Bush Didn’t Lie
Clayton Cramer has now produced pretty much definitive proof that the Bush administration did not lie about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. What’s really amazing is he did this without actually finding any WMDs. (Not surprising, since he’s in Idaho, so even if he found WMDs they wouldn’t be in Iraq.)
What’s even more amazing is that no one thought if this before. I say this admiringly, and without any sarcasm — or criticism, since I didn’t think of it either — and it’s so obviously spot-on. Then again, I often think that sort of thing after reading Clayton Cramer’s blog.
December 30th, 2004 at 8:41 pm
Not quite spot on. My reading on the subject led me to conclude that CIA professionals felt the intelligence on Iraq on too murky to say one way or the other what Iraq’s capability was. Bush officials wanted to make a strong political case, so they emphasised the intel that helped their case and suppressed the intel that didn’t. Tenant went along with this. They were taking a gamble and they lost. Now we all have to live with the consequences. It is unfortunate that conservatives who a few years ago sneered at the concept of nation building now feel compelled to defend this massive drain on our treasury for strictly partison reasons.
December 30th, 2004 at 8:53 pm
Even if that’s the case, it more in the category of “a mistake” than “lying,” which is just what Clayton said.
As to your second point, I don’t see how nation-building is “strictly partisan.” Care to elaborate? If Bush were doing this to get the votes of Iraqis, that would be partisan — but Iraqis don’t vote in U.S. elections, and there aren’t enough Iraqi-Americans to swing an election.
After WWII, we had the Marshall Plan and the reconstruction of Japan, both huge nation-building enterprises. Support for those wasn’t unanimous, but was it really “partisan”? How is this different?
December 30th, 2004 at 10:58 pm
actually, mr cramer has interesting things to say, but it’s safer to say he has produced “a definitively better explanation” than “definitive proof.” he in fact offers no proof at all, but that is part of his point, which i appreciate.
December 30th, 2004 at 11:08 pm
While I agree with Clayton’s ultimate conclusion, it is folly to think of “the administation” as a simple
organism with a single brain (or even purpose). The fact is that there are many individuals, each with
their own body of knowledge, opinions, agendas, etc. Remember that game called “telephone” that we played
at summer camp? Something like that happened somewhere between the intelligence guys in the field, and the
day that Tenet whispered “slam dunk” in Bush’s ear. The PNAC ideologues rushed forward, and the rest is
now history.
I agree with the sentiment of “Joe” (above), and ask, what ever happened to the good old days when
conservatives were held in disdain for being ‘isolationists?’ I would trade today’s “neo-cons” for
yesterday’s Barry Goldwaters any day of the week. And yes, Joe is correct, “nation-building,” a
generation ago the desire of Democrats, now belongs to Republicans. It’s been a long, strange trip!
December 31st, 2004 at 12:59 am
romy: By “proof,” I meant something more like mathematical proof, rather than a courtroom proof with physical evidence. He basically made a reductio ad absurdum arguement, right? If A is true, then B must be true. But B is false, therefore A must also be false. A=”they intentionally lied about WMDs” and B=”they would have placed WMDs there to be ‘found’ to substantiate the lie.” Since they didn’t find WMDs, B is false …. so A must be false. Does this make sense?
July 28th, 2006 at 5:10 pm
More Evidence There Really Were WMDs in Iraq
I noted previous poorly-publicized evidence of WMDs here and here.
Here is some more evidence:
Senator Rick Santorum … as announced a document ( ISGQ-2005-00022470 Title: “Information from a source about the transfer of weapons of mass des…