Americans—an alarming number of whom believe the government plotted 9/11, presumably with the help of Saddam and bin Laden—were told today what the reality-based community has known since… 2002, which is when I wrote this (vis-à -vis there being no relationship between Hussein and al-Qaida):

Iraq is a secular dictatorship profoundly at odds with Islamic fundamentalism. No less an authority than the former head of the CIA’s counterterrorism office Vincent Cannistraro stated categorically that there was no evidence of Iraq’s links to al-Qaeda. Even the putative Prague meeting between Mohamed Atta, the ringleader of Sept. 11, and Iraqi intelligence, turned out to be bogus. … Lacking proof of Iraqi links to al-Qaeda, Mr. Bush fixed on accusing Iraq of reacquiring chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, as well as long-range ballistic missiles…

However, what truly takes the cake is the response of the Party of Mules to this bit of non-news. Democrats declared ponderously that what we finally have here is information that undermines the president’s case for war. Had these jackasses not voted almost unanimously to give the president the power to take the country to war, they’d not feel the need to pretend there was justification for war with Iraq in the first place.

Or perhaps Pelosi is just retarded. Both rationales are equally plausible.

By the way, by asserting that the presence of Zarqawi in Iraq indicates Hussein gave al-Qaida a nod and a wink, one is also conceding that the presence of terrorists in the US proves they are here with Bush’s tacit approval. Any rational individual, whose reasoning faculties are slightly more developed than Cindy Sheehan’s, knows this is ridiculous.

Selective history is in vogue with the fiction-based community these days—I refer to the administration’s repeated references of late to Lenin and Hitler. Pundits are also generally pig-ignorant. Or if they aren’t, they cultivate historical amnesia when it comes to events that don’t confirm their world-view. Nevertheless, and for anyone who cares for yet another bit of historical evidence of the animus between Hussein and bin Laden: When Iraq occupied Kuwait in 1990, bin Laden petitioned Saudi authorities with a plan to mount an attack on Hussein if he dared to threaten The Kingdom. Bin Laden was furious when the Saudis rebuffed him and turned to the US, instead.

Jill Carroll spent 82 days in the captivity of Iraqi insurgents, after which she was miraculously released. She has been documenting the nightmare online at the Christian Science Monitor. This once-naïve American young woman will not be putting herself in such a predicament anytime soon.

One of the observations she shares in her reports is that the “movement … included children and mothers, whole families who exhibited ardent devotion to their brand of Islam – and to chilling brutality.â€? (Ignore the CSM’s politically correct obeisance to the idea that the bad guys have hijacked, rather than heeded, Islam.)
Carroll relates how her captor boasted that his wife, Um Ali (mother Ali), pregnant with her fourth child, wanted to become a suicide bomber. “Later I was told,� writes Carroll, “that this was the only way women could be part of the mujahideen [sic]. The men could have the glory of fighting in battle. Women got to blow themselves up.�

As the evening progressed, and as she joined the women in picking at the food scraps the men had magnanimously tossed them after they feasted royally–she also discovered that the women (only under hijacked Islam, of course) don’t get to eat much.
Nor do seventy Chippendale dancers await them in hell, after “martyrdom.�

Jill Carroll spent 82 days in the captivity of Iraqi insurgents, after which she was miraculously released. She has been documenting the nightmare online at the Christian Science Monitor. This once-naïve American young woman will not be putting herself in such a predicament anytime soon.

One of the observations she shares in her reports is that the “movement … included children and mothers, whole families who exhibited ardent devotion to their brand of Islam – and to chilling brutality.â€? (Ignore the CSM’s politically correct obeisance to the idea that the bad guys have hijacked, rather than heeded, Islam.)
Carroll relates how her captor boasted that his wife, Um Ali (mother Ali), pregnant with her fourth child, wanted to become a suicide bomber. “Later I was told,� writes Carroll, “that this was the only way women could be part of the mujahideen [sic]. The men could have the glory of fighting in battle. Women got to blow themselves up.�

As the evening progressed, and as she joined the women in picking at the food scraps the men had magnanimously tossed them after they feasted royally–she also discovered that the women (only under hijacked Islam, of course) don’t get to eat much.
Nor do seventy Chippendale dancers await them in hell, after “martyrdom.�