A Complex Legacy
General Colin Powell passed away yesterday. Like many Americans these days, he passed away due to complications from COVID. Unlike many of those Americans, his death was complicated. He wasn’t going to be a Herman Cain Award nominee. He had been vaccinated. By all accounts, he had been careful. Unfortunately, he was recovering from cancer treatments and his body just didn’t have the immune system necessary to fight off the infection.
His death was as complicated as his life. In the case of most of these COVID deaths, you could easily say it could have been avoided. In most cases you could say it was a self-inflicted wound. In most cases you could chalk it up to arrogance and irresponsibility. Powell’s death can’t be placed in that category. His death became as complicated as his life. Legacies are usually not clean and his life is a reminder.
I imagine the first thing that comes to people’s minds is watching Powell stand before the United Nations and lie about weapons of mass destruction. It seemed credible at the time and a lot of that credibility was due to him. Once you surrender your credibility it’s hard to get it back. So, it is impossible to consider his legacy without considering that first.
Powell’s legacy is one of speaking truth to power most of the time. For some, most of the time simply won’t cut it. These days, most of the time is something we’d likely settle for. He was a registered Republican, but he hardly seemed like the usual Republican even back then. There was a brief, fleeting moment when we thought he might make a successful run for the presidency. That seems as distant a memory as our childhoods now.
In a moment of brutal honesty, we would readily admit that Powell is like many of us. Yesterday, we talked about civic religion. These stories intersect in the legacy we hope to achieve. When we all pass on it will be asked whether we lived a life of good or a frivolous life. For most of us, the answer will not be so simple. It wasn’t for him either.
How does one balance all of the good he did over the course of a career with one moment that may very well erase it all? It is impossible to know now how much he actually knew at the time. Did he honestly believe there were weapons of mass destruction? Had he been misled by those above him? Was he complicit in the biggest lie of the first decade of the century? We might never know the answer to that question.
What we do know is that there are some things we can never outrun. There are some things that a thousand or even a million good deeds can’t wash away. We can ask the same thing we always ask when any one us finally goes. On the balance, was the world a better place because we were here? In Powell’s case, that’s a hard one to answer.
Life is not a choose your own adventure book. We can’t go back and try the alternative story line. We also have no way of knowing if there was anyone available to stand up to the administration in that moment. That’s what makes legacies so hard. It’s also clear that he figured that out eventually. Maybe that is worth some points in the end and maybe it’s not. For me, it’s worth retaining his humanity until the very end.
From My Lai to Yellowcake, he had no credibility.
1I’ll just leave this here: https://www.rawstory.com/colin-powell-legacy/
2His legacy is to have lost the trust of people that he had influenced over his lifetime. I told my son when he was a teenager that one lie can ruin any trust and a loss of trust is fatal to any relationship.
If Powell didn’t know he was lying, it didn’t matter. When the truth came out, he had failed himself and those who respected him.
Of course, the people who lied to him were never revealed. I hope they go to their graves ashamed of themselves. But I doubt it.
3Nick: a very generous obit.
From the page from RA’s link: “One of the most unjustly lauded individuals in early twenty-first century America”
I suppose he deserves the same state funeral that Nixon and Reagan got in a “thank you for your service” kind of way, but I am not going to get more emotionally vested than that.
4@3 WA Skeptic: That reminds me of the old joke (suitably edited for Momma’s criteria:
A man on a walking tour of Scotland stops at the local pub for a pint. Although it is very crowded, he notices there’s one empty chair next to a very grump looking old man. He sits in the chair, and noticed everyone else in the pub is trying not to stare at him.
The old man taps the tourist on the shoulder and says “You see that man over there in the red shirt? He drinks too much and passes out every night. Do they call him Enoch the drunk? They do not.
The old man takes another sip of his beer and continues: “You see that woman over there? She stole a chicken once. Do they call her Lucy the chicken thief? They do not.
The old man then drinks the last of his beer and stands up, muttering: “You (date) ONE goat!”
The old m
5Reading the obits of Powell, I’m glad Gen. Milley knew the right things to do between November 3rd and January 20th.
6There are many stories documenting how Powell went against his own instincts and evidence to go along with the big lie of 2003, even by his own admission years later. Instead he chose loyalty to the Bush whacker- make the case to go to war (so he could be the hero and get revenge for 9/11). Who knows how the Middle East and the world would be different today had that administration taken a different approach like using the UN to continue doing their work to verify accurately if there were or weren’t WMDs. And how many lives would have been saved. Some lies are bigger than others, but his was beyond big. That’s his legacy- same as dick (head) cheney, and in my opinion, gwb.
7“My Lai Powell” in Google may be enlightening…
8After Trump’s comments about Colin Powell, I’m inclined to believe he was a good man with some flaws (unlike Trump who is a flawed man with no good). He was lied to about yellowcake uranium but should have been more diligent in his duties at the time. The war he helped start is one of the greatest and most costly in US history.
Trump said he hopes the fake news media treats him as well as Powell. I say we will be fortunate the quicker we get to test his theory out.
9RIP Gen. Powell. Didn’t he leave the Rs when trump came in? And he backed Obama and acted as a real voice of sanity at several critical moments (apart from lying to the UN). He tried to do the right thing. That’s good enough for me.
10I think that there is so much about a man that most of us never know. The one thing that I can say I know for sure as the daughter of a career military man. Those that appreciate their career and uphold their duty, do as they are told. In the movies you get the rogue Rambo’s. Real life has different consequences and unless you walk in their shoes what can you know about a man.
11Reading what I have about a man that went into service voluntarily. Was in at a time when many and some still that are deserving of rank would never get the honor for doing their duty. For following orders is what you do. I can understand, I don’t condone or absolve, I just understand. Not every order is an easy one to follow or execute.