Offering constructive criticism to the social cripples in our midst since early 2005.

[SlaveNoMore]

Shape Shifter
Josh has been over this:

If you [channeling Ty]bothered to read the entire posting by Djerejian[/channeling Ty], you'll see he goes over these 2004 assertions by Marshall, as well as the Marshall posts Ty alluded to yesterday.

So you don't have to click the link, I'll post the whole thing here for you:

July 17, 2005
Marshall's Not Shooting Straight

Glenn: "When the loudest critics start changing the subject back to their old discredited talking points, well..."

Indeedy. Witness Exhibit A, from TPM:

As Ivo mentioned yesterday evening, whatever the British 'Butler Report' or the Senate (SSCI) report said about the quality of reporting that Iraq had tried to sell uranium Niger, the Iraq Survey Group -- which basically owned Iraq for more than a year -- found that there was no evidence whatsoever that Iraq had tried to purchase uranium from anywhere after 1991, let alone from Niger. And for the reasons just stated, the ISG clearly trumps the two earlier reports.

But one might go much further than that. I've discussed over at TPM the various ways that Senate report is intentionally misleading and tendentious. But what of the British Butler Report?

The Butler Report -- in an explicit effort to retrospectively validate the president's '16 words' in the 2003 state of the union -- claimed that the British judgment had not relied on the forged Niger papers. However, there was an earlier British parliamentary inquiry in September 2003 -- before the issue became such a political hot potato. And that report makes clear that most of the British judgment was based on the forged documents. (See a full explanation here).

This is but one example of how the Butler Report and the Senate intel report are political documents. From start to finish.

Josh approvingly links to Ivo Daalder who writes:

In attempting to counter the obvious, Rove's supporters (like the Post editorial page and David Brooks on Lehrer tonite) argue that the reports by Lord Butler and the Senate Intelligence Committee supported earlier intelligence assessments that Iraqi attempts to acquire uranium from Niger were well founded. But this ignores the definitive judgement on the matter by the Iraqi Survey Group, which concluded as follows last September:
ISG has not found evidence to show that Iraq sought uranium from abroad after 1991 or renewed indigenous production of such material—activities that we believe would have constituted an Iraqi effort to reconstitute a nuclear weapons program.

The fundamental problem facing the administration and its supporters is that on this, as on all other question relating to Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, they were, in the words of David Kay, who initially headed the ISG, "all wrong."

It's one thing to state the obvious, which is that the state of U.S. intelligence regarding Iraq was abysmally wrong on many scores indeed. But Ivo Daalder's post is quite disingenuous, of course. The whole Niger/Africa/uranium hullabaloo had at its very core the hysterical leftist shrieks (Bush lied, People died!) that the '16 Words' of the SOTU were purposeful lies pronounced by POTUS so as to help drag the so gullible, Murdoch-fed ranks of the jingo-fied public into Mesopotamia. So whether the Iraq Survey Group turned up no uranium or such once in Iraq is wholly besides the point vis-a-vis establishing the bona fides of the President's honesty or lack thereof in relation to the contents of the SOTU. It's a total straw man really. But look, we are all capable of Daalder's rather breezy moving of the goal posts to score a partisan point now and again. It happens to the best of us. What really bothers me, however, more than anything Daalder writes, is Josh Marshall's treatment of this matter. He totally impugns the integrity of both the SSCI and the Butler reports ("This is but one example of how the Butler Report and the Senate intel report are political documents. From start to finish.") That's quite a statement, and it well showcases Josh's abject hackery on this issue. No, it's worse. I simply can't avoid the conclusion that Josh Marshall is, very probably, being flat-out dishonest on this issue. He's ignoring so much evidence that disproves his treatment of the matter, and he is too smart to just innocently be 'missing' it, that I must reluctantly conclude he is likely purposefully lying.

First, let us recall that both the Butler Report and the SSCI report were independent, non-partisan investigations (the former led by an independent jurist, the latter a bipartisan effort by the Senate Intelligence Committee). As even that conservative rag (the WaPo!) puts it:

One year after that, reports by two official investigations -- Britain's Butler Commission and the Senate intelligence committee -- demonstrated that Mr. Wilson's portrayal of himself as a whistle-blower was unwarranted. It turned out his report to the CIA had not altered, and may even have strengthened, the agency's conclusion that Iraq had explored uranium purchases from Niger. Moreover, his account had not reached Vice President Cheney or any other senior official. According to the Butler Commission, led by an independent jurist, the assertion about African uranium included in Mr. Bush's State of the Union speech was "well-founded."

So, first off, keep that background in mind when Josh says these are politically biased documents from "start to finish". That arguably the brightest blogger on the left can so easily get away with such comments makes one pause and wonder about the quality of the entire blogosphere, frankly. Again, this was not James Schlesinger investigating Abu Ghraib. You had Jay Rockefeller and all the Democrats on the Senate Intel side. What would have been their motivation to white-wash the record? If anything, guys like Rockefeller were in full-blown gotcha mode trying to establish that Bush had purposefully ignored contrary intelligence and/or lied.

Regardless, Josh has pretty much been forced to piss all over the SSCI and Butler reports because they simply don't support the narrative he peddled assiduously for months last year. The Marshall storyline went that the entire universe of intelligence indicating that Iraq may have been pursuing uranium from Niger/Africa was based on forged documents and so totally compromised. But as I extensively detailed in this blog last year (go here and here) the facts simply didn't (and still don't) support Josh's hyperbolic treatment of the story. Josh then tried to argue that, even if there was alternate intelligence supporting the claim that Iraq tried to get uranium from Africa--evidence that was unrelated to the forgeries--said evidence was still inexorably tainted by linkage to the forgeries (the 'fruit of the poisonous tree' argument). That argument too, proved a red herring. Finally, left with neither the support of the SSCI nor the Butler Report reports, nor the FOPT argument, Josh was forced to resort to a previous British parliamentary report chaired by UK MP Ann Taylor in September 2003. His argument went that this report was drafted before Bush's so infamous SOTU, and so treats the whole Africa and uranium story more head-on and honestly--in other words it's not a political, spin-infused document meant to protect Bush or Blair (recalling that Butler and SSCI were both non-partisan investigations, I need to stress again). Josh writes:

But the key point is that the authors of the earlier report felt free to be candid about what the Butler Report chose to keep hidden -- namely, that most of the British judgment about 'uranium from Africa' was based on the phony documents the Butler Report claims had nothing to do with their judgment.

But even this desperate final argument is simply untrue. As I had written almost a year ago to the day:

For instance, how can Josh say "most of the British judgement about uranium from Africa was based on the phony documents"? Take the September '03 UK Parliamentary Report Marshall is so enthused about. TPM likes it so because it ostensibly makes plainer, as compared to the Butler report, that one of the British intel sources (assorted documentary evidence) was based on the forgeries. But that very same report states unequivocally:
"The SIS stated that the documents did not affect its judgement of its second source and consequently the SIS continues to believe that the Iraqis were attempting to negotiate the purchase of uranium from Niger. We have questioned the SIS about the basis of its judgement and conclude that it is reasonable."

So that's two sources; one ostensibly FOPT tainted and the other not. From this, how does one divine that "most" of the British judgement was based on forgeries? Depends on what the definition of "most" is, I guess.But wait, there's more. Josh neglects to remind us of the Congo finding in the Butler report:

Quoting, at section 499:

"There was further and separate intelligence that in 1999 the Iraqi regime had also made inquiries about the purchase of uranium ore in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In this case, there was some evidence that by 2002 an agreement for a sale had been reached."

Recall, Bush's SOTU referenced Iraqi efforts to procure uranium from Africa generally--not just Niger. So that's three separate sources of intel the Brits had regarding Iraqi attempts to obtain uranium in Africa. One would appear to be FOPT tainted. Two weren't.

Josh's credibility would be bolstered significantly if he accepted that he never struck gold on this story. He tried, tooth and nail, to score a grand slam. He never did. That's OK, and he may have opportunities in the future on other stories. But in life, when you get something wrong, it's good to admit it, hang up your gloves, and move on to the next thing. Instead, Josh appears to prefer to repeat lies to his overly credulous readers. That's really too bad.

If you recall, Josh kept beating the drum for months that he was cracking this story and that the show would drop. It never really happened.

He has a vested interest in his credibility to make this story.