Dowd doesn’t care for WMD Report, makes up her own
The QandO Blog
Posted by: Jon Henke
Thursday, March 31, 2005
Here's what I assume today's Maureen Dowd column looked like as a rough draft:
<<<
I went to see a Woody Allen movie.
Um.
Hey, how about that Iraq Intelligence Investigation? That didn't turn out at all like I expected. I'm just gonna assume that the unanimous report from a panel of Democrats and Republicans was a partisan conspiracy to cover up my the Truth. [hit Democratic Underground and Alternet, copy and paste, voilà! 800 words!]
Anyway. Woody Allen.
nytimes.com
>>>
It strikes me that Maureed Dowd keeps dropping hints that she's really much rather be back on the Lifestyle/Culture/Art pages. And since Frank Rich is moving back to the op-ed pages, there's certainly room for her. All of which would be just fine, since Maureen Dowd can't seem to restrain herself from analysis like this...
<<<
...political pressure was the father of conveniently botched intelligence. Dick Cheney and the neocons at the Pentagon started with the conclusion they wanted, then massaged and manipulated the intelligence to back up their wishful thinking.
As The New Republic reported, Mr. Cheney lurked at the C.I.A. in the summer of 2002, an intimidating presence for young analysts. And Douglas Feith set up the Office of Special Plans at the Pentagon as a shadow intelligence agency to manufacture propaganda bolstering the administration's case.
>>>
Dick Cheney lurked. Douglas Feith set up another office. Cheney probably lurked in that office, too. Well, there you go. What more needs to be said?
A few things, actually. A responsible journalist might have mentioned that 1) Conclusion 26 of the WMD Report (pdf) said...
<<<
"The Intelligence Community did not make or change any analytic judgements in response to political pressure to reach a particular conclusion..."
nytimes.com
>>>
...and 2) the conclusion of the Commission—which included Democrats—was unanimous.
answers.com
But Maureen Dowd is not a responsible journalist. Continuing, Dowd writes...
<<<
Mr. Cheney and his "Gestapo office," as Colin Powell called it, then shoehorned all their meshugas about Saddam's aluminum tubes, weapons labs, drones and Al Qaeda links into Mr. Powell's U.N. speech.
>>>
However, the WMD Report says of that speech...
<<<
The Commission also learned that, on the eve of war, the Intelligence Community Failed to convey important infomation to policymakers. ... These doubts [about, inter alia, an informant] never found their way to Secretary Powell, who was at that time attempting to strip questionable information from his speech.
These are errors—serious errors. But these errors stem from poor tradecraft and poor management. The Commission found no evidence of political pressure to influence the Intelligence Community's pre-war assessments of Iraq's weapons programs. As we discuss in detail in the body of the report, analysts universally asserted that in no instance did political pressure cause them to skew or alter any of their analytical judgements. [emphasis added]
>>>
But Maureen Dowd knows better, because....what? She saw a Woody Allen movie?
The irresponsible journalist also writes...
<<<
Charles Robb, the former senator and governor of Virginia, and Laurence Silberman, a hard-core conservative appeals court judge, headed the commission.
>>>
Laurence Silberman is a "hard-core conservative", but Charles Robb is just a "former Senator and governor". He's also a Democrat, though you could hardly expect Maureen Dowd to mention it.
If, as Michael Kinsley suggests, Maureen Dowd is truly "the most influential columnist of our time", then we live in desparate, ridiculous times.
qando.net |
