The Chicago Tribune has stumbled into Bush's alternate universe. In defense of the floundering occupation, or what they call "building a representative democratic government for Iraq" (truly representative to its people if built in the interests of another country) their
editorial page struggles to downplay the Downing Street Minutes as mere evidence of government "business as usual," rather than the smoking gun it is.
The Tribune takes the same defensive stance other big media outlets have taken on the DSM, acting as though they offered objective inquiry and equal time to peace advocates, when papers like the
Washington Post and
New York Times did little more than beat the drums of war.
If you can't blame the liberal media, blame the UN--the Tribune tries to put the war off on the international body, saying they could've stopped the if it "had been willing to enforce its resolution." The author forgets that the US ignored UN recommendations for further weapons inspection and attacked preemptively.
UN weapons inspector Hans Blix reported in detail on Iraq's failure to cooperate with inspectors. If Iraq had cooperated, it would have defused any U.S. intention to go to war. Iraq did not.
The author neglects
another British memo released after the minutes, showing the Brits scrambling to push a UN ultimatum on Saddam to justify the illegal debacle in which they were complicit.
Bombard the Tribune with letters.