“I wish the intelligence had been different, I guess.” That, in a nutshell, is George W. Bush’s valedictory thought about invading Iraq, in interviews with Charlie Gibson on ABC this week.
“A lot of people put their reputations on the line and said the weapons of mass destruction is [sic] a reason to remove Saddam Hussein,” Bush added.
But the historical record shows that the “lot of people” consisted mainly of Dick Cheney and his henchman, relying on a swindling Ahmad Chalabi and torturing CIA intelligence into a false case against the Iraqi regime he was salivating to replace.
“We’ve really got to make the case” against Hussein, Bush told Secretary of State Colin Powell in January 2003, “and I want you to make it” at the UN.
A few days later, according to the Washington Post, Powell was “taken aback” by “a 48-page, single-spaced compilation of Hussein’s alleged weapons of mass destruction program, replete with drama, rhetorical devices and a kitchen sink full of allegations…
Yes, Colin Powell was “taken aback” and then went and took all of that BS “evidence” and played it like a true drama queen in front of the UN. They lied, they knew they were lying, and they are STILL lying. 55 days cannot pass fast enough.
The source of the term is a quotation in an October 17, 2004, New York Times Magazine article by writer Ron Suskind, quoting an unnamed aide to George W. Bush:
The aide said that guys like me were “in what we call the reality-based community,” which he defined as people who “believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.” … “That's not the way the world really works anymore,” he continued.
“We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”[1]
I'm with Rev Dave– Cheney and Libby camped out at the CIA and cherry-picked evidence-no matter how unreliable, and even had it forged when necessary. They harassed analysts to give them the conclusions that would scare us into war with Iraq.
We need a full investigation as to facts to be tried in Congress. Very simple: if there was conspiracy, the conspirators (all of them from the top down to their cohorts in BigOil) need to be exposed for what they are and punished for what they did.
As to punishment I like beneficial solutions. Freeze assets of the conspirators and impose heavy heavy HEAVY fines and some jail time.
[...] Debriefing Bush This entry was posted 10 January 2009 at 2:43 pm in the Politics category. | Tags: Barack Obama, Central Intelligence Agency, CIA, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush, Iraq, Leon Panetta, New York Times, Saddam Hussein, Soviet Union, United States, Weapon of mass destruction | Permalink | SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: “NY Times Endorses Panetta Pick”, url: “http://www.lycanthropia.com/2009/01/10/ny-times-endorses-panetta-pick/” }); [...]