Batman of Capitol Hill (?)

[atommom]

:puffpiece:
The glaring omissions from this piece about Pat Roberts ... his insistence on shutting down investigation of the Bush administration's misuse of intelligence before the Iraq war, and his refusal to investigate the mistreatment of prisoners in "the war on terror".

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., keeps many secrets. The chairman of the powerful Senate Intelligence Committee, he is lovingly regarded by staffers as a modest superhero, the Batman of Capitol Hill.

As leader of the committee that oversees the government's 15 spy agencies, Roberts has become one of the most influential lawmakers in Washington.

Roberts said he knows there have been intelligence failures in the past, including the faulty threat analysis used by Congress and the Bush administration to support going to war with Iraq. Weapons of mass destruction never have been found in Iraq.

"It did a great deal of damage in terms of our intelligence capability and our credibility," Roberts said.

http://www.cjonline.com/stories/041105/kan_batmancap.shtml

[MuseRider]

1. Oh good lord.

:puke:

I did not even have a chance to look at the paper yesterday so I missed this. In fact, reading this paper has never been particularly pleasant it is now downright disgusting. Most days it feels like visiting FR.

Can I say it again? :puke:

[Mabus]

2. Okay, that explains it

He has been in the Bat Cave every time I've tried to set up a meeting with his office.

Does this make Brownback "Robin, the Boy Wonder"?

[atommom]

3. Boy Blunder, perhaps...

;)

[hfojvt]

4. intelligence failures in the past?

or just integrity failures?

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/special_packages/iraq/6227824.htm

"Posted on Thu, Jul. 03, 2003

Roberts: news will break on Saddam's weapons program

LIBBY QUAID
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration and the U.S. intelligence community have had some success in finding Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, Sen. Pat Roberts said Thursday.

Roberts, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told reporters on a telephone conference call that he couldn't go into detail because the news is classified."

Funny how now that the news has broken that Saddam did not have any weapons of mass destruction, the press does not bother to look back and report the news that Senator Pat Roberts is a lying sack of crap.

[hfojvt]

5. more prevarications from "Batman"

http://roberts.senate.gov/07-09a-2004.htm

Iraq Pre-War Intelligence Report: Additional Views of Chairman Pat Roberts joined by Senator Christopher S. Bond, Senator Orrin G. Hatch

"I have no doubt that the debate over many aspects of the U.S. liberation of Iraq will continue for decades, but one fact is now clear, the U.S. Intelligence Community told the President, the Congress, and the American people before the war that Saddam had stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and if left unchecked, would probably have a nuclear weapon during this decade. More than a year after Saddam’s fall, it also seems clear that no stockpiles are going to be found, the Iraqi nuclear program was dormant, and the President, the Congress and American people deserve an explanation. In short, the Intelligence Community’s prewar assessments were wrong. This report seeks to explain how that happened."

So when Senator Roberts claimed that WMD has been found after the war, that was the intelligence community's fault too? Gee Senator, CBS news was reporting this in 2003, before the war.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/01/18/iraq/main537096.shtml

"While diplomatic maneuvering continues over Turkish bases and a new United Nations resolution, inside Iraq, U.N. arms inspectors are privately complaining about the quality of U.S. intelligence and accusing the United States of sending them on wild-goose chases."

What about this report from the inspectors?

http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/02/14/sprj.irq.un/

"Mohammed Aldouri, the Iraqi ambassador to the United Nations, said his country has cooperated with inspectors and proved that it does not possess weapons of mass destruction.

"An empty hand has nothing to give. You cannot give what you don't have. If we do not possess such weapons, how can we disarm ourselves of such weapons? Indeed, how can they be disarmed when they don't exist?" Aldouri asked the council."

Perhaps Roberts does not remember the Byrd resolution?

http://tokyo.usembassy.gov/e/p/tp-20030203a5.html

"Senator Robert Byrd (Democrat of West Virginia) submitted a resolution to the Senate January 29 that calls on the United States to give "sufficient time" to United Nations weapons inspectors in Iraq to assess the Baghdad regime's compliance with UN resolutions that it disarm."

Plenty of people were protesting the rush to war in February of 2003. If that "focus group" which turned out to be correct, had been heeded instead of scoffed at and ignored, billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of lives would have been saved. Roberts should admit and atone for his own part in that process rather than attempt to make a scapegoat out of the intelligence professionals who told their bosses what the bosses wanted to hear.

[atommom]

6. Exactly why he doesn't deserve a superhero nickname.

He's not a superhero, just an administration shill.