The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: Amnesia in the Garden

The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: Amnesia in the Garden:
"…
W. took a page from Arnold Schwarzenegger's 'Total Recall,' a futuristic movie about inserting fully formed memories into the minds of unsuspecting victims.

The president and vice president ignored all the expert evidence now compiled indicating no link between 9/11 and Saddam, and no Saddam threat to U.S. security. After talking about 'the fanatics who killed some 3,000 of our fellow Americans,' Dick Cheney boasted: 'In Iraq, we dealt with a gathering threat, and removed the regime of Saddam Hussein.'

Though the convention mythologized Mr. Bush's bullhorn moment at ground zero, there was no mention of Osama, the fiend W. vowed to catch that day. The speakers did not acknowledge the brutal spiral in Afghanistan and Iraq, or the re-emergence of the Taliban, now finding sanctuary with our ally, Pakistan. "

Mr. Cheney, king of hooey, bragged about a "Taliban driven from power," even though just as the convention got under way, at least seven people, including two Americans, were killed by Taliban fighters in Kabul.

W. stormed ahead with the discredited domino theory of democracy promoted by the neocons and Ahmad Chalabi - ignoring the widening F.B.I. probe into alleged leaks from neocon central at the Pentagon to Mr. Chalabi, an accused Iranian spy, and to an Israeli lobby. "Because we acted to defend our country, the murderous regimes of Saddam Hussein and the Taliban are history," the president said, adding that "democracy is coming to the broader Middle East."

The $445 billion deficit? Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney erased it. In their inside-out universe, the economy is blossoming, there's money to pay for Mr. Bush's to-do list and No Child Left Behind is more than an empty slogan.

…
Inside Madison Square Garden, W. kept insisting he'd made the world safer. Outside, the exploding world didn't seem safe at all.…

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/05/opinion/05dowd.html