06-21-2004 

QUOTABLES:

“We live in a sound-bite culture. Ronald Reagan’s sound bite is, ‘Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.’  Bill Clinton’s sound bite is, ‘I did not have sex with that woman,” comments historian Douglas Brinkley.

"In many ways, the book is a mirror of Mr. Clinton's presidency: Lack of discipline leading to squandered opportunities; high expectations, undermined by self-indulgence and scattered concentration.” -- writes book critic Michiko Kakutani.

“Bill Clinton, having delivered a command performance in launching his book blitz with Dan Rather last night, is in no danger of getting the Ronald Reagan treatment.” – writes Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post.

"Scandals? What scandal? He had sex with an intern, okay?" – comments James Carville on Bill Clinton.

“Stop wasting time posturing on television and get involved writing a defensible commission report.” – writes Bill Safire about the 9-11 Commission.

BUSH BEAT

UN Confirms: WMDs Smuggled Out of Iraq

editorial by Rod D. Martin

In a report which might alternately be termed "stunning" or "terrifying", United Nations weapons inspectors confirmed last week not merely that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, but that he smuggled them out of his country, before, during and after the war.

Late last week, the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) briefed the Security Council on Saddam's lightning-fast dismantling of missile and WMD sites before and during the war. UNMOVIC executive chairman Demetrius Perricos detailed not only the export of thousands of tons of missile components, nuclear reactor vessels and fermenters for chemical and biological warheads, but also the discovery of many (but not most) of these items -- with UN inspection tags still on them -- as far afield as Jordan, Turkey and even Holland.

Notably absent from that list is Iraq's western neighbor Syria, ruled by its own Baath Party just like Saddam's and closed to even the thought of an UNMOVIC inspection. Israeli intelligence has been reporting the large-scale smuggling of Saddam's WMD program across the Syrian border since at least two months before the war. Syria has long been the world's foremost state-sponsor of terrorism.

Perricos highlighted the proliferation danger to the Security Council, as well he should: UNMOVIC has no idea where most of the WMD material is today, just that it exists and it's gone; and anything in Syria is likely to be in Jerusalem or New York tomorrow.

This is the biggest news story of 2004 so far. Yet you haven't heard about it, have you?

You probably haven't heard about Canada's Prime Minister Paul Martin either -- a socialist and no friend of America. Addressing a group of 700 university researchers and business leaders in Montreal last month, Martin stated bluntly that terrorists have acquired WMDs from Saddam. "The fact is that there is now, we know well, a proliferation of nuclear weapons, and that many weapons that Saddam Hussein had, we don't know where they are. [T]errorists have access to all of them," the Canadian premier warned.

The tip of this terrorist sword was scarcely deflected on April 26th, when Jordanian intelligence broke up an al Qaeda conspiracy to detonate a large chemical device in the capital city of Amman. Directed by al Qaeda terrorist leader Abu al-Zarqawi -- the same man who personally beheaded American Nicholas Berg in Iraq last month -- the plotters sought to use a massive explosion to spread a "toxic cloud", meant to wipe out the U.S. embassy, the Jordanian prime minister's office, the Jordanian intelligence headquarters, and at least 20,000 civilians (by contrast, only 3,000 died on 9/11). Over twenty tons of chemical weapons were seized from the conspirators, who were just days away from carrying out their plot.

One wonders where CNN and USA Today think twenty tons of nerve gas and Sarin came from: Chemical Weapons-Mart? Yet their coverage, like most major media outlets, mentioned not a word about Saddam's smuggled WMDs, which -- according to liberal dogma --"don't exist."

Even though the UN says they do exist, now spread around the world.

It's not just the UN. Bill Clinton says they exist, even after the war: in a July 2003 interview with Larry King, the ex-president uncharacteristically defended George Bush, saying "it is incontestable that on the day I left office, there [was]...a substantial amount of biological and chemical material unaccounted for" in Iraq. Every intelligence agency in the world -- French, British, German, Russian, Czech, you name it -- agreed before the war; Jordanian intelligence can certainly confirm their opinion today.

So what's the deal? Why the relentless pretence that "Bush lied" when even the UN and Bill Clinton say he didn't? Why the absolute silence about "inconvenient" parts of various UN reports, such as the discovery of chemical and biological weapons plans, recipes and equipment; of bio-weapons agents in an Iraqi scientist's house; of a prison lab for testing bio weapons on humans; of complexes for manufacturing fuel for prohibited long-range missiles; of artillery rounds containing enough sarin to kill thousands of people, of similar shells containing mustard gas, two (but far from the only) of which were used in a terrorist attack against U.S. forces just weeks ago?

America cannot afford the answer to this "why": that many on the left consider George W. Bush's defeat more urgent than al Qaeda's, his political death more essential than the possible physical death of millions of Americans.

The character of our foreign enemies has never been in doubt. The character of the enemy within -- from Dan Rather to Michael Moore -- has never been clearer. And the stakes are the highest they've ever been.

 Just POlitics

Al Qaeda – Iraq ties

Reuters is reporting on Vice President Dick Cheney’s claim of al Qaeda – Iraq connections being given review by 9-11 Commissioner John Lehman:

Republican commissioner John Lehman told NBC's "Meet the Press" program that the new intelligence, if proven true, buttresses claims by the Bush administration of ties between Iraq and the militant network believed responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on America.

Iowa Presidential Watch reported previously on the incident where review of captured Iraqi documents show that Lieutenant colonel, Ahmed Hikmat Shakir of the Iraqi Fedayeen attended a planning meeting for the Sept. 11 attacks in January 2000, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The meeting was also attended by two of the hijackers, Khalid al Midhar and Nawaf al Hamzi and senior al-Qaida leaders.

The United Press International is also carrying a story that shows Lehman supporting a position contrary to the staff report that has been used to say there were no al Qaeda – Iraq connections:

He [John Lehman] pointed out that the Clinton White House had made the same charges the current administration did about the danger that Iraq might pass chemical or biological weapons to al-Qaida. Those charges, he said, formed the basis for the missile strikes against alleged terrorist targets in Sudan in August 1998. "The Clinton administration portrayed the relationship between al-Qaida and Saddam's intelligence services as one of cooperating in weapons development," he said.

Kerry out-spends Bush

The Associated Press reports that Kerry outspent Bush by $10 million in May:

Kerry spent $32 million in May and opened this month with about $28 million left, a monthly campaign finance report he filed Sunday with the Federal Election Commission showed.

Bush used up $22 million last month and started June with $63 million on hand, according to his latest FEC report

The Associated Press is also reporting that John Kerry is returning a $2,000 check from the son of South Korea's disgraced ex-president after learning the donor was charged with tax evasion.

There has been heavy fundraising from the Asian community and rumors abound about illegal contributions to Kerry’s campaign. So far, there is no proof of any illegal campaign contributions or violation of foreign involvement.

New York Times on Kerry

The NY Times reports on the rich and privileged Sen. John Kerry’s Fathers Day at the wealthy resort of Nantucket. It seems that most of his day was spent being disappointed by flat bicycle tires, plane problems and boating problems.

There was this cautionary note and reply by those concerned about his appearance at his wife’s resort home:

Though some Democrats were concerned about the image of their wealthy candidate frolicking among the fabulously wealthy here on an island where the average home sells for $1.4 million, Mr. Kerry insisted not only on coming, but also on trying to kite-surf, a dangerous combination of waterskiing and parasailing with basic equipment costing about $2,500.

"Let Kerry be Kerry," said David Wade, Mr. Kerry's press secretary. "It's a place he and his family have been coming to for years. He loves to be out on the water.''

"He'll be America's most active president since Teddy Roosevelt," Mr. Wade added.

Safire’s 9-11 Commission advice

NY Times editorialist William Saffire offers advice to the 9-11 Commission on how to regain credibility after its failure to accurately portray the al Qaeda-Iraq connection:

What can the commission do now to regain its nonpartisan credibility?

1. Require every member to sign off on every word that the commission releases, or write and sign a minority report. No more "staff conclusions" without presenting supporting evidence, pro and con.

2. Set the record straight, in evidentiary detail, on every contact known between Iraq and terrorist groups, including Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's operations in Iraq. Include the basis for the Clinton-era "cooperating in weapons development" statement.

3. Despite the prejudgment announced yesterday by Kean and Democratic partisan Richard Ben-Veniste dismissing Mohammed Atta's reported meeting in Prague with an Iraqi spymaster, fairly spell out all the evidence that led to George Tenet's "not proven or disproven" testimony. (Start with www.edwardjayepstein.com.)

4. Show how the failure to retaliate after the attack on the U.S.S. Cole affected 9/11, how removing the director of central intelligence from running the C.I.A. would work, and how Congress's intelligence oversight failed abysmally.

5. Stop wasting time posturing on television and get involved writing a defensible commission report.

MoveOn.org’s lies

Right March is pointing out that the Annenberg Political Fact Check (FactCheck.org -- a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania) states that the recent MoveOn.org Halliburton – Silver Platter ad is factually wrong. The ad implies that Bush administration gave Vice President Dick Cheney’s old company illegal contracts.

Right March reports that MoveOn.org goes even further on their website, "While soldiers are dying in Iraq, Dick Cheney's old company Halliburton has defrauded the government of millions and charged for meals for the troops which were never delivered."

Visit http://www.factcheck.org/article.aspx?docid=201 to view this FactCheck article in full.

clinton comedies

Reagan v Clinton... no contest

Under the heading of “Bill Clinton’s Aura: Still at the Cleaners,” the Washington Post writer Howard Kurtz makes the following observation about the former presidents Reagan and Clinton:

Bill Clinton, having delivered a command performance in launching his book blitz with Dan Rather last night, is in no danger of getting the Ronald Reagan treatment.

Liberal commentators, some swallowing hard, may have hailed the 93-year-old Gipper as he passed from the scene. But there is no cultural cease-fire for the 57-year-old Democrat who left office less than four years ago.

And then there is this observation by historian Douglas Brinkley:

“We live in a sound-bite culture. Ronald Reagan’s sound bite is, ‘Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.’  Bill Clinton’s sound bite is, ‘I did not have sex with that woman, Miss Lewinsky’... take a swipe at Reagan at your peril. Take a swipe at Clinton, and you get laughs and applause.”

And this gloss-over gem from former Clinton campaign mastermind James Carville:

"Scandals? What scandal? He had sex with an intern, okay?"

The article surmises the summer will be spent rehashing the old issues of yester-year, polarized now as they were then, as Clinton book tours for dollars.