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" Saddam Hussein was an evil person and there was justification to get rid of him," he observed to the Daily News. "But we shouldn't have put the basis on weapons of destruction. That was a bad mistake.

This much I do agree with. There was and is excellent justification to take out Saddam and form a friendly democracy in Iraq outside of the WMD issue:

1) To get rid of a mass-murdering dictator and prevent the death and torture of thousands of Iraqis.

2) To create a stable, democratic ally in the Mideast besides Israel.

3) To remove Saddam's threat to Saudi Arabia, thereby allowing us to remove US troops from the nation of Mecca and Medina and defanging one of al-Qaeda's propaganda points about the US.

4) To serve as a catalyst for democratic change in the surrounding Muslim tyrannies. This actually seemed to be happening in the period after the invasion, with Lebanon's Cedar Revolution and student protests in Iran.

5) To give our long-suffering Kurdish allies, betrayed repeatedly by "realists" such as Kissinger and Baker, some relief and autonomy.

The WMD threat, based on the best available intelligence at the time, was one excellent reason to depose Saddam, but it was not the only one. I was surprised at the time that the Administration and State Dept. put such emphasis on the WMD issue and didn't highlight the other solid reasons to invade Iraq - reasons that I think should have appealed to the more rational members of the Left. I respect and applaud Bush entirely for his decision to invade - but it's a pity he didn't spend plenty of time both before and after the invasion making sure everyone heard why there were so many good reasons to do so.