Government never linked Saddam to 9/11

The psy-ops disinformation campaign is on again. This is a perfect opportunity to skip the final piece that deflates Mr. Gore's assumption that humans are making the world unsafe for his private jet. Back to putting the lie to other curious mass assumptions.

On Sunday, June 25, 2006, there was a Meet the Press softball interview with a Democrat Senator running for President who said that the President, along with his staff, has committed an impeachable offense by telling the American people we attacked Iraq because Saddam Hussein was involved in the 9/11 murders. The senator was not in favor of impeachment, mind you, just a censure. You know, that formal process not in the Constitution.

The theory of the great lie is that it has to be said repeatedly with a straight face, so he diminutive Senator did his job. The sad thing is, it works, as few of us are able to really pay attention to detail or, for that matter, what happened before breakfast. We wind up with sound bites in our heads.

Let's take the 'Way-Back' machine for a ride to actual statements made by the administration in 2003.

Thursday, September 18, 2003

Bush: No Iraq link to 9/11 found
President says Saddam had ties to al-Qaida, but apparently not to attacks

By SCOTT SHEPARD
COX NEWS SERVICE

WASHINGTON -- President Bush, having repeatedly linked Saddam Hussein to the terrorist organization behind the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, said yesterday there is no evidence that the deposed Iraqi leader had a hand in those attacks, in contrast to the belief of most Americans. [Emphasis added. Don't think this editorial comment is at all true, nor the 'repeatedly, but these are mere lame cuts to defuse an unwanted statement.]

The president's comments came in response to a reporter's question about Vice President Dick Cheney's assertion Sunday on NBC's "Meet The Press" program that Iraq was the "geographic base" of the terrorists behind the attacks on New York and Washington.

Bush said yesterday there was no attempt by the administration to try to confuse people about any link between Saddam and Sept. 11.

"No, we've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with September the 11th," Bush said. "What the vice president said was is that he (Saddam) has been involved with al-Qaida.

"And al-Zarqawi, an al-Qaida operative, was in Baghdad. He's the guy that ordered the killing of a U.S. diplomat. ... There's no question that Saddam Hussein had al-Qaida ties."

Most of the administration's public assertions have focused on the man Bush mentioned, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a senior Osama bin Laden associate whom officials have accused of trying to train terrorists in the use of poison for possible attacks in Europe, running a terrorist haven in northern Iraq -- an area outside Saddam's control -- and organizing an attack that killed an American aid executive in Jordan last year...

Bush's statement was the latest in a series by administration officials this week that appeared to distance the White House from the widely held public perception that Saddam was a key figure in the attacks.

Publicly, at least, Bush has not explicitly blamed the attacks on Saddam. In speech after speech, however, the president has strongly linked Saddam and al-Qaida, the terrorist organization of bin Laden, the renegade Saudi whose followers hijacked jetliners and crashed them into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and rural Pennsylvania. [Note the implied rebuke in the words 'at least' and 'however.' If he doesn't say what you want him to say, then say he implied it.]

In his May 1 declaration of military victory in Iraq from the deck of the Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier, Bush said, "We have removed an ally of al-Qaida and cut off a source of terrorist funding." He also said, "The liberation of Iraq is a crucial advance in the campaign against terror."

Two months earlier, in a speech aimed at mustering public support for a pre-emptive strike against Iraq, Bush said, "The attacks of September 11th, 2001, showed what the enemies of America did with four airplanes. We will not wait to see what terrorists or terrorist states could do with weapons of mass destruction." [Section cut out is about candidate Clarke saying the administration let people allegedly believe that there was a link. Hence, it is the same thing as saying so. Bizarre. Personally, I haven't met this alleged person.]

Sunday, Cheney began the group of Bush administration officials denying any ties between Saddam and Sept. 11. He said "we don't know" whether Saddam was connected to the attacks, but admitted, "It's not surprising that people make that connection...

White House National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice, in an interview aired late Tuesday on ABC's "Nightline," said one of the reasons Bush went to war against Saddam was because he posed a threat in "a region from which the 9/11 threat emerged." But she insisted, "We have never claimed that Saddam Hussein had either direction or control of 9/11."

Her remarks echoed those of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld during a briefing for reporters at the Pentagon earlier Tuesday. Asked if Saddam was personally involved in the Sept. 11 attacks, Rumsfeld replied, "I've not seen any indication that would lead me to believe that I could say that."

White House spokesman Scott McClellan reiterated to reporters yesterday that the administration never directly linked Saddam to the Sept. 11 strikes.

"If you're talking specifically about the September 11th attacks, we never made that claim," McClellan said. "We do know that there is a long history of Saddam Hussein and his regime and ties to terrorism, including al-Qaida."

By the way, just to clarify the mission of this blog, again. I am not an apologist for Mr. Bush and his team. I am just providing a reality check and documenting anti-consensus opinions that you don't read in the newspapers or hear on TV.

If it seems that I am constantly repairing lies, not errors, regarding the President, then there is a lesson there. Might have something to do with the media responding to a poll that 92 percent of those polled said they were 'liberals.'

If John Kerry actually did ride his swift boat into Cambodia, contrary to his boatmates' statements and military records that a dam was in place to block the river, I will promptly publish that source here.