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Huh? There's a Simple ExplanationBy Rick Horowitz
Q. Thank you,
sir. Even after hearing that one of the major conclusions of the National
Intelligence Estimate in April was that the Iraq war has fueled terror
growth around the world, why have you continued to say that the Iraq
war has made this country safer? PRESIDENT BUSH: I, of course, read the key judgments on the NIE. I agree with their conclusion that because of our successes against the leadership of al Qaeda, the enemy is becoming more diffuse and independent. And I've been -- as you know, I've been using the exact same words they used on the NIE: "United States." "Iraq." "Al Qaeda." "Jihadists." "Winning." "Losing." I just use them in a different order.
Some people have guessed what's in the report and have concluded that going into Iraq was a mistake. I strongly disagree. That just shows you how wrong guessing can be when you don't have all the information. When you have all the information you don't have to guess, or find out things in the newspaper. That's why I don't read newspapers. I rely on our experts in the -- on the ground, not anonymous sources like they do. I think it's naïve to believe that going on the offense makes us less safe, and just because there's a lot of statistics you can produce one way or the other doesn't prove anything. All the politics about somebody saying something about Iraq, it's just -- you see, over here you've got what the CIA says, and what the other, what 15 other intelligence agencies researched and analyzed and agreed on. But over here, you've got me, and what my gut tells me, which is we're winning. So who are you gonna believe? You know, to even suggest that if we weren't in Iraq, we would see a rosier scenario with fewer extremists joining the radical movement -- well, we weren't in Iraq when we got attacked on September the 11th. We weren't in Iraq when they bombed the Cole, or those embassies in Africa. So if those things all happened before we went into Iraq, then it's obvious Iraq has nothing to do with it. And if Iraq didn't even have anything to do with the past, which already happened, how can it have anything to do with the future? And some say, "Well, what about recruiting?" But if it's 200 radical murderers trying to kill us, or 200,000, it's the same thing -- it's just extra zeroes, and zero means nothing! Now, you know, what's interesting about the NIE -- it was an intelligence report done last April, which means it's been, it's been almost six months we've had it, and you never heard me say anything about it even once until now. In fact, it's been just the opposite -- when I've given speeches, which I know you're always so happy to report on, the American people would never suspect from anything I said that I'd ever even seen the report. And here we are, coming down the stretch in an election campaign, and it's on the front page of your newspapers. Isn't that interesting? Somebody has taken it upon themselves to leak classified information for political purposes, so there's only one thing to do: leak more of it for political purposes. Only we'll call it "declassifying." I don't like -- I think it's a bad habit to declassify every time there's a leak, because it makes it harder for me to get what I call candid information, which is much easier for me to ignore than the other kind. But this is a vital time in our struggle against the Demo -- in our struggle for democracy, so I've asked our people to put out enough parts of the report to show we're right and everyone else is wrong. So I -- please be patient. But we'll act as forcefully as we can to meet this threat, because there's a leak out of our government, coming right down the stretch in this campaign, to create confusion in the minds of the American people. That's my job. Posted 10/1/06.
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Rick Horowitz
