“Franks Lied”?

As always, Rich Lowry hits the nail on the head – in this instance, regarding how nonsensical the cries are that the President “lied” about the evidence used to justify the war in Iraq and how, if the “BL” crowd really believes what they say, they should be prepared to say quite a few distinguished military men, public officials, etc “lied” too:

“Bush lied” is still gospel for Bush critics, even though it has become such a tattered article of faith that it is near total disintegration. The faithful want to believe that President Bush made up his charges about Saddam Hussein’s WMD capabilities in order to “mislead” the country into war. The latest shredding of this argument comes courtesy of Gen. Tommy Franks’s new book, American Soldier.

Perhaps the true believers should amplify their charge to “Franks lied,” since he believed exactly the same thing about Saddam as the president. Actually, to be consistent, the charge would also have to be “important Arab leaders lied” – indeed, “most everyone with some knowledge of Saddam’s regime lied,” in a conspiracy so vast it included war skeptics and everyone up and down the chain of command of the American military.

Franks recounts a meeting with King Abdullah II of Jordan in January 2003. Abdullah told Franks, “General, from reliable intelligence sources, I believe the Iraqis are hiding chemical and biological weapons.” Perhaps Abdullah, an opponent of Saddam, wanted to bait us into invading Iraq – and so presumably “Abdullah lied.”

Fantastic and spot on! How many more times are the war critics on the left going to cry “Bush lied” before someone finally tells ’em to shove it” (apologies to Teresa Heinz Kerry)?

Ted Kennedy, are you listening?