Did anyone watch HardBall today 6/20/05? If so you may have seen James Woolsey (?), a former spook and current neocon apologist attempt to insult the intelligence of the American Public. As Matthews apparently had the night off, another anchor was questioning "experts" about the DSM. Naturally the compelling issues were ignored and the conversation was diverted to issues of intelligence or intelligence failures. This is what the media continues to talk about thus giving the impression that the DSM has been covered.
Anyway... Woolsey attempts to float an idea that we in America don't understand the British use of the word "fixed". He attempted to imply that the Brits use this word to mean "gathered" rather than "fqbricated". Well, I know that I am preaching to the choir, but this is the second time that I have heard this idea floated. This is what the right does to introduce the idea into the MSM "debate". Pretty soon everyone will think that the Brits just use funny language. And to be honest, it does sound a little funny and they may have a point. But, wouldn't an intelligent person like Woolsey realize that if this was the case, Tony Blair would have indicated this when questioned about it while visiting the White House? You can see it at this link:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/06/20050607-2.html And if the WhiteHouse has changed it, theis is the transcript:
Q: Thank you, sir. On Iraq, the so-called Downing Street memo from July 2002 says intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy of removing Saddam through military action. Is this an accurate reflection of what happened? Could both of you respond?
PRIME MINISTER BLAIR: Well, I can respond to that very easily. No, the facts were not being fixed in any shape or form at all. And let me remind you that that memorandum was written before we then went to the United Nations. Now, no one knows more intimately the discussions that we were conducting as two countries at the time than me. And the fact is we decided to go to the United Nations and went through that process, which resulted in the November 2002 United Nations resolution, to give a final chance to Saddam Hussein to comply with international law. He didn't do so. And that was the reason why we had to take military action.
But all the way through that period of time, we were trying to look for a way of managing to resolve this without conflict. As it happened, we weren't able to do that because -- as I think was very clear -- there was no way that Saddam Hussein was ever going to change the way that he worked, or the way that he acted.
PRESIDENT BUSH: Well, I -- you know, I read kind of the characterizations of the memo, particularly when they dropped it out in the middle of his race. I'm not sure who "they dropped it out" is, but -- I'm not suggesting that you all dropped it out there. (Laughter.) And somebody said, well, you know, we had made up our mind to go to use military force to deal with Saddam. There's nothing farther from the truth.
My conversation with the Prime Minister was, how could we do this peacefully, what could we do. And this meeting, evidently, that took place in London happened before we even went to the United Nations -- or I went to the United Nations. And so it's -- look, both us of didn't want to use our military. Nobody wants to commit military into combat. It's the last option. The consequences of committing the military are -- are very difficult. The hardest things I do as the President is to try to comfort families who've lost a loved one in combat. It's the last option that the President must have -- and it's the last option I know my friend had, as well.
And so we worked hard to see if we could figure out how to do this peacefully, take a -- put a united front up to Saddam Hussein, and say, the world speaks, and he ignored the world. Remember, 1441 passed the Security Council unanimously. He made the decision. And the world is better off without Saddam Hussein in power.
Now, you could infer from the Hardball bebate that Woolsey is either ignorant, meaning stupid, or, which is the more probable, he is, like his masters, simply trying to purposely mislead the American Public.
My suggestion to us progressives is to avoid debating the issues with our conservative friends. Simply point out how the right is taking advantage of them and duping them into believing lies.