Sickening. Not really surprising, I suppose, but sickening all the same. In some ways it's good that someone just came out and told the truth. It may not make any difference to Shrub, but Tony will come under more pressure from within his own party (and hopefully the people who elected him, myself included).

The quote from Wolfowitz is actually a gross misrepresentation. Check out little footballs http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=6906_Another_British_Attack_on_Wolfowitz

Hey the British get things wrong too.

Gross misrepesentation? I don't think so. One could argue that people are taking and interpreting it one of context, sure, but that's really beside the point. Point is, a senior administration official is baldly admitting that oil was, surprise surprise, a big factor in our decision making.

The fact that the deputy defence minister thinks, or at least states publicly, that the most important difference between North Korea and Iraq is not North Korea's nuclear weapons (not to mention the ability to obliterate Seoul at will) is somewhat disturbing as well if you think about it.

I'm not going to bother posting another link, little green men did a good job of explaining it.

He didn't say that oil was a reason for the war, he just made the point that America couldn't engage in economic hardball with Iraq because it was swimming in oil, whereas N. Korea is not. Say what you want about the official, that's not what he said.

Man, c'mon people, it's being documented everywhere. Follow a few links to find out for yourself.

oh, sorry that's little green footballs.

At This Modern World: http://www.thismodernworld.com/weblog/mtarchives/week_2003_06_01.html#000703

It seems I shouldn't be so quick to believe everything I read (although I'm surprised to see The Guardian make such an error). Even so, I don't think it warrants the 'scum sheets' label.

Maybe the story was too good (or bad) to be true. But come on, do people really beleive we went to war over WMD?

It's a poor translation, as it turns out, but I don't think it's quite to the level of a "gross misrepresentation." I think it's more a matter of something being translated into one language, then back again, and emphasis and shading can get lost in that process.

Oh, and Adam, I don't willingly subject myself to littlegreenfootballs unless I'm feeling in need of a reminder of how hateful and bigoted humans can be. Just my own personal policy; your mileage may vary.

Mostly I'm glad to see that we can correct ourselves so quickly in this kind of environment.

I think I actually agree with your point that it was a mistranslation and not something done diliberately as "gross misrepresentation" seems to suggest. However, you have to wonder what the hell they were doing using a translation when the original talk was done in English.

See that, I changed my mind too. Whodathunkit?

RE: Little Green Footballs. I like checking sites that challenge me to figure out why they are wrong. They may be bigots, but they sure do document their bigotry.