Dana Priest Live Chat

It can be read in all its glory here. There are often several wonders to explore in these chats, and today's was no exception. This evening I highlight only the following:

New York, N.Y.: Re: al Qaeda - Iraq links.

You write that there is "overwhelming intelligence" against "a link between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda".

Are you kidding me???

Even the 9/11 Commission said exactly the opposite: it detailed many links between Al Qaeda and Saddam. The 9/11 Commission only said that there wasn't a "collaborative relationship" between the two. Indeed, Tom Kean and Lee Hamilton went out of their way to say that there WERE links between them.

Sheesh. I can't believe you don't have a grasp of even the simplest facts.

Dana Priest: Well the White House allegation was of a collaborative, operational nature--not something vaguer. They continually linked SH with 9-11. That's the whole point. And on that point, zilch.

That's just flat wrong. The "White House" did not allege a collaborative, operational link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11, and on several key occasions explicitly denied it was making that charge. The Bush Administration has repeatedly linked the war against terror to Saddam Hussein and 9/11, making the uncomplicated argument that Saddam provided a safe haven for terrorists that we shouldn't risk leaving untouched in a war against, you know, terrorism.

Should I say that I'm stunned that Priest would make this kind of mistake, or assume it was an unintentional live-chat misfire? My decision: I'm going to have a beer.

Vice President Cheney was the only major Administration figure who came near to linking Saddam to being actively involved in 9/11. This CNN story during the presidential campaign is a decent roundup of his statements. Cheney tap-danced around the issue at times, saying "we don't know" if Saddam was involved, for example. But that same CNN story accurately quotes both Secretary of State Powell and Bush himself saying there was no proof that Saddam was behind 9/11.

In short, Priest has it backwards: the Bush Administration doesn't argue Saddam had a collaborative, operational link to 9/11, but has made vaguer or at least more general claims that the safe haven he provided to terrorists posed a mortal risk to the United States.

And New York, N.Y. is right: The years have strengthened the case for connections between Al Qaeda and Saddam.

Comments

[Al]

Hey, that was my question!

Re: "Should I say that I'm stunned that Priest would make this kind of mistake, or assume it was an unintentional live-chat misfire?"

I doubt it was an "unintentional live-chat misfire". I was a little taken aback, but not stunned, that Priest was thinking this. I think most lefties think it, facts be damned. It's simply one of the many myths that the "reality-based community" believe. I was very happy to get it out of her, so we can all see how full-of-[it] she really is.

[This comment edited for language. Thanks very much for visiting, Al, I appreciate it. FYI to all commenters, I choose to edit out language that I personally and randomly find to be offensive. One of my mottos is "The World is Ugly Enough," and I try not to add to that ugliness. A number of comments with obscenities are sitting in my moderation tray and will never be approved because of it. And kudos to Al for partially editing the comment in the first place-PW]

[MQ]

The 9/11 commission found contacts but no collaboration/cooperation between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. Contacts, or as you put it in an apparent attempt to make things sound more sinister, "links", demonstrate nothing. There were all kinds of contacts between the U.S. and Russia during the cold war, does that mean we were working together? The notion that Saddam posed a "mortal risk" to the United States because one of his intelligence agents chatted with an Al Qaeda member a decade ago doesn't pass the laugh test.

[M. Watkins]

MQ,

The whole point is that Dana Priest makes the claim that the Administration said there was a concrete connection when they didn't and that's the point he is debunking. Your point whether true or not is irrelevant to that fact. Dana Priest, E.J.Dionne jr. and others keep debunking things that the administration never claimed in the first place.

I'll make stuff up that you said,"Hitler was a nice guy who loved the Jews" then I'll go about debunking it. That's the equivalent of what they are doing.

Andrew Sullivan caught EJ Dionne in a big one when before the war EJ lamented the fact that Bush was using three reasons for going to war against Iraq(Supposedly in EJ's world you're only allowed one reason):WMD's, Humanatarian and potential threat, then after he, EJ, claimed Bush only used one reason, WMD's, and that turned out to be a "lie". The NY Times editors were caught in the same chicanery.

[M. Watkins]

MQ,

The whole point is that Dana Priest makes the claim that the Administration said there was a concrete connection when they didn't and that's the point he is debunking. Your point whether true or not is irrelevant to that fact. Dana Priest, E.J.Dionne jr. and others keep debunking things that the administration never claimed in the first place.

I'll make stuff up that you said,"Hitler was a nice guy who loved the Jews" then I'll go about debunking it. That's the equivalent of what they are doing.

Andrew Sullivan caught EJ Dionne in a big one when before the war EJ lamented the fact that Bush was using three reasons for going to war against Iraq(Supposedly in EJ's world you're only allowed one reason):WMD's, Humanatarian and potential threat, then after he, EJ, claimed Bush only used one reason, WMD's, and that turned out to be a "lie". The NY Times editors were caught in the same chicanery.