Sunday, June 5, 2011

Lawrence Eagleburger, who...

...served as secretary of state under the first President Bush, died at age 80. Survivors include his three sons, all named Lawrence. (He was originally from Wisconsin.)

When asked by The Washington Post why all had the same given name, he replied: “It was ego. And secondly, I wanted to screw up the Social Security system.”

But the career diplomat wasn't a total whack-job:

...Mr. Eagleburger had openly questioned the [second Bush] administration’s increasing preoccupation with Iraq and its talk of an invasion.

“I am scared to death that they are going to convince the president that they can do this,” he said in August 2002, “overthrow Saddam Hussein on the cheap, and we’ll find ourselves in the middle of a swamp because we didn’t plan to do it in the right way.”

And:

In 2008, he was a strong supporter of Senator John McCain’s bid for the White House but drew wide publicity when he questioned the qualifications of Mr. McCain’s running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska, wondering if she would be “prepared to take the reins of the presidency” if necessary.

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