Well, yes, Keith Olbermann covered the Downing Street Memo Monday (Crooks & Liars has the video), and a Daily Kos <a href="diary trumpets a “Kos Success“: “downingstreetmemo.com is getting the news out!”
Our BooTrib LondonBear is doggedly pursuing the story with the latest must-read installment, “Iraq, Tony & the Truth: Timeline – An Essential Resource.”
But, as the Chicago Tribune asks, is the “‘Downing St. Memo’ fizzling in U.S.”? [NOTE: Early today, I checked the Chicago Tribune’s site. The original title is “British memo reopens war claim.” The Seattle Times retitled the article.] More below:
From the Chicago Tribune, reprinted in The Seattle Times:
By Stephen J. Hedges and Mark Silva
Chicago Tribune
WASHINGTON — A British official’s report that the Bush administration appeared intent on invading Iraq long before it acknowledged as much or sought Congress’ approval — and that it “fixed” intelligence to fit its intention — has caused a stir in Britain.
But the potentially explosive revelation has proved something of a dud in the United States. The White House has denied the premise of the memo, the U.S. media have reacted slowly to it and the public generally seems indifferent to the issue or unwilling to rehash the bitter prewar debate over the reasons for the war.
All of which have contributed to something less than a robust discussion of a memo that would seem to bolster the strongest assertions of the war’s critics.
Frustrated at the lack of attention to the memo, Democrats and other war critics are doing their best to make sure it receives a wider hearing, doing everything from writing letters to the White House to launching online petitions.
[Ensuing section about history of the document.]
[……………………………]
On Capitol Hill, where investigations have denounced prewar intelligence about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq as “deeply flawed,” there appears to be little appetite for reopening the question of why the United States went to war.
“I suppose it hasn’t played there because, basically, didn’t everyone know that Bush decided early on to get rid of Saddam?” asked Philip Stephens, a Blair biographer and associate editor of the Financial Times of London.
Stephens said there was a basic difference in the argument over the invasion of Iraq in Britain and the United States.
“The contexts of the debates have always been different,” Stephens said. “There was never really a question [in the United States] about whether it was justified or not to go for regime change. This was the administration’s objective. People either agreed with it or disagreed with it. There really wasn’t a disagreement about the legal basis for it.”
[……………………………]
Opponents of the war and administration have launched e-mail campaigns to elevate the issue. One Web site, DowningStreetMemo.com, encourages visitors to sign a petition and “take action.” Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., wrote a letter to the White House, signed by 89 House Democrats, that expressed concern about the memo’s revelations.
If the memo is true, he said last week, it is “a huge problem” in terms of an abuse of power. He said there had been no response from the White House.
I excised the portions of the article that go into the timeline and events. But there is this section at the end of the article:
Graham wrote that he was going for a status report on the mission in Afghanistan, but that Centcom’s Gen. Tommy Franks called him aside to tell him, “Senator, we are not engaged in a war in Afghanistan.”
“Excuse me?” Graham replied.
“Military and intelligence personnel are being re-deployed to prepare for an action in Iraq,” Graham quoted Franks as saying. “I was stunned,” Graham wrote. “This was the first time I had been informed that the decision to go to war with Iraq had not only been made but was being implemented … .”
Another piece of the British memo has relevance now, as the United States battles an insurgency that some say was exacerbated by faulty post-invasion planning. “There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action,” the notes say, without attributing that directly to Dearlove.
