[mattdono]

The sad part about this is that this is a losing game for Bush. Unfortunately, the left already has the "big lie" out there. The left will do a "reverse Rather" --there will be a completely legit document, but they will say that it's phony. One of the initial documents that came out a couple of weeks ago, providing a pretty clear and direct tie between Saddam and Al Qeada (maybe even bin Laden himself), were already greeted with this reply.

I guess this is the "real, but phony" paradigm, as opposed to the Rather paradigm of "fake, but accurate".

And, it is more unfortunate that the administration was the one that open the door for all of this criticism.

The administration should have never let the "16 words" get raised to any level at all. The White House should have never said that "it shouldn't have been in there" (or whatever they said). If the White House said anything, they should have said,

"Yeah, the President said it. So what? The British believe it and they are our allies, so we believe them. If you don't, go talk to Tony Blair. It's the intelligence that is available and the President is required to act. Period. End of Story. If you don't like that, stuff it."

Or, at least they could have established that these 16 words were only the smallest of smallest parts of the reasons for going to Iraq. And, while the President cited many other reasons, this is the only thing that he said in the SOTU address that his political opponents have latched on to.

It's noteworthy that they latched onto this phrase. And, it's more curious that a few months later, those were the words that "launched 1,000 lies". The Wilson thing, the "we shouldn't have invade", the "bad intelligence", etc., etc., etc. The entired "Bush lied, people died" mantra is premised almost entirely on these 16 words.

Is it bogus? Yes.

Do alternative media sources (talk radio, the internet, etc) snuff out the left's lies very easily? Yes.

But, that is the smallest of effects. People still are relying on the leftist idiots that give different variations on the "Bush lied" theme every night. But, as long as these folks can watch American Idol or some other mindless claptrap, they really don't care and the just gobble the lies up.

Once again, I'm forced to conclude my post with...

Sad. Just sad.

[MNJohnnie]

The top 5 Talk Show hosts draw a larger daily audience then the nightly news.

[tang-soo]

I'm curious if the Left tried the same tactics to discredit the Verona papers a decade ago. Those documents busted wide open some of their pets ideals.