Posted on 07/20/2004 6:04:28 PM PDT by Pikamax
Wilson finally shows on the News Hour: Senator Kit Bond directly calls him a liar, suggests Wilson should apologize to President Bush and Vice President Cheney And it was worth the wait.
He did everything he could to avoid answering any of the direct charges and allegations, equivocating, changing the subject, and throwing up as many straw man distractions as his time allowed. The audio of the often outrageous, often hilarious and wholly pathetic performance may be found here.
Wilson was interviewed by Margaret Warner, who at one point was almost trying to help him out by throwing him a 'possible wording' but Wilson even discarded that and flailed away in the face of direct exposure from Senator Kit Bond. Senator Bond read almost directly from the Senate Intelligence report, and cited the Butler Inquiry conclusions. He summarized by stating that Wilson was a liar, and owed the President and Vice President an apology.
When confronted on the subject of his wife being the one to recommend him for the trip, he went off on a tangent mentioning what unnamed CIA sources had mentioned to reporters a few days later - skipping, and not re-hashing his earlier vigorous assertions. Wilson's overall demeanor was that of a man that is still hawking the same old goods that he realizes everyone knows is a sham. His only rise from this was a feeble attempt at self-puffery when talking about his own bona fides after Margaret Warner asked him if his wife's glowing recommendation couldn't have been interpreted as a recommendation to send him on the trip. This immediately followed the biggest howler of the segment - when Wilson claimed "I haven't seen that" in reference to his wife's now famous e-mail.
Went so far as to discredit his own early reporting about Iraq overtures to meet with Niger officials about expanded trade dealings when confronted with the conclusion that Wilson's reporting had increased, rather than decreased some analysts belief that Iraq was seeking Uranium from Africa. While Bond pointed out that Niger exports uranium, goats and peas, Wilson now asserts that even though the Niger official that told him of the contacts had assumed they would be to talk about Uranium, that he 'couldn't see' how that conclusion could be drawn.
Joe Wilson seems to be realizing that his 15 minutes are ticking down to the last few seconds. Joe, we hardly knew ya, but we're now sure you're full of crap.
Joe Wilson first went to Niger in 1999 at the suggestion of his wife, looking into the uranium question. I wonder if the Clinton administration was briefed on that trip and if it was in the intelligence notes Berger took.
That was in 1999.
Wilson tried to pull the same equivocating crap last night on the John Batchelor show on WABC radio, with quite a bit of help and leading questions from his admitted pal, John Loftus -- but it didn't placate nor fool anyone.
Liar, liar, pants on fire!
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