Lying About The War Is Fun! (Pt. 2)

Vice President Cheney subjected himself to the questions of the liberal media Rush Limbaugh last week, in which he reasserted one of his favorite lies (it's a long list)... namely that al-Qaeda was operating inside Iraq "before we ever launched" the war.

But look out Mr. Vice President, the truth is launching a counter-attack!!!-

Captured Iraqi documents and intelligence interrogations of Saddam Hussein and two former aides "all confirmed" that Hussein's regime was not directly cooperating with al-Qaeda before the U.S. invasion of Iraq, according to a declassified Defense Department report released yesterday.

The declassified version of the report, by acting Inspector General Thomas F. Gimble, also contains new details about the intelligence community's prewar consensus that the Iraqi government and al-Qaeda figures had only limited contacts, and about its judgments that reports of deeper links were based on dubious or unconfirmed information...

Not that this matters. Those who believed the myth-- the hardcore war defenders-- always will; it's a part of their worldview. And judging by Zogby poll this past September, they're not alone. 46% still believed in a link between Saddam and 9/11.

This latest report, of course, comes on the heels of a Senate report last September that debunked the supposed ties, as well as a Defense Department inspector general's report two months ago that showed efforts by the Pentagon to manipulate intelligence to suggest those ties.

Meanwhile, Andrew Sullivan reads through the transcript of the Cheney/Limbaugh chat-- particular why we can never leave Iraq-- and comes away with this conclusion-

So what would be the feasible conditions for withdrawal? I see none. Even if we were to "win," as in Afghanistan in the 1980s, Cheney sees that as a reason to stay. If there is any chance of "losing," we also have to stay. The same logic applies to Pakistan were Musharraf to fall. And Saudi Arabia if that autocracy were to collapse. If the criterion is now space for Islamist terrorists to return, then we don't so much have mission creep as mission explosion. We're talking empire here - for ever. At least that's the logical conclusion of Cheney's control-fixation. And, of course, as these occupations create more terrorists, Cheney uses that as more reason to keep fighting. There is no end to this strategy - just permanent war, occupation and terror.

Took ya four years to figure that out, Andrew?

He continues-

And domestically, you can see Cheney outfitting the executive office with extraordinary powers to fit this unending imperial project. He sees the presidency as a permanent war-maker and guardian of domestic security: able to arrest citizens at will without charging them, legally empowered to torture them if necessary, wiretap phones without warrant, and eager to treat all opposition as a form of treason against the troops. Hence his aspersions about "the motive" for wanting a redeployment out of the catastrophe Cheney has created in Iraq. Isn't the motive obvious? We have created a disaster, and we need to find some way forward. Nowhere in the interview is it assumed or even thought that the administration has any responsibility for the possibility of defeat we now face in Iraq. It is all the Democrats' fault. Because the Democrats have been running this war for the past four years.

Bingo. He found the new talking point... Bush would've won this war big-time, if it wasn't for those meddling Democrats. They used it for Vietnam, so why not dust it off again?

It's going to be a long two years.