Hearsay?

If Tenet had told Richer "I forged the letter", that would be evidence that Tenet said those words, but would be hearsay as to the question of whether Tenet forged the letter.

However, Tenet told Richer to forge the document. Once again that is evidence that Tenet said those words, and here the words are key. The words eqaute to the order, so Richer's evidence is NOT hearsay to the question of whether Tenet ordered him to forge the letter.

BTW, to forestall Bush's enablers, do not confuse the word "evidence" with conclusive or definitive evidence. There is evidence that Tenet ordered Richer to forge the letter. There may be contrary evidence out there that shows Richer is making this up, or that Tenet had gone "off reservation" and Bush had no knowledge of Tenet's illegal acts. I repeat my call for an inquiry to get to the bottom of this. Incompetence is one thing. Malicious deception is quite another.

I'm no nuclear physicist, but I don't think that would have worked. The IAEA would have insisted on inspecting the supposeduly seized WMDs. If I remember correctly, it is possible to subject the fissible material to tests to determine their point of origin. It probably wouldnt look too good if the tests came back "Made in America"

The problem with the War on Drugs are all the half-measures.

I'm from Singapore. We have little-to-no drug scene to speak of. However, I suspect our solution will be too harrowing for even the most hard right law-n-order US voter to stomach.

We have mandatory death penalties for drug trafficking. And I don't mean for kilos of coke. Nope, we hang drug dealers and traffickers for even small quantities of drugs. How small? 250g of meth = death. 30g of morphine = death. End result? Little to no drug crime. Drug cartels try to avoid transitting thru Singapore cos we don't care if u're only in transit. We catch u with the stuff in an airport lounge waiting for your connecting flight to Amsterdam? We string u up. The closest thing we have to a serious drug problem is valium abuse.

The addicts dont get off easy either. We imprison addicts. Possession for the purpose of consumption is criminalised. We give our addicts longer sentences than you give your dealers. Hell, we even imprisoned a couple of teenagers for smoking pot while they were overseas (hair samples).

Its probably too late for you folks to try this in the US. Not unless you're ok with wiping out a significant proportion of your inner city youth. We didn't have to make those kind of hard choices. This stark legal regime was put into place before widespread drug trafficking could take root.

The moral of the story? You will never win the War on Drugs until you make the consequences of drug dealing and consumption so utterly horrifying that even the prospect of lifting yourself from poverty is not a sufficient incentive. For America, that boat has sailed. You're probably better off with just legalising the stuff. Your half-*ss War on Drugs is an exercise in futility.

Reading the total cost of the Bush Administration's serial debacles is sobering stuff.

What further beggars the imagination is that the American Public voted this man in not once but TWICE. Mostly on the basis that he was the kinda guy you would want to have a beer with. Kerry in '04 wasn't perfect sure, we rejected him 'cos he was a "flip-flopper". In hindsight, seems to me the willigness to change one's mind was exactly what we needed. But nope, Americans love someone who is a "decider" who is determined to "stay the course" until we can declare "mission accomplished"!

George Bernard Shaw wrote that "There are two tragedies in life. One is to lose your heart's desire. The other is to gain it.” In Bush, the American public got exactly what they wanted. A resolute man in uncertain times. And it has cost America dearly.

Well, its not often that an article completely blindsides me!

Did a quick search on Wikipedia for "Marc Rich", but I didn't see any repeat of allegations that he was a Mossad asset. Any chance we can get the author's source?

On a side note, I can understand pardoning someone who was a CIA asset? But a Mossad asset? I think this country needs to seriously reassess its priorities. America's special relationship with Israel notwithstanding, Clinton should not have bowed to Israeli pressure unless there was some kind of quid pro quo. As far as I can tell, its a one-way street. America needs to refocus on its own strategic interests.

P.S. For those neocons who feel that blindly backing Israel on everything under the sun is in the national interest because we need to "democratise" the Middle East, I think I speak for all of us when I say that the national interest would be better served by shipping every single neo-con chickenhawk to Afghanistan to serve the war effort. The troops could use more human shields.