If it looks like a duck . . .

Sometimes Americans can be too arrogant for their own good. When we took our case against Iraq to the United Nations and several of the countries stated their opinion that we were wrong in our assertions, we balked at them. "From this point on, we'll order nothing but Freedom Fries, we'll only drink California Wine, and we'll only have . . . uh . . . bread dipped in egg mixture toast for breakfast." But we (and by 'we', I mean George W. Bush) were hell bent on going to war. There had to weapons of mass destruction, our fixed intelligence told us as much.

Wait a second, Robert, did you just say "fixed intelligence"?

Why yes . . . yes I did. The way I see it, there's really nothing else to call it. If we call it strictly "intelligence", that makes us (and by 'us', I mean our intelligence community) look rather inept. After all, as we all . . . let me rephrase . . . as most of us know by now, there were no WMD in Iraq.

But "fixed"? Couldn't you just say "mistaken or faulty intelligence"?

Sorry, the only mistake we made was believing the White House and that's where the fault lies. How much proof do some of you need before you start to glimpse the truth? scandals are now colliding left and right and they all lead back to Bush wanting to invade Iraq so badly that certain "facts" had to be manipulated. Let's take a look:

• Scandal #1. On Sunday, July 6, 2003, Joseph Wilson wrote a piece for the New York Times that began "Did the Bush administration manipulate intelligence about Saddam Hussein's weapons programs to justify an invasion of Iraq?" He goes on to recount how Bush was misleading the American people by asserting that Iraq was actively seeking Yellow Cake Uranium from Niger. In fact, in his 2003 State of the Union Address, Bush said, “The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” Wilson however had already informed the government that those allegations were incorrect. They were based on forged documents. Of course, this went against Bush's intention of taking down Saddam. After Wilson's piece appeared in the New York Times, someone decided he best retribution would be to let the world know that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, was a CIA agent.



• Scandal #2. In 2002 a US undersecretary of state flew to Europe to confront the head of a global arms control agency, Jose Bustani, and demand that he resign from the agency. The undersecretary had learned that Bustani was planning on sending a chemical weapons inspection team to Iraq and that their findings might help defuse the crisis over alleged Iraqi weapons. The undersecretary felt such findings might run counter to what the US "intelligence" was asserting. This could prove fatal to war plans and the undersecretary would have none of it. The undersecretary made threatening phone calls to Bustini and eventually was successful in having him removed during a special session of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. Bustini was later reinstated, but this was after the US invasion of Iraq. Oh, by the way, that undersecretary who was so conniving and threatening . . . current nominee to ambassador at the UN, John R. Bolton.



• Scandal #3. The Downing Street Memos. By now most of you are aware of the several leaked British documents which assert that the US was fixing intelligence to fit their policy of invasion.

Each of these incidents point to the same conclusion, the White House wanted to invade Iraq and were willing to do whatever it took to make sure their plan came to fruition, even if that meant "fixing intelligence" and lying to the American people. Let's be honest, how many American citizens would have said yes to a plan to invade Iraq just to make a regime change? Even with all the blind loyalists in the Bush house, the outcry would have been too loud. The international community would have cried foul and Bush's "coalition of the willing" would have been seen for what it truly is, a "coalition of the coerced."

If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck . . . it must be a duck.