| Pottery Barn Rule |
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| causes and prelude of the 2003 iraq conflict | |
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According to Woodward, United States secretary of state Colin Powell cited this rule when warning President George W. Bush , in the summer of 2002, of the consequences of military action in Iraq . Colin Powell also admitted this directly on Jonathan Dimbleby's "Dimbleby" programme on 30th April 2006. :" 'You are going to be the proud owner of 25 million people,' he told the president. 'You will own all their hopes, aspirations, and problems. You'll own it all.' Privately, Powell and Deputy Secretary Of State Richard Armitage called this the Pottery Barn rule: You break it, you own it." (page 150) The Pottery Barn chain denies it has such a policy — broken merchandise is written off as a loss, even if it is broken by a customer, according to Leigh Oshirak, public relations director for the company (''St. Petersburg Times'', April 20, 2004, "Rule that isn't its rule upsets Pottery Barn," Helen Huntley. See also {Link without Title} ). The source of the term "Pottery Barn rule" is unknown, but it may not have originated with the reference in Woodward's book. In his column of ). The term is now almost exclusively used to mean the expectation of full accountability for the consequences of a public official's decisions and particularly, in the case of President Bush, for the consequences of his decision to invade Iraq. On September 30, 2004, during the first debate for the 2004 Presidential election, Democratic candidate John Kerry misquoted the rule: :"Secretary of State Colin Powell told this president the Pottery Barn rule: If you break it, you fix it. Now, if you break it, you made a mistake. It's the wrong thing to do. But you own it." EXTERNAL LINKS |
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