The Prince of Darkness

This weekend, I spent four days on my sailboat at Catalina Island, in Avalon Harbor. My son and his friends were celebrating his coming marriage. I spent most of the weekend reading a book I should have read several years ago when it came out. It is called The Prince of Darkness and is a memoir by Robert Novak who died last week. Novak was a reporter who spent 50 years reporting on politics from Washington, DC. He began as a young reporter for the Wall Street Journal after an apprenticeship as a local sports reporter and then as an AP writer, rewriting phone reports by AP stringers. He then was invited, much to his surprise, to a partnership with Rowland Evans, a well-connected Washington socialite and political reporter. They began with a column that emphasized political gossip but soon moved on to hard reporting mixed with opinion. They were probably the most effective and influential partnership in national political history. The best comparison would probably be Drew Pearson and Jack Anderson, who combined hard reporting and strong opinion for many years although they were not a partnership so much as a succession from Pearson to Anderson.

I disagreed with Novak on several issues, chiefly Israel and the Iraq War. On the Iraq War he was consistent and, unlike most Iraq War critics, he was also opposed to the 1991 Gulf War. My problem with most critics of the Iraq invasion of 2003 is that they have no realistic opinion on the alternatives Bush faced after the 2001 attack. Once we had been attacked, the alternative to an invasion was withdrawal from Saudi Arabia and a concession that Saddam should be allowed to continue his regime with the risk of nuclear weapons and further aggression. The usual critics try to say that we had Saddam “in a box” and sanctions would have been sufficient to prevent further adventurism on his part. This is ignoring the failure of sanctions, which were being attacked by the same leftists who attacked the invasion. Had we conceded that we could not prevail, radical Islam would have been empowered and we would face further attacks. Novak, almost unique among serious pundits, opposed the 1991 war and was willing to accept the Kuwait annexation and the potential for a second invasion of Saudi Arabia. Given that Saudi Arabia was the origin of most of the 2001 hijackers, and that they have continued funding of radical Islamic activity throughout the world, his position had consistency and a logic that, while I may oppose it, is far more compelling than the opportunism seen on the left wing since 1991.

I also disagree with him on Israel and he does not provide the same logic and consistent argument that he provides on Iraq. His book shows a seamy side of Washington that, no doubt, led to his cynical and skeptical view of the machinations of the federal government over the 50 years in which he wrote his column. The book is a real education on the workings of the federal government and a cause for concern that nothing seems to have changed except, perhaps, for a lessening on the quality of political leaders. He is very critical of Newt Gingrich, for example, and his reputation as a right wing critic should be discounted as his criticism is bipartisan and well founded. I have seen enough politics at close hand to be impressed that this is an account that will stand for many years. I highly recommend it.

5 Responses to “The Prince of Darkness”

  1. This may seem strange but I couldn’t see the image above, I am using FireFox 2. anyways, what I read was very good and I enjoyed it. I was thinking about print it out, do I have permission to do that?

  2. Thanks for the recommendation. I have been looking for a good book on the life of Robert Novak. While I appreciated much of his commentary, I also didn’t agree with him on a number of issues. Nevertheless, what we would agree on far out-weighed the disagreements.

    I particularly like your views on the Iraq War and President Bush’s options after the attacks on 9/11. So many on the Left and Right don’t understand what kind of world we all lived in before 9/11, and given the evidence, how difficult it would have been to try to respond to foreign threats like Saddam Hussein without some form of force.

    More specifically, what are your disagreements with Novak on Israel?

  3. cassandra says:

    All I know is if we hadn’t gone in to Iraq, the left would have been giving Bush grief about it for his entire term of office. They’re that cynical.

  4. I think Novak has a point about the 1991 Gulf War. In retrospect, would we be worse off with Saddam in control of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia ? The answer seems obvious but there are points on his side. Certainly, we would be far better off financially. Having a madman like that armed with nuclear weapons, which he would certainly have by now, is a daunting prospect. On the other hand, he did not become very devout as a Muslim until he had lost the 1991 war. What would it have meant to have a secular Arab in control of Mecca and Medina ? It’s an interesting speculation.

    As far as Novak on Israel, I haven’t found an explanation in his writing. My enthusiasm for Israel was largely stimulated by Entebbe and the Six Day War. I have believed the Palestinians to be self destructive since 1948 but didn’t have a strong opinion one or the other until Entebbe showed me how effective a small state could be at a time when we were looking more and more ineffectual. The Entebbe raid occurred in July 1976 and was a marked contrast to the botched Mayaguez incident in 1975.