Elliott Abrams: the teflon assistant secretary

Washington Monthly, May, 1987 by Eric Alterman

Abrams complained to me that the "liberalestablishment line' had, until recently, considered the president's SDI program to be "madness' and the contra policy to be "wrong.' "But now,' he observed, "they're cracking.' Who, I asked, is the liberal establishment? "The Washington Post, The New York Times, Time, Newsweek, the TV networks,' plus a few Democratic politicians and some academics, in other words, the same journalists Abrams described in 1984 as "simply yesterday's peace activists in somewhat more decorous garb.' "It is not surprising,' he noted, "that their view of the world is distorted by a seemingly invincible anti-Americanism on the one hand, and by a profound reluctance to criticize America's adversaries on the other.' The SDS is back, only they've changed their initials to CBS, NBC, and ABC.

In the middle of last summer, while the administrationwas secretly diverting funds to arm the contras, Abrams gave a speech to the Inter-American Defense College. He told his audience, "Overreaction will only discredit us. We must guard against fighting the enemy indiscriminately with an excess of zeal or an excess of force. To lose sight of the values we defend is to help our enemies!' Well said.