Understating the importance of the existence or absence of WMD at the time of the invasion won't settle the critical question of whether administration officials hyped government intelligence about the threat to win congressional support for launching pre-emptive war. Without WMD, what was being pre-empted?
E-mails to a columnist are hardly the equivalent of a Gallup poll, but mine have taken an interesting turn in recent weeks, from strong defenses of the president to questions about his rationale for the war.
One e-mailer writes: "You ask whether Bush's case was built on deception? Do Marylanders like crab cakes?"
Another asks: "If Bill Clinton was impeached because he lied about having sex with an intern, shouldn't George W. Bush also be impeached for the much more serious lie of inventing the case for war against Iraq out of whole cloth?"
Finally, another reader writes: "I find it odd that you do not utter the word 'impeach' in your articles. About the missing WMD which were the rationale for going to war in Iraq, Senator [Robert C.] Byrd is right to keep looking at the Constitution.
As Leah pointed out today, letters to the editor count. (Why do you think that the GOP Team Leader operatives give points for them? Though we hope it takes more to motivate a liberal than a beer cooler with a Grand Hypocrisy Party sticker on the side.)
Write your own letters (not Astroturf) to the editor. Call your Congressman. Talk to your neighbors. Wear an American flag lapel pin and a "Proud Liberal" t-shirt. Lots of people besides you want to know they aren't alone. The way to get the word out is to get the word out.