The first part of the program was quite informative with even an interview with the reporter who originally broke the story. However the last part of the show was terrible.
James Woolsey and David Kay were on the show and they both basically had the same point of view that the memos were not very important and that somehow the term "fixed" does not mean "to make the way you want something to be." Yet they would not say, however, what THEY thought the term "fixed" would mean.
This from Daily Kos:
There was some discussion as to just what exactly "fixed" meant on the other side of the aisle. They deemed "fixed" as is "The intelligence was being "fixed" meant "focused" as in "The intelligence was being "focused."
I don't think so. Neither does the reporter who first broke the story.
Here are the words of the reporter himself on this "fixed" definition:
Michael Smith: There are number of people asking about fixed and its meaning. This is a real joke. I do not know anyone in the UK who took it to mean anything other than fixed as in fixed a race, fixed an election, fixed the intelligence. If you fix something, you make it the way you want it. The intelligence was fixed and as for the reports that said this was one British official. Pleeeaaassee! This was the head of MI6. How much authority do you want the man to have? He has just been to Washington, he has just talked to George Tenet. He said the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. That translates in clearer terms as the intelligence was being cooked to match what the administration wanted it to say to justify invading Iraq. Fixed means the same here as it does there.
This is a SUCH a lame attempt to dismiss the Downing Street Memos.
The show should of had one supporter of the memo and one non-supporter. Anyway, these guys went on to say that Bush/Blair going to the UN showed that they were not fixing the intelligence or rushing to war. Yet they didn't admit that the UN weapons inspectors were working and that Bush was pressuring them to leave Iraq so that he could start his war.
We remember that Bush was barely giving the inspectors time in Iraq to look for weapons and they were working. They found and destroyed those missles for one.
I don't think that the neo-cons can find a good defense of these memos because they ARE true and they ARE damning.
---End of Transmission---
2 comments:
Hi,
You know, ever since I heard of the Downing St. Memos, I have whole-heartedly agreed that they should have been made just as, if not more public here in the U.S. I wrote numerous letters to as many mainstream media outlets as I could think of, to no avail, of couse.
But then, it occurred to me. If the memos had been given the attention they deserved, and the possibility of impeaching Bush became a reality, it would be great! Except for one thing that sounds anything but pleasant:
Guess which Vice President would happily step in as president for the rest of the term? And more than likely quickly surround himself with his own "people", who most certainly would be neo-cons, molded by Cheney. He could then feasibily run for two more terms as an incumbant!
By the next election in 2008, it would be very likely that the neo-cons would by then have had plenty of time to have gotten a strong foothold in the whitehouse, with the key players well established in positions of power, not to be easily budged. Cheney could, if he so chose, feasibily stay in power for the next 10 - 11 years!
Help us all if that were to happen.
Perhaps in the long run, it's best that the Downing St. Memos didnt' attract the attention they should have. What would be worse, 3 more years of Bush wreaking havoc? Or 10 more years of Cheney doing the same, but doing it with a brain?
**Scary!**
tornado: you have a great point about impeaching Bush over the memos. I think the thing that I rather like to see is people voting for change in the mid-term elections in 2006. If we can get the House and/or Senate back then we can slow down the Bush/Cheney White House.
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