# While the media runs through another Bush-bashing frenzy, the main point is ignored. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 10, 2003, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486 "2003-07-10T15:37:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/61 "2003-07-15T02:09:22Z")
Hell, its only 16 words, and not even very big words, either, not like “obfuscatory” or “mendacious|” or even “disingenuous”. OK, so he says British Intelligence “learned”…well, that could be true! I once learned that George Washington threw a cherry tree across the Potomac for a dollar. It wasn’t true. But I learned it! So the guy makes one off-handed remark before both houses of Congress. Is this supposed to be some big deal? So the reasons for invading Iraq were bogus. And the reasons for invading Grenada were compelling? The international drug bust in Panama, this was urgent? OK, there. I’ve been bi-partisan. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/62 "2003-07-15T02:34:06Z")
In the interest of fairness, how have the 19 words immediately following the disputed 16 stood the test of time ? > [@](#): > > Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production. It’s not as if there’s any pattern of misinformation is it ? ---
**Author:** ![Spavined\_Gelding](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/958977/32.png) [@Spavined\_Gelding](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spavined_Gelding)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/63 "2003-07-15T02:35:33Z")
Alright, who kidnaped **elucidator**? Who ever it was, just bring him back and no questions will be asked. Maybe he was a pain in the neck, but it was in an amusing way. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/64 "2003-07-15T03:08:31Z")
> [@](#): > > ## quote: > > ## BTW, most people consider the main case for invading Iraq to have been made by Colin Powell at the U.N. - and he didn’t mention a thing about African uranium purchases. > > But he did mention the infamous WMDs. Don’t change the subject. You want to argue the rest of the evidence, fine. I’m talking specifically about the forged Nigerian documents, which were one part of a larger intel package on Saddam’s activities in Africa, and which the has recently said the president was not aware of. That’s the dog that won’t hunt. That issue is going nowhere. Feel free to bash Bush about any number of other things. I’m preparing to myself. ---
**Author:** ![Ben](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/df788c/32.png) [@Ben](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ben)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/65 "2003-07-15T04:02:36Z")
How many different explanations for Saddamscam have we seen thus far? Rice (a couple of months ago): somebody deep in the bowels of the intelligence community might have known, but nobody in the upper levels knew that the Nigerien letter was fraudulent. Tenet: Tenet knew the letter was fraudulent, and told Bush about it before the address. But, it’s technically accurate if we just say, “the Brits say so,” even though we think the Brits have based their case on questionable intelligence. Rice (yesterday): Big deal! It’s 16 words! Remember, Saddam was a bloody tyrant trying to “reconstitute” a nuclear _program_. (Yeah, if I had a nuclear program, I’d be sure to disassemble my apparatus and bury the parts…) [Fleischer](http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030715/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_intelligence&cid=544&ncid=716): The forged letter was about _Niger_, but really we have secret evidence showing that it was a _different_ African country that Saddam was dealing with. And let’s not forget British Intelligence, while we’re at it: The Niger letter we showed you was a fraud, but we haven’t shown you the real Niger letters. ---
**Author:** ![blowero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/41988e/32.png) [@blowero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blowero)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 8:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/66 "2003-07-15T08:16:21Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sam Stone \* > That is just not true. In October Tenet objected to a single specific line, which was struck. That line was NOT included in the State of the Union address. Sorry, but what you are saying directly contradicts what **Collounsbury** posted, and since _he_ provided a cite… It was not a “single line” that Tenet objected to; I don’t know where you are getting that information (other than straight out of Condie Rice’s lying mouth). It was in fact the very nature of the evidence itself that was seriously in doubt, and had been LONG before the State of the Union address. > [@](#): > > Now, the spin you guys are putting on it is that Bush kept trying, modifying, twisting, until he has something that could pass muster. But this is the way the administration says it went down: > > White House: Hey, CIA - here’s what were going to say about your intelligence assessment in the State of the Union. Could you clear this please? > > CIA: After going through it, we feel that the specific intel about this is not good enough for a presidential address, and we have redacted that line. Other than that, A-OK. > > White House: Thanks, guys. Forget “spin” - I’m just talking facts here: Fact 1: In October, Tenet successfully had the ENTIRE reference to the uranium deal taken out of the text of a speech, because the underlying evidence was weak. Fact 2: The reference cropped back up in the January speech. Fact 3: Tenet has now admitted that he only approved the text in January based on the sophistry of claiming it to be “British intelligence”, even though it was KNOWN that the evidence was weak, and he now admits that was the wrong thing to do. Fact 4: Condoleezza Rice went on record claiming that Tenet NEVER stated any objections to the allegation _itself_, only to the specific details of the allegation. It’s very clear, JUST from what these people have said on record, that Tenet says he objected to the allegation, while the Bush administration says he did not. I don’t see how you can possibly look at all the evidence, and say with a straight face that these people’s stories add up. > [@](#): > > Now, maybe it did happen the way you guys say. Maybe Tenet was browbeaten into finally giving the OK, and is now being made the fall guy. > > But, this being Great Debates and all, I would like a cite for that. Already done. If you go back a page or so, you will see that I quoted the L.A. Times. The opinion of some in the intelligence community seems to be that Tenet caved because he feared for his job. You will no doubt complain that the sources remain anonymous. But the thing is, people aren’t likely to allow their names to be printed when they are giving up dirt on their boss. At any rate, whether Tenet bowed to pressure is speculation, but not _unfounded_ speculation. The POINT is that his story conflicts with Rice’s, so if you have another explanation for the conflicting stories, I’d like to hear it. > [@](#): > > This is a major tempest in a teapot. You’re arguing about one line in a speech. BTW, most people consider the main case for invading Iraq to have been made by Colin Powell at the U.N. - and he didn’t mention a thing about African uranium purchases. But the flimsy justification for was has been criticized since day one. The fact is that NONE of the claims made have come to fruition. No WMDs were found and no link between Saddam and Osama has been proven. Just as the critics have said all along, it all appears to have been hype. The case against the war is not made on this one issue; it just happens to be important because not only has it been discredited (as much of the other “evidence” has been as well), but this time there’s proof that the administration DELIBERATELY lied about it. A lot of people suspect that Bush lied about a lot of things, but this is the smoking gun that PROVES it. > [@](#): > > So, this doesn’t affect the justification for war, it was an intel error of one small piece of one package regarding one subject that was later ignored anyway. According to the White House, Bush didn’t know about it. According to the White House? Oh, well why didn’t you say so? Yeah, presidents never lie about stuff, and Clinton never got a b.j. in the Oval Office, right? > [@](#): > > Time to find something else to attack Bush over - this dog won’t hunt. Oh, he’s huntin’ all right, baby! ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 9:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/67 "2003-07-15T09:19:35Z")
Further to this issue: From the Washington Post the following information: “President Defends Allegation On Iraq Bush Says CIA’s Doubts Followed Jan. 28 Address” By Dana Priest and Dana Milbank Washington Post Staff Writers 15 July 2003 [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A56336-2003Jul14.html?nav=hptop\_tb](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A56336-2003Jul14.html?nav=hptop_tb) First this part, which is just sad and bizarre: > [@](#): > > Bush said the CIA’s doubts about the charge – that Iraq sought to buy “yellowcake” uranium ore in Africa – were “subsequent” to the Jan. 28 State of the Union speech in which Bush made the allegation. Defending the broader decision to go to war with Iraq, the president said the decision was made after he gave Saddam Hussein “a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn’t let them in.” > > Bush’s position was at odds with those of his own aides, who acknowledged over the weekend that the CIA raised doubts that Iraq sought to buy uranium from Niger more than four months before Bush’s speech. He should at least get on story, further his subsequent claim, in re inspectors, is just… clownish. > [@](#): > > The president’s assertion that the war began because Iraq did not admit inspectors appeared to contradict the events leading up to war this spring: Hussein had, in fact, admitted the inspectors and Bush had opposed extending their work because he did not believe them effective. Orwellian I would say, or stupid. However, further to the issue of knowledge: > [@](#): > > The president’s remarks yesterday came as evidence emerged that the administration had information that seemed to guarantee that Iraq probably could not acquire nuclear material from Niger. A four-star general, who was asked to go to Niger last year to inquire about the security of Niger’s uranium, told The Washington Post yesterday that he came away convinced the country’s stocks were secure. The findings of Marine Gen. Carlton W. Fulford Jr. were passed up to Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – though it was unclear whether they reached officials in the White House. > > A spokesman for Myers said last night that the general has “no recollection of the information” but did not doubt that it had been forwarded to him. “Given the time frame of 16 months ago, information concerning Iraq not obtaining uranium from Niger would not have been as pressing as other subjects,” said Capt. Frank Thorp, the chairman’s spokesman. Ah, the memory hole. The remainder of the article describes how Gn. Fulford came away convinved that there was nothing to the Niger issue at all. > [@](#): > > Fulford’s impressions, while not conclusive, were similar to those of former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson, who traveled to Niger for the CIA in February 2002 to interview Niger officials about the uranium claim and came away convinced it was not true. By the way Sam, there’s only a small universe of African countries with Uranium. As memory serves, Niger, South Africa and Namibia – wait, just checked, add Gabon. The dodgery about “other African nations rather is weak” if one can not pony up some evidence. See [http://www.ieer.org/ensec/no-4/bigmines.html](http://www.ieer.org/ensec/no-4/bigmines.html) > [@](#): > > The charge that Iraq was seeking to buy nuclear material in Africa was based mainly on documents that the International Atomic Energy Agency concluded this March were forged. Before an October 2002 speech by Bush, the CIA succeeded in removing a reference to an Iraq-Niger connection because of doubts about the intelligence. > > The charge was revived for the State of the Union speech in January but referred to Africa generally and attributed the information to the British, even though the CIA had expressed reservations to the British about including some of the information in its public dossier on Iraq. Now, I hate to say, but I would have to say that were Bush a Democrat, Sam et al would be frothing at the mouth with Wag the Dog kind of references. Also in re backpeddling: > [@](#): > > Fleischer said yesterday Rice was not referring to the State of the Union reference but to Bush’s October speech given in Cincinnati – even though Rice was not asked about that speech. Fleischer said that while the line cut from the October speech was based on the Niger allegations, he said the State of the Union claim was based on “additional reporting from the CIA, separate and apart from Niger, naming other countries where they believed it was possible that Saddam was seeking uranium.” > > But Fleischer’s words yesterday contradicted his assertion a week earlier that the State of the Union charge was “based and predicated on the yellowcake from Niger.” Rice was asked a month ago about Bush’s State of the Union uranium claim on ABC’s “This Week” and replied: “The intelligence community did not know at the time or at levels that got to us that there was serious questions about this report.” But senior administration officials acknowledged over the weekend that Tenet argued personally to White House officials, including deputy national security adviser Stephen Hadley, that the allegation should not be used in the October speech, four months before the State of the Union address. Well this begins to look just… wonderous. Poor bloody bastards in the Agency, fucked no matter which way they turn by mendacious fucks. ---
**Author:** ![Desmostylus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@Desmostylus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Desmostylus)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 9:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/68 "2003-07-15T09:42:50Z")
It wasn’t under oath or anything, but Rumsfeld is having a bit of trouble with his [congressional testimony](http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=33574) > [@](#): > > July 15, 2003 > In congressional testimony last week, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld swore repeatedly that he’d just “days” earlier learned that the uranium charge President Bush made against Iraq six months ago was bogus. > > Since then, he’s had to correct the record twice, finally admitting he knew the allegation was false as early as March – less than two months after Bush’s now-controversial State of the Union speech and just before the Iraq war started. > > “When did you know that the reports about uranium coming out of Africa were bogus?” asked Sen. Mark Pryor, D.-Ark., at Wednesday’s Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on “lessons learned” in Iraq. > > “Oh, within recent days, since the information started becoming available,” Rumsfeld replied. Then over the weekend, revised it to “in recent weeks”, then “in March”. I suppose he won’t admit to anything else until the next story comes out, and we find out that he meant “March 2002”. Pack of liars. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/69 "2003-07-15T11:56:52Z")
**Desmo** , Now, now, thyose are “not-lies”, not lies. If they were lies, they would be untrue. However, they are “not-lies” which are true, technically true. “Recent” is a qualifier of a relative variety. It was geologically recent after all. Astronomically recent even. Get a grip on yourself. If you go around accusing people of lying… The admin’s quite obviously been “not-lying” which is different than lying or not lying. **GOM** , You’d’ve lost the wager. Even the WND realizes that there’s doubletalk newspeak going on here. The CIA cleared it…ha… This is anopther “not-lie.” ---
**Author:** ![OliverH](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/278dde/32.png) [@OliverH](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OliverH)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/70 "2003-07-15T12:10:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sam Stone \* > \*\* > Now, the spin you guys are putting on it is that Bush kept trying, modifying, twisting, until he has something that could pass muster. But this is the way the administration says it went down: > > White House: Hey, CIA - here’s what were going to say about your intelligence assessment in the State of the Union. Could you clear this please? > > CIA: After going through it, we feel that the specific intel about this is not good enough for a presidential address, and we have redacted that line. Other than that, A-OK. > > White House: Thanks, guys. > > Now, maybe it did happen the way you guys say. Maybe Tenet was browbeaten into finally giving the OK, and is now being made the fall guy. > > But, this being Great Debates and all, I would like a cite for that. \*\* How do you suppose such a cite looks like? The evidence is overwhelmingly on the side of the administration distorting intelligence, quite simply because practically every single piece they presented was distorted, misrepesented, or quite simply invented. > [@](#): > > \*\* > This is a major tempest in a teapot. You’re arguing about one line in a speech. BTW, most people consider the main case for invading Iraq to have been made by Colin Powell at the U.N. - and he didn’t mention a thing about African uranium purchases. > \*\* Unfortunately, his claims were found to be just as false. > [@](#): > > \*\* > So, this doesn’t affect the justification for war, it was an intel error of one small piece of one package regarding one subject that was later ignored anyway. According to the White House, Bush didn’t know about it. > > Time to find something else to attack Bush over - this dog won’t hunt. \*\* Sorry, man, but the fact that you consider it ok that the president is a gullible idiot who goes to war on wishful thinking doesn’t mean that anyone else has to share that believe. If you believe this to be a tempest in a teapot, I assume you have a similar assessment of the 1939 invasion in Poland, which happened as a reaction to ‘threats’ which were just as staged as the material presented by the Bush administration. ---
**Author:** ![OliverH](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/278dde/32.png) [@OliverH](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OliverH)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/71 "2003-07-15T12:13:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sam Stone \* > \*\*Don’t change the subject. You want to argue the rest of the evidence, fine. I’m talking specifically about the forged Nigerian documents, which were one part of a larger intel package on Saddam’s activities in Africa, and which the has recently said the president was not aware of. > > That’s the dog that won’t hunt. That issue is going nowhere. Feel free to bash Bush about any number of other things. I’m preparing to myself. \*\* The president was most certainly aware that the documents were forged before he started the war. As such, he had ample time to qualify his statements or retract them. Instead he is trying to weasel his way out and find ways to claim how he was, indeed, right, even if it doesn’t look that way. Unless, of course, you want to claim that the President paid no attention whatsoever to the reports brought in by the UN inspectors -which would be perfectly credible, but only another demonstration on how he was never interested in them in the first place. ---
**Author:** ![OliverH](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/278dde/32.png) [@OliverH](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OliverH)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/72 "2003-07-15T12:15:06Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Desmostylus \* > > I suppose he won’t admit to anything else until the next story comes out, and we find out that he meant “March 2002”. > > Pack of liars. \*\* I think it’s really funny that he wants to make us believe he only learned of the forgery a few days ago, given that the IAEA labeled the documents ‘primitive forgeries’ eons ago. ---
**Author:** ![quixotic78](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/3ab097/32.png) [@quixotic78](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/quixotic78)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/73 "2003-07-15T15:18:18Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by OliverH \* > **Instead he is trying to weasel his way out and find ways to claim how he was, indeed, right, even if it doesn’t look that way.** But don’t you get it? Bush is convinced that he’ll be vindicated. Absolutely certain. Positive. Surer than shit. :mad: :mad: :mad: I’m positively fucking sick sick sick of this tactic of the Bush Administration. Believe in it hard enough, and it’ll come true! (Or, more likely, the media will finally drop the story). How many times have I seen Cheney, or Bush, or Rumsfeld quoted as saying, “I’m utterly confident that [our latest pile of steamin’ bullshit] will turn out to be true”? This is politics, not a Born Again revival! I’m an educated adult, dammit! I need more than just your word and your conviction. \ \ \ Okay, I feel better now. But I reserve the right to go Hulk again once I start thinking about how Bush’s tactic has worked in the past, and will probably work again. ---
**Author:** ![blowero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/41988e/32.png) [@blowero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blowero)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2003, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/74 "2003-07-15T17:58:08Z")
Collounsbury, the info in your latest post is just downright spooky. They’re just stacking lies on top of more lies. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by quixotic78 \* > Okay, I feel better now. But I reserve the right to go Hulk again once I start thinking about how Bush’s tactic has worked in the past, and will probably work again. I hate to say it, but I wouldn’t be surprised at all if he’s re-elected. Sadly, there are enough voters in the U.S. who really don’t care about international law, foreign relations, or even whether the government told lies to start an illegal war - that stuff’s all “fuzzy math” to them. They just get a boner every time the USA “kicks some ass”. Yeeee-haw!:rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Ben](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/df788c/32.png) [@Ben](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ben)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2003, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/75 "2003-07-16T01:38:08Z")
So, GOM, what do you think of Bush’s claim that we went to war because Saddam refused to let the inspectors in? ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2003, 9:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/76 "2003-07-16T09:47:47Z")
The Washington Post continues its trend with another helpful article: “Analysis: Bush Faced Dwindling Data on Iraq Nuclear Bid” 16 July 2003; Page A1 If I may: > [@](#): > > In recent days, as the Bush administration has defended its assertion in the president’s State of the Union address that Iraq had tried to buy African uranium, officials have said it was only one bit of intelligence that indicated former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was reconstituting his nuclear weapons program. > > But a review of speeches and reports, plus interviews with present and former administration officials and intelligence analysts, suggests that between Oct. 7, when President Bush made a speech laying out the case for military action against Hussein, and Jan. 28, when he gave his State of the Union address, almost all the other evidence had either been undercut or disproved by U.N. inspectors in Iraq. The remainder of the article covers this ground in moderate depth. I find it most useful to highlight this: > [@](#): > > On Aug. 26, Vice President Cheney, the official most publicly vocal about Iraq as a nuclear threat, began the campaign when he told a Veterans of Foreign Wars audience: “Many of us are convinced that Saddam will acquire nuclear weapons fairly soon. Just how soon we cannot gauge.” This of course contradicts our dear Blog Spotter and others who have backpeddled on the imminent threat issue now that it has turned out to be a crock of shit. However, it also raises another issue, what is lying versus self delusion. I am in fact convinced that the Bush Administration is less guilty of lying per se, as self delusion to an almost criminal extent. (criminal in a metaphorical sense) Personaly, as the extreme cynic that I am, I do not mind a moderate amount of deception in policy making. Frankly people do often have to be lied to, or massaged. What is far more dangerous is for the policy making community to delude itself to the point of becoming almost irrational in the pursuit of a pre-concieved idea. That is ‘criminal’ and indeed the most disturbing point of this entire farce. The handling of the intelligence and the entire handling of the non-military aspects of the Iraq crisis have been marked by this self-delusion and intense self regard, navel gazing as it were, that has crossed the line from the merely unwise blindness into the dangerously incompetent disregard for inconvenient realities. ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2003, 9:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/77 "2003-07-16T09:49:00Z")
Bah, forgot the link: [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61622-2003Jul15.html?nav=hptop\_tb](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61622-2003Jul15.html?nav=hptop_tb) ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2003, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/78 "2003-07-16T12:37:54Z")
I see **Col** ’s already got the Post story in. I found the last two paragraphs extremely telling: > [@](#): > > On March 7, ElBaradei gave his final report to the Security Council before his inspectors were removed from Iraq on March 18. His conclusion was that “the IAEA had found no evidence or plausible indication of the revival of a nuclear weapons program in Iraq.” He also said the documents that gave rise to the allegation that Iraq had tried to buy African uranium were forged. > > On March 16, Cheney appeared again on “Meet the Press” and reiterated his views of the previous August about Hussein’s nuclear program. “We know he’s been absolutely devoted to trying to acquire nuclear weapons, and we believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.” The war began three days later. ---
**Author:** ![Desmostylus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@Desmostylus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Desmostylus)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2003, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/79 "2003-07-16T12:52:31Z")
And so the U.S. finally finds the smoking gun. It was in the administration’s hand, and it was pointed at the administration’s own head. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2003, 11:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486/80 "2003-07-17T11:35:35Z")
More reasons that **GOM** would’ve lost his bet. > [@](#): > > \*\*[Tenet Says He Didn’t Know About Claim \*\*](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A2936-2003Jul16.html?nav=hptop_tb) > \*By Walter Pincus > Washington Post Staff Writer > Thursday, July 17, 2003; Page A01 \* > > CIA Director George J. Tenet told the Senate intelligence committee yesterday that his staff did not bring to his attention a questionable statement about Iraq seeking uranium in Africa before President Bush delivered his State of the Union address. > > But Tenet told the senators during a nearly five-hour session behind closed doors that he takes responsibility for the now-famous 16-word sentence in the speech because an agency official had approved it after _ **negotiations** _ with the White House, according to congressional and administration sources who attended the session. > > _© 2003 The Washington Post Company_ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/while-the-media-runs-through-another-bush-bashing-frenzy-the-main-point-is-ignored/187486.md?page=5)