Democrats Rewriting History Regarding Iraq Intelligence

Attack, attack, attack . . .

. . . that’s the only message that has been coming from the Democrats in Washington. Without any semblance of a positive vision for America’s future, those on the left have resorted to sniping at anything the president and Republicans in Congress are doing. In many cases, the strategy has been working because of the lack of will of Republicans to fight back. However, the latest attacks regarding pre-war intelligence leading up to the war in Iraq are so off base, that, thankfully, President Bush is fighting back.

The Democrats are back on their kick of saying President Bush “misled” the American people in the build-up to war in Iraq. They claim he stretched the truth and exaggerated the facts. However, every step of the way, Democrats in Congress were privy to the same intelligence, and in public statements, speeches, and votes, they were on the same page as the president. I guess that page was written in erasable ink.

This past Friday, on Veterans’ Day, President Bush used a portion of his speech to address his critics. At one point, President Bush said, “While it’s perfectly legitimate to criticize my decision or the conduct of the war, it is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began.”

Some Democrats and anti-war critics are now claiming we manipulated the intelligence and misled the American people about why we went to war. These critics are fully aware that a bipartisan Senate investigation found no evidence of political pressure to change the intelligence community’s judgments related to Iraq’s weapons programs.

As FOX News is reporting today, on his way to the Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, President Bush spoke to American troops in Alaska and again hammered the Democrats, saying, “They spoke the truth then and they’re speaking politics now.”

A few items are important, given the fact that the media continues to cover this story even though the Democrats have presented no new information. They continue to use the same tired claims over and over again, and yet they still get coverage. First, America was not alone in its assessment of the threat posed by Saddam Hussein. Britain, France, Russia, and other nations all had similar intelligence reports on Saddam’s weapons capabilities and his desire to reconstitute his weapons programs. Second, Democrats reviewed the intelligence provided by the CIA and other agencies and overwhelmingly came to the same conclusions as the president.
“Some Democrats who voted to authorize the use of force are now rewriting the past,” Bush said. “They’re playing politics with this issue and they are sending mixed signals to our troops and the enemy. That is irresponsible.”

One of the president’s harshest critics now is Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA). Yet, even Kennedy was singing a different tune just a few years ago.

In a speech in September of 2002, Kennedy said, “We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction.” Speaking on CBS’s “Face the Nation” in October of 2002, Kennedy said, “Saddam Hussein Is A Dangerous Figure. He’s Got Dangerous Weapons.” Was Kennedy purposely misleading the American people at the time?

“Reasonable people can disagree about the conduct of the war but it is irresponsible for Democrats to now claim that we misled them and the American people,” Bush said yesterday.

The Democrats are engaging in grand theatrics, and the mainstream media continue to give them a stage. It is up to all of us to point out not only the hypocrisy of their claims, but the fact that if anyone is misleading the American people, it is the Democrats, and not President Bush.
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Unless you've been hiding under your bed, you know that Democrats have stepped up their campaign to convince the American people that over two thousand young men and women of the American armed forces died in Iraq for one reason and for one reason only, Bush lied. The problem with this "Bush lied" charge is that Democrats know full well that it simply is not true. The issue for Democrats though is not whether or not the charge is true, but whether or not they can convince the American people that it is true. For politicians ... and I'm referring to politicians on both sides of the aisle ... the truth is whatever you can convince the people that it is. The problem with this particular attempt to create a new truth is that it is undermining our war on terror and endangering the men and women serving in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Here's a link for a Wall Street Journal article by Norman Podhoretz titled "Who is Lying About Iraq?" http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110007540. In his 10-page essay, Podhoretz does an excellent job of showing just how completely dishonest the Democrats are being in their attacks on Bush. The problem we face here is that people who are convinced that Bush lied about the reasons for going after Saddam won't bother to read the article. These people just don't want to be inconvenienced by the truth.

On the same issue, last night we had an object lesson in just why leftists hate Fox News Channel. Brian Wilson appeared on Special Report with Brit Hume to specifically address some of the "Bush lied" claims being made by Democrats. The first Democrat featured in Wilson's report was Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid. Reid recently said that his vote for using military force to remove Saddam was based " ... on a number of things. Yellowcake. Aluminum tubes. Secret meetings by Iraqi agents in Europe. Training facilities in Iraq training terrorists."

Well, . . . that seems to be at variance with what Harry Reid said on March 17, 2003. On that date Reid said "I agree with - and have long supported - the ultimate goal of disarming Saddam Hussein. Removing this despicable tyrant from power will make the world a safer place." Hmmmmm . . . . no mention of yellowcake, aluminum tubes or terrorist training. He just said that the world would be a safer place with Saddam out of power. Anti-Saddam then. Pro-Saddam now. Go figure.

Oh -- and don't give me flack about that "pro-Saddam" line. To say that the United States should not have gone to war in Iraq is to say that Saddam Hussein should not have been removed from power. You can't have it both ways.

Next we have Michigan's Democratic Senator Carl Levin: Just a few days ago Levin, in pushing the idea that Bush lied, said "President Bush said before the war you cannot distinguish between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein." Is it true? Did Bush really say that? Some reporters pressed Levin and his aids to come up with the specifics of that quote ... when Bush said that you cannot distinguish between Saddam and Al Qaeda. The best that Levin's office could do was to come up with a White House briefing on September 25, 2002. At that event Bush was asked who he considered to be the greater threat to the United States, Al Qaeda or Saddam Hussein. He answered: "Both of them need to be dealt with. The war on terror, . . . you can't distinguish between Saddam and Al Qaeda when you talk about the war on terror. You can't distinguish between the two because they're both equally as bad."

Does it seem to you that Levin took that statement out of context?

Of course he did!

. . . . And since Fox News Channel didn't let him get away with it, that makes Fox News Channel a right-wing extremist hate machine.

However, . . . Carl Levin wasn't through with his distortions and lies. He also claimed that Bush said that Saddam trained the 9/11 hijackers. Take the way-back machine to January of 2003. Bush was asked if he thought that Saddam had anything to do with training the 9/11 hijackers.

His response? "can't make that claim."

OK, Senator Levin . . . . you're move.

It's not news that politicians lie. They do -- Republicans and Democrats alike.

The news here is that you won't find the New York Times, the Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, Time or Newsweek going out of their way to investigate the claims made by Levin, Reid and the rest of the "Bush lied" cabal the way Fox News Channel and The Wall Street Journal did. Why, that would be out of the mainstream, wouldn't it??

God Bless,
Dan'L