Bush's State of the Union speech is redeemed - Mark Steyn (Sun-Times)

[coda]

I read somewhere else about this Brit report due out about the yellowcake. He really goes after Tenet, the CIA, and Joe Wilson too. In all his bashing of Wilson though, he forgets to mention the outing of his wife. :shrug:

excerpt:

" Last summer, the comparatively minor matter of uranium from Niger was all over the front pages and the news shows. Do you think Butler's report will be? "


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Bush's State of the Union speech redeemed

July 11, 2004

BY MARK STEYN SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST


Do you remember a year ago when the Democratic National Committee was putting out press releases headlined ''President Bush Deceives The American People"?

''The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."


Well, on Wednesday in London, Lord Butler will publish his report into the quality of the intelligence on which rested Britain's case for going to war with Iraq. The report is said to be critical of some of Tony Blair's claims, supportive of others. And, among the latter, he says that the statements about Iraq and Niger are justified and supported by the intelligence. In other words, the British Government did learn that Saddam Hussein did seek significant quantities of uranium from Africa.


<snip>


And so it's proved. The fact is almost every European intelligence service reckoned Saddam was trying to buy uranium in Africa. The only folks who didn't think so were the CIA.


Let's weigh their comparative interest in the story. The Financial Times revealed last week that one continental intelligence agency had had a uranium-smuggling operation involving Iraq under surveillance for three years. In return, the only primary investigation initiated by the most powerful nation on the face of the Earth was to send a narcissistic kook from a Saudi-funded think-tank on vacation for a week to sip mint tea with government stooges. He didn't even bother filing a written report, and the ''Bush spurned my advice!'' column he wrote for the Times reads like a bad travelogue: ''Through the haze, I could see camel caravans crossing the Niger river.'' After that, the great narcissist somehow managed to make himself the center of the story -- But hey, enough about Saddam's nuclear ambitions; let's talk about me.



more.....

http://www.suntimes.com/output/steyn/cst-edt-steyn11.html

[Wink]

1. Steyn is, at all times, a Bush apologist.

Believe me, there is nothing Bush can do wrong in Steyn's eye. I don't think I've ever read Steyn say anything bad about Bush.