Why do you still support Bush?

Russia had it right.

From the UN Security Council:

Russia

Russia has called for the UN weapons inspectors to be given more time to complete their work and insisted that the inspections have not provided evidence that would justify a war in Iraq.

Moscow has said that it will veto the current draft resolution on Iraq, sponsored by the US, UK and Spain, if it comes to the vote.

CI, link please! What an important article.

Cycloptichorn

Cyclo, Here's the link, but they are easy to find with the writer's name and title of article in any search engine.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/jul2003/air-j24.shtml

Weapons Inspection Program


Because the UN Security Council refused to endorse the US-UK invasion and occupation of Iraq in March 2003, Washington and London hoped to ignore the UN and operate with a free hand in the country. But a fierce Iraqi resistance, persistent economic and political problems, and continuing international criticism forced the US-UK to seek international partners for their enterprise, including assistance from the UN. A debate ensured between those who thought that the UN could be the wedge for internationalization and US-UK withdrawal and those who thought a UN presence would only discredit the world body. Following the adoption of Security Council Resolution 1483 two months after the war, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan appointed a Special Representative for Iraq and the UN assumed some small responsibilities there. Many critics warned, though, that the UN should not be identified with the illegal war and occupation. In August 2003, a massive bombing of UN headquarters in Baghdad confirmed the critics' fears, killing fifteen UN staff including the Special Representative. The UN then pulled out of Iraq and kept its distance, but in February 2004, under heavy US pressure, the UN agreed to send a mission to the country, to help construct a new interim government. Again, Washington kept the UN's political role weak, while seeking UN legitimation. After the establishment of an interim government in June, the US pressured the UN to take a larger role in planning national elections, but security dangers and reluctance by the Secretary General and UN staff kept the UN role to a minimum. Only if the US occupation ends, does a substantial UN role now appear likely.


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ADMINISTRATION
Libby Says Bush Authorized Leaks

By Murray Waas, National Journal
© National Journal Group Inc.
Thursday, April 6, 2006

Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff has testified that President Bush authorized him to disclose the contents of a highly classified intelligence assessment to the media to defend the Bush administration's decision to go to war with Iraq, according to papers filed in federal court [PDF] on Wednesday by Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor in the CIA leak case.


Libby testified to a federal grand jury that he had received "approval from the President through the Vice President" to divulge portions of a National Intelligence Estimate.



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I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby testified to a federal grand jury that he had received "approval from the President through the Vice President" to divulge portions of a National Intelligence Estimate regarding Saddam Hussein's purported efforts to develop nuclear weapons, according to the court papers. Libby was said to have testified that such presidential authorization to disclose classified information was "unique in his recollection," the court papers further said.

Libby also testified that an administration lawyer told him that Bush, by authorizing the disclosure of classified information, had in effect declassified the information. Legal experts disagree on whether the president has the authority to declassify information on his own.

The White House had no immediate reaction to the court filing.

Although not reflected in the court papers, two senior government officials said in interviews with National Journal in recent days that Libby has also asserted that Cheney authorized him to leak classified information to a number of journalists during the run-up to war with Iraq. In some instances, the information leaked was directly discussed with the Vice President, while in other instances Libby believed he had broad authority to release information that would make the case to go to war.

In yet another instance, Libby had claimed that President Bush authorized Libby to speak to and provide classified information to Washington Post assistant managing editor Bob Woodward for "Plan of Attack," a book written by Woodward about the run-up to the Iraqi war.

Bush and Cheney authorized the release of the information regarding the NIE in the summer of 2003, according to court documents, as part of a damage-control effort undertaken only days after former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV alleged in an op-ed in The New York Times that claims by Bush that Saddam Hussein had attempted to procure uranium from the African nation of Niger were most likely a hoax.

According to the court papers, "At some point after the publication of the July 6 Op Ed by Mr. Wilson, Vice President Cheney, [Libby's] immediate supervisor, expressed concerns to [Libby] regarding whether Mr. Wilson's trip was legitimate or whether it was in effect a junket set up by Mr. Wilson's wife."

Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, was a covert CIA officer at the time, and Cheney, Libby, and other Bush administration officials believed that Wilson's allegations could be discredited if it could be shown that Plame had suggested that her husband be sent on the CIA-sponsored mission to Niger.

Two days after Wilson's op-ed, Libby met with then-New York Times reporter Judith Miller and not only disclosed portions of the NIE, but also Plame's CIA employment and potential role in her husband's trip.

Regarding that meeting, Libby "testified that he was specifically authorized in advance... to disclose the key judgments of the classified NIE to Miller" because Vice President Cheney believed it to be "very important" to do so, the court papers filed Wednesday said. The New York Sun reported the court filing on its Web site early Thursday.

Libby "further testified that he at first advised the Vice President that he could not have this conversation with reporter Miller because of the classified nature of the NIE," the court papers said. Libby "testified that the Vice President had advised [Libby] that the President had authorized [Libby] to disclose relevant portions of the NIE."

Additionally, Libby "testified that he also spoke to David Addington, then counsel to the Vice President, whom [Libby] considered to be an expert in national security law, and Mr. Addington opined that Presidential authorization to publicly disclose a document amounted to a declassification of the document."

Addington succeeded Libby as Cheney's chief of staff after Libby was indicted by a federal grand jury on Oct. 28, 2005 on five counts of making false statements, perjury, and obstruction of justice in attempting to conceal his role in outing Plame as an undercover CIA operative.

Four days after the meeting with Miller, on July 12, 2003, Libby spoke again to Miller, and also for the first time with Time magazine correspondent Matthew Cooper, during which Libby spoke to both journalists about Plame's CIA employment and her possible role in sending her husband to Niger.

Regarding those conversations, Libby understood that the Vice President specifically selected him to "speak to the press in place of Cathie Martin (then the communications person for the Vice President) regarding the NIE and Wilson," the court papers said. Libby also testified, Fitzgerald asserted in the court papers, that "at the time of his conversations with Miller and Cooper, he understood that only three people -- the President, the Vice President and [Libby] -- knew that the key judgments of the NIE had been declassified.

"[Libby] testified in the grand jury that he understood that even in the days following his conversation with Ms. Miller, other key officials-including Cabinet level officials-were not made aware of the earlier declassification even as those officials were pressed to carry out a declassification of the NIE, the report about Wilson's trip and another classified document dated January 24, 2003." It is unclear from the court papers what the January 24, 2003 document might be.

During those very same conversations with the press that day Libby "discussed Ms. Wilson's CIA employment with both Matthew Cooper (for the first time) and Judith Miller (for the third time)," the court papers further said.

Although the special prosecutor's grand jury investigation has not uncovered any evidence that the Vice President encouraged Libby to release information about Plame's covert CIA status, the court papers said that Cheney had "expressed concerns to [Libby] regarding whether Mr. Wilson's trip was legitimate or whether it was in effect a junket set up by Mr. Wilson's wife."

Cheney told investigators that he had learned of Plame's employment by the CIA and her potential role in her husband being sent to Niger by then-CIA director George Tenet, according to people familiar with Cheney's interviews with the special prosecutor.

Tenet has told investigators that he had no specific recollection of discussing Plame or her role in her husband's trip with Cheney, according to people with familiar with his statement to investigators.

Two senior government officials said that Tenet did recall, however, that he made inquiries regarding the veracity of the Niger intelligence information as a result of inquires from both Cheney and Libby. As a result of those inquiries, Tenet then had the CIA conduct a new review of its Niger intelligence, and concluded that there was no evidence that Saddam Hussein had in fact attempted to purchase uranium from Niger or other African nations. Tenet and other CIA officials then informed Cheney, other administration officials, and the congressional intelligence committees of the new findings, the sources said.

Six days after Libby's conversation with Cooper and Miller regarding Plame, on July 18, 2003, the Bush administration formally declassified portions of the NIE on Iraqi weapons programs in an effort to further blunt the damage of Wilson's allegations that the Bush administration misused the faulty Niger intelligence information to make the case to go to war. It is unclear whether the information that Bush and Cheney were said to authorize Libby to disclose was the same information that was formally declassified.

One former senior government official said that both the president and Cheney, in directing Libby to disclose classified information to defend the administration's case to go to war with Iraq and in formally declassifying portions of the NIE later, were misusing the classification process for political reasons.

The official said that while the administration declassified portions of the NIE that would appear exculpatory to the White House, it insisted that a one-page summary of the NIE which would have suggested that the President mischaracterized other intelligence information to go to war remain classified.

As National Journal recently disclosed, the one-page summary of the NIE told Bush that although "most agencies judge" that an Iraqi procurement of aluminum tubes was "related to a uranium enrichment effort", the State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research and the Energy Department's branch "believe that the tubes more likely are intended for conventional weapons."

Despite receiving that assessment, the president stated without qualification in his January 28, 2003, State of the Union address: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa. Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production."

The former senior official said in an interview that he believed that the attempt to conceal the contents of the one-page summary were intertwined with the efforts to declassify portions of the NIE and to leak information to the media regarding Plame: "It was part and parcel of the same effort, but people don't see it in that context yet."

Although the court papers filed Wednesday revealed that Libby had testified that Bush and Cheney had authorized him to disclose details of the NIE, two other senior government officials said in interviews that Libby had asserted that Cheney had more broadly authorized him to leak classified information to a number of journalists during the run-up to war with Iraq as part of an administration effort to make the case to go to war.

In another instance, Libby had claimed that Bush authorized Libby to speak to and provide classified information to Washington Post assistant managing editor Bob Woodward for "Plan of Attack."

Other former senior government officials said that Bush directed people to assist Woodward in the book's preparation: "There were people on the Seventh Floor [of the CIA] who were told by Tenet to cooperate because the President wanted it done. There were calls to people to by [White House communication director] Dan Bartlett that the President wanted it done, if you were not co-operating. And sometimes the President himself told people that they should co-operate," said one former government official.

It is unclear whether Libby will argue during his upcoming trial that these other authorizations by both the President and Vice President show that he did not engage in misconduct by disclosing Plame's CIA status to reporters, or that he considered these other authorizations giving him broad authority to make other disclosures.

Fitzgerald has apparently avoided questioning Libby, other government officials, and journalists about other potential leaks of classified information to the media, according to attorneys who have represented witnesses to the special prosecutor's probe. Outside legal experts said this might be due to the fact that other authorized leaks might aid Libby's defense, and because Fitzgerald did not want to question reporters about other contacts with Libby because of First Amendment concerns.

In a Feb. 17, 2006 letter to John D. Negroponte, the Director of National Intelligence, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., wrote that he believed that disclosures in Woodward's book damaged national security. "According to [Woodward's] account, he was provided information related to sources and methods, extremely sensitive covert actions, and foreign intelligence liaison services."

Woodward's book contains, for example, a detailed account of a January 25, 2003 briefing that Libby provided to senior White House staff to make the case that Saddam Hussein had aggressive programs underway to develop chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons.

Two former government officials said in interviews that the account provided sensitive intelligence information that had not been cleared for release. The book referred to intercepts by the National Security Agency of Iraqi officials that purportedly showed that Iraq was engaging in weapons of mass destruction program.

Much of the information presented by Libby at the senior White House staff meeting was later discarded by then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and then-CIA Director George Tenet as unreliable, and would not have either otherwise been made public.

One former senior official said: "They [the leakers] might have tipped people to our eavesdropping capacities, and other serious sources and methods issues. But to what end? The information was never presented to the public because it was bunk in the first place."

In the letter to Negroponte, Sen. Rockefeller complained: "I [previously] wrote both former Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) George Tenet and Acting DCI John McLaughlin seeking to determine what steps were being taken to address the appalling disclosures in [Woodward's book]. The only response that I received was to indicate that the leaks had been authorized by the Administration."

-- Previous coverage of pre-war intelligence and the CIA leak investigation from Murray Waas. Brian Beutler provided research assistance for this report.

Thanks ci. I know it's easy enough to find, but I had to run out of the office and didn't want to forget about the article on the way home; I have a mind to bring it up with Ican tonight...

Cycloptichorn

Cyclo, Don't waste your time with ican. With almost anybody else, something you post may have a reasonable chance for acceptance, but ican's constant rhetoric about "malignancy" is all he knows. That's his first and last argument.

I must confess that at first I skimmed Mr. Imposter's posts. Then I went back and began to read them, but something stopped me.

I will call it--the Mr.Imposter political qualifier syndrome--

On another thread, Mr. Imposter refused to accept the findings of a certain Mr. Podhoretz even though Mr. Podhoretz's findings were exhaustively documented.

Mr.Imposter refused to accept those findings because he said that Mr. Podhoretz was a neo-conservative. Apparently, if one is listed as a neo-conservative, that categorization alone is sufficient to render all of his writing as highly biased and, therefore, unworthy of review.

I must, with a heavy heart, point out to Mr. Imposter, that if I use his "political qualifier syndrome", I must immediately reject the writings of Mr. Conachy was highly biased since the post Mr. Imposter gave above which was written by Mr. Conachy was from the wsns, which is (gasp) THE WORLD SOCIALIST WEB SITE.

Similarly, the other reference is from a Mr. Murray Waas, who is celebrated as a writer for the "American Prospect' A magazine, the web states, founded in 1990 as a magazine of LIBERAL IDEAS.

Therefore, if Mr. Imposter's "political qualifier syndrome" is valid, neither of these posts is worth reading.

I, of course, do not believe that a liberal or a conservative is not worth reading. I do believe that if the ideas are mistaken or twisted, those ideas must be rebutted using evidence. It is an Ad Hominem error to attack a writer on the basis of his ideology. His ideas must be met head on and either accepted or rebutted USING EVIDENCE.

I am ready to read all of the material above and will prepare to rebut the articles,if possible. I urge Mr. Imposter to go back to the posting of the article by Mr. Podhoretz to do the same.

So David, do you think we should pack up and get out now? Let the Iraqis take care of the mess we created there?

I'd vote for that.

I'm sure Old Europe can be counted on for help, too, if there are enough oil contracts thrown their way ... you know, like when Saddam was in power.

If our enemies knew we would blow them to the stone age and then leave them to their own devices it would be more of a deterrent IMO, but then the businessmen who own our leaders would be unable to profit from these little wars.... and that's the whole idea of them n'est pas?

Since Mr.Imposter may have missed my post, I will repost it.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I must confess that at first I skimmed Mr. Imposter's posts. Then I went back and began to read them, but something stopped me.

I will call it--the Mr.Imposter political qualifier syndrome--

On another thread, Mr. Imposter refused to accept the findings of a certain Mr. Podhoretz even though Mr. Podhoretz's findings were exhaustively documented.

Mr.Imposter refused to accept those findings because he said that Mr. Podhoretz was a neo-conservative. Apparently, if one is listed as a neo-conservative, that categorization alone is sufficient to render all of his writing as highly biased and, therefore, unworthy of review.

I must, with a heavy heart, point out to Mr. Imposter, that if I use his "political qualifier syndrome", I must immediately reject the writings of Mr. Conachy was highly biased since the post Mr. Imposter gave above which was written by Mr. Conachy was from the wsns, which is (gasp) THE WORLD SOCIALIST WEB SITE.

Similarly, the other reference is from a Mr. Murray Waas, who is celebrated as a writer for the "American Prospect' A magazine, the web states, founded in 1990 as a magazine of LIBERAL IDEAS.

Therefore, if Mr. Imposter's "political qualifier syndrome" is valid, neither of these posts is worth reading.

I, of course, do not believe that a liberal or a conservative is not worth reading. I do believe that if the ideas are mistaken or twisted, those ideas must be rebutted using evidence. It is an Ad Hominem error to attack a writer on the basis of his ideology. His ideas must be met head on and either accepted or rebutted USING EVIDENCE.

I am ready to read all of the material above and will prepare to rebut the articles,if possible. I urge Mr. Imposter to go back to the posting of the article by Mr. Podhoretz to do the same.

************************************************************
If Mr. Podhoretz, by virtue of being a neo-conservative is not worthy of having his views considered, then, a fortiori, Mr.Conachy, speaking from his perch in the W O R L D S O C I A L I S T W E B S I T E and
Mr. Waas, as a writer in the American Prospect which was ESTABLISHED IN 1990 as a magazine of L I B E R A L I D E A S, are also not worthy of having their views considered.

I, of course, would consider the views of all three commentators. In the interest of fairness, since Mr. Conachy and Mr. Waas have already been referenced, I will reference Mr. Podhoretz.

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/Production/files/podhoretz1205advance.html

Oh sure, indeed! I like oil contracts!

And maybe the kind of deals Halliburton gets! Nice! That will establish democracy in the Middle East! The dominoes are falling!

Yes ... like those.

Yeah ... nation-building sucks.

Much easier to look the other way like Old Europe did during the Balkan ethnic cleansing horror show of the 90s.

Or we could just turn and run like Commander Clinton did in Somalia.

The sky is falling!

It's not flowers they're throwing at our soldiers, it's shrapnel. Or am I misreading you. Are you being sarcastic?

I almost feel bad about attacking Bush any more; he's such a tragic character, a neo-Nixon as much a a neocon. Every week there is a new scandal or tradegy. Nixon did some good things, though he was a little loony; I can't think of one good thing that Bush has done. His Iraq policy is as bankrupt as LBJ's Vietnam was.

I've always thought of Bush as being way over his head in the office of the presidency. He's totally incompetent, and has reached many levels above his level of incompetence. Maybe he would have made a decent mayor of Crawford, TX. or a dictator of a banana republic, and that's about it.

Coluber, I was surprised to see your "location" as Texas, but I have a good friend who lives in Houston, an active democrat, that used to spend time here on a2k. We've met a couple of times in Austin.

Isn't it interesting to see Busch apologists continuing to support all the incompetent actions of this president? Bush's incompetence have cost so many lives in Iraq and the Gulf Coast, it makes one wonder how their heads are screwed on; like those bobble-heads we often see on cars.

Cicerone: It's interesting that many conservative talk show hosts are now viciously attacking Bush on many of his policies, especially the Mexican border issue. But many of them still support his Iraq policy. Bush seems to be so inflexible that he'll follow the same course to disaster. Iraq may still be salvaged as a loose confederacy of three sections as proposed by Peter Galbraith, Leslie Gelb, and now, Sen. Joe Biden, but I look for Bush to toss his Iraq problem onto the next presidency to solve, as LBJ thew his Vietnam albatross onto Nixon.