March 27, 2006
[First posted 3/26, 10:07 p.m.; updated and bumped]
Following well behind other news sources, the New York Times
is out with the shocking news that George Bush was intent on war in
January, 2003. As if anyone with two eyes and two brain cells to rub
together didn't recognize that fact well before that January.
What's interesting about this story isn't what the Times
is "revealing." What's interesting to me is that more and more
government insiders are trying in some way to jump ship (or perhaps to
salve their guilty consciences) and get this information out to the
public (e.g., slipping copies of memos to Times reporters), and more and more news outlets (like the Times) are willing to run with such stories. Think about this - the Times
says they have now seen the memo of this secret meeting. How exactly
did they authenticate this memo? Is there any proof it has any more
authenticity than the memos which got Dan Rather in so much trouble? I
doubt it. But the Times is willing to run with this memo now.
Why? Because they know how strongly the world public opposes this war
and occupation, and they have to in some way accomodate that fact. They
are, after all, a news business, and need to retain some credibility in order to continue selling their product. Being in denial may work for George Bush, but it wouldn't work for the Times. Not to the same degree, anyway.
Update: Reader ralphbon finds something in the article that I missed, and it's no small matter. From the comments: When I read the article this morning, I gagged on the following passage: By
late January 2003, United Nations inspectors had spent six weeks in
Iraq hunting for weapons under the auspices of Security Council
Resolution 1441, which authorized "serious consequences" if Iraq
voluntarily failed to disarm. Led by Hans Blix, the inspectors had
reported little cooperation from Mr. Hussein, and no success finding
any unconventional weapons. The article is basically
enabling Bush's lie, repeated most recently last week, that Iraq was
not cooperating with the inspectors.
A quick Google search turned up the following, from Blix's January 2003 report to the UN: Iraq has on the whole co-operated rather well so far with Unmovic in this field.
The
most important point to make is that access has been provided to all
sites we have wanted to inspect and with one exception it has been
prompt. We have further had great help in building up the
infrastructure of our office in Baghdad and the field office in Mosul.
Arrangements and services for our plane and our helicopters have been
good. In the full report, Blix added qualifications regarding the cooperation, but none amounted to "little cooperation."
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