Trinicenter.com - Worse Than Clinton

by Charley Reese, reese.king-online.com

It was bad enough to have a president who lied under oath about his sexual misadventures, but the George Bush administration is by far the more deceitful and deceptive group of characters.

Right now, about half of the American public believes Saddam Hussein had something to do with the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. No wonder. By clever disinformation, the Bush administration deliberately created that misconception. Iraq, in fact, had no connection with the Sept. 11 attack. Even the Bush administration never said so explicitly, but by constantly talking about Saddam and Sept. 11 in the same breath, it deliberately created this false impression.

This administration has been especially deceptive in regard to the United Nations. When you know the facts, you can see how it has twisted the truth to shift the blame from itself to the international body.

First of all, if President Bush wished to attack Iraq unilaterally, he should never have gone to the United Nations. Thanks to a feckless Congress, Bush had all the authority he needed to launch an act of American aggression against Iraq. He did not need the U.N. Security Council's approval.

Bush, however, chose to go to the United Nations and introduce Resolution 1441, which passed unanimously. At that point, the United States made itself obliged to obey the Security Council. Resolution 1441 does not contain one single word that says the United States can unilaterally declare the inspection process finished and launch a war. Only the Security Council majority has that authority. And the Security Council, in accordance with Resolution 1441, would make that decision on the recommendation of the U.N. arms inspectors. Furthermore, Resolution 1441 says nothing about regime change.

Mr. Bush grew impatient and demanded that the council end the inspection process and launch a war. A majority disagreed. It's as simple as that. The question was not whether anybody "supported the United States." The question was, has the disarmament process been frustrated by Iraq? The inspectors themselves and a majority of the council said "No." The disarmament process was making progress, they said.

In the Bush administration, of course, disarmament had always been only a ploy. The real objective was regime change. So, like a frustrated schoolboy, Bush picked up his U.N. marbles and went home, saying, "I'll do it myself." He has the authority to do it, but to blame the United Nations for his own decision is really contemptible and dishonorable. It was not the Security Council that "failed to live up to its responsibility"; it was in fact the United States that failed to live up to its responsibility, a responsibility it had assumed voluntarily by introducing Resolution 1441 in the first place.

That resolution does not authorize war, and neither do any of the earlier resolutions passed at the end of the Gulf War. Mr. Bush's war is, from the standpoint of international law, illegal. It violates the United Nations charter, which the United States is obligated to abide by as long as it remains in the organization. Thanks to Mr. Bush, the United States has now become the "rogue state."

This might strike you as pettifoggery, but it is actually quite serious. Whether domestically or internationally, there are only two choices: the rule of law or the law of the jungle. Mr. Bush has chosen the law of the jungle. We're bigger and stronger than Iraq, so we will crush it. That's the same mentality as the common criminal. Mr. Bush has said to the world, the democratic process is OK unless we disagree with the outcome, then to hell with it.

The fact that an administration is consistently dishonest and deceptive doesn't seem to bother most Americans. Well, that's probably just one more sign that our time in the spotlight is drawing to a close.

© 2003 by King Features Syndicate, Inc.