some fruit. But I've got to see the fruit, because I've seen this before."
A presidency built on certitude
To disaffected insiders such as Wilkerson, Bush has seemed powerfully indifferent to alternative views or shielded from them altogether. First-term figures such as Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, Environmental Protection Agency chief Christine Todd Whitman and Treasury Secretary Paul H. O'Neill ultimately left frustrated. Skeptical assessments of Iraq's weapons programs were largely disregarded before the 2003 invasion.
In Bush's view, certitude has served him well -- a fidelity to core principles that avoids the sort of equivocation that he believes undermined Bill Clinton's presidency. But as he headed into his sixth year in office, the president was derided in a Newsweek cover story titled "Bush in the Bubble," which characterized him as perhaps "the most isolated president in modern history."
The White House shake-up orchestrated by Bolten has begun to crack that bubble just a bit. While he and other new appointees were already Bush aides, Bolten recruited radio host Tony Snow as the new press secretary, even though Snow had criticized the White House for giving up on Social Security changes and scaling down its legislative ambitions. And Bolten prevailed upon Goldman Sachs chief executive Henry M. Paulson Jr. to take over as Treasury secretary, even though Paulson headed an environmental group highly critical of Bush's approach to climate change.
Demanding a seat at the table
"The notion that there hasn't been debate here over the last 5 1/2 years is flat wrong," said White House communications director Nicolle Wallace. "But it's also true that there's more people with more ideas and perspectives, and that's good."
Snow agreed. "My experience from my first day here is that debates are wide open, they're wide-ranging, and opinions, even those that disagree with the president, are aired, and people discuss them," he told reporters when Paulson was hired. "And I think Hank Paulson is certainly going to be able to express his views."
Still, neither Snow nor Paulson took that for granted. Before agreeing to take the jobs, they secured guarantees that they would have seats in the inner circle. The real test may be whether those promises are fulfilled. Bush has not agreed, for instance, to change his mind on global warming just because Paulson will join the Cabinet.
"It remains to be seen whether Paulson will be asked his opinion on this subject or whether he'll offer it," said David D. Doniger, director of climate policy at the Natural Resources Defense Council, who noted that O'Neill also favored action on global warming. "Certainly in this administration if you had these views, you learned very quickly to keep your mouth shut."
Calling on Congress
Bolten has also emphasized more consultation with Congress, many of whose leaders have grown bitter. Bush has met with scores of lawmakers from both parties lately and has issued more coveted invitations to White House social events. The White House said it has sent 603 invitations to members of Congress for meetings and receptions so far this year.
Yet there are limits. Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), the hawkish former Marine who turned against the Iraq war, has been invited to social events, according to his office, but not substantive meetings.
Last month, Bush invited former secretaries of state from both parties -- including Madeleine K. Albright, who has been critical of the war and the administration's conduct of foreign policy -- to advise him on Iraq and Iran. When Albright emerged, she said the discussion had been far livelier than at past gatherings. "We had quite a bit of give and take," she told reporters.
Albright is among those who have been urging Bush to drop his refusal to engage in direct negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program. Bush evidently listened, because on Wednesday the administration announced it would talk with Iran along with European negotiators if Tehran suspends uranium enrichment. White House officials consider it a way to call Iran's bluff and convince Russia and China that they tried. But it represented a rare instance of heeding the advice of the Washington elite.
Turning the page
McCaffrey is another Washington veteran who hasn't always found his advice welcomed by the administration. A division commander in the 1991 Persian Gulf War, McCaffrey has been highly critical of the Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's leadership in the current war. But on returning from his latest foray to Iraq, McCaffrey was included among six specialists who briefed Bush for 90 minutes on Tuesday, then was told he was free to speak to the media on the White House driveway. "The president seemed open to views," McCaffrey said in a separate interview afterward.
Deputy National Security Adviser Michele Davis, who attended, said the McCaffrey invitation reflected an attempt by the White House to put disputes of the past behind it. "We can have differences of opinion about going in [to Iraq] and the way things were handled the last three years," she said. "But we've got to move forward. . . . Differences of opinion about how things went in the past aren't a big deal."
Staff writer Thomas E. Ricks contributed to this report.