Posted on 07/12/2003 12:52:33 PM PDT by Cathryn Crawford
George Tenet's admission last night that it was his mistake that caused President Bush to use faulty intelligence in his State of The Union address is interesting at the same time as it is convienent. In the statement itself, which is lengthy and filled with reasons as to the intelligence failure, Tenet wholeheartedly takes responsility for his agency.
"Let me be clear about several things right up front. First, CIA approved the President's State of the Union address before it was delivered. Second, I am responsible for the approval process in my Agency. And third, the President had every reason to believe that the text presented to him was sound. These 16 words should never have been included in the text written for the President. "
On the face of it, this admission seems like the perfect solution to the growing problems for both the Bush and Blair administration. It's all CIA's fault, they can claim. But is that really viable?
On the face of it, perhaps. But Bush is the President. He has to take final responsibility, doesn't he?
If Bush can truly claim to know absolutely nothing, then don't we have a serious problem - wouldn't that imply that Bush is either incompetent or is simply not paying attention?
For discussion purposes - has Bush been conned by Tenet? And if he has, isn't that rather serious?
And if he wasn't conned by Tenet, what is the alternative?
I tend to agree with you on that point - especially if she is reporting as opposed to opining - but that's probably because I'm sensitive to what I see as unfair bashing of President Bush day in and day out. It would be refreshing to see a little benefit of the doubt come his way on occasion, particularly from conservatives.
Ultimately though, Cathryn has to trust herself and write what she believes.
She'll just give people like me high blood pressure. : )
LOL. Who are you trying to kid? You're tougher than nails.
Both of you are. ;-)
I guess she is following in Maureen Dowd's footprints.
Personally, I have a lot of reservations about Wilson and his claims
All the more reason someone should look into the matter.
I'm sorry. If it's any consolation, my mother says that I'm the reason she's going gray, and my dad says that he needs tranquilizers after a conversation with me.
So far, there have been three people making allegations. One: Terrance Wilkinson, who appears to not exist, but the far left grabbed his story and peddled it to the international media.
Two: Joseph C. Wilson. "He was recently the keynote speaker for the Education for Peace in Iraq Center, a far-left group that opposed not only the U.S. military intervention in Iraq but also the sanctions — and even the no-fly zones that protected hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Kurds and Shias from being slaughtered by Saddam." He's an "adjunct scholar" at the Middle East Institute — which advocates for Saudi interests. The March 1, 2002 issue of the Saudi government-weekly Ain-Al Yaqeen lists the MEI as an "Islamic research institutes supported by the Kingdom." And he worked for Tom Foley, Al Gore, and Jimmy Carter.
Three: Greg Thielmann, who worked for John Chester Culver, Iowa politician who thought FDR was not far enough to the left and admired Henry Wallace, a man once called 'Stalin's ambassador to the court of Roosevelt'
I am really starting to think there may be a real scandal here- and it is a red one.
The mistake was admitted ..
And I have no doubt it will be
Since his September 12, 2002 speech to the UN, the President and this administration, along with Tony Blair and our allies have called for either Saddam to either disarm or prove that he had disarmed or face the consquences.
Since 1991, no one doubted that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. The Clinton administration bombed Iraq on several occasions (most notably in 1998) because of Iraq's failure to abide by UN resolutions.
Leaders in both the democratic and republican parties informed the American people that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
The debate in the UN that lead up to the invasion of Iraq did not center on whether or not Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, but on the best way to disarm Iraq. The only two people who believed that Iraq didn't have weapons of mass destruction were Saddam Hussein and Scott Ritter. Every argument was based on how to disarm Iraq.
Now, the media, in collusion with the democratic party, think they have an issue to beat up the President with. Sixteen words in the SOU address where the President quoted British intelligence. A report the British still say is true.
Now, the democratic nine (running for president) are beating up GWB for lying. But, there was no lie. No lie whatsoever.
If our CIA believed that the Niger information was false, then it was the CIA's responsibility to remove that one sentence from the speech. It did not happen. And George Tenant, rightfully so, has said it was his responsibility to have removed those sixteen words. When the speech went to the CIA for vetting, for whatever reason, it was not.
Big whoop! This is not about the President deliberately deceiving the American people. It would have taken more than 16 words to do this. This is not about incompetence or anything... It is about the media, whipping up a non-story in order to damage the war on terror.
I have no doubt that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. That was never a non-starter, not even with Hans Blix. If Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction, then Saddam could have simply opened up his country to the inspectors.
What the media is doing in trying to damage this President's credibility and the more important war on terror is hiding the true and more important questions.
If Iraq had weapons of mass destruction (and the world believed he did) where are they? Who has them? And what do they plan to do with them?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.