William Kristol in his column says At last, the president confronted the slander that he "lied us into war"--a slander propagated by his opponents with amazing success. George Bush said:
"While it's perfectly legitimate to criticize my decision or the conduct of the war, it is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began. Some Democrats and antiwar critics are now claiming we manipulated the intelligence and misled the American people about why we went to war. These critics are fully aware that a bipartisan Senate investigation found no evidence of political pressure to change the intelligence community's judgments related to Iraq's weapons programs. They also know that intelligence agencies from around the world agreed with our assessment of Saddam Hussein. They know the United Nations passed more than a dozen resolutions citing his development and possession of weapons of mass destruction. And many of these critics supported my opponent during the last election, who explained his position to support the resolution in the Congress this way: 'When I vote to give the president of the United States the authority to use force, if necessary, to disarm Saddam Hussein, it is because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his
hands is a threat and a grave threat to our security.' That's why more than a hundred Democrats in the House and the Senate, who had access to the same intelligence, voted to support removing Saddam Hussein from power"
At least the anti-American left, which wants to get out of Iraq immediately and to impeach the president, is consistent. But Kennedy--and his colleagues like Sen. Harry Reid--do not really want to follow the logic of their accusations. They would rather just damage the president--and the country's foreign policy--and enjoy the political effect. For the rest of Kristol's column click on the title above.
