Proof that the Pentagon Pushed Pompous Polity to Pugnacity? AND Pelosi's Plane Provokes Peevish Passions
By Chad A. B. Wilson
Published February 9, 2007, 10:47 am in News, Voting & Partisanship, Rhetoric.
Sorry about the alliteration there. Sometimes I get caught up in it and just can't stop. My apologies. But don't expect me to stop doing it. It's just too much fun!
I thought it was appropriate due to the spin on these stories.
The New Pentagon Report
From MSNBC: "Probe: Prewar intel inappropriate but not illegal: Pentagon report says ex-policy chief gave 'dubious' info to White House"
From The Washington Post: "Official's Key Report On Iraq Is Faulted: 'Dubious' Intelligence Fueled Push for War"
From CNN.com: "Inspector general: Pentagon manipulated prewar intel"
I don't quite understand why these sources don't say what they mean. Nevermind that the Houston Chronicle hasn't even featured a story yet. I guess they're waiting for tomorrow's edition.
This story basically says this: "Bush Administration Officials Requested Fake Intelligence and then Used that Phony Intelligence to Go to War with Iraq."
Those of you who read this column know that I'm often conflicted about the war. But this story made me want to go out and join the Moveon.org peace marches. I felt like listening to Democracy Now and chanting along with their Marxist propaganda. None of the headlines captures the importance or the real meaning of this Pentagon report, though. It should be the cover story of every newspaper in the country, and if it's true, heads should roll. In general, I don't think that way. I figured that Bush et al. wanted to go to war with Iraq even before 9/11. They were looking for a reason. When intelligence came out that Iraq was linked to al Qaeda and had WMDs, they jumped on it. And everyone else did, too. It wasn't just that Bush was fooled; everyone was fooled. So it was a mistake, yes, but I have always given Bush the benefit of the doubt. I have always said that it was misleading intelligence plus an insistence on wanting to go to war with Iraq that led to the war.
If you're familiar with this new story, you may think that that's exactly what it says, but there is an important distinction here. The import of this study, as Sen. Carl Levin says,
"The bottom line is that intelligence relating to the Iraq-al-Qaeda relationship was manipulated by high-ranking officials in the Department of Defense to support the administration's decision to invade Iraq," Levin said yesterday. "The inspector general's report is a devastating condemnation of inappropriate activities in the DOD policy office that helped take this nation to war."
Whoa. Did you catch that? The "intelligence" "was manipulated by high high-ranking officials...to support the decision to invade Iraq." The decision was already made. And they were looking for a reason, as I said they probably were. But then they manipulated the intelligence to support what they already wanted to do. Bush has constantly said that he didn't lie to the public about the war; that he had the same intelligence that everyone else had. And the Democrats, too, they agreed to go to war, now didn't they. They all had the same intelligence.
But that's not the case, after all, not if this new Pentagon report is to be believed. The reports about al Qaeda and Iraq went against the assessment of the intelligence community. Everyone in intelligence knew that the two were not linked. But then the Department of Defense wanted to go to war with Iraq, so they had someone do some "alternative intelligence" and come up with the opposite conclusion. And they used that information to go to war.
That's some crap if I have ever heard it.
My first response is how in the world did this new Pentagon report get out in the first place. It seems that it would have been hush hush and the people responsible would have been fired before it could be released.
My second thought is that the higher-ups who allowed this need to be disciplined. I really don't know why everyone seems to be okay with this. THIS IS NOT OKAY. The government cooked the books to support a preconceived plan, and they led the rest of us right along with them.
I feel sorry for the troops they sent to die. Yes, the world is a better place without Saddam Hussein, but don't make up reasons for doing it. Be straightforward and then do it. Don't make us believe something that you know wasn't true. That's what upsets me.
Pelosi's Plane Fiasco
On a lighter note, the Republicans had a field day with the irony that Pelosi is using a gas guzzling military equivalent of a 747 to fly home to San Francisco. This is a "silly story," as Tony Snow has called it, and it's so hilarious that it's worth repeating again and again. What's funny is that the Republicans are making such a big deal about it. They spent two hours railing about Pelosi's use of a big military plane, when from all accounts it seems that Pelosi had nothing to do with it.
The Speaker of the House is entitled to a military plane because it's safer than a civilian one, and her security chief said that it would be a lot more secure if it were nonstop. The small commuter jets aren't capable of going nonstop from Washington D.C. to San Francisco, so the security chief asked for a larger plane. Not a 747, of course, but a plane large enough to go nonstop.
Whoa! the Republicans cried! A plane bigger than what the Republican Speaker got? No way! A plane that could pollute the air all by itself and eat thousands of dollars a minute? No way! This is an issue of public expenditures, of course, and the public must be notified of the House Speaker's obvious betrayal of her values and constituents!
Whatever. Silly, Mr. Snow, silly. I agree with you. It just seems petty. After having to sit there and watch as the Democrats have done whatever they wanted to in the House, this is what the Republicans come up with. Why not say something meaningful, you guys? Why not condemn your Republican president's faulty use of faulty intelligence? Why not say that you will actually do something about global warming?
Sheesh. Petty, petty, petty.
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