Bush administration kept vital intelligence on Iraq from Blair

Blair is so dumb he believes Bin Laden planned the 911 attacks.

It´s hard to beleive the useless prick is still in power.

I wouldnt think the yank let anyone else fly their stealth planes,so acess to manuals wouldnt be an issue the rest makes sense though.

The USAF certainly allow RAF pilots to fly F-117 stealth bombers and this link suggests the B-2 as well.. Not sure about B-2s, but there's a long history with the USAF and RAF of personnel going on secondment to each other's air forces. I'm sure I've seen a picture of an F-117 with an RAF guy's name on the side somewhere.

http://www.f-16.net/f-16_forum_viewtopic-t-4489.html

I bow to your superior knowledge (should have asked son in law cos hes in RAF and might have known.

Frankly if either Bush or his buddy Bliar told me it was Saturday on the day following Friday, I would have to check it out. I doubt if either of the blighters are now able to differentiate truth from spin from downright lies. And these are key people on this planet. How the hell did we ever get into this mess...

The Atlantic has long been a one-way street. The US was supposed to share information when we were both attempting supersonic flight in the forties, but they simply took our key information and used it to make their plane work.

More recently, we have the one-way extradition rule, which is hardly surprising with the Poodle in charge. Interestingly, though, it was suggested on R4 this morning that the 'special relationship' (!) was under threat because London(istan) was seen as a potential seat of terrorism. And the P says that Iraq hasn't made things worse...

Bob Woodward's mathematics is rubbish, and that of the subs that have checked the article just as bad. He seems to have rounded down twice and thus underestimated the rate of attacks (weakening his own argument). "800–900 attacks a week", spread over 24x7 = 168 hours, gives a rate of 4.8–5.4 attacks per hour (average over five), not four.

This might seem initially like nitpicking, but that's an underestimate of 20–30 percent. I appreciate the quality of misleading actions is more important than the quantity by which it has been done, but how many journalists will shoot themselves in the foot when tackling this administration before they learn to check everything they're given, not just the English words?

Fair point, but not much comfort for Bush if the criticism is erring on the low side...

Just as the technical ignorance of US Congressmen was always safely assumed to be bottomless*, the mathematical knowledge of most journalists should be taken to be approximately zero, to one significant figure :) He's not after Professor Stephen Hawking's job.

* Prime example was the Titanic inquiry, where one asked why the passengers weren't able to get inside the waterproof compartments when the ship sank.

How Bush blatently and knowingly lied to his own top Republicans, in order to sell the war in Iraq to a sceptical Capitol Hill and the Republican Party elite's serious doubts at the time.

"As the White House pressed its case for war against Iraq in the fall of 2002, one senior GOP lawmaker agonized about what to do. In this exclusive excerpt from 'Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War,' a new book by Michael Isikoff and David Corn, is the previously untold story of how Dick Armey, who was then House majority leader and a silent skeptic about Iraq, succumbed to Vice President Dick Cheney’s pressure—much to Armey’s later regret. "

The article continues:
"Daschle pressed Bush on why there was a need to move quickly. Sure, Saddam was a problem that had to be addressed. But what was new? How immediate was the threat? Where was the tangible evidence?...
The day before, Daschle had attended a breakfast with Bush in the president's private dining room with Cheney, House Speaker Dennis Hastert, Senate minority leader Trent Lott, and House minority leader Dick Gephardt. And he had put the same questions to the president. Wouldn’t it be better, he asked, to postpone this until after the election and take politics out of the question? Bush had looked at Cheney who shot the president what Daschle would describe as a “half-smile.” Then Bush turned back to Daschle and said, “We just have to do it now.” That was it, Daschle would later recall: “He didn’t answer the question.” But Bush’s sidelong glance to Cheney told Daschle that the two of them had thought this through.

Intersting how even in the face of indisputable facts, senior US politicians chose to believe the White House wouldn't cross the line and lie to their own colleagues for nafarious ends.
Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

Every journalist - every person in a semi-skilled profession - should be able to divide one number by another number. They're allowed to use a calculator; I'm not saying they're not. I don't see how pressing buttons is something that's somehow, gosh, all braniac, dude. Mistruths and obfuscations abound because people know they can get simple mathematical errors past idiots posing as reporters. So, yes, they do need to be able to do primary-school maths. Why not?

And if I were Bush, I'd be tremendously happy that my critics were erring on the low side. If they err low enough, then they've no story to complain about, have they?

At least the Americans know they have Dicks in high office.We seem to call them Tony,Gordon etc.