Yesterday, after noting the false reporting on the president's 2003 SOTU address, I attempted to contact the reporter directly. Unfortunately, AP doesn't make this very easy to do. If you go their contact page, it just says that for any queries to correspondents, to send an email to info@ap.org. I should also note that the reporter is not listed under any of the categories I checked (national reporting, news features, or regional reporters). (S)he may be a freelancer.

So anyway, I sent the following email to that address:

In this AP story (link from Yahoo), the reporter writes:

"Wilson's revelations cast doubt on President Bush's claim in his 2003 State of the Union address that Niger had sold uranium to Iraq to develop a nuclear weapon as one of the administration's key justifications for going to war in Iraq."

Wilson's "revelations" (read, in large part, proven lies) couldn't have done this, because, the president did not make such a claim. Go back and read the address.

He said that the British government had learned that Saddam had *attempted* to purchase uranium from *Africa*. He didn't say that the attempt had succeeded, and there was no mention of Niger (Africa is a very big continent). This is an ongoing media myth that AP has a responsibility to quash, not promulgate.

It's about twenty-four hours later, and I've not even received an acknowledgment of the email, let alone a substantive response. Down the memory hole, I guess.

I note the irony of the large-font words on the contact page: "We Welcome Your Feedback." I guess they do, as long as we understand that it's apparently the information equivalent of sending it into a black hole.

Sometimes you just gotta try, right?

AP's not the only source you can't contact to correct.

I've noticed many times that somehow Google News (for example, if you have the top 3 headlines on your homepage) continually puts stridently pro-PLO and aggressively liberal blog posting in its 'news' section. If you click on the link, you find you're at some PLO or HAMAS funded, radically anti-Israel site.

The number of times this has happened--often even with poorly written, barely intelligible posts--is far beyond random occurances. The Google News faq claims that its algorithm is entirely random and related merely to the number of links. If that is the case, there's got to be some deep-pocketed Islamist organizations that have figured out how to spoof Google, because it bothered me enough to remove Google news from my home page.

It's not even the information equivalent of sending it into a black hole. When facts pass the MSM event horizon. it gets smaller.

According to the Butler report, the only Africa country British Intellgence believe had be contacted by Iraq concerning uranium was Niger.

So if the President implied that the UK thought any other country other than Niger had been contacted - he was lying (or misinformed).

And if he was implying that Niger was that country - at best he was ignoring the CIA assesment that Niger had not been contacted.

There was the little thing of Tenet saying that that sentance should never had been in the SOTU - witn the complete backing of teh Whate House.

I find it amusing, the semantic arcana of the bush-ites in
defending their hero. Did the president say "Mission Accomplished" on board the Lincoln, or was he misinterpreted
in his claims about Iraqi WMD work.

The president used sloppy reasoning and logic, it's kind of sad
seeing the complicated logic to defend him.

to: anonymous (idiot)

No, as a matter of fact, the president did not say "mission accomplished' on board the Abraham Lincoln. The Abraham Lincoln carrier, which had just completed a 9 month deployment at sea during which they supported both Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom (two different wars, not bad for one carrier), posted the banner.

The president did say that the end of major combat operations in Iraq had arrived. Unfortunately, the idiotic media, which doesn't seem to know which end of a gun actually shoots, thinks that this means the war is over and everybody gets to go home.

anonymous, I suspect you know it's a misrepresentation and that's why you don't even have the courage to post your name.

Good job, Tom.

Here is a link to the text of Bush's speech.

Please lefties of the world, do a search on the words "Mission Accomplished". You'll find they do not exist. "weapons of mass destruction" exists twice, here's one:

Any outlaw regime that has ties to terrorist groups, and seeks or possesses weapons of mass destruction, is a grave danger to the civilized world, and will be confronted.

Eight months later, Qadhafi gave up his efforts to seek and possess WMD. I think that was worth the taxpayers cost of the President landing on the carrier.

At least anonymous admits to being FUBAR.