Posted on 07/08/2003 1:32:03 PM PDT by William McKinley
In this article on Capitol Hill Blue, there are the following lines:
"The report had already been discredited," said Terrance J. Wilkinson, a CIA advisor present at two White House briefings. "This point was clearly made when the President was in the room during at least two of the briefings."Serious allegations. But I notice it is a single source. Being a conservative, I value the lessons of experience, and experience has told me that single sources are to be treated with skeptism. When I see one, I want to know more about the source quoted so as to establish if I should treat that source as credible.
Bush's response was anger, Wilkinson said.
"He said that if the current operatives working for the CIA couldn't prove the story was true, then the agency had better find some who could," Wilkinson said. "He said he knew the story was true and so would the world after American troops secured the country."
So what about "Terrance J. Wilkinson"?
A Google search for "Terrance J. Wilkinson" found no results (which will change when Google picks up the Capitol Hill Blue article).
Google suggested that the name might be Terrence. But a Google search on "Terrence J. Wilkinson" also produced no hits.
Perhaps the middle initial is the problem. Alas, a Google search on "Terrence Wilkinson" CIA gave no hits, and a Google search on "Terrance Wilkinson" CIA also yielded no hits.
A Google news search on Terrence Wilkinson comes up with nothing relevant. So does a Google news search of Terrance Wilkinson.
A Google search on one of the phrases from one of the quotations comes up empty.
I would anticipate a 'CIA advisor' who attends the same briefings as the President to live somewhere near D.C. But there are no listings according to Anywho for a Terrance or Terrence Wilkinson in D.C., Maryland, or Virginia.
A Google search on "CIA Advisor" Wilkinson also comes up empty.
Perhaps Capitol Hill Blue would be better served by providing some more information about the person quoted so that others can judge his credibility. That is, if he exists.
"Bush's response was anger, Wilkinson said.
"He said that if the current operatives working for the CIA couldn't prove the story was true, then the agency had better find some who could," Wilkinson said. "He said he knew the story was true and so would the world after American troops secured the country."
This scares me if the Pres went with it on his own judgement rather than true info. This could be monumental if there is another witness than Wilkenson.
william McKinley, you are just doing what we're supposed to do here, find the truth.
As for what is scaring you, I wouldn't lose too much sleep over it. A President who would be ruthless enough to act in the manner described would also be ruthless enough to make sure some evidence was found once we secured the country; in other words, he would have planted it. The fact that we haven't found anything tells me Bush is not that Machiavellian, and the described conversation never happened.
If Thompson is telling the truth, then that tells me that Wilkinson is lying.
I'm amazed the notoriety you receive after writing from anger about Bush. This article and the "Madman of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" seems to have given you much press on FR.
Damages your credibility and your sources because you've thrown impartiality and unbiased opinion out the window.
In the Biblical sense, perhaps.
It is conceivable to me that someone who helped Jim with the lawsuit might have had a divergent path since then. Given the "Madman of Pennsylvania Avenue" article posted earlier this year, and given the twisted headline which originally led this article, I give Capitol Blue zero credibility on this issue.
I firmly believe that if Bush were the type to manufacture evidence before hand, he would be the type to manufacture evidence afterwards. Yet we have not found the 'smoking gun' every peacenick has been demanding. We would have, if Bush were the Machiavellian manipulator they want us to believe he is.
And the war was justified without us finding a single thing. But that's a whole other ball of wax.
LOL! You're right.
I thought the same thing about THIS
My hunch is that some evidence was in the middle, and we didn't know that is was false, but we didn't have a smoking gun that it was true. Knowing what we did about Hussein in the past, we didn't give any benefit of the doubt to him when it was gray, and we believed the worst.
Is that wrong? I don't think so. Saddam is a guy who gasses his neighbors, and an ethnic minority in his own nation, and has attempted a nuclear program in the past. You get unconfirmed reports that he is attempting to buy Uranium. So, you believe it to be true, just on what you know of his last behaviour. The mistake, as it appears to be, is in not using more careful language. Saying, "Saddam is buying uranium from Africa", and saying "We have reports that Saddam is attempting to buy uranium from Africa, and we believe it based on his past track record", are two different animals. I think the White House has acknowledged the mistake they made in their emphasis on the "smoking gun" nature of their evidence.
If we poopooed the reports, and Saddam tossed a dirty bomb at our troops, it would leak out that we got these reports. Can anybody imagine the circular firing squad that would occur in that event?
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