Never Apologize, Never Explain

[Donutboy 0]

Never Apologize, Never Explain

Never apologize. Never explain. Never concede. Many politicians--and many Homo sapiens--live and die by these words. But the Bush clan has emblazoned them onto the family crescent. Bush has had a good run of late: US forces nabbed Saddam Hussein, Libyan ruler Moammar Qadaffi declared he would voluntarily abandon his WMD programs, the US economy grew at a high rate this past quarter. All of this has contributed to a Bush bubble, and political commentators are once again diminishing the chances of the Democratic presidential nominee, whomever it will be.

But at the moment Bush's political fortunes are on the rise, more evidence has emerged showing that he deserves less respect than ever. Take the case of those missing weapons of mass destruction. Before the war, Bush said there was "no doubt" Hussein had them. In the months following the fall of Baghdad--as no such weapons were discovered--Bush and his crew continued to insist that Bush had been right to say Hussein was neck-deep in actual WMDs. Then in the fall, chief weapons hunter David Kay reported that his team had found evidence of possible weapons programs in Iraq. (Former UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix has argued that the evidence is not conclusive that the labs cited by Kay were used for WMD research.) Bush and his aides pointed to Kay's report as proof they had been right all along, even though there is an obvious distinction between weapons and weapons programs. And when asked if the administration was backing away from its previous assertions about the presence of weapons (not programs) in Iraq, Bush officials said no. They suggested that Kay needed more time to find the proof. (The Bush crowd has been far more patient with him than they were with the UN inspectors.)

Now Bush--attempting to shift the terms of the debate in his favor--says it did not matter whether or not Iraq possessed weapons before the invasion. In a recent interview, ABC News' Diane Sawyer asked Bush, "Fifty percent of the American people have said that they think the administration exaggerated the evidence going into the war with Iraq, weapons of mass destruction, connection to terrorism. Are the American people wrong, misguided?" Bush replied, "No, the intelligence I operated on was good, sound intelligence." That was a non-responsive but untruthful reply, for the House and Senate intelligence committees (both led by Republicans) and Kay himself have each definitively stated that the prewar intelligence on Iraq's WMDs was loaded with uncertainties. Sawyer continued to press Bush about his prewar statements on WMDs, and he refused to directly address the question, repeatedly asserting that Saddam Hussein had been a "threat." And then he referred to Kay's discovery of a supposed "weapons program" to defend himself. But when Sawyer noted that Bush and other administration officials had "stated as a hard fact that there were weapons of mass destruction as opposed to the possibility that [Hussein] could move to acquire those weapons," Bush countered, "What's the difference?...The possibility that he could acquire weapons. If he were to acquire weapons, he would be the danger."

Hold on. Before the war, Bush asserted Hussein was an immediate threat because he already had such weapons. He never went before the public and said, Hussein may have weapons of mass destruction; then again, he may only have weapons programs; but there's no difference. This is disingenuousness after the fact, backpedalling without acknowledgment. Moreover, after the Sawyer interview, the news broke that Kay had decided to quit his post, supposedly for personal reasons. Reports of his departure were widely interpreted (and probably rightfully so) as a signal that he had uncovered little in the way of evidence of WMDs. And Representative Jane Harman, the ranking Democrat on the House intelligence committee, noted that the administration had removed "critical people"--including analysts and linguists--from Kay's weapons hunting unit. This was another sign that Kay and his crew were not close to finding WMDs, and it showed that the Bush administration was not taking the WMD search all that seriously.

Which leads to the question: will Bush and his aides ever admit they oversold the WMD threat? Their case gets weaker by the day. If there had been real WMDs in Iraq, wouldn't at least one Iraqi have turned over information on them to the CIA, which presumably is ready to pay millions of dollars for information leading to real WMDs? Even conservative columnist George Will weeks ago urged the Bush White House to come clean on WMDs. The administration ignored his advice. Rather, Bush officials kept saying, wait for Kay's report. But even Kay is not sticking around for it.

Bush's excuses are falling apart on another front. After 9/11, he and his senior advisers maintained over and over that no one could have imagined such an attack against the United States. That was not so. For years, the intelligence community had collected warnings reporting that al Qaeda and other terrorists were interested in launching a 9/11-sort of attack--using hijacked aircraft as weapons--against American targets. (The final report produced by the joint inquiry on 9/11 conducted by the Senate and House intelligence committees includes a list of such warnings.) And there is strong evidence that Bush was told of a July 2001 intelligence report that noted that al Qaeda was planning a "spectacular" attack involving "mass casualties" against an American target. But by insisting falsely that 9/11 was so far out of the box that no one could have done anything about it, Bush absolved his administration and the Clinton administration of any blame for failing to thwart the assault.

Now former New Jersey Governor Thomas Kean, the Republican chairman of the independent 9/11 commission, says that 9/11 could have been prevented. In a recent interview with CBS News, Kean noted that he would, if he could, fire the government officials who had failed the public. For over a year, evidence has been public proving that two administrations screwed up. But Bush and his aides have refused to acknowledge that. Kean's remarks--which drew much public attention--cast new light on a d*mn serious allegation that Bush had so far dodged rather well. Kean's commission is due to release its final report in the spring, but the commission--which has encountered bureaucratic resistance--may have trouble finishing its complex inquiry by then.

Another excuse from Bush circles was recently proven phony. In the run-up to the Iraq war, media accounts revealed that in 1983 Donald Rumsfeld had been sent by President Ronald Reagan to meet with Saddam Hussein and broker a closer relationship between Baghdad and Washington. At the time, Hussein was using chemical weapons in his war against Iran. How odd that Hussein's use of WMDs in 1983 did not bother Rumsfeld back then, when in 2002 and 2003 it was cited by Bush officials as a reason the United States had no choice but to invade Iraq. In his defense, Rumsfeld claimed that in 1983 he had "cautioned" Hussein against using chemical weapons. But then The Washington Post reported that declassified State Department notes of the meeting with Hussein indicated Rumsfeld had not raised this subject with the Iraqi dictator.

Rumsfeld then claimed he had discussed the matter with Iraqi Foreign Minster Tariq Aziz, not Hussein. Official records, though, showed that Rumsfeld had only mentioned it in passing. More recently, the National Security Archive found records related to a 1984 meeting that occurred between Rumsfeld and Aziz. According to these documents, Rumsfeld had been instructed to tell Aziz privately that the Reagan administration's public criticism of Iraq for using chemical weapons was not intended to signal the United States was any less eager "to improve bilateral relations, at a pace of Iraq's choosing." That is, Rumsfeld was to tell Aziz not to fret over what the Reagan administration said in public about Iraq's use of chemical weapons; the Reaganites still wanted to cozy up with Hussein.

So the Bush gang has escaped accountability on WMDs, on 9/11, and on the policy sins of their political fathers. Their cover stories no longer hold, yet there are no indications Bush and his lieutenants will necessarily pay for that. The accepted wisdom among analysts of American politics is that voters tend to look forward, not backward. When voters evaluate politicians, they care less about history than they do about present-day results and ask, what are you going to do for me (or us) now? Will that pattern hold in 2004? No doubt, Bush is hoping so. With the Bush clan, politics is indeed never having to say you're sorry.

[Tiger Al 0]

Watch 60 Minutes Sunday night because Leslie Stahl is going to interview former treasury secretary Paul O'Neill and he's supposed to have some candid insight to life in the Bush administration.

The Bush Administration began laying plans for an invasion of Iraq, including the use of American troops, within days of President Bush's inauguration in January of 2001 -- not eight months later after the 9/11 attacks as has been previously reported.

That's what former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill says in his first interview about his time as a White House insider. O'Neill talks to Correspondent Lesley Stahl in the interview, to be broadcast on 60 Minutes, Sunday, Jan. 11 at 7 p.m. ET/PT.

O'Neill, fired by the White House for his disagreement on tax cuts, is the main source for an upcoming book, "The Price of Loyalty," authored by Ron Suskind.

In the book, O'Neill is quoted as saying he was surprised that no one in a National Security Council meeting questioned why Iraq should be invaded. "It was all about finding a way to do it. That was the tone of it. The president saying 'Go find me a way to do this,'" says O'Neill in the book.

Bush gets busted again!!!

Sounds like a book I'm going to have to buy!!! Watch the show and we'll discuss it Monday!!!

[War Eagle 96 10]

Before the war, Bush said there was "no doubt" Hussein had them.

I have no doubt.

It's because of people like TA and DB that they had time to smuggle those weapons out of the country before we came. Remember, for MONTHS the demand was that we "go to the UN, go to the UN" before going in. It took several extra months to prove the UN totally inept and impotent so that we could move forward. If you were Sadaam, what would you do? I bet you'd pull a clinton and lie, hide, cover-up and TRY to make yourself look like the good guy.

[rexbo 104]

What? You mean Saddam was a threat before 9-11? Say it ain't so!! I am shocked, outraged!! I never remember hearing ANYTHING about Saddam before 9-11, so the fact that Bush and company were considering how to handle his threat before then really surprises me! This is a bombshell of a story.

(Boy, am I glad I live in my world, and not TigerAl and Donutboys'. I think I would have already suffocated with my head in the sand that deep.)

[AUesquire 1]

Great point WE96. They're spewing the same kind of Democrat spin as always. Damned if you do and damned if you don't. 9-11 hits and the Dems holler "You knew or should have known this would happen". If we don't go in to Iraq and Saddam does use WMD's and wipes out a few thousand people, they'd say, "Oh look, Bush knew all along they had em' and wouldn't do anything about it."

Donut and AL, maybe they didn't find WMD's, maybe they were moved in the months and months we were stalled before going in, who knows. What we DO KNOW is that Saddam Hussein systematically murdered 10's of thousands of his own people and was running torture chambers. But I guess that's not a good enough reason to stop a ruthless dictator. Please find some way to justify that.

[Tiger Al 0]

Before the war, Bush said there was "no doubt" Hussein had them. 

I have no doubt.

It's because of people like TA and DB that they had time to smuggle those weapons out of the country before we came. Remember, for MONTHS the demand was that we "go to the UN, go to the UN" before going in. It took several extra months to prove the UN totally inept and impotent so that we could move forward. If you were Sadaam, what would you do? I bet you'd pull a clinton and lie, hide, cover-up and TRY to make yourself look like the good guy.

One problem with that theory, big guy, and that is that, if you'll remember, we were told by Rumsfeld that he knew exactly where the WMD's were. Remember his clumsy statement, "We know exactly where they are. They're north, west, east and south, somewhat, of Baghdad and Tikrit." We were told that he had them, because, remember still, THAT was the reason we were attacking Iraq was because they possessed this ungodly huge amount of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. We weren't told they USED to be there but they're gone, we were told they did, IN FACT, have them. Early last year, UNMOVIC was beginning to confirm all of the reports that Bush didn't want to hear which said that Iraq was not in possession of WMD's. That's why he had them pulled out so he could attack before too many people got wise to his scam. You see, very much longer with UNMOVIC running all over Iraq coming up with NO WMD's would've made it really hard for the US not to look like it was simply attacking a militarily feeble country for its' oil...or whatever.

BUT, playing along with your little scheme, WE96, wouldn't it would be just as damnable if we'd known exactly where the WMD's were, as Rumsfeld said, and stopped paying attention to them, thus allowing them to be smuggled into the hands of...anybody???

That theory holds little credibility because, if you remember, Saddam did that once before and got burned, or did you forget about the fighter planes he hid in Iran during Desert Storm so we wouldn't destroy them. Problem for him was that Iran decided NOT to give them back and instead sold them to Afghanistan. I doubt he would make that same mistake again, especially since he would probably have needed WMD's to repel our army when it attacked. That is, if he'd had them.