WMD in the News

US Weapons Inspector David Kay has resigned his job and this, along with W's SOTU v3.0 (you try saying weapons of mass destruction-related program activities with a deadly-sincere look on your face, and then tell me W has it easy) seems to be the occasion for a bunch of WMD-related stories today.

A couple of notes on the LA Times story:

First, regarding the failure to find the promised WMD, David Kay says, "I actually think the intelligence community owes the President, rather than the President owing the American people." This is a pretty remarkable quote. Interesting in that it gets the situation precisely backwards - since as we know, it was the President (or, more accurately, the Veep) who leaned on the services to distort the intelligence to the point where he could claim knowledge of WMD in SOTU v2.0. Also interesting in that it seems to imply Kay is indeed looking towards a future in either politics or lobbying.

Next, feast your eyes on this excerpt from the LAT:

The Republican chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee said Sunday that his panel is investigating the prewar data. But Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas told CNN's "Late Edition" that if Hussein didn't have weapons of mass destruction, "why on Earth didn't he let the U.N. inspectors in and avoid the war?"

Two points: First, as we know but prominent Republicans keep forgetting, Saddam did let the UN inspectors in when he saw the US prepared for war. The inspectors were withdrawn when the US told them to go lest they be shot at. Second, if you read the quote carefully, you'll see that Sen. Roberts is actually conceding that if we had known Saddam didn't have any WMD, we would not have attacked Iraq. This is the only possible explanation for his idea that Saddam could have "avoid[ed] the war." After all, if attacking Iraq was justified independent of Iraq having WMD by Saddam's brutal regime and his past use of chemical weapons, then clearly, there was nothing he could do to "avoid the war" - after all, nobody has ever suggested that he might have given over power voluntarily, or stood for free and democratic elections.

Update: I've checked the Sen. Roberts quote against the shows' transcript and it checks out. Moreover, the remark went unchallenged on-air (as expected).