- WASHINGTON -- Some of the
words uttered by very important people in Washington in 2003 are best forgotten.
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- On the other hand, as we enter an election year, maybe
they should be remembered. Many of the official statements were made about
the war in Iraq, and the so-called imminent threat Iraqi weapons posed
for the United States:
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- * On March 17, three days before the invasion of Iraq,
President Bush said in an address to the nation: "There is no question
we have evidence and information that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction,
biological and chemical."
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- On May 1, he delivered a war-ending speech on the USS
Abraham Lincoln off the coast of California with a banner across the ship
reading: "Mission accomplished."
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- But the death toll approached 470 GIs on Friday and is
unlikely to stop climbing anytime soon. The number of combat wounded is
2,679.
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- * In an interview on Dec. 16, television anchorwoman
Diane Sawyer pressed Bush on the fact that no unconventional weapons had
been found in Iraq some nine months after the search had begun.
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- Bush kept interjecting: "Yet."
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- Sawyer persisted, asking about the administration's flat
statements that Saddam had such weapons versus the mere possibility that
he could acquire them.
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- An exasperated Bush replied: "So, what's the difference?"
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- Do we really have to explain?
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- * On Oct. 17, Bush gave an interview to Fox News, saying
he does not read newspapers.
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- "The best way to get the news is from objective
sources," Bush said. "And the most objective sources I have are
the people on my staff who tell me what's happening in the world."
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- Objective? Hardly. Protective? Absolutely.
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- * On Dec. 15, after attending more than 30 fund-raisers
in recent months to rally the GOP troops, Bush told a news conference:
"There is plenty of time ahead for politics. Now is not the time."
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- Who is he kidding?
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- * Last June, during one of his many church speeches,
Army Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin said George W. Bush became president "because
God put him there." He also said Islamic extremists hate us "because
we are a Christian nation."
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- Boykin went on to claim that a Muslim warlord in Somalia
had been defeated because "I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew
that my God was a real god and his was an idol."
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- His zealotry smacks of the extremism he hates.
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- * On Jan. 22, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld ruffled
diplomatic feathers when he referred to France and Germany as the "old
Europe" and the former communist nations now in NATO as the "new
Europe."
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- This is the same "old Europe" that stood by
us in the Cold War and is now heading up security operations and civil
enforcement operations in Afghanistan.
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- * On March 7, Secretary of State Colin Powell said: "Intelligence
gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime
continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised."
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- Isn't it time for Powell to recant?
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- * On Jan. 9, then-White House press secretary Ari Fleischer
said, "We know for a fact there are weapons (of mass destruction)
there."
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- Any regrets, Ari?
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- * On Dec. 17, Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., said the Bush
administration gave a classified intelligence briefing to members of Congress
in October 2002 saying Iraq not only had the weapons "but they had
the means to deliver them to East Coast cities." The briefing was
held before the vote authorizing the use of force to attack Iraq.
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- So why the congressional silence -- throughout 2003 --
after being misled into voting for war?
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- * On May 28, in a Vanity Fair interview, deputy defense
secretary Paul Wolfowitz, a key architect of the Iraqi war, told of the
administration plotting to sell the war to the American public.
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- "For bureaucratic reasons, we settled on one issue
-- weapons of mass destruction because it was one reason everyone could
agree on."
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- Honest but appalling.
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- * After a trip to Iraq in late July to check on how the
U.S. occupation was going, Wolfowitz warned: "Foreigners should stay
out of Iraq."
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- A little too late, isn't it?
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- * For credibility, I'll take former chief U.N. weapons
inspector Hans Blix. He reminded us on Dec. 23 that there are only two
justifications for pre-emptive war: the presence of a threat of armed action
credibly documented, and an urgency that does not tolerate delay.
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- The U.S. action against Iraq met neither test.
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- Helen Thomas is a columnist for Hearst Newspapers. E-mail:
helent@hearstdc.com.
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- Copyright 2003 Hearst Newspapers.
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- http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/154440_thomas30.html
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