By Derrick Z. Jackson, 9/24/2003
ON THE ASSUMPTION that America is thoroughly brainwashed, President Bush said with no hint of shame, "We've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved in September the 11th." National Security adviser Condoleezza Rice said, "We have never claimed that Saddam Hussein had either . . . direction or control of 9/11." Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said, "I've not seen any indication that would lead me to believe I could say" that Saddam Hussein was tied to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
These statements were meant to drown out Vice President Dick Cheney. With public support sagging for the Iraq quagmire, Cheney recently tried to restore legitimacy to the invasion and occupation by resurrecting the discounted claim that top 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta met with an Iraqi intelligence agent five months before the attacks.
Cheney said the invasion "struck a major blow right at the heart of the base, if you will, the geographic base of the terrorists who have had us under assault now for many years, but most especially on 9/11."
Cheney was doing what Bush, Rice, and Rumsfeld did all along. To date, 304 American soldiers and thousands of Iraqi soldiers and civilians are dead because the White House riled up Americans into a rash blurring of the facts until they could no longer distinguish Sept. 11 from Saddam.
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2003/09/24/owning_up_to_deceptions_on_the_iraq_war/