Of the 2008 presidential candidates who were in Congress in 2002, only Biden read the NIE before voting to allow Bush to take this country to War in Iraq! Edwards, Clinton, McCain and Brownback all admitted they cast the most important vote that any member of Congress can make without reading the most complete assessment of the reasons to attack another country—The National Intelligence Estimate. As former Governor Gilmore said, Members of Congress “ought to read at least that kind of material” It is still not clear if Congress was also provided the 2002 assessment from the Pentagon that concluded that Saddam was not capable of conducting ANY military operations outside Iraq. It is also not clear who was provided the intelligence from the CIA that concluded that Saddam would most likely only use any WMD he did have within Iraq and had no potential for using such weapons outside Iraq.
What is clear is we had a President and Vice President that cherry picked the intelligence which supported the argument to attack Iraq and buried anything that documented reasons not to invade Iraq. We had a President that ignored the advice of the most senior diplomats who warned to attack Iraq would destabilize the country, get the U.S. bogged down in a civil war and cause significant hatred among the Moslems thought the world. We had a Congress that did not read the NIE but relied on briefings that can distort or ignore information essential to make an informed decision.
We sent our brave young military into war and the responsible elected officials failed the most basic responsibility necessary to make the choice. There is NO more important decision of Congress and the president then to take our country to war. We took the MOST awesome step any country can take without understanding the REAL nature of the threat. We have a President and a Congress that has failed their MOST BASIC responsibility to our country and it’s military!