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Downing Street Memo proves nothing
By Karen M. Lewis

 

June 16, 2005
Thursday


The position that Bush lied or influenced intelligence is not "ludicrous" as Mr. Ambrose states.  Numerous members of the intelligence community have said that they warned the administration not to use certain allegations, such as the yellow cake and aluminum tube purchases, as proof of WMD programs because these claims had been disputed.  But the administration used these claims regardless.  Also, VP Cheney made many unprecedented vists to the FBI while they were investigating wmd claims.  These visits could have been for no other reason than intimidation.  No other VP in recent history has made these types of "visits". 
 
Also, stated in this article is the idea that Saddam should have proven the intelligence wrong.  And that he didn't cooperate with UN inspectors.  First, it is very difficult to prove a negative and, second, Saddam was cooperating with the UN inspectors.  It was the US adminstration that ordered the inspectors to leave after they informed the administration that they believed there were no wmd or re-constituted programs for these weapons. 
 
Not everyone believed the allegations of the White House and their buddies.  I, and many others, believed the inspectors and from day one and were against pre-emptive aggression against a country that had not threatened or harmed our country.  Al-Queda was based in Afganistan but most of the hijackers were Saudis.  But the Saudis, whose regimes are just about as evil and deadly as Saddam's, are our friends.   Of course we couldn't take any action against them but there was another country, full of oil and "evil-doers" that the neocons in this administration had been wanting to bring down for many years.  This was their perfect chance and they would have done and did do, anything to achieve their dream, a US occupied Iraq.
 
Karen M. Lewis

Related Column:

Downing Street memo proves nothing by Jay Ambrose- Repeatedly, those contending that President Bush lied us into the war in Iraq have had to face contrary evidence, stacks and stacks of it, and how have they handled this refutation of their fantasies? By ignoring it. - More...
Thursday - June 16, 2005

 

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