Clark says WMD intelligence inquiry is a 90-day job

[BeyondGeography]

Planned date of delivery is March, 2005.

From CNN Late Edition:

BLITZER: The president, as you know, under pressure, ordered the establishment of the commission to look into pre-war intelligence on Iraq on weapons of mass destruction.

Critics are saying he's punting, in effect, because the results won't come in until well after the election in November. Early next year, the results are supposed to come out.

The president defended that decision on the time line, saying on "Meet the Press" earlier today, "The reason why we gave a time is because we didn't want it to be hurried. This is a strategic look, kind of a big-picture look, at the intelligence gathering capacities of the United States of America."

Is it a good idea to let these commissioners take their time to study what went wrong?

CLARK: No, it's not a good idea. And if the intelligence is so bad that we went to war by mistake, then the intelligence is so bad it needs to be fixed. I would say 90 days is an appropriate period of time if you've got a major flaw that you're looking at in the intelligence community.

What we've got here is a president who simply doesn't want to be held accountable. This is an administration that's quick to take credit. They're very slow to take responsibility, Wolf.

http://www.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0402/08/le.00.html

I think this is an easy-to-understand point that ALL the candidates should use. Kerry, in particular, as front runner, should use this time-line dodge to question Bush's character in the way Clark does above. At this point in the game, I don't care who gets the credit. I want the true nature of this president to be exposed to the light of day as much and as often as possible.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Way to go, General!

He put it absolutely perfectly! If our intelligence gathering is that flawed, this inquiry should have started long ago-as should the 911 inquiry.

[maddezmom]

2. 90 days seems reasonable to me

You'd think they'd want to know WTF happened so it doesn't happen again. But no, not the bushies.

[maddezmom]

4. hey BG check your PM's

:)

[BeyondGeography]

8. "Planned date of delivery"

is the existing time line. The commission's work is due in March, 2005.

[maddezmom]

9. thanks :) n/t

[pinto]

3. kick, the intel reports are there, the chain of communication is there,

all that's needed is to lay out the info, the source(s), the time line, the receiving personnel, and connect the dots.

[democracy eh]

5. This is one position Kerry needs to cherry pick

it is so critical, and so important
it crosses candidate allegiances

unfortunately with all the media attention on Kerry, it will get reported more than Clark alone.

[pinto]

6. as mentioned above, a "heads up" admin would have started this process

long ago and maintained an ongoing quality control review process.

Remember Busboy saying he was not one for "introspection"....

[Postman]

7. How they used the intel is the problem....

they ignored the caveats and hyped the highly questionable data. In some instances, like Cheney's speech to the VFW claiming Saddam has reconstituted a nuclear weapons program, they flat out lied.

They misled the people by design to launch a war in Iraq.

The "saddam was a madman" paradigm isn't gonna fly. He was contained and they started a war for reasons other than the stated ones.

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

10. 'quick to take credit . . . slow to take responsibility'???

This administration has NEVER taken responsibility for any of the messes they've created. It's always been someone else's fault, and when that fails, they fall back to the ABCs:

Always Blame Clinton

[teevee99]

11. "thank you wes clark"...

i've been saying those words a lot lately

[Leilani]

12. I'm sure Kerry will use it

He has used Clark's, Dean's & Edward's ideas quite freely.

[pinto]

13. in the big picture, civilisation is built on shared ideas, imho....n/t