Seven years ago today, in a speech on the Iraq war, Sen. Ted Kennedy fired the first shot in an all-out assault on President George W. Bush's integrity. "All the evidence points to the conclusion," Kennedy said, that the Bush administration "put a spin on the intelligence and a spin on the truth." Later that day Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle told reporters Mr. Bush needed "to be forthcoming" about the absence of weapons of mass destruction (WMD).
Thus began a shameful episode in our political life whose poisonous fruits are still with us.
The next morning, Democratic presidential candidates John Kerry and John Edwards joined in. Sen. Kerry said, "It is time for a president who will face the truth and tell the truth." Mr. Edwards chimed in, "The administration has a problem with the truth."
The battering would continue, and it was a monument to hypocrisy and cynicism. All these Democrats had said, like Mr. Bush did, that Saddam Hussein possessed WMD. Of the 110 House and Senate Democrats who voted in October 2002 to authorize the use of force against his regime, 67 said in congressional debate that Saddam had these weapons. This didn't keep Democrats from later alleging something they knew was false—that the president had lied America into war.
Senate Intelligence Chairman Bob Graham organized a bipartisan letter in December 2001 warning Mr. Bush that Saddam's "biological, chemical and nuclear weapons programs . . . may be back to pre-Gulf War status," and enhanced by "longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies." Yet two years later, he called for Mr. Bush's impeachment for having said Saddam had WMD.
On July 9, 2004, Mr. Graham's fellow Democrat on Senate Intelligence, Jay Rockefeller, charged that the Bush administration "at all levels . . . used bad information to bolster the case for war." But in his remarks on Oct. 10, 2002, supporting the war resolution, he said that "Saddam's existing biological and chemical weapons capabilities pose real threats to America."
Even Kennedy, who opposed the war resolution, nonetheless said the month before the vote that Saddam's "pursuit of lethal weapons of mass destruction cannot be tolerated." But he warned if force were employed, the Iraqi dictator "may decide he has nothing to lose by using weapons of mass destruction himself or by sharing them with terrorists."
Then there was Al Gore, who charged on June 24, 2004, that Mr. Bush spent "prodigious amounts of energy convincing people of lies" and accused him of treason, bellowing that Mr. Bush "betrayed his country." Yet just a month before the war resolution debate, the former vice president said, "We know that [Saddam] has stored away secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country."
Top Democrats led their party in making the "Bush lied, people died" charge because they wanted to defeat him in 2004. That didn't happen. Several bipartisan commissions would later catalogue the serious errors in the intelligence on which Mr. Bush and Democrats relied. But these commissions, particularly the Silberman-Robb report of March 31, 2005, found that the "Bush lied" charge was false. Still, the attacks hurt: When they began, less than a third of Americans believed the charge. Two years later, polls showed that just over half did.
The damage extended beyond Mr. Bush's presidency. The attacks on Mr. Bush poisoned America's political discourse. Saying the commander-in-chief intentionally lied America into war is about the most serious accusation that can be leveled at a president. The charge was false—and it opened the way for politicians in both parties to move the debate from differences over issues into ad hominem attacks.
At the time, we in the Bush White House discussed responding but decided not to relitigate the past. That was wrong and my mistake: I should have insisted to the president that this was a dagger aimed at his administration's heart. What Democrats started seven years ago left us less united as a nation to confront foreign challenges and overcome America's enemies.
We know President Bush did not intentionally mislead the nation. Saddam Hussein was deposed and eventually hung for his crimes. Iraq is a democracy and an ally instead of an enemy of America. Al Qaeda suffered tremendous blows in the "land between the two rivers." But Democrats lost more than the election in 2004. In telling lie after lie, week after week, many lost their honor and blackened their reputations."
Conservative Republicans and democrats are two different animals. Duh. But hold on a sec; it was not always them vs. us, but more of a tweak here and a tweak there because true Patriots actually lived and worked in Washington D.C. and protecting America and its interests were, at the end of the day, the bottom line.
Television changed all that. Bang for the buck replaced integrity, handsome faces flashing pearly whites replaced time worn creases of hard earned visage, wavy locks nearly even disenfranchised Dwight Eisenhower. Were he to run today, the man who saved the world from Hitler and Tojo would be dismissed as a Hairclub for Men candidate and left languishing as a State Senator at best.
Remember, the medium IS the message. Not what you say but how you say it. Not what you do, but what you vouchsafe that you someday MIGHT do. If only those damned Republicans would just get with the program.
They couldn't beat George W. Bush in a toe-to-toe so they lied. They lied to get a job. But even in applying for so lofty a position, John (who served in Vietnam by the way) Kerry STILL omits his DD-214 from his resume, and Barrack Hussein Obama can't even remember how many states there are in the Union, when he visited Pakistan, whether he is a moslem or Christian half the time, or release even his grade school transcripts for perusal.
That alone should give people of good will reason enough to pause. Try and get a dogcatching job nowadays without the requisite background information and its a no-go, but meet the right people and you can win the dash for the White House.
Boggles.
But we know WHY Barry hides his paperwork. The first affirmative action president likely took courses that would shame any self respecting conman, and probably didn't do all that well with them either. African-American this, Minority-American that, Basket-Weaving for immigrants 101, and lets not forget Advanced Teleprompter for Public-Service, don't exactly point the way towards success unless you have lots and lots of help.
And yeah, Karl was wrong not to push George W. into firing back at those cheating, lying, thieves who put themselves above the welfare of America.
In the days of the Yellowstream Media, fighting back sells newspapers and gets your opponents face off the front page. The lefties soon understood they had a pinata and banged away for all they were good for.
The Presidency SHOULD remain an honorable position but the country was worth fighting over.
