On TV, I bet GOP pundit Brad Blakeman $1,000
he misrepresented the Iraq War—then he misrepresented the bet.

Spinners gotta spin. And Brad Blakeman, a Republican strategist and commentator, is an expert at keeping his own gyrations turning.

On Tuesday, he and I appeared on MSNBC to discuss Karl Rove’s new book. The main issue at hand was Rove’s assertion that George W. Bush did not “lie us” into the Iraq war. I went first and explained how the Bush administration had overstated iffy intelligence regarding Iraq’s WMD capabilities to grease the way to the invasion. Defending Bush’s war, Blakeman, who had worked in the Bush White House’s scheduling office, noted that Saddam Hussein had used WMDs against the Kurds—without mentioning that this had happened 15 years before the Iraq war and that UN inspectors had subsequently reported destroying Iraq’s WMD facilities. He then asserted that another reason for the war was that Saddam “was preventing inspectors from coming in and inspecting the [suspected WMD] sites that the UN demanded be inspected.”

I interrupted, “Brad, that’s not true,” noting that UN inspectors had been inside Iraq for months prior to the war and had uncovered no evidence of existing WMD stockpiles. “They were denied access,” Blakeman insisted.” And after I referred to two instances when Bush had made utterly false statements about Saddam’s relationship to al Qaeda and his nuclear weapons capabilities—statements not supported by the intelligence of the time—Blakeman argued that Bush had not lied. He repeated his claim that the reason for the war had been Saddam’s opposition to weapons inspections:

President Bush did not bring us into this war because of WMD. He brought us into the war because Saddam Hussein failed to allow inspections of the sites the UN demanded be inspected.

I told Blakeman that he was “absolutely wrong” and offered to bet him $1,000 that “the inspectors…were there.” Blakeman continued to say that the UN monitors had been kept from inspecting the sites. After host David Shuster said that he thought Blakeman owed me a thousand bucks, Blakeman said, “I never took that bet.”

No, he didn’t, unfortunately, for he had indeed peddled a false account. And afterward, he spun this whole exchange, brazenly misrepresenting what had transpired.

First, the facts. The inspectors were in Iraq for months before the war, scrutinizing key sites. Anyone who read a newspaper back then (or watched cable news) would know that—and know that the inspectors pulled out only when it became clear that Bush was about to attack. (They were not booted by Saddam.) But for sticklers who demand back-up, here are some excerpts from a 2003 Congressional Research Service report on the inspection process:

* From late November 2002 to March 2003, U.N. inspectors combed Iraq looking for weapons of mass destruction (WMD).

* The U.N. Monitoring, Verification, and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) conducted over 750 inspections at 550 sites. These inspections seemed to benefit from strengthened authorities under the new U.N. resolution, new technologies, a better relationship between UNMOVIC and the [International Atomic Energy Agency], and pressure from the threat of military strikes.

* On the eve of war, inspectors withdrew from Iraq.

* For the approximately three months of inspections, inspectors reported that the Iraq was cooperating on access, with a few minor delays. Dr. [Hans] Blix [the head of UNMOVIC] noted in his March 7 [2003] report that cooperation on process was better this time for UNMOVIC than it had been for UNSCOM [in the 1990s].

Inspectors in Iraq, inspections conducted. Case closed. Had Blakeman had the guts to accept the wager, he’d be a thousand dollars lighter.

Read the full story, here.