The "Czar" Fallacy

Ralph Peters on why the Iraq "Czar" is a joke:

ON paper, the appointment of three-star Gen. Douglas E. Lute as White House "war czar" - after five retired four-stars turned down the job - makes perfect sense. It's about time somebody took charge.

The reality is something else: The whoppingly mislabeled "czar" will have neither the authority to force departments and agencies to do what they were supposed to do all along, nor the vital power of the purse.

He'll have to rely on persuasion. In D.C., that's a joke.

Lord knows, the administration needs a grown-up to make its brats do their homework, to ensure that our commanders and troops get the support they need and to look ahead instead of forever scrambling to fix yesterday's goofs.

But the problem with past "czars" has been that they were handed big missions and zero clout. Despite the hoopla surrounding their appointments, they were little more than nags in the government kitchen. At most, they provided the illusion that a problem was taken seriously.

What's most disturbing about this is Bush essentially abdicating his commander-in-chief responsibilities so he can concentrate on getting even more illegal aliens to come over here and vote Democrat.

This guy's our party's Manchurian Candidate.

After all, we've seen how well the appointment of the Homeland Security "czar" worked out, haven't we?