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Friday, January 14, 2005

The headline lead the top of page 8, next to the world roundup of wire service reports: "Weapons-of-mass-destruction search over". It's finished. The leading reason given for our trek into the morass of Baghdad is now officially a lie. According to the AP story, the White House said the search for the elusive little buggers was concluded "without any evidence" that they existed.

This, despite assurances from Bush, Tony Blair, Dick Cheney and others, that the safety of the world was at risk from WMDs ready to be deployed by Saddam. His refusal to give up what he didn't have was unfortunate for the Iraqi people, as well as for hundreds of American military and their friends and families.

The Lying-Sack-of-Shit-in-Chief told ABC's Barbara Walters that he had "felt" that the WMD's would be found. "We need to find out what went wrong in the intelligence gathering," he lied. He also prevaricated when saying that the "world is a safer place without (Saddam) in power." One presumes he does not include Iraq as part of the world, since that country is demonstrably less safe for the average Iraqi than is was three years ago.

As of January 12th, 1,356 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of Bush's war, with many thousands more wounded. The number of Iraqi deaths is unclear, since the U.S. military had no interest in keeping a tally. However, a study published in the British medical journal Lancet, in October, 2004, suggests that as many as 100,000 more people may have died throughout the country in the 18 months after the U.S. invasion than would be expected based on the death rate before the war. They said that the chances of a violent death were 58 times higher after the invasion than before it. The report was written before the rise of the violent insurgent attacks that have killed many more Iraqis.

By the way, the price tag for Bush's war is approaching $150 billion, or the cost of fully funding world anti-hunger programs for the next six years.
6:38:36 AM

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