Connecting the Dots
It appears that the so-called liberal mainstream media has finally heard about the Downing Street Memo. It has taken six weeks for them to do so, but the excuse has been a variation of "it's old news."
Kevin Drum, someone whose formulations I generally appreciate, has this to say:
Was the Iraq war a foregone conclusion by early 2002? Of course it was. These new memos provide further evidence of that, but I'm not sure there's anyone who really doubted it in the first place.
Hello? What the press reported all had to do with Weapons of Mass Destruction about to be catapulted our way. If reporters knew the Administration had other reasons, why didn't they tell us? Isn't that what their job is?
Since the press apparently doesn't have the time or the inclination to present an article which sets forth the machinations leading up to the war (which has cost us billions of dollars, at least 1700 American lives and thousands of Iraqi lives, not to mention our national integrity). allow me to list a very bare bones time line.
1999
Mickey Herskowitz was selected to ghost-write candidate George W. Bush's autobiography during the campaign.
“He was thinking about invading Iraq in 1999,” said author and journalist Mickey Herskowitz. “It was on his mind. He said to me: ‘One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief.’ And he said, ‘My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it.’ He said, ‘If I have a chance to invade….if I had that much capital, I’m not going to waste it. I’m going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I’m going to have a successful presidency.”
9/2001
Richard Clark told CBS news that within days after 9/11, the Administration wanted to lash out at Iraq:
In the aftermath of Sept. 11, President Bush ordered his then top anti-terrorism adviser to look for a link between Iraq and the attacks, despite being told there didn't seem to be one.
5/2002
The Times of London printed a leaked memo regarding the significantly increased bombing of Iraq:
The RAF and US aircraft doubled the rate at which they were dropping bombs on Iraq in 2002 in an attempt to provoke Saddam Hussein into giving the allies an excuse for war, new evidence has shown. The attacks were intensified from May, six months before the United Nations resolution that Tony Blair and Lord Goldsmith, the attorney-general, argued gave the coalition the legal basis for war. By the end of August the raids had become a full air offensive.
7/2002
The Times of London releases the Downing Street Memo:
C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.
Get the picture?
Kevin Drum, someone whose formulations I generally appreciate, has this to say:
Was the Iraq war a foregone conclusion by early 2002? Of course it was. These new memos provide further evidence of that, but I'm not sure there's anyone who really doubted it in the first place.
Hello? What the press reported all had to do with Weapons of Mass Destruction about to be catapulted our way. If reporters knew the Administration had other reasons, why didn't they tell us? Isn't that what their job is?
Since the press apparently doesn't have the time or the inclination to present an article which sets forth the machinations leading up to the war (which has cost us billions of dollars, at least 1700 American lives and thousands of Iraqi lives, not to mention our national integrity). allow me to list a very bare bones time line.
1999
Mickey Herskowitz was selected to ghost-write candidate George W. Bush's autobiography during the campaign.
“He was thinking about invading Iraq in 1999,” said author and journalist Mickey Herskowitz. “It was on his mind. He said to me: ‘One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief.’ And he said, ‘My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it.’ He said, ‘If I have a chance to invade….if I had that much capital, I’m not going to waste it. I’m going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I’m going to have a successful presidency.”
9/2001
Richard Clark told CBS news that within days after 9/11, the Administration wanted to lash out at Iraq:
In the aftermath of Sept. 11, President Bush ordered his then top anti-terrorism adviser to look for a link between Iraq and the attacks, despite being told there didn't seem to be one.
5/2002
The Times of London printed a leaked memo regarding the significantly increased bombing of Iraq:
The RAF and US aircraft doubled the rate at which they were dropping bombs on Iraq in 2002 in an attempt to provoke Saddam Hussein into giving the allies an excuse for war, new evidence has shown. The attacks were intensified from May, six months before the United Nations resolution that Tony Blair and Lord Goldsmith, the attorney-general, argued gave the coalition the legal basis for war. By the end of August the raids had become a full air offensive.
7/2002
The Times of London releases the Downing Street Memo:
C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.
Get the picture?
posted by Diane at 6:50 AM
1 Comments:
Keep on beating the drum. (The metaphoical drum that is, not Kevin Drum). The more/longer this is out there, the better the chances that someone will finally pay attention to it.
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