Posted on 02/07/2007 3:40:57 PM PST by fkabuckeyesrule
To see how liberal history is created, you need to tune into the nut-cable stations and watch their coverage of the Scooter Libby trial. On MSNBC, they're covering the trial like it's the Normandy Invasion, starring Elvis Presley, as told by Joseph Goebbels.
MSNBC's "reportage" consists of endless repetition of arbitrary assertions, half-truths and thoroughly debunked canards. No one else cares about the trial – except presumably Scooter Libby – so the passionate left is allowed to invent a liberal fable without correction.
Night after night, it is blithely asserted on "Hardball" that Wilson's trip to Niger debunked the claim that Saddam Hussein had been seeking enriched uranium from Niger.
(Column continues below)
As David Shuster reported last week: "Wilson goes and finds out that the claim that Iraq was seeking uranium from Niger is not accurate."
There have been massive investigations into this particular claim of "Ambassador" Joe Wilson, both here and in Britain. Nearly three years ago, a bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee concluded that this was not merely untrue, it was the opposite of the truth: Wilson's report actually bolstered the belief that Saddam was seeking uranium from Niger.
"The panel found," as the Washington Post reported July 10, "that Wilson's report, rather than debunking intelligence about purported uranium sales to Iraq, as he has said, bolstered the case for most intelligence analysts." So you can see how a seasoned newsman like David Shuster might come to the exact opposite conclusion and then repeat this false conclusion on TV every night.
Wilson's unwritten "report" to a few CIA agents supported the suspicion that Saddam was seeking enriched uranium from Niger because, according to Wilson, the former prime minister of Niger told him that in 1999 Saddam had sent a delegation to discuss "expanding commercial relations" with Niger. The only thing Niger has to trade is yellowcake. If Saddam was seeking to expand commercial relations with Niger, we can be fairly certain he wasn't trying to buy designer jeans, ready-to-assemble furniture or commemorative plates. He was seeking enriched uranium.
But Wilson simply accepted the assurances of the former prime minister of Niger that selling yellowcake to Saddam was the farthest thing from his mind. I give you my word as an African head of state.
Chris Matthews also repeatedly says that Bush's famous "16 words" in his 2003 State of the Union address – which liberals say was a LIE! a LIE! a despicable LIE! – consisted of the claim that British intelligence said there was a "deal" for Saddam Hussein to buy enriched uranium from Niger.
Matthews huffily wonders aloud why Wilson's incorrect report didn't get into Bush's State of the Union address "rather than the president's claim of British intelligence that said there was a deal to buy uranium, which of course became one of the underpinnings of this administration's argument that we had to go to war with Iraq."
Considering how hysterical liberals were about Bush's "16 words," you'd think they'd have a vague recollection of what those words were and that they did not include the word "deal." What Bush said was: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
Even if the British had been wrong, what Bush said was factually correct: In 2003, the British government believed that Saddam sought yellowcake from Niger. (Not "MSNBC factual," mind you. I mean "real factual.")
But in fact, the British were right and Wilson was wrong. By now, everyone believes Saddam was seeking yellowcake from Niger – the CIA, the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee, Lord Butler's report in Britain, even the French believe it.
But at MSNBC, it's not even an open question: That network alone has determined that Saddam Hussein was not trying to acquire enriched uranium from Niger. Actually, one other person may still agree with MSNBC: a discredited, washed-up State Department hack who used his CIA flunky wife's petty influence to scrape up pity assignments. But even he won't say it on TV anymore.
Shuster excitedly reported: "We've already gotten testimony that, in fact, that Joe Wilson's trip to Niger was based on forgeries that were so obvious that they were forgeries that officials said it would have only taken a few days for anybody to realize they were forgeries."
This is so wrong it's not even wrong. It's not 180 degrees off the truth – it's more like 3 times 8, carry the 2, 540 degrees from the truth. Shuster has twisted Wilson's original lie into some Frankenstein monster lie you'd need Ross Perot with a handful of flow charts to map out in full.
During Wilson's massive media tour, he began telling reporters that he knew Saddam was not seeking yellowcake from Niger because the documents allegedly proving a deal were obvious forgeries.
Again, thanks to endless investigations, we now know that Wilson was lying: He never saw the forged documents. (Not only that, but Bush's statement was not based on the forged documents because no one ever believed them.)
The bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report notes that Wilson was asked how he "could have come to the conclusion that the 'dates were wrong and the names were wrong' when he had never seen the CIA reports and had no knowledge of what names and dates were in the reports." Indeed, the United States didn't even receive the "obviously forged" documents until eight months after Wilson's trip to Niger!
Wilson admitted to the committee that he had "misspoken" to reporters about having seen the forged documents. Similarly, Cain "misspoke" when God inquired as to the whereabouts of his dead brother, Abel.
But on "Hardball," the forged documents that no one in the U.S. government saw until eight months after Wilson's trip now form the very impetus for the trip. A perfectly plausible theory, provided you have a working time machine at your disposal.
If you wonder how it came to be generally acknowledged "fact," accepted by all men of good will, that Joe McCarthy was a monster, that Alger Hiss was innocent, that mankind is causing global warming and that we're losing the war in Iraq, try watching the rewriting of history nightly on MSNBC. Don't forget to bring your time machine.
I think it was a couple of tons. The UN inspection team had logged it. We flew it out of Iraq in July 2003 I believe.
Well, that's what it says here:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20040522/news_1n22uranium.html
"Of the uranium, 500 tons is naturally occurring ore or yellowcake, a slightly processed concentrate that cannot be directly used in a bomb. Some 1.8 tons is classified as low-enriched uranium..."
It wasn't necessarily newly known... It was previously listed by the IAEA. But... they still had it.
If you wonder how it came to be generally acknowledged "fact," accepted by all men of good will, that Joe McCarthy was a monster, that Alger Hiss was innocent, that mankind is causing global warming and that we're losing the war in Iraq, try watching the rewriting of history nightly on MSNBC. Don't forget to bring your time machine.Well put, as always. She has the libs nailed --- don't we all?? They are too easy now.
For many FReepers, yes - but by no means all. You still see FReepers taking for granted that Edward R. Murrow was the straight shooter he claimed (and was acclaimed by all of journalism, not just CBS News) to be. And yet he was leading the pack on putting the hit on the reputation of Joe McCarthy. Who, as Ann so ably pointed out in Treason, was far from being the ruthless demagogue portrayed by "objective" journalism. If I say, "McCarthy was a reasonable man" you recoil - because you have been conditioned to head for the tall grass when his name is mentioned.The claim that McCarthy was a dangerous demagogue is of a piece with the claim that the US is forced to accept defeat in Iraq because we have lost, not 50,000 men as in Vietnam but 3000 - including accidents. We lose far more people to auto accidents in a year - but no one seriously suggests banning the automobile. Absurdities are accepted as unassailable facts if they are repeated often enough and not disputed vigorously. And when I say "vigorously," I mean as in "suing the socks off of someone."
I have a hard time understanding why more wasn't made of this. Especially in light of the WOT and particularly in light of the Wilson Plame debacle.
Unbelievable. Confounding. Why is this not common knowledge? This stuff makes me angry.
I guess I was confusing the 1.8 tons of enrich uranium. Apologies. Pretty sure we removed about 2 tons out of Iraq in 2003.
One thing that surprises me is that there has been no discussion of the $10 mil. Sadaam paid to North Korea for missle technology and, possibly, missles. This was mentioned in David Kaye's First Interim Report.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/iraq/20040707-1923-iraq-dirtybomb.html
7:23 p.m. July 7, 2004
UNITED NATIONS – The United States didn't have authorization from the U.N. nuclear watchdog when it secretly shipped from Iraq uranium and highly radioactive material that could be used in so-called "dirty bombs," U.N. officials said Wednesday.
I'm not sure that article I posted is accurate. I don't believe that it's right to say "uranium ore or yellowcake" as if they are the same thing. There's a little bit of processing required to make yellowcake out of ore. Only a little, but a little nonetheless.
Perhaps the 500 tons they're referring to is ~both~ some ore and some yellowcake. Don't know.
But the 1.8 tons of lightly enriched stuff is interesting too.
I had never seen the 500 ton amount in Iraq. I would have used it as ammo against the WMD deniers.
Ping to the weekly Coulter!
With regard to the rest of the WMD claims, I've always suspected that we didn't *want* to prove that there were chemical and biological weapons anywhere in the the thousands of munitions depots spread around Iraq. Do that, and suddenly its a race against time to find them before Al Queda does.
When the story of no-WMD was being reported, it was only days after the fall of Baghdad. We didn't even know where all the munition bunkers were yet.
Beats me... but I want dibs on the credit if it is ever declassified. :-)
Ann Coulter's effectiveness can be gauged by imagining the looks on liberal's faces when they get a call Wednesday evening to find that they are the subject of an Ann Coulter column. Imagine his trepidation as he goes to AnnCoulter.com to read the column, and his mortification as he sees how he is masterfully exposed as a buffoon. Imagine his wife saying, "Is there something wrong, dear?" Thursday morning, as he walks by the cubicles it is suddenly silent. He enters his office, shuts the door, and pounds the desk.
She forgot to include Florida in her list. They hammered the myth that Gore won even though he was never even ahead in vote counts.
just flipped to see Hardball and Schuster is flat out lieing and spitty Chrissy is drooling......honest to god drooling.............godless SOB'S
Ann rocks.
"3000 - including accidents. We lose far more people to auto accidents in a year "
1100+ homicides in DC in 3yrs
800+ in Phila last yr alone
Time to CUT & RUN!
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