Pres. Bush with then-U.N. chief Kofi Annan addressing reporters in the Oval Office on July 14, 2003.
Prevaricator-in-Chief: The media is ignoring the revelation yesterday that it was Vice Pres. Cheney who knowingly inserted a false statement about Iraq’s nuclear program into the 2003 State of the Union speech.
They are also apparently uninterested in reporting that both Pres. Bush and his spokesman Scott McClellan lied on the record in July 2003 about how the infamous 16-word statement — “The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” — came to be included in the speech.
As everyone knows now the original leaker of the name of secret agent Valerie Plame was Richard Armitage, who in 2003 was deputy secretary of state serving under Sec. of State Colin Powell.
– Pres. George W. Bush, July 2003
Yesterday, in the perjury trial of Scooter Libby in the CIA leak scandal, the audiotape was played of Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward’s June 2003 interview with Armitage in which Armitage revealed Plame’s identity.
What has largely been overlooked — except, of course, by Keith Olbermann on MSNBC’s Countdown — is that the tape also revealed that around that same time Pres. Bush and his spokesman Scott McClellan both lied outright to the public about how a false statement about Iraq’s nuclear capabilities made it into Pres. Bush’s 2003 State of the Union speech.
Here’s what Armitage told Woodward about how the 16 word lie was inserted into the speech:
WOODWARD: What’s [George. H.W. Bush National Security Adviser Brent] Scowcroft up to?
ARMITAGE: [expletive deleted] Scowcroft is looking into the yellowcake thing.
W: Oh yeah?
A: As the PFIAB [President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board].
W: Yeah. What happened there?
A: They’re back together. [coughs] They knew with yellowcake, the CIA is not going to be hurt by this one …
W: I know, that’s …
A: … [Bush security officials Stephen] Hadley and Bob Joseph know. It’s documented. We’ve got our documents on it. We’re clean as a whistle. And George [Tenet, then-CIA Director] personally got it out of the Cincinnati speech of the president.
W: Oh, he did? …
W: It was taken out?
A: Taken out. George said you can’t do this.
W: How come it wasn’t taken out of the State of the Union then?
A: Because I think it was overruled by the [Vice Pres. Cheney] types down at the White House. [Then-National Security Adviser] Condi [Rice] doesn’t like being in the hot spot.
(Armitage’s mention of Valerie Wilson comes a minute or so later in the transcript.)
A month after the conversation between Woodward and Armitage, on July 14, 2003, Pres. Bush compounded the SOTU uranium lie in a brief Q&A with reporters:
Q Mr. President, back on the question of Iraq, and that specific [16 word] line that has been in question –
THE PRESIDENT: Can you cite the line? (Laughter.)
Q I could, if you gave me some time.
THE PRESIDENT: When I gave the speech, the line was relevant.
Q So even though there has been some question about the intelligence — the intelligence community knowing beforehand that perhaps it wasn’t, you still believe that when you gave it —
THE PRESIDENT: Well, the speech that I gave was cleared by the CIA. And, look, the thing that’s important to realize is that we’re constantly gathering data. Subsequent to the speech, the CIA had some doubts. But when I gave the — when they talked about the speech and when they looked at the speech, it was cleared. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have put it in the speech. I’m not interested in talking about intelligence unless it’s cleared by the CIA. And as Director Tenet said, it was cleared by the CIA.
We now know that the president was lying when he said the 16 word statement was cleared by the CIA. According to Armitage, CIA Director George Tenet had the reference removed from a speech the president gave in Cincinnati in October 2002, and tried to have it removed from the 2003 SOTU in January — but Vice Pres. Cheney over-ruled him and had the false statement reinserted into the text of the State of the Union speech.
The next day, July 15, 2003. which happened to be Scott McClellan’s first briefing as White House press secretary, McClellan lent the full force of his newly minted credibility to Bush’s false statement:
– Scott McClellan
Q Scott, on this Iraq-Niger situation, why is it that the President made the comment yesterday that doubts were only raised about the underlying intelligence behind that statement after the State of the Union address, when other administration officials and other evidence suggests that’s not true?
MR. McCLELLAN: Well, when it came to our attention, when it came to the President’s attention was when the IAEA came out in March [2003] with the report showing that those documents relating to Niger were forged. And that was only one part of the overall piece of information that was cited.
[This is false, of course, the statement was removed from the president’s speech in Cincinatti the previous year. The text of the speech can be found on the White House website on a page ironically titled, “Iraq: Denial and Deception.” - Ed.]
Q But doubts were raised clear back to the previous –
MR. McCLELLAN: But go back to the NIE, and in the NIE it stated that Iraq was trying to seek uranium from Africa. And I think that we have addressed this issue. We have made it clear that that statement should not have been in the speech, and if the CIA had said, take it out, we would have taken it out.
But let’s put this in perspective. This issue here relates to the threat that Saddam Hussein and his regime posed to the region, to his people and to the world. And the statement in the State of the Union was one piece of one part of a much larger body of evidence that –
Q Right, but that’s not — the question I’m dealing with has to do with –
MR. McCLELLAN: — related to the regime’s weapons of mass destruction and the threat that the regime posed; not only that it had weapons, but it has past history.
Q I’ll ask a question about that in just a second. The point is, the President said doubts were only raised after the State of the Union address — and that’s not accurate. Why did he say that?
MR. McCLELLAN: And it was laid out previously. I think we’ve addressed this. We’ve addressed this over the last couple of days, about the timing of when we found out that those — that the documents were forged.
On July 11, 2003, a few days before these statements were made, then-CIA Director George Tenet had released a statement about how the 16 words made it into the State of the Union speech that we now must judge to be false too:
Portions of the State of the Union speech draft came to the CIA for comment shortly before the speech was given. Various parts were shared with cognizant elements of the Agency for review. Although the documents related to the alleged Niger-Iraqi uranium deal had not yet been determined to be forgeries, officials who were reviewing the draft remarks on uranium raised several concerns about the fragmentary nature of the intelligence with National Security Council colleagues. Some of the language was changed. From what we know now, Agency officials in the end concurred that the text in the speech was factually correct - i.e. that the British government report said that Iraq sought uranium from Africa. This should not have been the test for clearing a Presidential address. This did not rise to the level of certainty which should be required for Presidential speeches, and CIA should have ensured that it was removed.
Within months, Tenet resigned from his post and threatened to write a book about his tenure. Pres. Bush awarded him a Medal of Freedom and apparently somehow elicited a promise to put the book on hold.
*
The Case Against Cheney
Update: This new section is intended to clarify Cheney’s role in putting the Niger statement into the 2003 State of the Union speech.
While Armitage is a gossip and a loose cannon, his statement to Woodward that Tenet took the Niger statement out of the SOTU is probably not false. No one disputes the fact that Tenet took the Niger statement out of Bush’s Oct. 2002 speech in Cincinnati, which makes it extremely likely he took the same false information out of the SOTU less than three months later.
If Tenet took it out, somebody rescinded his order and put the statement back in. My source for Cheney being the “somebody” is MSNBC reporter David Shuster on Keith Olbermann’s “Countdown” show Monday night:
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
RICHARD ARMITAGE, DEPUTY SECRETARY OF STATE: And George personally got it out of the Cincinnati speech of the president.
BOB WOODWARD, “THE WASHINGTON POST”: Oh, he did?
ARMITAGE: Oh, yes.
WOODWARD: Oh, really? It was taken out (INAUDIBLE)?
ARMITAGE: Taken out. George said, You can‘t do this.
WOODWARD: How come it wasn‘t out of the State of the Union then?
ARMITAGE: Because I think it was overruled by the types down at the White House. Condi doesn‘t like being in the hot spot.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
SHUSTER: The implication is that Condoleezza Rice, who was then the national security adviser at the time and responsible for voicing Tenet‘s concerns to the president, didn‘t like being in the hot spot, as Armitage said, of having to stand up to Vice President Cheney and others who were pushing the uranium claim in the State of the Union.
And again, Keith, the point is that there just shows the power of the vice president as far as overruling other administration officials regarding prewar intelligence, not only before the war, but after the war had begun.
There‘s already been testimony in this case about how Vice President Cheney decided himself to declassify some information to undercut Joe Wilson, and in the process of getting approval from President Bush and getting Scooter Libby to leak the information to Judy Miller, the secretary of state—I‘m sorry, the now—the former—the secretary of state, who was then the national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, her deputy and even the CIA director were kept completely out of loop as far as this declassification was concerned.
But even without Shuster’s reporting, the case against Cheney is there. The pool of suspects who could reverse the CIA director and re-insert the Niger statement was small: Bush, Cheney, Powell, Rumsfeld and Rice.
Rumsfeld and Cheney were a lock-step, like-minded two headed beast, so Rumsfeld’s possible involvement is irrelevant since the ultimate decision to over-rule Tenet would have been enacted by Cheney.
In his taped conversation with Woodward, Armitage explicitly excluded Rice and, by implication, his boss, Powell. (The State Dept. is “clean.”) That leaves Cheney and Bush.
I suppose it is possible Bush decided all by himself to put the statement back in, but even so, it appears to me that either Armitage lied to Woodward — or Bush and Scotty lied to the cameras.
*
It is disheartening to know that Pres. Bush and his gang will never be held accountable for lying to the American public about something as serious as going to war.
It is equally disheartening that the same traditional media who covered Pres. Clinton’s sex lie so hyper-intensively is completely ignoring another instance of Pres. Bush lying to the country about why he took the country to war with Iraq.
The headline overstates the case.
Bush was not caught on tape lying.
Armitage was caught on tape making statements that imply Bush was lying.
That’s a meaningful difference.
Wrong, Sarabeth: When Bush said this — which was caught on videotape — he was lying:
Armitage says the CIA director tried to remove the 16 words but Cheney insisted on putting them in. Bush knew this and so was knowingly lying when he said the statement “was cleared by the CIA.”
Even if I were for a second to entertain the concept of a human soul, and considering it’s a safe bet that DICK cheney would never possess even a scintilla of one nor know what to do with it, there is the possibility that at one time perhaps Lil’ Georgie might have enjoyed the odd remnant of a human soul, hell, he might have at one time even had the potential to be an artist. But depending on how lucky you are in life, you never know how other people are going to react, especially when your mama is Babbs the Impaler. I’ve known this depressing little gem for too many years, ever since my finger painting took an unconventional turn toward the avant-garde, expressionist mien in second grade Mrs. Goodwin’s art class, and then, instead of proclaiming me a young prodigy or an artiste or, at the very least, a mildly precocious little shit, my parents sent you to see that odd child therapist with the dandruff that fell of in large snowflake chunks and whose office was always freezing cold and smelled like mothballs, dog hair and urine. There, the therapist would ask me to play with his toys (?????), hoping I’d reenact some violent or perverse quarrel that would shed a pen light of reason on my irrational home life, but instead all I’d do is stare at the weird exotic patterns in his carpet, making my eyes focus and unfocus, and kick my Buster Browns against the leather couch in a way that seemed to make the therapist uncomfortable.
Maybe at one time Lil’ Georgie could have been an artist, but the powers that be (Babs, or nuns perhaps?) taught him to be a sociopath instead, to sublimate all his (alleged) good, pure talents and creative urges into repressed, disturbing, vaguely antisocial behaviors, behaviors more appropriate to his future life in a fraudulent and distorted corporate setting as it was ordained to be. Not only was he abandoned in La Habra, he was forced to take his raw intelligence and originality (such as it was - no evidence to point to as of yet) and force it into the confines of Bab’s sinister social expectations, reducing his passions to passive-aggressive manipulations, violent irrational protestations, and deeply irritating tics, but also some small, beautiful part of him (some would say the only good part of him, if it in fact existed) died a fast, painful death. Eventually, his brilliant finger painting breakthroughs lost all its originality and freedom and boundary-pushing explosiveness, and began to resemble more closely the mediocre scribbling of his dim-witted peers.
How do we know that Bush knew about Tenets objection in Cincinatti and Cheney’s inistence in the SOTU? If he knew he was lying - how much does Bush know about what Cheney does?
Madison said:
Armitage says the CIA director tried to remove the 16 words but Cheney insisted on putting them in. Bush knew this and so was knowingly lying when he said the statement “was cleared by the CIA.”
Can someone put this entire episode in the form of an allegorical sexual transgression and then forward it to the media?
Perhaps if there were an implication that Anna Nicole was peripherally involved the media would start to become interested in what is quite possibly the greatest crime in the history of the US. Treason doesn’t sell . . . but big breasts do . . .
[…] video to match the lie, check it out. Topics: Politics, Worst President Ever | Permalink | Trackback | To Comment Name: […]
Great comment, Carl, except why does everyone blame the mom when kids go bad? George had two parents and they choose each other. And Dad was no prize himself.
Big surprise. The dumbass in chief only lies when he opens his mouth and the press has given him the perverbial free pass.
What most people don’t realize, is this,
‘WHEN BUSH’S LIP ARE MOVING, HE IS LYING…’
Carl:
I love your description of your experiences with the shrink, and your speculations of why Bush is the way he is! I have copied it and will send it to friends who will also appreciate it, iffn you don’t mind.
Alas, I do believe it’s too late for the Gruesome Twosome to redeem their souls (if indeed they have them).
Bush needs to go soon before it’s too late.
Of course, Condi Rice told the same lies as Scotty-boy McClellan– but, she is given a pass by the cowardly Congress & main-stream media toadies.
When will the American people grow-up and impeach Bush, Cheney, Rice & Rove– all disgraceful criminals, unfit to serve our nation.
What will it take? WW3?
Of course, we will be lied into Iran too… For Bush’s mantra is:– “I fool you once– shame on everybody else… I fool you twice– ha ha ha!”
There seems to me to be only two conclusions.
Either bush is lying or he’s one of the most incompetent imbeciles to have ever gained so much power.
I say it’s both.
Carl Gordon wrote “Even if I were for a second to entertain the concept of a human soul, and considering it’s a safe bet that DICK cheney would never possess even a scintilla of one”
Actually he only possesses only scintilla of one currently. You see every time that Cheney has lied to Americans and someone to die his soul has been divided into another piece. If you are a reader of the Harry Potter series you will understand how this works. After more than 3000 American soldiers and marines, 650,000 Iraqi civilians, possibly the 3000 who died on September 11. There exists only the tiniest sliver of a soul within Cheney. Now if we can only figure out how to stop all his Death Eaters.
Carl, you have made my day! What a great insightful post. Personally, I do believe their is some Oedipus Complex thing going on. He wants to show up his father and blew it big time.
This practice they have of not talking to evil people is not working as Dick Cheney is probably one of the evilist persons on the seen today. The whole thing stinks when you think back to how he was chosen for Veep.
It’s true, Bush is both a liar and and imbicile. When he opens his mouth you can bet on it, that he may be lying.
Face it the man had entirely too much priviledge growing up. He had no idea what the common man must face.
Now, if only an intern would give him a blow job, we might get the press riled enough to take a closer look at all he’s done since high school.
These people are the biggest crooks on the face of the earth. They make Saddam, the North Korean dude, the Iranian dude, and Castro look like Boy Scouts!!!! When is this nation going to storm that stupid Capitol building and demand impeachment proceedings to begin for these worthless pieces of monkey shit!!!!!!!
“Can someone put this in the form of an allegorical transgression?”
Bush lied, America bought it, and we’re f***ed. As with Monica, everyone sees the truth and laughs at our dysfunctional relationship with the president. As a result., Americans have become world outcasts and we have lost our self-respect. Things can only start to change once our ongoing relationship with the president is over and forgotten.
Remember: Sometimes a war is not just a war.
While our troops march up and down in Iraq, this bunch is stealing the unmetered oil. If the fighting should stop and peace break out, someone might ask where the oil is going. Bartcop has estimated the daily take. It’s time for someone to check the oil wells we are protecting. Ain’t it strange that Iraq is too dangerous for the media to investigate these things.
Is it only lying about blowjobs that gets you impeached?
As within, so without. America, and the world are gradually beginning to resemble the inside of Bush’s (alleged) brain. That is, a political, economic and environmental wasteland full of either dead, or very unhappy people.
Why even 25% of Americans are supporting, aiding and abetting this international terrorist - that is precisely what he is - we may never know. The good news - the percentage is dwindling.
Along with Cheney, we’re looking at two very sad and depraved individuals. Even more scary, they want to propogate that sadness throughout the world, and even into outer space. And the only answer from our media, the government and other so-called pundits: Heil Busche!
Ah, excuse me, gang. The quoted transcript reads:
W: How come it wasn’t taken out of the State of the Union then?
A: Because I think it was overruled by the [Vice Pres. Cheney] types down at the White House. [Then-National Security Adviser] Condi [Rice] doesn’t like being in the hot spot.
Unless the brackets have been misplaced, this does NOT say Cheney was responsible. It says some one in the White House was responsible–that’s all.
DK
..well if it was “someone” at the white house, that “someone’s boss” should be held accountable. simple really.
It’s impossible to dream-up something as surreal as the story of continuing this way; the blow job vrs genocide, genocide vrs blow job……………..the water’s very very HOT NOW by the way.
American Sisters and Brothers, and i really do mean that,Richard Armitage is one of the scariest people on the planet.For a long time I considered Colin Powell a traitor to, well to the human race, but when you have mr. armitage at your back, you do what you are told. The guy is a criminal, and more importantly, one of the key players in the shadow world that controls much of what happens. Start a Revolution!! A peaceful one, on mind and soul. We can still beat the bastads. radicalheretic,calgary
[…] Bush Caught on Tape Lying about 2003 SOTU ‘16 Words’ - Media Yawns Prevaricator-in-Chief: The media is ignoring the revelation yesterday that it was Vice Pres. Cheney who knowingly inserted a false statement about Iraq’s nuclear program into the 2003 State of the Union speech. They are also apparently uninterested in reporting that both Pres. Bush and his spokesman Scott McClellan lied on the record in July 2003 about how the infamous 16-word statement — “The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” — came to be included in the speech. […]
There’s only one problem here: the so-called “16 words” were not false to start with. And it’s not just right-wing bloggers saying this. It’s the non-partisan factcheck.org.
http://www.factcheck.org/article222.html
Quinto -The White House said the statement was wrong — and the UN said the documents it was based on were forgeries:
What we know now is that Hadley was lying when he took the blame. The CIA director removed the Niger statement, Cheney put it back in and Hadley fell on his sword. In return for doing this, apparently, he was promoted to National Security Adviser when Condi moved up from that job to sec. of state.
Sorry, Madison, but the statement was not based on the forged Italian document. Part of those 16 words were, “British intelligence has learned …” and that is 100% factually correct. Turns out, too, that what British intelligence learned was correct too, as corroborated by both the Senate Intelligence Committee and the British Butler report.
Give it up. There’s no crime here and no error.
Frankly the words were not accidentally put in. They were put in with the clear knowledge of all the players. The idea to “make someone responsible” is a diversion. Bush knew, Cheney knew, Condi knew. Powell was most probably ignored.
The statement was put into the SOTU to deliberately deceive the American public and the world into believing that we were in jeopardy of an atomic bomb attack from Iraq.
The Brits and the Bush administration knew in 2003 that Iraq had not purchased uranium from Niger — and that the most recent overtures between Saddam’s government and the Nigerians had been in a 1999 meeting during which the subject of “expanding commercial relations” between Iraq and Niger was discussed, which the Nigerians interpreted as an entre to discussions on uranium sales. The Nigerians later said they did not pursue talks with Iraq because U.N. sanctions against Iraq would have made it impossible to transport tons of yellowcake into the country undetected.
Deception is lying. We can split hairs about the careful wordsmithing of the SOTU statement, but their intent was crystal clear. Many people who had been on the fence about invading Iraq were convinced to support the war after this statement and the others about smoking guns being mushroom clouds.
If they weren’t lying, why did they care that Wilson contradicted them? All they had to do was show their evidence — the tons of yellowcake uranium in Saddam’s arsenal. But that’s not what they did. They backed off and admitted the assertion was a “mistake.”
That’s the consistent theme of this gang. “Oh, we weren’t lying, we’re just incompetent” — to which the media, rightwingers and other Bush worshippers say, “Oh, well, then, you’re incompetent — that’s okay. Just so long as you’re not technically lying, especially lying about sex — it’s fine by us.”
We all know Bush lied. How come the media doesn’t question him about his comments 3 weeks after 9/11 about seeing the first plane hit the WTC? He said he saw it on a TV in a classroom. The video of the first plane didn’t air till 9/12?????? Get to the root of 9/11 and all the rest is will follow.
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/bushlie.html
Maybe you should check what CIA Director Tenet said in his statement at the time — virtually the exact same thing Bush and McClellan said, that the CIA should have stopped it from being included but they did not.
You are an liar for spreading this false assertion.
ALL of these so called “humans” are such extreme liars,and have no consciousness or morals/ethics ,it is so obvious to actual real thinking/feeling people.Karma never ever forgets,so I wish them good luck with being Super A-holes,they already have stamped tickets to their destination , a reality beyond their imaginations.