So when Instpundit linked to this article and quoted the following, I had hope that the short-term memory press was actually going to look at what the Left has distorted:
The administration's overarching point is true: Intelligence agencies overwhelmingly believed that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, and very few members of Congress from either party were skeptical about this belief before the war began in 2003. Indeed, top lawmakers in both parties were emphatic and certain in their public statements.
But then I noticed the authors of the article. Yeah, they are looking for inconsistencies, but they are going after the usual target: the President:
Bush, in his speech Friday, said that "it is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began." But in trying to set the record straight, he asserted: "When I made the decision to remove Saddam Hussein from power, Congress approved it with strong bipartisan support."The October 2002 joint resolution authorized the use of force in Iraq, but it did not directly mention the removal of Hussein from power.
The resolution voiced support for diplomatic efforts to enforce "all relevant Security Council resolutions," and for using the armed forces to enforce the resolutions and defend "against the continuing threat posed by Iraq."
So these fine inquiring minds of a leading American newspaper are trying to tell me that a decision by Congress to authorize the use of force against Saddam's Iraq, in the light of a law that Congress passed and the prior president signed four years earlier that makes regime change in Iraq our official policy, was incomprehensibly twisted by the President into a war to change the regime in Iraq? Do these two writers really think the Congressional vote was about another round of pounding Iraq without actually going all the way?
Is it possible for these two reporters to be that dimwitted? Or biased? This debate was not that long ago, people. We aren't blank slates that the Post writes over with a whole new history of the debate. The debate was about removing the Saddam regime! There was nothing unclear about what was being debated. Recall the re-debate of Desert Storm and whether it was a mistake to halt the war short of total victory. Note the post-war complaints that we supposedly went into Iraq with too few troops to occupy Iraq after the war. In their rush to complain about troops strength and get a draft to supply the men (and build an anti-war base), the Left seemed to assume regime change was our goal up until this article. This is the first time I've heard of this line of attack--that Congress just authorized striking Saddam while leaving his regime intact!
That these two can now look back and say that this whole regime change thing came out of the blue is astounding. And a disgrace.
When our enemies count on our press to carry them to victory, I sometimes fear they are well founded in their hopes. This article does nothing to soothe my worries. Our Left is in a fight to the death over Iraq. And our press helps them right along every chance it gets.
