A former commander of NATO, Wesley Clark, has joined six other retired United States generals in calling for the resignation of the US Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld. ~ABC News (Australia)

Many politicians are using the open criticism of Rumsfeld to step up attacks on him, the Bush administration and the war in Iraq. “My view is that the secretary should step aside,” said Bill Richardson, the Democratic governor of New Mexico and a possible presidential candidate on CBS’s Face The Nation.

“Besides the fact that the Iraqi war has been mismanaged, that a lot of brave American men and women, over 2,300, have perished,” he told Bob Schieffer. “We should listen to what these generals are saying.” ~CBS News

When the man who wanted to start WWIII over Kosovo (Clark) and the man who presided over the most ineptly managed administration at the Department of Energy in living memory (Richardson) both agree that you are not fit to hold a job, you are probably doing a lot better than most people give you credit for.

Gov. Richardson, when he is not busy glad-handing with Richard Branson (to build the “Spaceport,” no less!) and forcing spending commitments on New Mexico at breakneck pace (trains, planes and spaceships, all for Bill’s glory!), fancies himself a foreign policy whiz because he played at being an expert negotiator for a captured American in North Korea and presided over a DOE that seemed unusually capable of “losing” hard disks containing sensitive data on nuclear lab work and letting in people without sufficient clearance around the same time then-Secretary Richardson invited representatives of the Chinese PLA to tour the facilities at Sandia. Then again, maybe it takes one incompetent Cabinet Secretary to recognise another. In any event, with critics like these Don Rumsfeld doesn’t need defenders.