Posted on 06/19/2005 6:53:54 AM PDT by mabelkitty
The media and the Leftists have had a field day with the Downing Street memos that they claim imply that the Bush administration lied about the intelligence on WMD in order to justify the attack on Iraq. Despite the fact that none of the memos actually say that, none of them quote any officials or any documents, and that the text of the memos show that the British government worried about the deployment of WMD by Saddam against Coalition troops, Kuwait and/or Israel, the meme continues to survive.
Until tonight, however, no one questioned the authenticity of the documents provided by the Times of London. That has now changed, as Times reporter Michael Smith admitted that the memos he used are not originals, but retyped copies (via LGF and CQ reader Sapper):
The eight memos — all labeled "secret" or "confidential" — were first obtained by British reporter Michael Smith, who has written about them in The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Times. Smith told AP he protected the identity of the source he had obtained the documents from by typing copies of them on plain paper and destroying the originals.
The AP obtained copies of six of the memos (the other two have circulated widely). A senior British official who reviewed the copies said their content appeared authentic. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the secret nature of the material.
I guess they were hoping that nobody will raise the question of their authenticity, and for weeks, nobody did.
As long as documents make Bush look bad, they are accepted unquestionably.
But you should try to pass some fake memos justifying Bush's decision and the whole media would be sreaming that they are phony.
Someone should "find" some of Saddam's memos about how he conspired with the UN inspectors to hide his WMD, and you would see that the first point the MSM would make is that those memos are fake. Actually those were more likely to be "fake but accurate", than the ones the keep coming up with it to hurt President Bush.
That's a very good point. Whenever the MSM gets "leaked" a document that hurts Bush, they tout it as real. But give us a document saying Saddam had WMDs, and those pointy-heads will screw it over.
I think this needs a Freeper Call to action just like the Blather notes did. Let's see if we can get a Brit-Twit Canned like we did Dan Blather.
Uh huh. They're real - sort of. It depends on the meaning of the word "is."
They're about as real as Rather's phonies. Do they really think normal people are as stupid as the liberals? Besides being frauds, they don't even contain anything important anyway!
Imagine the memos that must have flew around during Clinton/China reign of terror. Next time, we'll know enough to pay closer attention and to publicize them, too.
Because we've grown up, we've forgotten how to play the lefts childhood games.
They are the "gift that keeps on giving"! ;-)
Far be it for me to question the media---but why do you think that we have heard NOTHING about this on Fox today?
They have had hours and hours to fill, and they have done a hundred shows on Natalee, and quite a few on Durbin, but no mention of this...
"The plan set out by the Foreign Office and Downing Street was to go to the UN for a new resolution demanding unfettered access for weapons inspectors. If Saddam failed to cooperate, that would be a casus belli.
A Foreign Office source said yesterday that war was not a predetermined outcome and that if Saddam had cooperated fully, war could have been avoided. "Jack [Straw] was convinced that Bush was prepared to accept that," the source said."
I forgot to add, that I didn't even click on this thread for the longest time today, because with Lucy Ramirez' name in the headline, I thought it was like a Scrappleface article....LOL
It was for sarcasm - as in "It's really real !! Experts said so!!" (Read the 2 posts I wrote before the link.)
Someone, like the Rather memo, actually claimed they were authentic. That's why I posted the link.
No. I don't believe they're real. Even if they were, I don't see what the big deal was anyway. It really makes them look quite immature doing stupid things like this.
"Far be it for me to question the media---but why do you think that we have heard NOTHING about this on Fox today?"
Because it's mainly old news?
There has been nothing in the British media today either, aside from The Sunday Times story which was hardly revelatory.
I really don't see what all the fuss is. The leaks are of genuine documents, some of them have been directly confirmed as genuine by the British government, none have been denied. They don't tell us a lot we didn't know anyway. Why some people feel the need to try to make them out to be fabrications I'm not sure, just makes it look like they have something explosive in them that must be denied at all costs.
so this thread is a cluster#$@%. Just to summarize, someone tell me where we stand as of today. What is the educated quess on these memos? Was this a fake thread or are we seriously finding fault and not authentic memo?
I read this article, and immediately turned on FOX. The TV has been off all day around here. So far, there's nothing being reported about it. Sometimes it takes a day or so.
Following the Rather fiasco, this one definitely should make the news. It would fill a lot of time slots!
Interesting---
I asked the question why the media hadn't reported this yet, and I got three answers from different Freepers...
1. It is old news and we freepers are ridiculous to think that someone copying notes, and destroying the originals is something to stupid to consider...
2. Questions whether there is a story here at all--and did the freepers on the thread "make a decision"
3. It takes time for the media to catch up to the internet.
LOL---I am really no closer to an answer now, than before I asked....
My opinion SO FAR is, if this were a memo that claimed it had PROOF that Saddam had WMDs before we attacked, but there wasn't an indication where they were moved,
THAT memo would be questioned and written off as a "trick" by the President to make up for the fact that we haven't found them yet...
AND, there would be a congressional investigation to see who put the author of the memo up to "lying" to American...
t
No problem.
I read the memos. What's the big deal? Bush had all kinds of legal reasons to take out Saddam any time he wanted. He was firing at us within the no fly zones. Saddam violated the terms of surrender, for another.
All through the 90's Clinton warned us about the dangers of Saddam's WMD's. It's even in his last state of the union address.
Don't know. Maybe because the news just broke today, and they don't have all the info yet? I'm sure someone will get around to it soon. 24 hour news needs stuff to talk about.
The Rather memo that was caught by a pajamanotti took a few days, too.
Kerry (the dork man) has a "serious" letter he wants to give to Bush about this "Real live memo". This news will make Kerry fun to watch afterwords.
"It is old news and we freepers are ridiculous to think that someone copying notes, and destroying the originals is something to stupid to consider..."
It certainly is old news, as evidenced by the link someone provided above where the Foreign Office confirms that one of the documents is genuine - that is dated September of last year.
Consider the journalists methods all you want, but in cases like this the simplest explanation is probably the correct one. We know that a lot of things have been leaked that are known to be genuine (Lord Goldsmiths legal advice for example). We know that this particular journalist has received leaked documents that are confirmed genuine. We know that no-one from the British government has disputed that the documents reported are what they say they are (they dispute the interpretation placed on them, but that's not the same thing at all). Simplest explanation is probably the right one.
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