A Tale of Two Crimes
Wilson's story, retailed to journalists and then presented in a column in the New York Times, was that he had debunked evidence that Iraq was seeking uranium from Niger and that his report had circulated in the highest levels of the administration; he suggested that he had been sent to Niger in response to a request by Cheney. In fact, as a 2004 bipartisan report of the Senate Intelligence Committee found, all those claims were false, as well as his denial that his wife had recommended him for the Niger trip.
Still, the "Bush lied and people died" mantra resonates. Yet there was no lie. Given Saddam Hussein's previous use of weapons of mass destruction and his refusal to cooperate with weapons inspectors, George W. Bush had to assume he had WMDs, just as Bill Clinton had before him-as we were reminded by Hillary Rodham Clinton's speech in favor of the Iraq war resolution. The Libby verdict in no way undercuts that. But the Republicans are running behind in the battle to write history.
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