RetroShivers

Just the thing on a cold winter's day -- Bob Woodward's trilogy.  From the third book in the series, State of Denial, this eerie quote from Daddy Bush, as he maneuvered behind the scenes on behalf of his boys:

On February 28, 1999, the former president was the honored guest at a gathering of some 200 Gulf War veterans at the Fort Myer Army base, just across the Potomac River from Washington.


...It burned him up when people said they hadn't finished the job, he said. "Had we gone into Baghdad -- We could have done it. You guys could have done it. You could have been there in 48 hours. And then what? Which sergeant, which private, whose life would be at stake in perhaps a fruitless hunt in an urban guerrilla war to find the most-secure dictator in the world? Whose life would be on my hands as the commander-in-chief because I, unilaterally, went beyond the international law, went beyond the stated mission, and said we're going to show our macho? We're going into Baghdad. We're going to be an occupying power--America in an Arab land--with no allies at our side. It would have been disastrous."  [p. 11]

Prescient is not my usual adjectival pick for George H. W. Bush...