December 2, 2005
Liars Lying About Lies
By Mike Rosen

Vice President Dick Cheney gave a speech on Nov. 21 at the American Enterprise Institute defending the administration's Iraq policy. This was part of a long overdue counterattack against the tactics of the president's political critics and their allies in the liberal media. Cheney made a particular point of setting the record straight about his criticism of some of the critics.

He said, "Several days ago, I commented briefly on some recent statements that have been made by some members of Congress about Iraq. Within hours of my speech, a report went out on the wires under the headline, quote, Cheney Says War Critics Dishonest, Reprehensible, end quote." The vice president went to on to explain and emphasize that, "I do not believe it is wrong to criticize the war on terror or any aspect thereof. Disagreement, argument and debate are the essence of democracy, and none of us should want it any other way. . . . What is not legitimate and what I will again say is dishonest and reprehensible is the suggestion by some U.S. senators that the president of the United States or any member of his administration purposely misled the American people on prewar intelligence. . . . The flaws in the intelligence are plain enough in hindsight. But any suggestion that prewar information was distorted, hyped or fabricated by the leader of the nation is utterly false. Sen. John McCain put it best: 'It is a lie to say that the president lied to the American people.' "

The unanimous conclusion of 15 separate intelligence agencies in their National Intelligence Estimate, submitted to the president in October 2002, was that Saddam Hussein's WMD constituted a real and present danger. Subsequent bipartisan investigations by the Senate Intelligence Committee in 2004 and the Silberman-Robb Commission in 2005 reported that the president neither distorted intelligence reports nor did he pressure intelligence agencies to reach tendentious conclusions.

In the afternoon following Cheney's Nov. 21 speech, here's how it was reported by Jack Cafferty on CNN's The Situation Room: ". . . if you dare question the use of prewar intelligence, according to that speech this morning, you are dishonest and reprehensible."

Outrageous! This is liberal media bias on stilts. Cafferty blatantly duplicated the very same distortion of an earlier Cheney speech that the vice president had specifically made a point of correcting. Cheney's distinction between what he believed was legitimate and illegitimate criticism couldn't have been clearer. Cafferty is either dense or shameless.

So, what's new? Bush-haters have a repertoire of shifty theatrical tactics. One is to feign outrage at make-believe attacks on their "patriotism." When the administration defends itself and challenges the claims of certain critics, the critics will falsely claim that their patriotism has been impugned. By this device, critics hope to discredit and discourage criticism of their criticism. No one in the White House questioned Rep. John Murtha's patriotism, just his judgment.

Another canard is the misuse of the "L-word." "Bush lied" has become a mantra and an outright obsession with Bush-haters, repeated endlessly in the titles of a spate of books by the likes of Al Franken (Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them), Joe Conason, Robert Scheer and other lefties. I believe this to be a backlash rooted in their resentment and anger over the downfall of the Clinton presidency. So they labor to turn the tables and take out their visceral revenge on Bush by branding him a "liar."

In Clinton's case, however, he was caught in blatant lies while under oath in a deposition, for which he suffered official discipline in a court of law. While his sexual exploits may have been of far less import than the current debate over the nation's foreign policy, the inescapable point is that it's flatly intolerable for the president of the United States - the attorney general's boss - to lie under oath about anything.

All politicians, including presidents, spin and embellish but a lie is defined as a willful falsehood. Simply being mistaken is not a lie. Clinton lied. At worst, Bush was misinformed. We now know the intelligence about Saddam's WMD was faulty, but a bevy of liberals from Bill Clinton to Ted Kennedy to Hillary Clinton also believed it and said so publicly. By definition, no one who believed the intelligence - not Bush or Kennedy or the Clintons - was guilty of lying.

Mike Rosen's radio show airs daily from 9 a.m. to noon on 850 KOA.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/Commentary/com-12_2_05_MR.html