What if Colin Powell had become President of the United States in 2000?
The Tuesday Talking Points
While it seems a distant memory, I strongly believe that the late Colin Powell, the venerable warrior and well respected diplomat who died yesterday at the age of 84 following a valiant fight against multiple myeloma, Parkinson's Disease, and Covid-19, very likely would have beaten both George W. Bush and John McCain in the 2000 Republican Primary—and garnered a significant enough number of Black votes to defeat Democrat Al Gore in the general election.
When I posted these thoughts to Facebook there were some skeptics, but the overwhelming show of love and support for Powell that I observed yesterday from Republicans, Democrats, and Independents alike on social and news media reminded Historian Hobbs that back in 1999, former Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush both strongly encouraged Powell to run for the Republican nomination—and that George W. Bush hedged on his own decision to run until he knew whether Powell would seek the nomination! This was around the same time that some Democrats were hoping that the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and architect of the Gulf War victory in 1991 would challenge Al Gore for the Democratic presidential nomination!
In fact, Powell's favorability ratings were so astronomically high across demographic groups and party lines back then that had he chosen to run under either party’s banner, he very likely would have become the first Black President of the United States!
I will always wonder how different a President Powell's response to Global Terrorism may have been since he was a Vietnam Veteran who learned through bitter combat in the jungles of Southeast Asia that “nation building" and successful warfare against guerilla enemy combatants are quite difficult objectives to achieve. Had it been President Powell calling the shots, as opposed to his becoming the Secretary of State who followed the orders of President George W. Bush (a Vietnam avoider who did not learn those bitter lessons of guerilla war), would America’s response to 9/11 been more measured? Would a President Powell have taken the Taliban’s offer in 2001 to turn over Osama Bin Laden, unlike Bush, the man who decided to throw caution to the wind and invade with hopes of doing what the Soviet Union and Great Britain had failed to do in prior centuries, which was to engage and defeat Afghan guerilla warriors in that country’s mountainous terrain? Would a President Powell have allowed the infamous Camp X-Ray to be constructed at Joint Base Guantanamo, a place where CIA operatives brutally tortured captured enemy combatants at the behest of the Bush administration with impunity? Cognizant that Powell reportedly sought to balance out former Vice President Dick Cheney’s and “W's” worst vengeful instincts, such leads me to conclude that a Powell administration would not have condoned such torturous acts.
My belief is that a President Powell not only takes that Bin Laden deal, but also further strengthens America’s defenses against terror attacks and, instead of following his president’s orders to make the false case for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction at the United Nations (so that Bush the Younger could avenge Iraqi Dictator Saddam Hussein's threats against Bush the Elder—a following that he later admittedly came to regret), perhaps he exercises his legendary restraint, one forged through his experiences as a decorated soldier who understood the importance of well defined missions and strategic objectives? A former soldier who, given the chance, may have saved hundreds of thousands of lives and trillions of dollars that were expended on idealistic, neo-colonial, white supremacy invoking crusades to control oil reserves—and Arab/Muslim self-determination—in the Middle and Near East.
While “what if” games are fun mental exercises, I conclude by saying that while we will never know how different the world may have become under a Powell Presidency, we can certainly pay homage to ways in which Powell left the world a better place than he entered—particularly with regards to racism and race relations, as I noted yesterday on “Real Talk with Andrew Gillum.” Check out the short clip of our discussion below:
Requeiscat in Pace, Gen. Powell!
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