Quote of the day: I hope he's lying

Update: It looks like I'm not the only one to find Bush's insistence of being ignorant on an important matter troubling. Salon.com's War Room blog asks:

What's worse -- the idea that George W. Bush continued to ratchet up his rhetoric on Iran after he was told in August or September that Iran may have halted its nuclear weapon program, or the idea that Bush was told then only that there was some kind of "new information" on Iran and didn't bother asking what that information might be?

The top story in the news today is the Bush administration's acknowledgment that Iran is not actively putting together nuclear weapons and Bush's press conference this morning. The national intelligence estimate (NIE) on Iran had been long delayed, presumably due to internal arguments over it's conclusions.

At the press conference this morning, Bush was asked why he was continuing the war-mongering remarks at Iran just weeks ago, as the NIE was being finalized. His response was he didn't know about the conclusion regarding Iran's not actively seeking nuclear weapons until last week. Another reporter followed up:

Q Mr. President, thank you. Just to follow, I understand what you're saying about when you were informed about the NIE. Are you saying at no point while the rhetoric was escalating, as "World War III" was making it into conversation, at no point nobody from your intelligence team or your administration was saying, maybe you want to back it down a little bit?

THE PRESIDENT: No, nobody ever told me that. Having said -- having laid that out, I still feel strongly that Iran is a danger. Nothing has changed in this NIE that says, okay, why don't we just stop worrying about it. Quite the contrary. I think the NIE makes it clear that Iran needs to be taken seriously as a threat to peace. My opinion hasn't changed.

This is a spectacular remark on so many fronts. The continuing insistence in light of evidence from his own administration shouldn't surprise anyone, but troubling all the same.

But what I think is most spectacular is the "No, nobody ever told me that." Huh? I hope and believe that he is lying here. As the intelligence community has been undoubtedly debating the conclusion regarding Iran's lack of a nuclear weapons program for many months, if not years. This isn't some random country we're talking about. This has been one of the big diplomatic focuses of this administration. And he just heard of this conclusion last week?

Certainly, it's not hard to believe that this president would lie to cover up another lie. "No, I really didn't know that the intelligence community is confident Iran hasn't been seeking nuclear weapons for four years when I was saying we were going to get into World War III." It kind of looks bad.

But, couldn't one say it looks worse that our president (and the rest of the administration) was pursuing a key foreign policy track based on incredibly false assumptions? (Hmmm, sounds familiar...) Oh wait, this incredible reversal from the intelligence community doesn't change a thing. He tells us right away, "My opinion hasn't changed." We can't let pesky facts get in our way. Especially when they may interfere with war and the threat of war.