Posted on 06/21/2005 5:47:54 AM PDT by bitt
The Downing Street memo has a new fan — Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. — who recently said that the memo was a "stunning, unbelievably simple and understandable statement of the truth and a profoundly important document."
The problem for Kerry, however, is that there is another document that contradicts his view, a document that the defeated Democratic presidential candidate ought to remember.
No, I am not talking about the other official British documents disclosed since Kerry made that statement, although they do show just how silly it was for people to interpret the first memo — which contained meeting minutes — the way they did.
At that meeting in 2002, eight months before the invasion of Iraq, the head of British foreign intelligence was paraphrased as saying that it looked like a U.S.-led war to oust Saddam Hussein was inevitable and that the justification would be Saddam's possession of weapons of mass destruction. According to an army of frenzied, Bush-bashing bloggers and, later, some way-out congressional Democrats, the leaked minutes proved Bush lied about the existence of weapons of mass destruction and that he had decided on war long before he said he had.
As responding pundits — both liberal and conservative — noted, the leaked memo contained nothing new. The most extreme interpretations were not justified and what you finally had were just the observations of one man who cited no sources and offered no proof.
Now, other official British documents have been leaked to the press. They do cite sources, they are explicit and they say that the British agreed that Saddam did have weapons of mass destruction and that Bush had made no final decision at that point about going to war, although preparations were under way.
There are other concerns in those documents about much-debated matters (Bush not wanting to go to the U.N. and inadequate post-war planning), but they punch huge holes in the notion that the first memo demonstrated Bush had lied. There is, of course, other evidence that he did not. A crucial fact in the debate about WMD is that Saddam was given his chance to prove the estimates of the United States, Britain and still other nations wrong, and he failed through his refusal to cooperate with U.N. inspectors.
The charge that the White House was trying to slant intelligence reports was examined by the 9/11 Commission and congressional probes. No support was found for the accusation.
While no weapons of mass destruction were discovered in Iraq, U.S. inspectors did find the danger there had been real: The reckless, America-hating, genocidal maniac named Saddam maintained programs that could produce chemical and biological WMD at the snap of his dictatorial fingers.
So now, back to Kerry, who had virtually the same access to U.S. intelligence as Bush himself and who surely examined the evidence before voting to give Bush the authority to go to war. His views on WMD are contained in a record of Senate debate in which he referred to Saddam "sitting in Baghdad with an arsenal of weapons of mass destruction" and asked:
"In the wake of Sept. 11, who among us can say with any certainty to anybody that the weapons might not be used against our troops or against allies in the region? Who can say that this master of miscalculation will not develop a weapon of mass destruction even greater, a nuclear weapon ...?"
Pretty good argument. Important document.
Bloggers, where are you?
The only thing that is the least little bit questionable is the word "fix." Dems seem to think that means "diddle the data" but a Brit would more likely use it to mean "firm up the data."
Right.
And then he tried to back away from his vote.
Imagine if Bush had NOT gone in, and Saddam had undertaken some attack. Would Kerry have stuck to his "I only gave the President the authority" line? Or would he have blasted Bush for not going in.
Kerry wanted the wiggle room to have it both ways.
That's not leadership. Thank God he lost.
Exactly right.
In order to believe the memos, you have to believe they are 100% accurate copies of authentic originals. Even if you believe the reporter is 100% honest, he could have been duped into copying and destroying something he sincerely thought was genuine but which was not.
They're worthless . . .
Yes, but Dan Rather has assured him they're accurate...
Last night David Gregory subbed for 'Tip' Mathews... and cross-examined David Kay & James Woolsey on the DSM. Gregory quized them on Michael Smith's re-typed memo -- he was on before them -- bringing up all the points Smith claimed the memo revealed. The fact that the original copies had been shredded was quickly brushed aside.
Time after time, Kay & Woolsey shot down Gregory who was rabid to get them to give an iota of credibility to the lefts allegations.
At the conclusion, Gregory summarizes his own scenario and tries to get them to nodd their heads or at least... let it stand unchallenged.
HA! Both of them shook their heads as he finished his 'summary' and 'corrected' Gregory's convoluted reasoning. It was unbelievable!
Maybe
He still hasn't brought it to the Senate Floor like he promised the loony left
YES!
It seems like there should be some public relations penalty to be paid. And there is.
Indeed!! Thank God and the 62,000,000 + voters who voted for President Bush!!
I have to laugh when the left wing nuts start foaming at the mouth. They are so visably shaken with the possibility of actually having an honest President, they don't know how to react. They are stuck in the time-warped Clintonista years of lies, lies, more lies, and trying to define what the meaning of is, is.
How sad for them. And how happy for me.
Anyone or anything that makes the liberal demoRats crazy is automatically a good thing for America.
I tend to agree.
This Downing Street Memo stuff sure got old fast . . .
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