Cheney distorts and misleads yet again as he accuses others of 'revisionism of the most corrupt and shameless variety'
"Cheney yesterday took point in the massive PR blitz aimed at salvaging the administration's reputation. He lashed out at the suggestion that 'brave Americans were sent into battle for a deliberate falsehood,' calling it 'revisionism of the most corrupt and shameless variety' and saying that 'it has no place anywhere in American politics.'
But he was a bit late: Opinion polls show that fully 55 to 57 percent of Americans believe the Bush administration was intentionally misleading in the run up to war. That kind of mistrust is why the question of the administration's integrity has become absolutely central to modern American politics.
Rather than substantively address any of the allegations against the administration, however, Cheney used a handful of straw-man arguments and dubious assertions to make his point. And he took no questions.
... William Douglas of Knight Ridder Newspapers today maintains his bureau's tradition of consistently pushing back on mischaracterizations in White House speeches, rather than just repeating them.

"Cheney laid out the administration's defense of the war again -- and again conflated the war with the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, even though investigative commissions have concluded that there was no connection between them and Saddam Hussein," Douglas writes.
He quotes Cheney:
"(T)hey attacked us on 9/11 here in the homeland, killing 3,000 people. Now they are making a stand in Iraq. . . . '
"Would the United States . . . be better off, or worse off, with Zarqawi, bin Laden and Zawahiri in control of Iraq?'
" . . . A precipitous withdrawal from Iraq would be a victory for the terrorists."
Then Douglas writes: "But the war in Iraq isn't primarily with terrorists. Cheney didn't note that Iraq's insurgency rises primarily from ethnic and sectarian tensions among Sunni and Shiite Muslims and Kurds, rejection of U.S.-led occupation forces, and loyalists to Saddam and his once-dominant Baath Party."
Fletcher and VandeHei also note at the end of their article: "Some observers called into question Cheney's repeated description of the enemy in Iraq as 'terrorists' who are seeking to control that country to establish a base from which they can 'launch attacks and to wage war against governments that do not meet their demands.'
"U.S. intelligence agencies say foreign terrorists represent a minority of the insurgent forces; the vast majority are Iraqis."

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- posted by geoff @ #