Monday, July 14, 2003

Truth vs. Accuracy

It depends on what the definition of "truth" is.... That is the new line coming from Bush officials like Condoleeza Rice and Donald Rumsfeld. Since trying to blame the whole bogus uranium story on the CIA chief hasn't worked as well as they had liked they are now, according to the NYTimes trying to renege and say the information was technically accurate - so no harm done right? "Bush Aides Now Say Claim on Uranium Was Accurate"

Ms. Rice, in an appearance on "Fox News Sunday," said that "the statement that he made was indeed accurate. The British government did say that."

And Mr. Rumsfeld said on the NBC News program "Meet the Press" that "it turns out that it's technically correct what the president said, that the U.K. does — did say that — and still says that. They haven't changed their mind, the United Kingdom intelligence people."

But of course, the British intelligence is based on the same forged documents that the CIA already rejected! So it is just as untrue.

Here is Time magazine's take on the issue

Is a fib really a fib if the teller is unaware that he is uttering an untruth? That question appears to be the basis of the White House defense, having now admitted a falsehood in President Bush's claim, in his State of the Union address, that Iraq had tried to buy uranium in Africa. But that defense is under mounting pressure from a variety of sources claiming that the White House could not have been unaware that the claim was false, because it had been checked out — and debunked — by U.S. intelligence a year before the President repeated it.


The big question I would like answered and no one even seems to be asking is who made these forged documents in the first place and why?




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