Well, yes, but not exactly. Shortly after the war was begun was when the heat started being generated about there being no WMD. That's when the Bush administration started scrambling for Plan B, and that letter (if it was released months after the start of the war) might have been part of that effort.

Obviously none of us has read this book yet, since it was just released today, but I don't even remember the letter actually coming out. There was a pretty big uproar from the press when the administration tried to link Iraq with al Qaeda (that there was no link) so maybe that letter sort of got lost in translation.

That doesn't mean, however, that the administration didn't get America into this war under "false pretenses."

Wow, you mean the left is going with that old, "Bush lied, blackberry pied!" thing again? Eeeek! The polar bears are in danger!

No WMDs, hahaha. Funny.

Riiiiiiiiiiight, Larry. There was no 500 tons of "yellowcake" uranium moved out of Baghdad recently. That whole thing was just a lie by Bushitler.

And if you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you in Nancy Pelosi's district.

I always use this a time to remind folks about how many times that I've been personally told that Saddam never had WMDs.

Sarin, Ricin, and maybe even the dreaded VX are actually conventional weapons according to Liberals.

I think that would be a bad policy to implement, but if they insist, maybe that can be one of the concessions that can be grudgingly allowed.

Just as long as they remember that they're on the hook for the consequences of doing it their way.

My mistake. I forgot we were talking about President Bush. He never lies and he's always always correct. Sorry.

No, Larry, Bush is not perfect. He's been wrong on several occasions which I've spoken out about, including Harriet Miers, "comprehensive immigration reform," and No Child Left Behind, among others.

See, what you don't get, Larry, is that we conservatives don't deify our members... unlike lefties, who can't admit that their Obamamessiah might possibly be wrong.

I guess going withe meme of "Sarin, Ricin, and maybe even the dreaded VX are actually conventional weapons" then that means the Atropine injectors I had to habitually carry with me on any rides around Baghdad were actually a "source of fiber" for a "better regulated system?"

It got so bad at one point because the local insurgents were using 155mm Binary VX gas shells that were so old the markings were worn off of them, and the fools didn't realise they were setting chem off when they built their early IEDs. I mean I know of at least 4 guys who got evac'd with a bad case of the "Twitchin' Chickens" because of poorly/improperly used Binarys that detonated and gassed them...

But OH NO!!! Nope!! No Weapons of Mass Destruction here... nothing to see here... move along... (the left begins to sound like Frank Drebbin after a while doncha think?)

Gee. Larry... does that mean that when President Clinton, and Hillary, and Nancy Pelosi, and Senator Kennedy, and Senator Kerry, and EVERY OTHER major Democrat were talking about Saddam's WMD threat BEFORE President Bush was inaugurated and going back into the '90s...
...and when they used the WMD issue as a rationale to conduct air strikes on Iraq...
...were they lying too, Larry?

I really want an anwer here. Because, y'know, that might just affect my confidence in them.

I don't think it was all about WMD, it was about violation of the cease fire signed in 1991, it was about violation of 17 UN resolutions, it was about failing to meet the requirements of UN resolution 1441. It was about Saddam's treat to the peace and security of the world. Those of you who oppose the Iraq war. What is it exactly you liked about Saddam that would want him to still be in power? The sanctions would have no doubt been lifed and Saddam would have had a lot of oil money to invest in mischief.

Zeldorf, the left never met a totalitarian dictator they didn't like. They went gaga over Lenin and Stalin, deify Castro and Che Guevara, and think Ahmadinnerjacket is really a misunderstood nice guy. Saddam was right in the same mold, so of course the left is sad that he got taken out.

Did we find "WMD" over there? Yes we did, just not the stuff we thought we would. We found the stuff that Saddam said was destroyed in the in the 90s but could not account for it. Also please keep in mind that we sat on the border for many months waiting for support to push in. Sat photos caught several large convoys heading out of Iraq into places like Syria and Iran. Next let us remember that there have been over 2 million pieces of intel gathered since the push in 03. Of that 2 million only about 600,000 have been deciphered and released. Yeah it takes a long damn time for less than a thousand analysts to go through Two million plus documents. Also remember that for TS classified documents there can be a wait time till declassification of up to 25 years after the operation in question ends before they can be released, depending on what priority is placed on their declassification. Then add in that a majority of the rest of the civilized world believed that Saddam had "WMD", and most of them came to this conclusion based on their own intel.

Now knowing all this, and using a little bit of critical thinking one should be able to see that the jury is still out on it.

Did they have "WMD"? We don't know yet. What matters is that we thought they did, and Saddam did nothing to alleviate our concerns.

Now tie this in with the documents that did tie Saddam to several terrorist organizations (though what we have seen in the 600,000 documents that have been deciphered have only loosely tied him with AQ), but did carry out attacks that did in fact kill U.S. Citizens, and his support of them. I feel confident in saying that no one was lied to.

Do you have solid evidence that says otherwise? I think not because the left seldom actually does any real research before making an accusation.

So nobody sees any problem at all with the White House possibly asking the CIA to forge a letter that would supposedly (falsely) link Iraq with al Qaeda? Just checking.

You will have to forgive me for believing people that have no further vested interest in keeping a lie, over someone who wrote a book without any actual evidence.

No answer to my question, Larry?

When leaders of your party used the same intel that President Bush used, before *and* after he was President, were THEY lying too?

Face it, Larry: YOU have been used like a cheap streetwalker during Fleet Week, by "leaders" of the Left who know for a fact that you will believe anything, anything at all, critical of GWB without ever checking easily-available history. Used for your votes and your time.

To quote from one of your guiding lights... "Better put some ice on that."

Just one question... has anyone here actually SEEN this letter, or do we have to rely on the words of those who would love to see the Bush Administration go down in flames?

I have made a mistake and wish to rectify.

In my post to Larry above, I likened him to "a cheap streetwalker during Fleet Week".
This was wrong, and I regret it.

Women in that trade accept money for services rendered; almost all of them would rather be working in any 'mainstream' trade but are trapped by addiction, violence, and lack of marketable job skills.

There is no evidence that Larry is being compensated in any way or that he is anywhere but where he wants to be, doing what he wishes to do.

Please disregard the "cheap streetwalker during Fleet Week" simile, and instead substitute the following: "eager twink at a Frisco bath-house".

Again, I regret any unintentional offense.

Iraq and al Qaeda had dozens of contacts with each other. Did Larry bother reading the 9-11 report? Go ahead and read the report Larry and then get back to us after you've been educated. Because right now you look intellectually challenged.

Does anyone think that Larry knows he's lying and just figures he can get away with it or is he really that stupid?

"... eager twink at a Frisco bath-house...."

Man, what's the deal with hard-core right-wingers (from Ann Coulter on down the line to anonymous posters at blogs like this) smacking the gay label on their opponents?

Weird.

Don't mean to drag the discussion even farther afield than Dave P. already has, but I must admit to being offended by those who make the Republican Party sound like the home of those who casually throw around homophobic slurs.

I apologize for not seeing that before, Keith, or I would have dumped the comment. Dave P, please reign in your homophobic comments, or head elsewhere. Your host has gay friends, and doesn't take kindly to such talk.

If you don't like the word, it's your website and your business.
However, before you tie in with Keith and slander me... you might just want to find out where "twink" came from, and who uses it most frequently.

Then you might want to apologise to me, and MY gay friends.

Hint: it's about as homophobic as "dyke".

What's next, CY? "Niggardly"? Devil's Food Cake? Black Hole?

PS- "Homophobic" means, pathologically afraid of homosexuality. It does NOT mean "someone who says things someone dislikes about gays", even though that is how it is commonly misused.
You can like or dislike waht I say, but you shouldn't enable the continuing effort to lable all speech nonfavorable to homosexuality as mental illness.

For what it's worth, DaveP. I absolutely ROFLed when I read that appology. Was actually lucky I wasn't drinking anything at the time.

I also have gay (meaning homosexual) friends and I showed the 'offending comment' to one...she ROFLed harder than I did!

http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=767

So when the American Forces Press Service quotes Dick Cheney as saying, "even though no weapons of mass destruction have been found there [Iraq]", who's telling a lie?

George Tenant?

Cheney and Bush have both stated that Iraq had no WMD. You guys who continue to claim that WMD was found there or used there -- do you have evidence that the president and vice-president don't have?

There is no question some wmd's have been found but not in the quantities that we thought. That's what the President and Vice President said. That's not even debatable.

Just in case you're not a far left wing fanatical nut job who gets all of his news from daily kos, here is but one article. This was one exploded sarin gas shell. Good thing it was rigged as an ied rather than a projectile. Again, no stockpiles like we thought but it's irrefutable that Iraq did possess at least a few wmd's

Cheney, does Google work at your house?

Works just fine at mine.

So when the American Forces Press Service quotes Dick Cheney as saying, "even though no weapons of mass destruction have been found there [Iraq]", who's telling a lie?

One BIG issue with that, "Cheney."

The article you list never actually has Cheney saying those words. Rather, those are the words of the reporter, not the Vice President himself.

Thank you for playing, we have some lovely parting gifts for you.

Wow, that's the best you two can do?

You point to two isolated cases from 2004. Sure, those artillery shells contained chemical weapons. Almost certainly left over from Iran-Iraq War. These are the vast stockpiles for which we went to war?

But I'll play -- let's pretend those represent stockpiles of WMD. Neither of you addressed my question. If these shells were sufficient to make true the statement "WMD were found in quantity in post-Saddam Iraq", why don't Bush and Cheney and the gang say that? Why do they continue to say "We now know that Iraq did not possess WMD"?

We just proved you wrong. Then you lie again, I said that there were no stockpiles. But you said no wmd's were found. You lied, we were truthful.

"Cheney," I already addressed your claim about the Vice President's statement. But, since you seem to be a slow learner, let me repeat it.

Your own link, "Cheney," that is, the link you yourself posted does not--I repeat--does NOT contain the quote you claim it does.

The phrase you mention was penned by the reporter, I say again, the REPORTER, not--one more time--NOT the Vice President.

Now, I've made it as obvious as I can. If you continue to make your now-debunked claim, I can only assume that you're either willfully ignorant or dain-bramaged...or both.

"do you have evidence that the president and vice-president don't have?"

"http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/Iraq_WMD_Declassified.pdf"

Please read the reports again there bright box. You will find that when they said we found no WMD in Iraq, they were talking about the stuff we thought they were producing.

As for the accounts of it actually being used. Well you will have to wait for about 25 years to read about any contamination of troops before you read about it.

I had not heard about anyone being contaminated from GB or VX. But I do not know every single thing that has happened over there.

The article I linked to was from the defense department.

Okay, so you doubt even the articles THEY publish, which is pretty amusing. Well, here's Cheney on Meet The Press in 2006: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14720480/page/2/

Here's one of his quotes: "Yes, Tim, because what the reports also showed, while he did not have stockpiles—clearly the intelligence that said he did was wrong."

He says it more than once. In 2006. Your own VP.

No, "Cheney," I don't DOUBT the article, I READ the article, and the phrase you mention never, NEVER, NEVER appears a a direct quotation of Vice President Cheney.

Since you're sticking by your absurd and completely debunked claim, you're obviously not in your right mind, so from now on you're just a cat toy for me to play with.

Okay, so I gave you a link to the direct quote. Would you like to respond to the quote?

Matt et al:
I was there when that happened… it happened on Route Irish on the road leaving BIAP… Baghdad International Airport. Those of us in the AOR went to carrying atropine and promasks immeadiately afterwards. The line from MSNBC “Two members of a military bomb squad were treated for “minor exposure,” but no serious injuries were reported” is sort of right… it was 4 guys, 3 of which were medically evacuated that night due to the exposure. The 4 of them remotely detonated the 155mm Binary shell (conveniently half buried on the side of the road) using a remote controlled delivery device and a brick of C4. The ensuing explosion improperly mixed the two agents (binary… get it?) and the resultant cloud drifted over them depositing a poorly mixed residue of VX. That afternoon, they went to the MEDAC as they were experiencing the typical symptoms of gas exposure (drooling, headaches, twitches) The resultant investigation showed it was a soviet made 155 or 152mm binary gas shell that was set off

It really spooked the hell out of us as the word was that the majority of shells that the insurgents had cached were not properly marked (buried in the ground or hidden in wells and suchlike removed all paint markings). So it made it damned near impossible for the EOD kids to tell if they were dealing with IED ‘normals’ (high explosives alone) or IED ‘freaks’ (gas or bio shells)

Any more questions? And BTW… I’ve seen stacks and STACKS and have photos of the shells that ARE chem…. Take it from me… BT-DT GTTS.

Thanks for the first-hand report, Big Country. Hope you didn't get exposed yourself.

Thanks CCG... to my knowledge I wasn't, but then again, my wife said that I was exposed to 'something' as I'm far more drain bamaged than I was when I first started this whole thing...

...then again, maybe it wasn't that but exposure to liberals... they are rather toxic and been omnipresent as of late...

"Matt et al:
I was there when that happened… it happened on Route Irish on the road leaving BIAP… Baghdad International Airport."

Thanks for the description brother. Just to clarify, I was not saying it did not happen. Just that I had not heard about it.

I too have seen the stockpiles of weapons.