[news.yahoo.com]Bush admin made 935 false statements on Iraq

presidents mislead ???

" i did not have sexual relations with that woman, monica lewinsky"
" read my lips, no new taxes"
" I'm not a crook"

" no honey, you dont look fat"....ok i made that one up

 

I thought it was all one, big lie?

 

I do think a lot of the Center for Public Integrity (no clue about the other group), but this is really misleading. It's not 935 different false statements. It's a few false statements, repeated over and over again.

 

Repeated over and over by Bush/Rove/Cheney, etc.
What's the difference? We were lied to.



Impeach Bush.

 

Exactly... They can point the finger at the CIA all they want, but even after the Tenet/CIA said "We can't support this statement" they kept using them.

SOTU being the most glaring of examples.

 

good point.

seems like they are just splitting hairs

 

This study was likely conducted in reaction to the Bush Admin's attempt at revising history by saying in the later war years that we didn't start this war because of weapons of mass destruction. By doing a count of these statements, you can get a pretty fair idea of what issues the Admin was pushing to get public consent for the war. That WMDs lead by a fomfotable margin is a good indicator that the public understood that WMDs were the main reason we started the fight.

 

actually, thats revising history for the better! It wasnt started b/c of weapons of mass destruction, per se (albeit intelligence was crappy on the matter) ...that was only the "way in", or loophole if you will.

 

How many lives did those lies cost? (in this case I’m not talking about the USA Soldiers).

And people wonder why people do not trust Bush any more (for example the Iran coastguard problems).

It really is terrible that a person that lies about such a thing and in the process starts an unjust war, is still in power. He should be impeached. He should be held responsible for the unnecessary deaths.

 

I agree with you.



Impeach Bush.

 

bush and cheney should be in prison. they are criminals.

 

http://www.factcheck.org/article222.html

 

From Tenet's book:

This story begins on Saturday, Oct 5 2002. I was at work in my office when several members of my staff came to say they were having trouble getting the White House to remove some language from a speech the president was preparing to deliver in Cincinnati. The 6th draft speech asserted that Saddam's regime had "Been caught attempting to purchase up to 500 metric tons of Uranium Oxide from sources in Africa- an essential ingredient in the enrichment process" Analytically, the staff said, we could not support such a statement. Having testified to Congress the day before on the matter, I was well familiar with the controversy. I picked up the phone and called Steve Hadley. Our conversation was short and direct. "Steve, take it out," I said, telling him that he did not want the president to be a "Fact witness" on this issue. The facts, I told him, were too much in doubt.

My executive assistant followed up with a memo to the speechwriter and Hadley to confirm our concerns. It said in part: "Remove the sentence {regarding Saddam's attempt to purchase yellow cake} because the amount is in dispute and it is debatable whether uranium oxide could be had from the source. We told Congress that the Brits have exaggerated this issue. Finally, the Iraqi's already have 550 metric tons of Uranium oxide in their inventory"

The White House remove the language, but the next day, one of our senior analysts sent yet another memo to the White house driving home the reasons why CIA thought the offending words should not be uttered by the President-

More on why we recommend removing the sentence about [Saddam's] procuring uranium oxide from Africa: Three points
(1) The evidence is weak. One of the two mines cited by the source as the location of the Uranium oxide is flooded. The other mine cited is under the control of French authorities.
(2) The procurement is not particularly significant to Iraq's nuclear ambitions because the Iraqi's already have a large stockpile.
(3) We have shared points one and two with Congress, telling them that the Africa story is overblown and this was one of two issues where we differed from the British.


The memo has a handwritten note on the bottom from Mike Morell: This has been sent to the White House (Rice, Hadley, Gerson-senior speechwriter)

Despite all that, the African yellowcake would unhappily reemerge three months later in the presidents 2003 SOTU Address.




In short... Bush knew this was misleading information, having previously been told to remove the story from previous speeches. Tenet testified to congress what he thought about the Yellowcake story long before the SOTU. Purposely misleading= lies.

 

That's one ROX

You've got 934 more to go!

 

saddam's link to al qaeda.

 

Interesting....

Statement by George J. Tenet Director of Central Intelligence
July 11, 2003

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Legitimate questions have arisen about how remarks on alleged Iraqi attempts to obtain uranium in Africa made it into the President’s State of the Union speech. Let me be clear about several things right up front. First, CIA approved the President’s State of the Union address before it was delivered. Second, I am responsible for the approval process in my Agency. And third, the President had every reason to believe that the text presented to him was sound. These 16 words should never have been included in the text written for the President.

For perspective, a little history is in order.

There was fragmentary intelligence gathered in late 2001 and early 2002 on the allegations of Saddam’s efforts to obtain additional raw uranium from Africa, beyond the 550 metric tons already in Iraq. In an effort to inquire about certain reports involving Niger, CIA’s counter-proliferation experts, on their own initiative, asked an individual with ties to the region to make a visit to see what he could learn. He reported back to us that one of the former Nigerien officials he met stated that he was unaware of any contract being signed between Niger and rogue states for the sale of uranium during his tenure in office. The same former official also said that in June 1999 a businessman approached him and insisted that the former official meet with an Iraqi delegation to discuss “expanding commercial relations” between Iraq and Niger. The former official interpreted the overture as an attempt to discuss uranium sales. The former officials also offered details regarding Niger’s processes for monitoring and transporting uranium that suggested it would be very unlikely that material could be illicitly diverted. There was no mention in the report of forged documents -- or any suggestion of the existence of documents at all.

Because this report, in our view, did not resolve whether Iraq was or was not seeking uranium from abroad, it was given a normal and wide distribution, but we did not brief it to the President, Vice-President or other senior Administration officials. We also had to consider that the former Nigerien officials knew that what they were saying would reach the U.S. government and that this might have influenced what they said.

In the fall of 2002, my Deputy and I briefed hundreds of members of Congress on Iraq. We did not brief the uranium acquisition story.

Also in the fall of 2002, our British colleagues told us they were planning to publish an unclassified dossier that mentioned reports of Iraqi attempts to obtain uranium in Africa. Because we viewed the reporting on such acquisition attempts to be inconclusive, we expressed reservations about its inclusion but our colleagues said they were confident in their reports and left it in their document.

In September and October 2002 before Senate Committees, senior intelligence officials in response to questions told members of Congress that we differed with the British dossier on the reliability of the uranium reporting.

In October, the Intelligence Community (IC) produced a classified, 90 page National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq’s WMD programs. There is a lengthy section in which most agencies of the Intelligence Community judged that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Let me emphasize, the NIE’s Key Judgments cited six reasons for this assessment; the African uranium issue was not one of them.

But in the interest of completeness, the report contained three paragraphs that discuss Iraq’s significant 550-metric ton uranium stockpile and how it could be diverted while under IAEA safeguard. These paragraphs also cited reports that Iraq began “vigorously trying to procure” more uranium from Niger and two other African countries, which would shorten the time Baghdad needed to produce nuclear weapons. The NIE states: “A foreign government service reported that as of early 2001, Niger planned to send several tons of pure “uranium” (probably yellowcake) to Iraq. As of early 2001, Niger and Iraq reportedly were still working out the arrangements for this deal, which could be for up to 500 tons of yellowcake.” The Estimate also states: “We do not know the status of this arrangement.” With regard to reports that Iraq had sought uranium from two other countries, the Estimate says: “We cannot confirm whether Iraq succeeded in acquiring uranium ore and/or yellowcake from these sources.” Much later in the NIE text, in presenting an alternate view on another matter, the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research included a sentence that states: “Finally, the claims of Iraqi pursuit of natural uranium in Africa are, in INR’s assessment, highly dubious.”

An unclassified CIA White Paper in October made no mention of the issue, again because it was not fundamental to the judgment that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program, and because we had questions about some of the reporting. For the same reasons, the subject was not included in many public speeches, Congressional testimony and the Secretary of State’s United Nations presentation in early 2003.

The background above makes it even more troubling that the 16 words eventually made it into the State of the Union speech. This was a mistake.

Portions of the State of the Union speech draft came to the CIA for comment shortly before the speech was given. Various parts were shared with cognizant elements of the Agency for review. Although the documents related to the alleged Niger-Iraqi uranium deal had not yet been determined to be forgeries, officials who were reviewing the draft remarks on uranium raised several concerns about the fragmentary nature of the intelligence with National Security Council colleagues. Some of the language was changed. From what we know now, Agency officials in the end concurred that the text in the speech was factually correct - i.e. that the British government report said that Iraq sought uranium from Africa. This should not have been the test for clearing a Presidential address. This did not rise to the level of certainty which should be required for Presidential speeches, and CIA should have ensured that it was removed.

 

Not that interesting.... he fell on the sword. It was wrong, he was CIA chief, he went down.

 

No, it's 935 lies. Each was told to a different audience with the purpose of getting press coverage or opinions favorable to the administration.

If my daughter says "I cleaned my room," and I trust her enough to let her go out and play and then says it again before I let her call her friend and then I find out she hasn't cleaned her room, that's two lies she has to account for because she told each one to accomplish a particular objective.

You can see this by the graph of the lies...



The first wave was told to try and change the dynamic of the Congressional races, the second wave was designed to create media and public acceptance of the war.

 

From the report...

http://www.publicintegrity.org/WarCard/