White House ordered forgery

Courtesy of Ron Suskind comes more news from the Department of Not Even Shocking Anymore With This White House.

Published August 5, 2008 2:34PM (EDT)

I'll of course leave it to Glenn Greenwald, since this story falls right in his wheelhouse, to put this news into greater historical context, but I am honestly not sure whether to scream or yawn anymore when informed of new evidence of how mendaciously the Bush administration behaved in the run-up to the Iraq war.

The latest development is the alleged attempt by the administration to get the CIA to forge and backdate a memo concocting some bogus link between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida, as reported in Ron Suskind's new book, "The Way of the World: A Story of Truth and Hope in an Age of Extremism." The White House, of course, denies the allegation. "The allegation that the White House directed anyone to forge a document from [former Iraqi intelligence director Tahir Jalil] Habbush to Saddam is just absurd," said White House spokesman Tony Fratto.

Yes, Mr. Fratto, how absurd -- because, like, there's just no historical precedent with this administration for lying, misleading or manipulating intelligence. We should all be ashamed of ourselves for such absurdities.


By Thomas Schaller

Thomas F. Schaller is professor of political science at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County and the author of "Whistling Past Dixie: How Democrats Can Win Without the South." Follow him @schaller67.

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