White House Blames Bad Intelligence on Dems

Last week DeLay blamed Democrats for Congress's recent overkill on deficit spending.  

[DeLay] also blamed Democrats [for the budget woes], complaining that they haven't offered any suggestions on how to cut spending. He said they created a congressional budget process that makes it difficult to cut spending.

"We've been operating off a Congress designed by Democrats," he said. source

Now the White House is blaming Democrats for the White House's use of false intelligence on the nonexistent WMDs in Iraq. It seems just a bit desperate to try to pin blame on the out-of-power Democrats for the recent fuck-ups of the in-power Republicans.

Next the White House will be saying:

If only the Democrats had stopped us from fucking up, we wouldn't be in this damn mess.  Why didn't they steal the election, seize power, leak the names of CIA agents and lie to the nation in order to take us down?  For their failure to stop us from failing, we should ban Democrats from taking any elected offices, so that they won't fail to stop us any longer.

A reminder: The intelligence on Iraq was either wrong or misstated.  If it was wrong, the false nature of the intelligence was missed by the administration in power, despite their urgent claim of immediate threats that required an immediate invasion of Iraq.

From the White House briefing yesterday:

Q Can I just do one follow on the intelligence? You said the prewar intelligence was clear. It was also wrong.

MR. HADLEY: Which clear?

Q You said the prewar intelligence was clear.

MR. HADLEY: Right.

Q It was also wrong, wasn't it?

MR. HADLEY: I said it was, I believe, a strong case -- a strong case was what I said in answer to the earlier question. And a lot of it --

Q You said the intelligence was clear.

MR. HADLEY: -- and a lot of it turned out to be wrong.

Q A lot of it turned out to be wrong.

MR. HADLEY: We know that.

A reminder: This White House takes no responsibility for nothing.  Therefore the Democrats are to blame for Iraq.

The above line of questioning followed Hadley's remarks to the press yesterday aimed at getting out the newest talking points on failed WMD intelligence for the White House: Many critics of the war were also wrong about the intelligence.

The Washington Post covered the new talking points, reporting:

The White House went on the offensive in the debate over the Iraq war yesterday, insisting that U.S. intelligence had compiled a "very strong case" that Saddam Hussein harbored banned weapons and accusing congressional critics of hypocrisy because many of them voted for force three years ago.

Reuters reports the same spin:

Administration officials have acknowledged the intelligence on Iraqi weapons was faulty, but have said Democrats, Republicans and foreign intelligence agencies had believed Baghdad had deadly weapons before the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

And the New York Times:

The White House's effort to stop the erosion is centered on defining the president's critics as Democrats who voted for the war based on the same intelligence Mr. Bush saw but have switched positions, often under pressure from their party's left wing.

This may be amongst the weakest tactics used by the administration to deflect charges of manipulation of intelligence.  What they are essentially saying is that (1) the intelligence was bad, and yet we invaded anyways (a problem of its own right) and (2) we spread bad intelligence to everyone, tricking many Democrats into backing the war.

It cannot be forgotten that Democrats in Congress do not have Executive Powers.  That means that they rely on the White House, the Executive Branch, for information and intelligence.  Congress does not have the CIA, the Pentagon or the National Security Agency at its disposal.  And given how secretive and protective of Executive Powers this White House is, its unreasonable to blame Congress for the administration's bad intelligence.

Additionally, the White House would like to present debates about intelligence as being about the past, about history.  But the war is taking place now.  And as such, it cannot be treated as history.  The same bad intelligence that was used to get us into war may be leading us down other wrong paths now.

It makes sense for Congress (and the White House) to change course based on what we've learned about the intelligence since first invading Iraq.  Admitting to the intelligence being bad doesn't make the problem go away.  And it might even change one's current basis for supporting the war.  And regardless if the intelligence were bad, false or spot-on, changing conditions in the battlefield may lead Congress and others to change their minds about the best course for the war now or in the future.  Only idiots don't change course based on changed information or conditions.

I believed then, and I believe now, that the White House lied about intelligence.  As I watched Powell before the United Nations it was clear to me that he was lying - at least about the urgency and the certainty.  Even if the facts that he was relaying were true ("someone" did say this or that, or it was "possible" to think that those were weapons labs), I think we should expect the Secretary of State to apply high standards of analysis before presenting a case for war before the United States and the world.  The same goes for Bush's claims of yellowcake.  Sure, he simply stated that there were reports from the UK about the yellowcake, but he's the fucking President of the United States.  He can't just say "someone" told me this, and not expect the implication to carry.  When someone tells him something that will lead us to war, he better be damn sure about the information.

The Bush administration, as well as all Democrats who supported the war, should come to terms with the reality of the war today.  First, the war is bad for America because it was so clearly based on falsehoods.  This not only removes any moral or just reasons for going there in the first place, but it also makes our continued presence more egregious in the minds of the rest of the world.  Second, the war is going badly. Given this, it makes sense to reassess the situation and to change course.  Third, the buck stops with the President.  If he committed acts of omission or outright lies, or if his intelligence services were just plain stupid, he alone is responsible.  It is a cheap political ploy for the White House to claim otherwise.

Cross posted: Political Porn

•  Watch out... Bush will be giving a

  speech today that denies he lied about intelligence and that blames others for the misfortunes going on in Iraq.

  by Tom Kertes on Thu Nov 10, 2005 at 11:56:12 PM PDT

•  You're right, Tom,

  and given that the Democrats were  trying to be good citizens of the Republic, they had to trust and try to back the Lies of the Adminstration. Unable to perceive the real "intelligence" behind the lies, they gave in to a paucity of information, choosing instead to support the executive.

  For that, they were wrong. Yet they all, Republican and Democrat alike, were operating on the same flimsy, skeletal outlines as was presented (Falsely) to them. They probably felt it was their duty to support the "commander in chief." Note how I cannot even bring myself to capitalize that grostesque mockerie of what Bush has done to the presidency.

  In spite of their deliberate blindness, and quite frankly naive faith in their "leadership," they were wrong. And the strong amongst them can admit it now. We all knew it was bogus. No one of us believed the half-truths and innuendoes and empty reasons for a war.

  by Thaxter on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 12:03:18 AM PDT

  •  we can be critical of the dems for

    supporting Bush, but he can't.  It's cheap and wrong for him to be critical for those who gave him the benefit of the doubt.

    by Tom Kertes on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 12:13:41 AM PDT

•  Figures

  Bush blames Democrats for false intel that Bush presented to them. I can see the new catch phrase, "Democrats made me do it!" Republicans are all for personal responsibility, as long as someone else does it.

  As for the budget, Republicans are handing out subsidies like candy. Democrats agree to it but who placed economic policies in place that lowered the $'s value, help send jobs overseas, and gave welfare money to billionaires?

  by Tux on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 12:06:02 AM PDT

  •  yeah, it seems like the Republicans

    are totally full of shit when it comes to just about everything

    by Tom Kertes on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 12:14:30 AM PDT

•  Actually, the war is all Chirac's fault

  Bill O'Reilly told me so.

  http://mediamatters.org/...

  From the November 7 broadcast of Fox News' The Radio Factor with Bill O'Reilly:

  O'REILLY: But this French thing, I mean to us -- just remember this: If Jacques Chirac had stepped up and looked Saddam in the eye and said, "You either let those U.N. inspectors do their job unfettered, or I'm going with the U.S.A. and Britain," Saddam would have blinked. There wouldn't have been an Iraq war. This Iraq War is on Chirac. It's right on his head. That's where it is.

  If only the French had been more insistent, then the US and UK wouldn't have had to invade Iraq based on manufactured intelligence.  So it's all Chirac's fault.  Got that?  Nothing that Stephen Colbert says on the Colbert Report can match the lunacy of the real thing.

  by ortcutt on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 12:34:46 AM PDT

  •  If You Overlook the Inconvenient Fact

    that he DID let the Inspectors have the run of the place, and WE forced them out so we could invade before they could confirm there were no WMD.

    If the U.N. Inspectors ever reported that Saddam was "clean" he'd have been out from under sanctions in a few weeks. THAT'S why Darth Cheney was determined to invade.

    by The Baculum King on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 12:58:37 AM PDT

    •  Facts?

      If we start listening to the facts, then the terrorists have won.

      by ortcutt on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 01:05:39 AM PDT

      •  Seems to be Little Danger of That n/t

        by The Baculum King on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 01:08:58 AM PDT

•  Facts:

  1. The Bushies and PNAC wanted to invade Iraq since 1998.

  2. The Bush Administration in 2002 and 2003 looked for ways of selling the idea of invading Iraq to Congress and the American people.  In the process of selling the war, they intentionally disregard ANY information that would lead a reasonable person to conclude that invading Iraq was a bad idea.  They disclose only intelligence to Congress and the American people that would lead people to believe that an Iraq invasion was necessary due to supposed Iraq WMD's.

  3. The Democrats in Congress (and the American people) had access to only the WMD intelligence that the Bush Administration wanted them to have.

  4. Now, in November 2005, the GOP wants to shift the blame regarding the Iraq War to the Democrats?  Given the facts above, how do the Republicans logically believe that they can accomplish this??

   

  by sunbro on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 02:01:30 AM PDT

  •  Reid's speech after Bush's speech

    "President Bush, since you say that both Democrats and Republicans, Congress and the Bush administration said that Saddam had WMD's and the intelligence was not manipulated then we ACCEPT your full cooperation in phase 2 intelligence report to CLEAR your good name.  We will be interviewing the entire WHIG and look at all the intelligence.  President Bush, we expect you to be fully supportive of phase 2 since you did not manipulated the intelligence".

    by Drdemocrat on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 03:55:28 AM PDT

•  I remember

  I remember that when Bush made his infamous yello-cake statement in his SOTU address, I turned to my partner and said "He just lied; the CIA has already dsimissed that rumor".  I knew this from reading the mainstream press over the previous few months(I admit to reading beyond page one).

  I never hear what seems to be the most obvious comment: If Bush read the newspapers, he would have known that Saddam didn't have diddly-sqaut.  If Bush ever read a newspaper he might know what's going on.

  They knew exactly what the fuck was going on.  Maybe not Bush, but then Bush hardly ever gets to sit in the front seat, so what would be the point in telling him?

  by Bob Love on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 02:11:29 AM PDT

•  How Dems can FIGHT back

  Dems can then say so if you feel both Dems and Bush administration had the same intelligence then we INSIST AND EXCEPT that you all (the WHIG) will cooperate in phase 2 and be interviewed since you say you did NOT manipulate intelligence.

  Dems should say the Bush administration would be so happy that phase 2 is being done which will then proof to the American people that they did not exaggerate or manipulate intelligence.  

  Call them on their SHIT!! Call them on their BLUFF!!

  by Drdemocrat on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 03:37:10 AM PDT

•  Call Hadley on his shit too!!!

  Dems should say so Hadley just how did those famous 16 words get into Bush's speech?  Dems should say that we accept Hadley's interview for the phase 2 intelligence report about how those 16 words got into Bush's speech.  We will be talking to you soon!!

  by Drdemocrat on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 03:46:34 AM PDT

•  Repugs whole argument seems to be

  the dems were idiots to trust the bush administration in the first place.

  If this is the best they can come up with, they're in deep shit.

  by bluestatesam on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 03:47:26 AM PDT

  •  Robert Kagan has been running this

    argument in WP monthly column for 5 months now.  Basically he says: I was a fool, but others, include some democratd were too.

    It is "a trouble for many = half a comfort". But it is also "a trouble for many = fool's comfort".

    by mdco on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 06:43:03 AM PDT

•  This reminds me

  of the "creep defense' that didn't work for Mike Tyson during his rape trial.

  "My client's behaviour was towards the beauty pageant contestants was so widely known to be crude and sexually aggressive, that it's not credible that one would not expect a sexual assault when alone with him."

  by dinazina on Fri Nov 11, 2005 at 04:37:38 AM PDT