Bolton Investigation Provides Collaboration of Downing Street Memo

I was going to write a witty and complex allegory in this space, drawing on the imagery of The Wizard of Oz to make my point. There was going to be a giant green head of "Dubya," complete with smirk, hovering over a dais in a teleprompter screen. He was going to laugh at the MSM Scarecrow, asking it whyever he should give it brains, since he liked it as it was. He'd mock the Democratic Lion, teasing it for not having a spine. He'd praise the Rightwing Tin Man for his rigidity and refusal to bend or compromise, and wonder why it wanted a heart -- those things just get in the way when you're pursuing a mandate. And Dorothy. Oh, poor Dorothy. What did she think was going to happen when she voted for him? Well, what do you expect? She's just a woman. And clicking those lovely red slippers wasn't going to do her a whit of good; they'd just take her right back to Kansas, wouldn't they? The head would chuckle, and return to its rants about how it was a good thing they landed that house on the Wicked Witch, and nevermind that the other Witch was still out there, funding her flying monkey suicide teams with the proceeds of the opium poppy trade.

But I couldn't manage it. I got hung up on trying to fit Bush's words into my own head; it was territory I was unwilling to traverse. The meaning of the allegory is still the same: the "man behind the curtain" is sitting pretty on his emerald throne, delighting in his ability to operate with impunity. So I guess it's up to little Toto the blog and his buddies to keep yanking on that curtain.

The latest update and call to action is below the fold.

It turns out that it's not just the Downing Street Memo that's raising questions about the Bush Administration's plans to go to war in Iraq in the absence of evidence. Rather entertainingly (in a sick sort of way), it turns out that, in the course of investigations into Bush nominee for the UN John Bolton, additional evidence has surfaced that Bush and Co. planned the war from the get-go and massaged the intelligence to justify it.

So why aren't we hearing more about this in the media?

(We're starting to hear a bit about it, but not enough. Keep making noise!)

Remember, the president does not make war without the consent and approval of Congress. Yet Bush, it's looking like, obtained that consent by lying to Congress, an impeachable offense. Don't we want to know if this allegation is true? Why aren't more people asking?

Here's the gist of the latest information about the Bolton revelations, c/o Shakespeare's Sister of the Big Brass Alliance (her original post also includes a timeline of the situation):

The Plot Thickens: DSM and Bolton

References to the Downing Street Memo are starting to pop up in the strangest places. Most recently, it was noted in an AP report that was about Bush’s nominee to the UN, crazy-ass bastard, John Bolton. In delving into a situation that serves as yet another example of why the miscreant Bolton is unfit for the position for which he has been nominated, the article also further strengthens the case, as seemingly evidenced by the Downing Street Memo, that the Bush administration was hellbent on invading Iraq long before they had secured Congressional authority to do so.

The aforementioned situation is this: In 2002, Bolton was key in ousting Jose Bustani, the head of a global arms-control agency, because Bustani was trying to send chemical weapons inspectors to Baghdad, which, as pointed out by the report in Newsday, “might have helped defuse the crisis over alleged Iraqi weapons and undermined a U.S. rationale for war.”

...snip...

The AP also notes (emphasis mine):

Quote:
The Iraq connection to the OPCW affair comes as fresh evidence surfaces that the Bush administration was intent from early on to pursue military and not diplomatic action against Saddam Hussein's regime.

An official British document, disclosed last month, said Prime Minister Tony Blair agreed in April 2002 to join in an eventual U.S. attack on Iraq. Two weeks later, Bustani was ousted, with British help.

This information about the US’ Bolton-led actions against Bustani, in conjunction with the Downing Street Memo, seem clearly to indicate that the US would stop at nothing to manufacture justification for a war with Iraq. Fixing intelligence around the policy, using “spikes of activity” to try to provoke Saddam into doing something that would justify an invasion, and removing any obstacles, like the unfortunate Bustani, that might hinder their path to war. We must continue to demand a formal inquiry into these actions. If the US was taken to war based on deceit and a rationale conjured out of thin air, we must know. And the administration who took us there must be held accountable.

ACTION:
Please contact the nightly news programs and ask them to investigate and report on the new evidence that the Bush administration manipulated intelligence to support its plan to invade Iraq.

CONTACT:
ABC World News Tonight
Phone: 212-456-4040
PeterJennings@abcnews.com

CBS Evening News
Phone: 212-975-3691
evening@cbsnews.com

NBC Nightly News
Phone: 212-664-4971
nightly@nbc.com

PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer
Phone: 703-739-5000
newshour@pbs.org

Comments

[Marja-Leena]

I love the allegory you've sketched here! And I wish all manner of luck to little Toto the blog and his buddies in their battle with the dark side. :-)

[Jill Smith]

And clicking those lovely red slippers wasn't going to do her a whit of good; they'd just take her right back to Kansas, wouldn't they?

Red shoes, red state - WTF is the matter with Kansas? You tell me....

[The Heretik]

Well worked. Nicely argued.

Thanks for you post. It has been added to the blogswarm aggregate for today . E mail me or drop links to new posts in comments over my way. Many voices make a wondrous sound.

Poe says hello, at least to the Raven. The frog . . .

[Jimbo]

Great post! I especially love the Wizard of Oz allegory.

I hope you are right about the DSM and Conyers. I see the Cons are trying to "discredit" the DSM by boldly claiming that it has already been "discredited." Here is a link from Media Matters on the subject.

jwb

[russianviolets]

This is brilliant; I'm laughing just thinking about it. Please do consider writing it in full.

[Satsuma]

Has anyone in America noticed that Bush is opposing Blair's very plans to alleviate third world poverty proposed for this summer's G8 summit? First Kyoto, now this and probably a whole load of other things. I used to be fairly neutral about America but the press coverage it's had in recent years makes me think of the country as it is run at present as a spoilt selfish child who is ruining the party and bringing other kids (i.e. the UK) down with it.

[murky]

"seem clearly to indicate that the US would stop at nothing"

Keyword "seem." Alas they only establish that there are some surprising but not criminal things they did not stop at.

[Rana]

Murky - yes -- for all the "smoking gun" talk, it's not quite that. It's more of a whiff of gunsmoke. Still, though, there's certainly enough to raise suspicions that Bush & Co. did slant evidence to support their position, and that they thus were knowingly deceptive when they made their case to war to Congress.

It's the knowing part -- it's one thing to state untruths unknowingly (which is the stance they've been taking and hiding behind up until now), but it's another to lie or deceive deliberately. And the memo and the Bolton findings are highly suggestive that this is what did happen.

But we can't know for sure without an inquiry: were Bush & Co. incompetent, or deliberate war-mongers who lied to Congress?

[murky]

It's the Catch-22 on which this administration perpetually relies. No certainty without inquiry, no inquiry without certainty.

[Rana]

Satsuma - yes. It would be nice to live in a grown-up country. For a while we were managing to be a rebellious but energetic adolescent with big ideas though not so much experience; now we've regressed back to selfish toddler-hood.