Bush, Aides Ignored CIA Caveats on Iraq

[CatWoman]

In its fall 2002 campaign to win congressional support for a war against Iraq, President Bush and his top advisers ignored many of the caveats and qualifiers included in the classified report on Saddam Hussein's weapons that CIA Director George J. Tenet defended Thursday.

In fact, they made some of their most unequivocal assertions about unconventional weapons before the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) was completed.

Iraq "is a grave and gathering danger," Bush told the United Nations on Sept. 12, 2002. At the White House two weeks later -- after referring to a British government report that Iraq could launch "a biological or chemical attack in as little as 45 minutes after the order" is given -- he went on to say, "Each passing day could be the one on which the Iraqi regime gives anthrax or VX -- nerve gas -- or someday a nuclear weapon to a terrorist ally."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A20194-2004Feb6.html

[Terwilliger]

1. WOW!

I'm hoping somebody starts to use the big ole "L" word on these guys!! :bounce:

[ninkasi]

2. Ok

They LIED. We've known that all along, though.

[Terwilliger]

3. somebody in charge

:hi:

[never cry wolf]

4. Also from the article

Former chief U.S. weapons inspector David Kay told senators last week that caveats often fall by the wayside "the higher you go up" the bureaucratic chain. At the top, he said, "you read the headlines, you read the summary, you're busy, you've got other things to do."

WTF???? You're busy, you've got other things to do?????????? Like other things are more frikkin important than leading your nation into a war. These guys amke me sick.

:puke:

[alittlelark]

5. I wonder how many of these 'caveats' got past CLINTON

uuuuuhhhhh, never mind. All that peace and prosperity was a drag anyway - boring even:eyes:

edit for spelling disaster

[oasis]

6. kick

[leftchick]

7. "unequivocle rhetoric"!!.... How about

how they fucking LIED!!! :grr:

<Now that extended efforts to find weapons of mass destruction have proved futile, some are asking why Bush, Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld used unequivocal rhetoric to describe the threat from Iraq when the intelligence on the subject was much more nuanced and subjective. >

.....you know, I don't remember ANY hesitation to use the LIE word when it came to a BJ!