"While it is perfectly legitimate to criticise my decision or the conduct of the war, it is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how the war began.-
[...]
"The stakes in the global war on terror are too high and the national interest is too important for politicians to throw out false charges,"
What we think he means, though it isn't clear from how he says it, is it's "deeply irresponsible" to throw out charges you know are false.
So that if you know Bush and his dark-matter constellation were telling the truth about why the US had to invade and occupy Iraq, and you accuse them of lying, you're being deeply irresponsible.
That's unimpeachable.
But the charges are being made in good faith, the people making them believe Bush and his dark-matter constellation were lying. And that that dishonesty slanders the names and impugns the honor of everyone connected with that invasion and occupation.
His way of saying that is what the younger folks call "weasel words".
Meditating on the whole sorry business, we can begin wondering if those in positions of authority and trust, if they did lie about the reasons for the war, if they would lie about something as serious as that - might they not be lying now? What wouldn't they lie about?
To really answer that we'd need to know why they lied in the first place. But they say they didn't. So here we are.
Another thing we're wondering first thing in the morning this morning - how many lives of far less magnitude and connection than Wilson's and Plame's were ruined by the same reputational death squads? Are we to assume that this was the only time in their collective histories that these men attempted to destroy those who got in their way? That they were never successful?
