Newspaper and media edit and cull the news all the time. If you want to find out anything that is considered remotely "controversial" or "political", you have to find original sources. You can't just assume that the daily hometown paper will provide you the original, non-editted source. More likely than not, what you will read in the paper or get on the TV news is an edited or re-written version of the original story.

One recent example occurred today, 5 September. The original story was written by Frank Davies from Knight-Ridder. It had this headline in the main Knight-Ridder wire : 9-11 hijackers tied to Saudi government, Graham says in new book. This story comes from Knight-Ridders Washington Bureau and was originally published in the Miami Herald. It gives the full account, and is 27 paragraphs long. You can read the original story here.

But how does this story get presented in other newspapers across the nation?

I did a google search with the phrase "9-11 hijackers tied to Saudi government, Graham says in new book By Frank Davies Knight Ridder Newspapers." I got 19 related articles, with another 66 related (according to google.)

The San Jose Mercury News:"Senator charges Saudi agents were linked to Al-Qaida. NEW BOOK SAYS WHITE HOUSE, FBI BLOCKED PROBE INTO RELATIONSHIP"
--12 paragraphs.

The story cuts off after a statement that "Saudi officials have vociferously denied any ties to the hijackers or Al- Qaida plots to attack the United States,"curiously cutting off cricism of Bush, blasting the politicization of the CIA, and the cooked intelligence that created the Iraq WMD threat.

The Boston Globe:"9/11 hijackers tied to Saudi government, Graham says in book."
--12 paragraphs.

The same edited version as the San Jose Mercury News.

Newsweek:"A Case Not Yet Closed Turn The Page: In a new book, Sen. Bob Graham examines the embers of 9/11."
--6 paragraphs.

This article by Michael Isikoff is a re- writing of the original Knight Ridder story, with some new phrases probably pulled out of the Graham book. The politicization of the CIA is missing. The connection between the FBI and the Saudi government is mentioned, and then watered down by an excerpt below.

"But Graham's conclusions about al-Bayoumi conflict with the conclusions of the 9/11 Commission report. Philip Zelikow, the staff director of the commission, noted that his panel had access to more material than Graham did and ultimately got the chance to question al-Bayoumi. They concluded that he had no connection to 9/11. "We've spent hours and hours with Bob on this," says Zelikow, who believes Graham doesn't seem open to new evidence. "He's got all these details. But it's like they're frozen in amber."

It is signifigant that Isikoff chooses Philip Zelikow as his source of rebuttal. Zelikow was the executive director of the 9-11 commission with authority to determine all interviews and oversee all evidence, but what Isikoff calls him is "the staff director." However, not only did Zelikow have extensive ties to the Bush administration, but he also was criticized by other 9-11 commission members for withholding documents from the commission. Isikoff never bothers to mention this.

According to disinfopedia, After the 2000 election, Zelikow and Rice were reunited when George W. Bush named him to his transition team for the National Security Council....Former White House terrorism czar Richard Clarke says he briefed not only Rice and Hadley, but also Zelikow about the growing al- Qaida threat during the transition period. Zelikow sat in on the briefings, he says."

"Kristen Breitweiser, a 9/11 widow, insists Zelikow has a "clear conflict of interest." And she suspects he is in touch with Bush's political adviser, Rove, which she says would explain why the White House granted him, along with just one other commission official, the greatest access to the intelligence briefing Bush got a month before the 9/11 suicide hijackings."

Isikoff then follows with a spin of the main story. "Yet even Zelikow acknowledges that Graham may be right when he says the FBI never fully unraveled a Qaeda support network that helped the hijackers—and that still may be out there...."

He ends the piece with "Who were the contacts? To this day, the FBI admits it doesn't know for sure—ample evidence, in Graham's mind, that his fears and criticisms remain as valid as ever. "

So Isikoff rewrites the Knight-Ridder article, skillfully removing the underlying implication that distorted facts were used by George Tenet to go into Iraq, and that the Bush administration wanted to cover up the Saudi connection to 9-11. Instead, Isikoff makes the story seem like FBI incompetance, which was not the theme of the Knight-Ridder article at all.

This is what Michael Isikoff does, and is the reason why you should not trust anything he writes. He is a devious, deceitful swindler of the journalistic profession. Read him for the sophistry and the spin, but read him with utmost caution.

Four years ago, this page endorsed George W. Bush for president. We cannot do so again — because of an ill-conceived war and its aftermath, undisciplined spending, a shrinkage of constitutional rights and an intrusive social agenda.

The Bush presidency is not what we had in mind. Our endorsement of John Kerry is not without reservations, but he is head and shoulders above the incumbent.

The first issue is the war. When the Bush administration began beating the drums for war on Iraq, this page said repeatedly that he had not justified it. When war came, this page closed ranks, wanting to support our troops and give the president the benefit of the doubt. The troops deserved it. In hindsight, their commander in chief did not.

The first priority of a new president must be to end the military occupation of Iraq. This will be no easy task, but Kerry is more likely to do it — and with some understanding of Middle Eastern realities — than is Bush.

The election of Kerry would sweep away neoconservative war intellectuals who drive policy at the White House and Pentagon. It would end the back-door draft of American reservists and the use of American soldiers as imperial police. It would also provide a chance to repair America's overseas relationships, both with governments and people, particularly in the world of Islam.

A less-belligerent, more-intelligent foreign policy should cause less anger to be directed at the United States. A political change should allow Americans to examine the powers they have given the federal government under the Patriot Act, and the powers the president has claimed by executive order.

This page had high hopes for President Bush regarding taxing and spending. We endorsed his cut in income taxes, expecting that it would help business and discipline new public spending. In the end, there was no discipline in it.... read more

-- Seattle Times editorial on Friday, August 27, 2004

From an article in the New York Times by Sam Dillon

School ratings issued under the terms of President Bush's No Child Left Behind law have clashed with school report card systems administered by some states, leaving parents unsure which level of government to believe or whether to transfer their children, an option offered by the law.

In North Carolina, which pioneered one of the nation's most sophisticated accountability systems, more than 32 schools ranked as excellent by the state failed to meet Washington's criteria for academic progress. In California, 317 schools showed tremendous academic growth on the state's performance index, yet the federal law labeled them low-performing.

Here in Darien, the Hinsdale South High School is one of a dozen prestigious high schools in prosperous Chicago suburbs that failed to meet a federal target and were obligated to send letters to parents explaining their shortcomings and offering to transfer children to other schools.

In Westport, Conn., the Bedford Middle School, where test scores are often among Connecticut's highest, was called low-performing because the school failed to meet the 95 percent standard for testing for the disabled by one student.

"It really bugs me that we got a black eye for a mechanical reason rather than for anything legitimate," said Dr. Elliott Landon, Westport's superintendent.

Montgomery High School in Skillman, N.J., seven miles northwest of Princeton, was honored by the federal Department of Education as a Blue Ribbon School of Excellence in 1993, and last year its mean SAT score of 1220 was 194 points above the national average. But Montgomery, too, failed to meet federal targets last year because one student's absence brought the school afoul of the federal rule requiring that 95 percent of students take standardized tests.

According to the Democratic Policy Committee's chairman Byron Dorgan,

President Bush's budget proposes the smallest increase for education since Fiscal Year 1996. While total discretionary spending for education would rise three percent (or $1.68 billion) from $55.67 billion to $57.34 billion, if enacted, this figure would be the smallest increase for education since Fiscal Year 1996, at a time when schools are struggling to meet the mandates of the NCLB.

The President's budget would severely underfund NCLB programs. Schools are struggling to provide quality services to increased numbers of students, while also implementing accountability and testing mandates. At the same time, state budget crises are forcing dramatic cuts in state education funding. Yet, the Administration proposes a small increase of only $448 million (or 1.8 percent) to $24.91 billion over the Fiscal Year 2004 level of $24.46 billion for the law. The Bush budget would underfund the levels promised by NCLB for Fiscal Year 2005 ($34.32 billion) by $9.4 billion.

The President's budget would leave millions of children behind by failing to fully fund the Title I program for disadvantaged students. Title I is critical to closing achievement gaps, maximizing student achievement, and helping all students learn. While the Administration proposes an increase of $1 billion - for a total of $13.34 billion - this figure is more than $7.1 billion below the NCLB authorized level for Fiscal Year 2005 ($20.5 billion). Overall, the President's budget leaves 4.6 million children behind. If Title I were funded at the level promised by the NCLB in Fiscal Year 2005, it would fully serve 2.4 million more - over half - of those children currently left behind.

The President's budget would fail to fully fund the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) (or special education) Part B State Grants. Fully funding IDEA would help disabled students succeed and ensure that schools have the resources they need to serve all children well. The Administration, however, proposes to increase IDEA Part B funding by only $1 billion, for a total of $11.07 billion - significantly less than what is needed to move toward fully funding the program. This figure would provide 19.7 percent of the national average per-pupil expenditure - still less than half of the "full funding" level that Congress committed to paying when the IDEA was first adopted in 1975.

Pell grant maximum award would be frozen. During his presidential campaign, then-candidate Bush promised a maximum Pell grant award of $5,100. But under President Bush's budget, the maximum award would be frozen for the third straight year at $4,050, enough to pay just 34 percent of the average annual cost of attending college - down from 42 percent in 2001.

The President's budget would pay for inadequate increases to Title I and IDEA by eliminating 38 education programs providing vital services to children. Programs slated for elimination include dropout prevention, gifted and talented, school counseling, alcohol abuse reduction, arts in education, Leveraging Educational Assistance Partnerships (LEAP), and school leadership. Many of the eliminated programs have proven track records in helping students stay in and succeed at school. Eliminating these programs seems in direct conflict with the laudable goal of increasing graduation rates which is central to the Administration's focus on literacy.

The President's budget would further undermine the NCLB by level-funding programs that work. These programs include 21st Century Community Learning Centers (which fund after-school programs), despite strong evidence that keeping children safe after school can reduce juvenile crime and prevent children from engaging in risky behaviors. 21st Century Community Learning Centers would be level-funded at $999 million - half of the $2 billion Fiscal Year 2005 authorized level. As a result, 1.32 million children who should receive after-school services would be left behind. He freezes most other major K-12 education programs without providing an inflation adjustment, including Impact Aid ($1.2 billion), rural education ($168 million), and English language acquisition ($681 million).

The President's budget includes a "choice incentive fund" that would divert taxpayer funds to private schools through a $50 million voucher program. Research clearly demonstrates that vouchers do little to improve student achievement. Yet, the President includes in his budget $50 million for a new "Choice Incentive Fund" to pay for student transfers to private and public schools - an initiative that is merely a cover for private school voucher programs. Rather than experimenting with programs that make no real difference in student achievement, we should focus on ensuring that all students have the tools for success - including smaller class sizes, high teacher quality, more parental involvement, and up-to-date materials.

Despite President Bush's emphasis on job training in his State of the Union address, his budget proposal would reduce federal spending for career and technical education to approximately $1 billion, a cut of more than $300 million from this year's funding levels.

"New Hampshire teachers receive the 49th lowest salaries in the country," Kucinich said, "and the Bush Administration's implementation of the 'No Child Left Behind Act' is exacerbating the problem. A study by the New Hampshire School Administrators Association estimated that the Bush Administration's plan will give New Hampshire schools only $77 for every student, while costing the state $575 per student to implement....

To make matters worse, the Bush Administration has cut in New Hampshire alone: $800,000 for Pell Grant funding for lower income college students, $1.1 million for educating children in rural schools, $400,000 for teacher quality training grants, and $230,000 for safe and drug free schools grants.

There are measures that are more effective than the Leave No Child Behind (LNCB) Legislation. These consist of reducing the class size and the work load of the teaching staff so that they will have more time to devote to the specific needs of the students. Providing intervention programs such as after school tutors, and special classes that specifically address the needs of disabled and ESL students. Schools that have improved use these techniques.

The LNCB act is however merely punitive, and does not provide the funds necessary to assist troubled schools in their efforts to improve. And how can a rubric which measures improvement as a percentage increase really be an accurate assessment? Once a school reaches a certain high caliber level of achievement, how much further can the school improve? To use an analogy, when a student makes a 98% on a test, do we consider the student failing because they score a 96% on the next test?

The LNCB act was really designed by people who wanted to destroy the public school system, because despite vast evidence to the contrary, they are blinded by a belief that privatization is preferable. But, just as in the Medical Health industry, some sectors of our society are just too important and too expensive to be farmed out to for profit corporations. The role of government is and has always been to make investments in our communities that benefit society as a whole.

Competition is based on the idea that the companies who survive are those who can make the most profit for the least amount of investment. This is often referred to in economic literature as efficiency or worker productivity. In some sectors of the economy, this is preferable. But in other economic sectors, a decrease in investment for the sake of efficiency (and profit)results in a product of poor quality, a more expensive product, or both. This is certainly the case with education and medical care.

And although it might be true that the President's budget is the largest educational outlay in the history of the budget, that statement is indicative only of the natural law of increase. The budget is still about $26 billion below what was authorized in the NCLB legislation. A 1.6% increase only keeps up with inflation. The money spent on Education each year has always been higher than the previous year, so it takes a lot of sophistry to imply that the minor increase is indicative of a great new era. You can increase my $3000 monthly salary by 48 dollars (a 1.6% increase) and I will have made more money than I ever did before, but I certainly won't be able now buy a house anymore than I was the year before. The same can be said for the Education budget that is touted as the largest in history.

So when president Bush mouths off about how he is raising the bar and eliminating the so-called "soft-bigotry of low expectations," he does not fairly describe the reality of education. Instead, The "Children Are Being Left Behind Act" should be referred to as "the rigid stupidity of ideological presumptions."

We know how the Bush administration has handled the war: It fouled up royally. First, it had bad intelligence. Second, administration members shut their eyes and their minds to all advice, to all of the caveats from the intelligence community, that didn't justify going to war. Third, the administration disregarded sound military advice that a lot more troops would be needed than it was sending. Fourth, by not giving the U.N. weapons inspectors time to finish their job, the Bush administration lost the support of France, Germany, Russia and most of the rest of the world. Fifth, it did not stop the looting. Sixth, it did not anticipate and prepare for the resistance. Seventh, its occupation has been nothing but a cluster-blunder. And eighth, it has overextended the U.S. military but stubbornly refuses to admit it....

I noticed that Mr. Bush has added Afghanistan and Iraq to the roster of democracies in one of his campaign ads, which, in a bizarre fashion, has clips of the Olympics. Neither Iraq nor Afghanistan is a democracy. They are both led by U.S.-appointed people. Both rely on U.S. forces for security. Both are unstable, are dominated by warlords and are far from peaceful.

Mr. Bush seems to have a talent (some would call it a mental aberration) of believing that things are so if he merely says they are so. Thus, Iraq, which he once said had weapons of mass destruction, is now a democracy in his mind, despite the fact that no elections have been held. He also believes that we have a robust economy, which is something else that is not in sync with reality.

That's what worries me most about President Bush. He seems to live inside a bubble created by his staff and cronies and to be genuinely unaware of what's going on outside his bubble. It is very dangerous to have a president who cannot see the world as it really is. Novelist Ayn Rand once observed that while we can ignore reality, we cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring reality.

President Bush has proven to be all campaign and no governance. Every word out of his mouth, every policy, seems to have been crafted by campaign aides with the goal of not accomplishing anything but his re-election.

That, too, is a dangerous situation. Every president has to keep an eye on the electorate, but the best ones have always tried to do the right thing even if their campaign aides objected. A true leader will do the right thing and then try to convince the voters that he has done so. An empty suit will do whatever his campaign manipulators tell him is best for the re-election campaign.

-- Charley Reese, For Friday, September 3, 2004

The Kerry campaign has just released the following prepared remarks, to be delivered tonight at a campaign rally in Springfield, Ohio.

"We all saw the anger and distortion of the Republican Convention. For the past week, they attacked my patriotism and my fitness to serve as Commander-in- chief. Well, here's my answer. I'm not going to have my commitment to defend this country questioned by those who refused to serve when they could have and by those who have misled the nation into Iraq.

"The Vice President even called me unfit for office last night. I guess I'll leave it up to the voters whether five deferments makes someone more qualified to defend this nation than two tours of duty.

"Let me tell you what I think makes someone unfit for duty. Misleading our nation into war in Iraq makes you unfit to lead this nation. Doing nothing while this nation loses millions of jobs makes you unfit to lead this nation. Letting 45 million Americans go without healthcare makes you unfit to lead this nation. Letting the Saudi Royal Family control our energy costs makes you unfit to lead this nation. Handing out billions of government contracts to Halliburton while you're still on their payroll makes you unfit. That's the record of George Bush and Dick Cheney. And it's not going to change. I believe it's time to move America in a new direction; I believe it's time to set a new course for America."

Perhaps instead the corporate media will focus on the "irresponsible antics" of the 10 or 15 protesters who shed their suits on the RNC floor in the middle of Bush's revision of history --- uh, I mean acceptance speech.

There I go again, Bush-bashing in a way only a Clinton-hater could love.

By the way, rumor is that Tony Blair is sick of President Bush's incompetence. Bush has been begging him to come to the United States to give him a medal, so there can be a photo-op moment of Bush looking presidential. But Blair refuses.

The word is out. Bush is an incompetent, petulant, desperately mean bastard.

Sorry if you're ignorant ass thinks that the truth is Bush-bashing.

No, I'm not. Get an education and leave me alone.

Zell Miller preceded Vice President Dick Cheney, saying that "nothing makes this ex-marine more mad" when American troops in Iraq are called "occupiers" instead of "liberators" by what he calls democratic "partisans."

Well sir, tell that to the Iraqi's.

When United States troops remained in Germany and Japan after World War Two, not one soldier, NOT A SINGLE SOLDIER was shot or killed by militia groups.

How many American soldiers have died since the day Bush landed on an Aircraft Carrier and announced "Mission Accomplished?" As of September 1st 2004, twice as many as were killed before the mission was accomplished.

And don't liberators do deeds like repair the infrastructure, rather than skim off billions for profits or importing cheap labor instead of hiring unemployed young Iraqi's in need of work?

Do liberators round up random groups of teenagers, toss them in jails like Abu Ghraib, and subject them to humiliation akin to (if not outright) torture?

Do liberators appoint corrupt Baathist officials and promulgate a constitution instead of holding free elections, because the Bush administration was more interested in creating economic opportunities for foreign investors and multinational corporations? This is what happened when General Jay Garner was pulled out of Iraq in June 2003 and replaced by Paul Bremer.

And is it to liberate Iraq that appointed ambassador John Negroponte says this week that he is going to divert reconstruction spending into security forces? Will the Iraqi's see Americans as liberators when they are dying from depleted Uranium, who have sewage in their water supply, and who can't get more than 4 hours of electricity because privatization has been an absolute failure. Does that hate in their eyes come from the love they have for what is presumed by speakers at the Republican podium?

And now in the wake of these compiled failures, the urge for stability is so great that we are in the midst of creating a police state headed by a new thug named Allawi, using the same police that Saddam used, and the same prisons where Saddam tortured.

Living in a bubble, blind patriots don't connect the ineptitude of the Bush administration to the current results, since they have assumed the morality of ending one dictator will automatically produce a glorious democracy of freedom regardless of history and deep rifts in the Iraqi state. We don't take up arms in the United States when we disagree politically, but will the well trained, armed militias of the Kurds, Shitites, and Sunni's do so.

According to observers with 20-30 years of knowledge and real experience in the region (as opposed to the ideologues who safely write position papers in the cubicles of statuesque offices at think-tank Washington D.C.) no one in Iraq believes the elections of 2005 will matter at all.

This is not a "miscalculation." That word implies that you dutifully multiplied 2 and 4 and ... oops ... you got 6. This is a disgraceful failure, and the vehemence of rebuttal is just defiant denial. Not only did the administration not study for the test, not only did they not pay attention in class or do their homework, but they also presumed they didn't even have to read the book on how to effectively pursue foreign policy and warfare.

But some people who take a shit will eat it too.

Beating the chest and shouting "USA" is not going to change reality. And completely misses the point. Admitting that the Iraq war is a disaster because of incompetence and lies is not anti-patriotic. Are we going to chop off our nose to spite the face?

Two sources you can consult : Robert Fisk and juan cole.

Picture of old geezer with squishy face, wearing a band-aid on his chin to mock Kerry -- based on lies that he believes to be true.

On Tuesday, 31 August 2004, at the GOP conventions, Schwarzenegger said:

I finally arrived here in 1968. What a special day it was. I remember I arrived here with empty pockets but full of dreams, full of determination, full of desire.The presidential campaign was in full swing. I remember watching the Nixon-Humphrey presidential race on TV. A friend of mine who spoke German and English translated for me. I heard Humphrey saying things that sounded like socialism, which I had just left.

But then I heard Nixon speak. Then I heard Nixon speak. He was talking about free enterprise, getting the government off your back, lowering the taxes and strengthening the military.

Mister, I-don't-take-no-special-interest-money-unless-it's-corporate-special- interests Schwastikaneger lied.

Yes Schwastikaneger said he took no special interest money, and when asked why he's taking millions from corporate lobbyists by some upsnippity reporter, Schwastikaneger said he meant unions.

And what things did his friend translate sounded like "socialism?" Could it be that ole Schwastikaneger threw uneducated nonsense to the hungry idiotic dogs so that he could fed of off their irrational screams?

Hubert Humphrey of all people. Hubert Humphrey was a great speaker with a passion for the rights and freedoms of all men. This is the man who bravely made a speech at the 1948 Democratic convention where he wanted his party to enter the "beautiful light" by ending southern segregation and add a civil rights plank. Was ending the culture of racism socialism?

He happened to be Vice President when Lyndon Johnson was president, and became the Democratic nominee by default after Johnson resigned and Robert Kennedy was assassinated. What could Schwastikaneger be talking about? What could Humphrey have said that "sounded like socialism?"

Let's look at some Humphrey quotes from http://home.att.net/~howington/hhh.html

Fortunately, the time has long passed when people liked to regard the United States as some kind of melting pot, taking men and women from every part of the world and converting them into standardized, homogenized Americans. We are, I think, much more mature and wise today. Just as we welcome a world of diversity, so we glory in an America of diversity-- an America all the richer for the many different and distinctive strands of which it is woven.
--Hubert H. Humphrey "All-America Tribute to Archbishop Iakovos," speech, 15 Jan. 1967, Chicago, Ill.

Much of our American progress has been the product of the individual who had an idea; pursued it; fashioned it; tenaciously clung to it against all odds; and then produced it, sold it, and profited from it.
--NO DATE GIVEN

"We cannot use a double standard for measuring our own and other people's policies. Our demands for democratic practices in other lands will be no more effective than the guarantees of those practiced in our own country."
--1948

"I am not here to judge whether people are locked in poverty because of themselves or because of the society in which they live. All I know is that they are there and we are trying to do something about it."
--1966

"It is all too easy for a society to measure itself against some abstract philosophical principle or political slogan. But in the end, there must remain the question: What kind of life is one society providing to the people that live in it?"
--1966

"When we say, 'One nation under God, with liberty and justice for all', we are talking about all people. We either ought to believe it or quit saying it ."
--1966

"Equality means equality for all - no exceptions, no 'yes, buts', no asterisked footnotes imposing limits."
--1967

"Be clear where America stands. Human brotherhood and equal opportunity for every man, woman, and child, we are committed to it, in America and around the world."
--1967

"What you do, what each of us does, has an effect on the country, the state, the nation, and the world."
--1968

"My philosophy has always been that benefits should percolate up rather than trickle down."
--1971

"There is no such thing as an acceptable level of unemployment, because hunger is not acceptable, poverty is not acceptable, poor health is not acceptable, and a ruined life is not acceptable."
--NO DATE GIVEN

What I do hear is a sense that there is a moral obligation by our society to have a bottom level, a bare minimum so that no one should have to be born into poverty, ignorance, or suffer the indignity of bankruptcy merely because they become sick. This does not mean government handouts or welfare queens. This means food stamps so that children don't have to starve. This means a free public education so that everyone has access to the same opportunity. This means that no one should be exploited or profit from the sick and disabled.

All too often, that word is abused by politicians with a hidden agenda and a vain eye looking at power. Schwastikaneger is no exception.

"When the strongest nation in the world can be tied down for four years in a war in Vietnam with no end in sight, when the richest nation in the world cannot manage its economy, when the nation with the greatest tradition of the rule of war is plagued by unprecedented racial violence, when the President of the United States cannot travel abroad, or to any major city at home, then its time for new leadership for the United States."
-- President Nixon, 1968 RNC Acceptance Speech

"The speech-makers kept saying "we did not seek this war," and that it was imposed on us, and by God we were going to keep hitting back. That is, the rhetoric was that of righteous anger, of the avenging victim. While this argument works with regard to Afghanistan (which the US did not invade, only providing air cover to an indigenous group. the Northern Alliance), it is hollow with regard to Iraq. Only by confusing the "war on terror" with the war on Iraq could this rhetoric be even somewhat meaningful, and it is not a valid conflation.

"No American president has more desperately sought out a war with any country than George W. Bush sought out this war with Iraq. Only Polk's war on Mexico, also based on false pretexts, even comes close to the degree of crafty manipulation employed by Bush and Cheney to get up the Iraq war. Intelligence about weapons of mass destruction was deliberately and vastly exaggerated, producing a "nuclear threat" where there wasn't even so much as a single gamma ray to be registered. Innuendo and repetition were cleverly used to tie Saddam to Usama Bin Laden operationally, a link that all serious intelligence professionals deny.
-- Juan Cole, at www.juancole.com