Michael N. Anton, a spokesman for the National Security Council, said today, "The documents alleging a transaction between Iraq and Niger were not the sole basis for the line in the president's State of the Union speech that referred to recent Iraqi attempts to acquire uranium from Africa."
OK. Now all we need is the rest of the "basis" -- the other evidence.
[Anton] said that at the time a "national intelligence estimate" cited "attempts by Iraq to acquire uranium from several countries in Africa," adding, "We now know that documents alleging a transaction between Iraq and Niger had been forged."
Right. But the issue is that the malAdministration could and should have known about Niger before the State of the Union speech, since that's when Ambassador Wilson told you there was no basis for it.
And the malAdministration could and should have immediately detected that the Niger documents were forged, since the forgeries were "crude." (Why on earth did they pass them to the UN? Oh well...)
So now all the malAdministration has to do is show the evidence on the other countries to make the case and save aWol's credibility, yes? We could start by naming the other African countries.... But no, not so simple.
Mr. Anton noted today that "other reporting that suggested that Iraq had tried to obtain uranium from Africa is not detailed or specific enough for us to be certain that such attempts were in fact made.
"Because of this lack of specificity," [Anton] continued, "this reporting alone did not rise to the level of inclusion in a presidential speech. "
In other words, without the forged Niger documents, this reporting didn't make the grade.
That said, the issue of Iraq's attempts to acquire uranium from abroad was not an element underpinning the judgment reached by most intelligence agencies ...
Most? Not all?
...that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program."
OK, so Anton's now thrown the idea that Iraq has trying to acquire uranium abroad over the side.
So what's the evidence now? Over in Britain, they keep peddling the same line, and even Blair's poodle commission says it's very odd indeed that they haven't been able to produce it.
Is it the aluminum tubes? The centrifuge parts under the rosebush? Is all the other evidence as politicized and worthless as the evidence we already know about? What a tangled web we weave....