This is willful misrepresentation of the facts by Joby
Warrick and the editors of the Washington Post in a page
one story. There were indeed varied interpretations of
the suitability of these trailers to manufacture bio-
weapons, yet the Post article purposefully decived its
readers to lend weight and column inches to the minority
viewpoint that was not unanimous as they suggested....
....As a matter of fact, one has to navigate a carefully
parsed and misleading claim of the "unanimous findings"
that were far from unanimous before finding out in the
twelfth paragraph that two other teams reached the exact
opposite conclusion....
Well, the Smell is Certainly Biological...
Posted by Confederate Yankee
The Washington Post, which within the past week blasted President Bush for declassifying a story to defend false allegations by Joe Wilson, collected classified information of its own through anonymous sources and leaked it on page one Wednesday, declaring:
<<< On May 29, 2003, 50 days after the fall of Baghdad, President Bush proclaimed a fresh victory for his administration in Iraq: Two small trailers captured by U.S. and Kurdish troops had turned out to be long-sought mobile "biological laboratories." He declared, "We have found the weapons of mass destruction."
The claim, repeated by top administration officials for months afterward, was hailed at the time as a vindication of the decision to go to war. But even as Bush spoke, U.S. intelligence officials possessed powerful evidence that it was not true.
A secret fact-finding mission to Iraq -- not made public until now -- had already concluded that the trailers had nothing to do with biological weapons. Leaders of the Pentagon-sponsored mission transmitted their unanimous findings to Washington in a field report on May 27, 2003, two days before the president's statement. >>>
Framed the way Joby Warrick presents it in these opening paragraphs, it seems like a slam-dunk case of the Bush Administration lying... but the Post is being less than forthright with it's readers, attempting to bias and shape their perceptions before giving them all the facts.
What facts would those be?
That the one team of inspectors Warrick cites in his opening paragraphs were not the only team to examine these trailers, and that two other teams that initially inspected the trailers did not agree with the team highlighted in the Post article's opening paragraphs. As a matter of fact, one has to navigate a carefully parsed and misleading claim of the "unanimous findings" that were far from unanimous before finding out in the twelfth paragraph that two other teams reached the exact opposite conclusion:
Intelligence analysts involved in high-level discussions
about the trailers noted that the technical team was among
several groups that analyzed the suspected mobile labs
throughout the spring and summer of 2003. Two teams of
military experts who viewed the trailers soon after their
discovery concluded that the facilities were weapons labs,
a finding that strongly influenced views of intelligence
officials in Washington, the analysts said. "It was hotly
debated, and there were experts making arguments on both
sides," said one former senior official who spoke on the
condition that he not be identified.
The actual facts are that a single team of nine civilian experts wrote a "unanimous" report that was only unanimous within their one group, while two military teams of experts reached the conclusion that these were bioweapons labs. By careful and I believe willful deceit, the Post would seem to purposefully imply that all experts examining the suspected bio-weapons trailers unanimously came to the conclusion that these trailers were not used to manufacture bio-weapons, and that the Administration blatantly lied in the face of the evidence. The actual facts are that this was not only a not a unanimous report, but that the "unanimous" report of the one team was actually a minority view overall.
This is willful misrepresentation of the facts by Joby Warrick and the editors of the Washington Post in a page one story. There were indeed varied interpretations of the suitability of these trailers to manufacture bio-weapons, yet the Post article purposefully decived its readers to lend weight and column inches to the minority viewpoint that was not unanimous as they suggested.
This appears to be a specific, calculated deception of a national newspaper’s readership. The Washington Post must be held accountable.
confederateyankee.mu.nu
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