Mr. Tenet, testifying before a Senate committee yesterday, did not go as far as to say he thought the Bush administration had misrepresented facts to justify going to war.
However, Mr. Tenet said he planned to call Mr. Cheney's attention to a recent misstatement, in a Jan. 9 interview, when the vice president recommended as "your best source of information" on links between Iraq and Al Qaeda the contents of a disputed memorandum by senior Pentagon official, Douglas J. Feith. That memo was sent last October to the Senate Intelligence Committee, and information from the memo was used last November in an now-infamous article titled "Case Closed" published in the Weekly Standard. In my opinion, the article seemed an attempt to convince readers that there was conclusive evidence of collaboration between Saddam Hussein's government and Al Qaeda. The article's writer, Stephen Hayes, failed to mention that intelligence agencies objected to Mr. Feith's findings.
How do these stories affect public perception/public opinion?
Last December, the "Case Closed" article played well in the business-as-usual right-wing media circles, but never got much farther due to its fact-challenged and innuendo-flavoured nature. Inside the mainstream media loop, questions about the actual facts continued. I recall, at that time, being disturbed about the misinformation floating around and the press' seeming incompetence or unwillingness to ask the tough questions in order to "get it right". It was a frustrating experience for citizens like me who appreciate the most honest and straightforward methods of disseminating information.
In a NYT column titled "Telling It Right" dated December 19, 2003 (after the capture of Saddam Hussein), Paul Krugman wrote:
By now, we've become accustomed to the fact that the absence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction — the principal public rationale for the war — hasn't become a big political liability for the administration. That's bad enough. Even more startling is the news from one of this week's polls: despite the complete absence of evidence, 53 percent of Americans believe that Saddam had something to do with 9/11, up from 43 percent before his capture. The administration's long campaign of guilt by innuendo, it seems, is still working.In retrospect, this news should not have been startling. Officials such as VP Dick Cheney were making public statements which were misleading Americans (whether intentional or unintentional, they were misleading just the same).
I think it's time we correct VP Cheney publically.
Professor Rodger Payne discusses the misleadings
Blogger Rodger Payne (Associate Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Louisville KY) has contributed some updated information about Salman Pak-an alleged terror camp in Iraq that was the proving-ground centerpiece of the "Case Closed" article. (See Professor Payne's entry titled Al-Qaida-Iraq Link Further Debunked). You may safely look at the official facts available today and rationally assume it's possible that Salman Pak never existed at all. Knight-Ridder reporters have been told by a lot of senior people in the intelligence community that "The U.S. military has found no evidence of such a facility."
Regarding the disturbing lack of evidence, Professor Payne says:
...this is a particularly egregious finding, first because DoD still lists the capture of the camp as one of its war accomplishments and second because the current head of the Iraq Survey Group (Charles Duelfer, who took over from David Kay) claimed that he saw the camps when he was a UN weapons inspector. Dunlop points out that no such claim is reported in the UN reports about Iraqi weapons.I think it's time the press corrects VP Cheney publically. An informed public is necessary in order for a healthy American democracy to exist. Case definitely NOT closed.
The media could play a central role in assuring public accountability. Dunlop notes that someone should ask Duelfer about Salman Pak.
