The Hole in the Right-wing Version of the Joe Wilson Story

Joshua Micah Marshall reports that the evidence is clear that the reason Wilson's version of the Iraq-Niger connection (or absence thereof) didn't make it into the administration's consciousness was that the intelligence community had learned that such information was going to be ignored anyway.

"The explanation confected by the authors of the SSCI report was the rather contradictory one that either Wilson's trip generated no substantive information or that it in fact tended to confirm suspicions of an illict uranium traffic between the two countries. No one who's looked at the evidence involved believes that. Nor is that cover story compatible with the CIA's subsequent and repeated attempts to prevent the White House from using the Niger story.

Here in Pincus's reporting -- before the evidentiary and political battle lines were drawn -- is the answer: 'Information not consistent with the administration agenda was discarded.'

It never made it back to Cheney's office because it wasn't what Cheney's office wanted to hear. They were looking for evidence of an Iraqi nuclear program, not ambiguous data and certainly not evidence that contradicted the claim.

In this key respect, the dismissal of the information is displaced from the VP's office to the CIA. And the reason is that they already understood what was wanted and what wasn't.

I think it's still an open question whether it made it back up the chain or not. But this remains the key question. Why did all the disproving evidence not get reflected in public statements? And why, if there was no disproving evidence -- as the harpies of the right want us to believe -- was the CIA constantly trying to get the White House to stop using it?"

If Wilson was so wrong, why did the CIA keep pushing his version of the facts? While the White House was scoring points with an Iraqi nuclear threat, the CIA kept trying to pull the forgery-based data from the narrative. In the end it is not the least bit surprising that we found no nuclear threat in Iraq because our government had made the mistake of jumping to a conclusion that meshed with their fantasies. When power forces fantasy to triumph over fact really bad things can happen...like illegal wars.

And that's the real crime that was committed. Our leaders, in their righteous zeal, intentionally blinded themselves to the facts. THAT is why we are in this mess and for THAT they need to be held accountable.

Like I've said before, sometimes it seems that the only way to win is to bet a bluff. But the guy sitting there with the pat hand is going to walk away with your stake. These jokers went all-in and lost it. It's time for them to leave the table.