Posted on 11/05/2005 7:01:35 AM PST by Carl/NewsMax
Ever since the indictment of Lewis "Scooter" Libby, New York Times scribe Frank Rich has gone into overdrive with complaints that the Bush administration lied about Saddam Hussein's nuclear capability.
But on Saturday Rich sounded clueless when confronted with reports that Saddam had stockpiled some 500-tons of uranium - news reported just last year on the front page of his own paper.
The usually informed-sounding Timesman fumbled for answers during the following exchange with WABC Radio's Mark Simone:
SIMONE: Speaking of uranium, your own paper, on May 22, 2004, reported on 500-tons of uranium we found in Iraq.
RICH: I don't remember that. I don't know if that was uranium that could be made into nuclear weapons. That's something that I don't know.
SIMONE: Well, it hadn't been enriched yet, but as your own paper pointed out, it sure could make good dirty bombs.
RICH: Well [sighing], ah . . .
SIMONE: I never heard you pause.
RICH: [laughs nervously] I have no - I don't - I didn't see this - no - even the administration hasn't made hay of it so I wonder if it was written by Jayson Blair. I don't know.
SIMONE: You know what your paper did back then. The reason they were going after it - apparently the Bush administration had decided to take it out of Iraq and environmentalists were screaming that it was too dangerous to move. So that's why the Times and the Washington Post were covering it.
RICH: I see.
SIMONE: But isn't that fascinating that the administration never brings that out.
RICH: Yeah - because maybe they don't trust it. Or maybe they don't read the New York Times. [END EXCERPT]
Apparently, neither does Mr. Rich - since the Times also reported in the same story that part of Saddam's uranium stockpile had been partially enriched, and then explained - "the low-enriched version could be useful to a nation with nuclear ambitions."
Moments before Rich's "homina-homina" moment, he had been railing how the Libby indictment showed that the Bush administration had lied about Iraq's WMDs.
"The administration, particularly Dick Cheney but not exclusive Dick Cheney, made claims for which they didn't have a basis to sell the war," he insisted to Simone, "No one but this administration, particularly, heightened the nuclear part of [the WMD threat] as much as they did."
say it aint so.
Frank Rich clueless = not news
The Uranium Files- Iraq, Mr. Bush... and more-
various FR links | 07-15-03 | The Heavy Equipment Guy
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/946772/posts
"RICH: Yeah - because maybe they don't trust it"
I believe this was the stuff that the IAEA tagged?
Does he trust them?
Why doesn't the WH pound this uranium story home at every opportunity?
I, after careful study, have found most stupid people are clueless.
It's as tho Rich was going to spew his lies no matter the truth.
It was funny to listen too.
Rich was formerly the theatre critic until the theatres demanded he be removed from that job at the NYSlimes.
Clearly, Rich is still into fiction.
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RICH: I don't remember that. I don't know if that was uranium that could be made into nuclear weapons. That's something that I don't know. What an idiot. Uranium is uranium. Number 92 on the atomic chart with an atomic weight of 238. Is Rich suggesting that the uranium used to make weapons consist of atoms that are NOT uranium?
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well, the Bush Administration must be clueless as well for not reminding folks about this.
Amen to that! And while they're at it, why don't they produce Joe Wilson's report to the CIA? It can't possibly have any intelligence value now (intelligence and Joe Wilson--now there's an oxymoron) and it would shut up Reid, Durbin, and the rest of the libs who are orgasming over Plamegate.
Come on...we all know now that Saddam had a few paint factories in Iraq. He also had mobile labs that rode from town to town displaying paint colors and wallpaper so that Iraqi decorators could have the very latest in hip design. The uranium was a necessary ingredient for mixing paint.
Gigantic eyeroll. LOL
There are multiple isotopes of uranium, and only some can be used for nuclear bombs (as opposed to just dirty bombs).
IIRC, uranium-235 (not 238) is required to make a nuclear bomb, as 238 is more stable. I believe U-235 is what is meant by "enriched" uranium.
He's probably using the lame partial excuse that this was not weapons-grade urnium. It's kind of like saying that a barrel of crude oil could not (eventually) be used to make Molotov cocktails.
Rich should have stuck to his mincing theater critiques and left politics to the real geniuses at the Slimes, like Krugman. /sarcasm
Frank Rich is a frustrated homosexual.
Uranium has an atomic number of 92, and comes in at least two isotopes, with atomic weights of 235 and 238. Natural uranium consist of mostly 238, with very little 235.
Depleted uranium has had some of the 235 removed. Depleted uranium is used in armor piercing rounds. Neither depleted nor natural uranium are very radioactive, nor would they make very good "dirty bombs", contrary to the asertion by the interviewer.
Natural uranium makes a very nice orangish-yellow pigment in pottery glazes, so you might have some in your house in the form of older ceramics.
Is this true or not? If so, this is not much of a story. If not, then it is a very big deal.
[Chris and Paulie just botched a hit on a Russian gangster, and are lost in the woods. They call Tony, and get bad cellphone reception.]
Tony Soprano: Listen to me, this guy was a Russian green beret. He was in the ministry of the interior or something. He single-handedly killed 16 Chechen rebels. Be f*cking careful.
Paulie 'Walnuts' Gualtieri: All right.
[hangs up]
Christopher Moltisanti: What did he say?
Paulie: He said the guy killed 16 Czechoslovakians, and he was an interior decorator.
Christopher: Interior decorator? His apartment looked like sh*t.
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Enriched uranium is uranium whose uranium-235 content has been increased through the process of isotope separation. Natural uranium consists mostly of the U-238 isotope, with about 1/2 percent by weight as U-235, the only isotope existing in nature in any appreciable amount that is fissionable. The point is, all uranium is potential weapons grade, except for the depleted Uranium left after enriching it to weapons grade. And since Niger doesn't mine/export DU, it's a moot point.
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Your recollection is accurate. Saddam was conducting his nuclear program out of country. We captured a load of "newer" yellow cake from Lybia and took it to Oak Ridge where it sits today. Bush held a press conference standing in front of the captured U in barrels and the media reported along the lines of, "An embattled Bush appeared in Tennessee today in a desperate attempt to gain votes..." No mention of the Uranium.
We also know of Iraqi nuclear scientists in North Korea lending a helping hand.
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