Thursday, January 15, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

Editor's Note: The real 'imminent threat'

Based on what we know--we being voters who are at least halfway paying attention and what we know being all the facts surfacing about the president's outrageous acts and cynical lies--there seems no possible way George W. Bush will be elected to a second term. Of course, sadly, that's not necessarily how things work.

Nevertheless, the information we all have at our disposal makes an incredibly strong case that Bush's first term is stacking up as among the most destructive in U.S. history. It's hard to believe, really, that there haven't been independent prosecutors and impeachment proceedings. There's something deeply wrong if, as some polls suggest, a majority of Americans still support this reckless, arrogant president.

But don't take my word for it. Here are some source materials so you can make up your own mind:

¥ "60 Minutes" report, Jan. 11. Bush's first Treasury secretary, Paul O'Neill, revealed that the president set in motion plans to oust Saddam Hussein just days after taking office--fully seven months before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that were the declared impetus for the Iraq war. O'Neill, who sat in on National Security Council meetings, said he never saw legitimate evidence that Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. O'Neill, who disagreed with Bush on several issues, was later fired. O'Neill's experiences, plus details of 19,000 documents the former corporate executive kept from his stint as Treasury secretary, are fully detailed in a new book, The Price of Loyalty, by Ron Susskind.

¥ Washington Post article, "Iraq's Arsenal Was Only on Paper," by Barton Gellman, Jan. 7. This in-depth article, based on extensive interviews with Iraqi scientists, weapons inspectors and other knowledgeable sources, shows that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction of any kind despite the Bush administration's claims to the contrary as it ordered troops into action. The article notes evidence that Iraqi leaders wanted to develop such weapons but for a variety of reasons never could get the covert projects off the ground. A combination of international boycotts, U.N. weapons inspections and weapons destruction, and internal squabbling and incompetence prevented Iraq from putting together any credible threat to the United States, or even to neighboring countries. Salon.com columnist Joe Conason sums up the article thus: "What Gellman's story proves is that the U.N. inspections regime worked. The first Gulf War and the inspections (and bombings) that followed had effectively disarmed Iraq."

¥ Carnegie Endowment for International Peace study, "WMD in Iraq: Evidence and Implications," Jan. 8. This nonpartisan study confirms much of what the Washington Post found, that "Operations Desert Storm and Desert Fox, and U.N. inspectors and sanctions effectively destroyed Iraq's large-scale chemical weapon production capabilities." The study adds that the "intelligence community overestimated the chemical and biological weapons in Iraq" and "appears to have been unduly influenced by policy makers' views." Carnegie researchers also say there is "no solid evidence of a cooperative relationship between Saddam's government and Al Qaeda." In an interview with the Boston Globe, Carnegie president Jessica Mathews said intelligence officials "were under intense pressure to produce something that buttresses policy makers' beliefs." In short, supporting Paul O'Neill's story, President Bush had decided long before Sept. 11 that he wanted to remove Saddam Hussein from power and pressured intelligence officials to cook up enough evidence to support his case for a unilateral, "preemptive" war.

¥ Army War College report, Jan. 11. Jeffrey Record, a professor at the Air War College at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama, strongly criticizes the Bush administration's handling of the war on terrorism, citing an "unnecessary" war in Iraq that draws resources away from fighting terrorism. Record contends the war on terrorism "as currently defined and waged is dangerously indiscriminate and ambitious" and "is strategically unfocused, promises more than it can deliver, and threatens to dissipate U.S. military resources in an endless and hopeless search for absolute security." Record, a veteran defense specialist and author of six books on military strategy, calls Iraq "a war-of-choice distraction from the war of necessity against" Al Qaeda. So, the Army, which Bush sent to Iraq to get Saddam, is now freely publishing reports highly critical of its commander in chief.

A key point: The information revealed by these studies, books and articles is not the ranting of some liberal politician with a kneejerk hatred for Bush. These are serious people doing serious investigative work, and they are uncovering very disturbing facts and trends.

And just to be clear: It's a good thing that Saddam Hussein no longer rules Iraq. He was a tyrant and he deserves to be severely punished for his crimes. It's also possible that a post-Saddam Iraq eventually will be a better, freer place, though few authorities seriously think genuine democracy can flourish there anytime soon.

But the fact that Hussein has been captured does not excuse the fact that President Bush has acted carelessly and foolishly in foreign affairs, and that he's blatantly, shamelessly lied to the American people (including the minority who voted for him). It also doesn't legitimize the 495 Americans (and counting) who have been killed during Bush's Iraq boondoggle.

As these reports and many others (on many other issues) show, President Bush has no credibility and no respect for democratic institutions. He is an "imminent threat" to the health and welfare of the United States and should be removed from power on Nov. 2.

--GEOFF SCHUMACHER