Rycroft memo

The press has uncovered yet another smoking gun. (Of course, the discharge from smoking guns is so heavy at this point that it wouldn't even pass muster under Shrub's environmental initiatives.) The latest revelations come from a memo written by Matthew Rycroft, a Downing Street foreign policy aide, and is dated July 23, 2002. The memo includes the following gems of forthrightness of which we are so unaccustomed:

Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.

This "fixing of the facts around policy" bears on odd resemblance to the ubiquitous criticisms of Bolton. But back to the memo:

It seemed clear that Bush had made up his mind to take military action, even if the timing was not yet decided. But the case was thin. Saddam was not threatening his neighbors, and his WMD capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or Iran. We should work up a plan for an ultimatum to Saddam to allow back in the U.N. weapons inspectors. This would also help with the legal justification for the use of force.

Like most of my fellow plebes, I don't like to be lied to. Especially when it results in needless deaths and a huge drain on my pocketbook. On the other hand, we may want to simply ignore this latest smoking gun. After all, the initial portion of the memo informs us that "this record is extremely sensitive. No further copies should be made." So I guess we should be loyal citizens and turn our eyes away. We wouldn't want to stare at our revered leaders as they piss on the bushes.