BLACKFIVE: 5 Years after Saddam’s capture (video from Iraq)

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Code Pink’s Jodie Evans Donates to Terrorists And Barack Obama

One of the founding members of Barack Obama’s finance campaign team has ties to terrorists. Jodie Evans, co-founder of Code Pink, has personally donated $40,000 to Barack’s campaign and raised between $50,000-$100,000 in donations. Evans has a long history of ties to foreign terrorist organizations and state sponsors, including the “Iraqi Resistance” which is responsible for killing thousands of US Soldiers.

This woman undermines our military, undermines our country and puts American lives in danger.

This is another “Association” that is troublesome. Barack Obama’s relationships, allies and partners, with extremist elements is just beginning to be uncovered, unfortunately the fourth estate will not do their job and dig into his past. They will go to the mattresses to discover what Joe the Plumber is hidding though…

More Change You Can Believe In!

Please read the whole article and educate yourself

Author’s note: It is commonly known that political visitors to totalitarian nations are only let in those nations if the visit serves the purposes of that government, the visitors are accompanied by minders and are monitored at all times and that the government facilitates propaganda events during the visits.

The following article is heavily documented with supporting links. The story it tells is very troubling for our nation. It is a story our news media refuses to investigate and report. Please forward this article widely.

A founding member of the campaign finance team of Democratic presidential nominee Illinois Sen. Barack Obama has been working with state sponsors of terrorism to undermine the United States in the global war on terror since at least February, 2003.

Jodie Evans, co-founder of the leftist anti-American group Code Pink, has documented ties to governments on the State Department’s list of current and former state sponsors of terrorism including Iran, Cuba, Syria and the former Iraqi government under Saddam Hussein. She also has endorsed and worked with the so-called Iraqi resistance that has killed over three thousand American soldiers and thousands of free Iraqis.

Evans is listed on the official Obama website as a bundler of between $50,000 and $100,000 in contributions. According to FEC reports, the official Obama website and news accounts, Evans has personally contributed over $40,000 to the Obama campaign—$4600 to Obama for America and around $36,000 to the Obama Victory Fund.

Evans served as a co-host for Obama’s first Hollywood fundraiser right after he announced his long-shot bid for the presidency in February 2007, just weeks after she returned from Cuba where she and Code Pink worked with the Castro government to protest the terrorist detention center in Guantanamo. Evans and Code Pink, who market themselves as feminists and human rights activists, blew off the Ladies in White, a Cuban human rights group that asked the delegation Evans led to inspect Cuban prisons where democracy advocates were being held by the Castro government.

The propaganda effort against the terrorist detention center at Guantanamo garnered worldwide sympathetic media coverage that undermined America’s efforts in the war on terror.

Evans and Code Pink’s trip to Cuba in January 2007 made up for their aborted effort to visit the communist nation the year before to celebrate the anniversary of Fidel Castro’s violent revolution.

In February, 2003, Evans traveled with Code Pink to Baghdad as a guest of Saddam Hussein’s government to lobby the world to keep him in power. Saddam’s government made a lasting impression on Evans. As late as summer 2008 she was still wishing that the genocidal, mass murdering tyrant was still in power in Iraq. She made a similar statement in 2006 pining for the ‘good old days’ under Saddam:

Let’s go back to the Iraq before we invaded, there was a good education and health care system, food for everyone. That system didn’t belong to Saddam it belonged to the Iraqi, it belonged to years of creating what a civilization needed. If your parents didn’t send you to school they could be put in jail.

Evans made several trips to Iraq in 2003 after the liberation. She worked with anti-liberation Iraqis to set up Occupation Watch in Baghdad. The purpose was to propagandize alleged war crimes by American soldiers and to recruit American soldiers into quitting the war by becoming conscientious objectors.

Evans did a propaganda interview with a communist newspaper in August, 2003, accusing G.I.s of wantonly slaughtering Iraqi women and children.

In December 2004, as the Marines were clearing out Fallujah from al Qaeda and Iraqi Sunni terrorists, Evans and Code Pink delivered over $600,000 in cash and humanitarian aid for what Code Pink called “the other side” in Fallujah.

(Giving cash and “humanitarian aid” to the anti-American or anti-freedom side in a conflict is an age old tactic of Western leftists as a way of bolstering their allies and prolonging the conflict without being accused of directly arming the enemy.)

In January, 2006, Evans traveled to Venezuela with Code Pink where she met with Hugo Chavez and protested against President Bush.

In April, 2006, Evans led a delegation to Iran. Blog entries by her and her fellow travelers are filled with propaganda designed to undermine U.S. policy againt the state sponsor of terrorism.

In June, 2006, Evans represented Code Pink at the World Tribunal on Iraq, a leftist-jihadist show trial held in Istanbul, Turkey, that proclaimed the ‘right’ of the terrorists in Iraq to kill Americans and free Iraqis:

There is widespread opposition to the occupation. Political, social, and civil resistance through peaceful means is subjected to repression by the occupying forces. It is the occupation and its brutality that has provoked a strong armed resistance and certain acts of desperation. By the principles embodied in the UN Charter and in international law, the popular national resistance to the occupation is legitimate and justified. It deserves the support of people everywhere who care for justice and freedom.

Evans herself gushed about her support for the so-called Iraqi resistance in an essay written in Istanbul:

“We must begin by really standing with the Iraqi people and defending their right to resist. I can remain myself against all forms of violence, and yet I cannot judge what someone has to do when pushed to the wall to protect all they love. The Iraqi people are fighting for their country, to protect their families and to preserve all they love. They are fighting for their lives, and we are fighting for lies.” (AlterNet, June 26, 2005)

In the summer of 2006, Evans and Code Pink traveled to Jordan and Syria. She and Code Pink wrote extensively about the Jordan visit, where they met with pro-terrorist Iraqi parliamentarians who urged them to seek recognition of the so-called Iraqi resistance.

The stop in Syria is clouded in mystery as none of the Code Pink members have written about what they did and who they met in Syria, except here:

From Damascus to Beirut: Arriving, Safely

By Medea Benjamin

Four of us—Gael Murphy, Judith LeBlanc, Diane Wilson and myself—split off from the rest of the group in Syria to make our way to Lebanon.

As noted at the beginning of this article, Evans traveled to Cuba in January 2007 to undermine America, then just weeks later she co-hosted Barack Obama’s first big Hollywood fundraiser.

In November, 2007, when Obama announced his campaign bundlers, Evans was on the list, as well as her husband Max Palevsky.

Evans got more involved in supporting Obama’s candidacy in 2008. In February she hosted a support Obama event and published an endorsement of Obama co-signed by several New York feminists.

On June 4, 2008, Evans was interviewed by radio talk show host Paul A. Ibbeston (Part One on YouTube and Part Two on YouTube.)

In the interview, Evans expressed her sympathy for the Sept. 11 terror attacks by al Qaeda that led to the murder of 3000 innocents, mostly her fellow Americans:

Jodie Evans:…”We were attacked because we were in Saudi Arabia, that was the message of Osama, was that because we had our bases in the Middle East, he attacked the United States.”

Paul A. Ibbetson: “Do you think that’s a valid argument?”

Evans: “Sure. Why do we have bases in the Middle East? We totally violated the rights of that country. Why do we get to have bases in the Middle East?”

Evans also expressed her “love” for the anti-American leader of Venezuala, Hugo Chavez, calling him a “sweetheart”, and admitted that Code Pink is trying to “undermine the war effort” of the United States in the war on terror.

Several weeks after that interview, Obama received Evans at a high-dollar fundraiser. Evans is listed by the FEC has having made a $7250 contribution to the Obama Victory Fund, a joint fundraising vehicle of Obama’s presidential committee, Obama for America, and the Democratic National Committee. The legal limit, $2300 of Evans’ contribution, was given to Obama’s general election coffers as she had already given the maximum allowed by law to his primary campaign, also $2300, at the Hollywood fundraiser she co-hosted in February, 2007. The balance of the $7250 went to the DNC.

Days after the event, a video was published featuring Code Pink’s Medea Benjamin bragging about Evans’ meeting with Obama.

In July, 2008, Evans joined other leftists in signing a letter urging Obama to keep left in his campaign that was published by The Nation.

The next month, Evans’ success at infiltrating the Democratic party was recognized with her being given the “Inside the Party” award by the Progressive Democrats of America, a group founded in 2004 at the Boston Democratic national convention to pull the party further to the left. Evans is known by her fellow leftists as a master of the ‘inside-outside game’.

Later that month, Evans attended the Democrats’ national convention in Denver. While Code Pink did their usual street theater outside the convention, they did not disrupt the convention inside. That is most likely because as a bundler for Obama, Evans was invited to private meetings with Obama and his vice presidential nominee Delaware Sen. Joe Biden after their respective acceptance speeches. From the National Journal:

After Biden’s speech on Wednesday night, bundlers are invited to an hour-long reception with the vice presidential candidate in a private room in the Pepsi Center, and then on Thursday morning, Barack and Michelle Obama are hosting a breakfast at the Hyatt Regency. After Obama’s acceptance speech, he is scheduled to mingle with bundlers at a private lounge inside Invesco Field.

The next week, at the Republicans’ national convention in St. Paul, Evans made headlines by trying to storm the stage during the acceptance speech by Republican vice presidential nominee Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

Evans spent her time in St. Paul committing identity theft to gain access to the convention and related events.

Less than two weeks later, Evans was again received by Obama, this time at an intimate $28,500 per person fundraiser in Hollywood and again later that evening at a $2500 per person fundraiser that featured a performance by Barbra Streisand.

Evans capped off her month by meeting with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in New York City. Ahmadinejad’s government has been funding, training and equipping terrorists in Iraq who have killed American soldiers and free Iraqis, as well as Hezbollah in its war against Israel, among many other activities that threaten the free world including seeking nuclear weapons.

Evans, who is no fool but is a propagandist, told Fox News after meeting Ahmadinejad that he is “really about peace and human rights and respecting justice.”

Ahmadinejad is also no fool. He would know that Jodie Evans, who visited his country in 2005, is in tight with the Democratic party’s presidential nominee and that Obama has stated his willingness to meet with Ahmadinejad and has downplayed the danger of Iran to the free world.

This raises the question of whether Evans was acting as an intermediary between Obama’s campaign and Ahmadinejad.

The American news media has utterly failed the nation by its willful failure to investigate and report the alliance between Barack Obama and the terrorist supporter Jodie Evans.

Evans has brushed off the few queries about this by saying her husband, Max Palevsky, is an old friend of Obama’s from Chicago and she’s just along for the ride. The evidence belies that story. Evans is a player in her own right.

In addition to working with state sponsors of terrorism, Evans works with pro-terrorist communist groups in the U.S. Those groups include The World Can’t Wait, ANSWER, Troops Out Now and United for Peace and Justice. Evans is the tip of spear of the pro-terrorist left into the heart of mainstream American politics.

There have been several calls from troop support groups for Obama to renounce Evans. He has ignored them and instead has drawn closer politically to Evans as the election draws near.

Obama said this summer he knows he needs to earn the trust to be commander-in-chief. He has failed to earn that trust, completely, by allying with Jodie Evans.

Jodie Evans and Barack Obama, photo by Code Pink

Jodie Evans and Code Pink lead protest against Marine Corps, Berkeley, CA. Feb. 12, 2008.

Jodie Evans being interviewed about anti-Marines protest, Berkeley, CA. Feb. 12, 2008. Photos by ZombieTime.com
More photos and story from that protest by Zombie Time here.

Cindy Sheehan, Jodie Evans, Hugo Chavez, Medea Benjamin in Venezuela. Photo by Code Pink. Jan. 28, 2006.

Jodie Evans in at Chavez speech, Caracas, Venezuela. Jan. 27, 2006. Photo by Code Pink. (Sign translation by Code Pink: Women Say Bush Must Go)

Jodie Evans and Jane Fonda.

Saddam’s Downfall

Here’s another story the liberal media does not want you to know. They are so intent on chanting that Bush Lied that they want to bury the truth.

The truth is simple, Saddam Hussein had a program to convince the world that he had weaopons of mass destruction and had all intentions of starting it up once the heat was off. He had the assests in place to resume the program at will, sort of like Iran’s “suspended” nuke program…

The program was so good they he believed it himself…

But the liberals will keep chanting that Bush Lied… Wake up, it is only a lie if he knew it to be false and said it anyways… Bush, Congress, intel agencies around the world, governments around the world believed that he had weapons of mass destruction. The liars are the ones that deny they believed it or campaign that they only believed it because of Bush’s lies…

NEW YORK – Saddam Hussein allowed the world to believe he had weapons of mass destruction to deter rival Iran and did not think the United States would stage a major invasion, according to an FBI interrogator who questioned the Iraqi leader after his capture.

Saddam expected only a limited aerial attack by the United States and thought he could remain in control, the FBI special agent, George Piro, told CBS’s “60 Minutes” program in an interview to be broadcast Sunday.

“He told me he initially miscalculated … President Bush’s intentions,” said Piro. “He thought the United States would retaliate with the same type of attack as we did in 1998 … a four-day aerial attack.”

“He survived that one and he was willing to accept that type of attack,” Piro said.

In 2003, a close aide of Saddam’s told The Associated Press that Saddam did not expect a U.S. invasion and deliberately kept the world guessing about his weapons program, although he already had gotten rid of it.

Keeping up the illusion of weapons program
Saddam publicly denied having unconventional weapons before the U.S. invasion, but prevented U.N. inspectors from working in the country from 1998 until 2002 and when they finally returned in November 2002, they often complained that Iraq wasn’t fully cooperating.

Piro, a Lebanese-American who speaks Arabic, debriefed Saddam after he was found in an underground hideout near his home city north of Baghdad in December 2003, nine months after the U.S. invasion.

Piro said Saddam also said that he wanted to keep up the illusion that he had the program in part because he thought it would deter a likely Iranian invasion.

“For him, it was critical that he was seen as still the strong, defiant Saddam. He thought that (faking having the weapons) would prevent the Iranians from reinvading Iraq,” Piro told Scott Pelley of “60 Minutes.”

Piro added that Saddam had the intention of restarting an Iraqi weapons program at the time, and had engineers available for chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.

Kuwait invasion after insult to Iraqi women
Piro also mentioned Saddam’s revelation during questioning that what pushed him to invade Kuwait in 1990 was a dishonorable swipe at Iraqi women made by the Kuwaiti leader, Sheik Jaber Al Ahmed Al Sabah.

During the buildup to the invasion, Iraq had accused Kuwait of flooding the world market with oil and demanded compensation for oil produced from a disputed area on the border of the two countries.

Piro said that Al Sabah told the foreign minister of Iraq during a discussion aimed at resolving some of those conflicts that “he would not stop doing what he was doing until he turned every Iraqi woman into a $10 prostitute. And that really sealed it for him, to invade Kuwait,” said Piro.

Russian Spys In The UN Stole $500 Million in Iraq’s Oil For Food Program

Well another reason has surfaced on why Russia was against invading Iraq…

UNITED NATIONS —  A former Russian top spy says his agents helped the Russian government steal nearly $500 million from the U.N.’s oil-for-food program in Iraq before the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003.

Sergei Tretyakov, who defected to the United States in 2000 as a double agent, says he oversaw an operation that helped Saddam’s regime manipulate the price of Iraqi oil sold under the program — and allow Russia to skim profits.

Tretyakov, former deputy head of intelligence at Russia’s U.N. mission from 1995 to 2000, names some names, but sticks mainly to code names. Among the spies he says he recruited for Russia were a Canadian nuclear weapons expert who became a U.N. nuclear verification expert in Vienna, a senior Russian official in the oil-for-food program and a former Soviet bloc ambassador. He describes a Russian businessman who got hold of a nuclear bomb, and kept it stored in a shed at his dacha outside Moscow.

The 51-year-old Tretyakov had never spoken out about his spying before this week, when he granted his first news media interviews to publicize a book published Thursday. Written by former Washington Post journalist Pete Earley, the book is titled “Comrade J.: The Untold Secrets of Russia’s Master Spy in America after the End of the Cold War.”

“It’s an international spy nest,” Tretyakov said of the U.N., during an interview this week with The Associated Press. “Inside the U.N., we were fishing for knowledgeable diplomats who could give us first of all anti-American information.”

His defection was first reported by the AP in 2001. Shortly after, the New York Times broke the news that he was not a diplomat, but a top Russian spy who was extensively debriefed by the CIA and the FBI.

Some of the people named or referenced by a code name in the book have denied Tretyakov’s claims. The Russian mission to the U.N. said Friday it would have no immediate comment.

Stephane Dujarric, a spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, described Tretyakov’s allegations as potentially serious violations of law and U.N. rules.

But Dujarric said it would be up to others to prosecute if the allegations are substantiated: “Since the U.N. can’t prosecute, it is now up to national governments to prosecute.”

An 18-month investigation into the oil-for-food corruption, led by former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, culminated in an October 2005 report accusing more than 2,200 companies from some 40 countries of colluding with Saddam’s regime to bilk the humanitarian program in Iraq of $1.8 billion.

The program was aimed at easing Iraqi suffering under U.N. sanctions imposed after Saddam’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait. It allowed Iraq to sell oil provided the bulk of the proceeds were used to buy food, medicine and other humanitarian goods and to pay war reparations. Volcker’s reports blamed shoddy U.N. management and the world’s most powerful nations for allowing corruption in the $64 billion program to go on for years.

Tretyakov defected to the United States with his wife and daughter in 2000, after serving as a double agent passing along secrets to the U.S. government. He calls his defection “the major failure of Russian intelligence in the United States” and warns that Russia, despite the end of the Cold War, harbors bad intentions toward the United States.

The decision to defect, he said, was made only after his mother died in 1997, and he had no other close relatives alive in Russia who could be used to blackmail him. The Tretyakovs now live in retirement in an undisclosed location.

“I got extremely disgusted with the Russian government, and I don’t see any light at the end of the tunnel. I’m not very emotional. I’m not a Boy Scout,” said Tretyakov, who was accompanied during the interview by his wife, Helen, and Earley. “Knowing people who are running Russia, I started feeling that it’s immoral to help them. And finally in my life, when I defected, I did something good in my life. Because I want to help United States.”

Al Qaeda Releases New MMS Videos

Al Qaeda has released more videos for MMS of Osama Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahri. It appears they are trying to play catchup on previous released videos that had not been converted for MMS yet.

CAIRO, Egypt (AP) — Al Qaeda video messages of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahri can now be downloaded to cell phones, the terror network announced as part of its attempts to extend its influence.

A still image of Osama bin Laden released by al Qaeda’s media wing, Al-Sahab.

The announcement was posted late Friday by al Qaeda’s media wing, al-Sahab, on Web sites commonly used by Islamic militants. As of Saturday, eight previously recorded videos were made available including a recent tribute to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the former al Qaeda in Iraq leader killed by U.S. forces in Iraq in June 2006.

“The elite jihadi media group presents the first batch of al-Sahab videos to be downloaded to cell phones,” the announcement said.

Ben Venzke, the head of IntelCenter, a U.S. group that monitors and analyzes militant messages, said it was not the first time al-Sahab has released videos designed for cell phones.

He said the group has been releasing them for years, but that between September and December, a few video messages did not come with versions for cell phones.

“They might just be filling in some of the gaps, or just trying to release some that had come out before,” Venzke said in an e-mail to The Associated Press.

In a written message introducing the new cell phone videos, al-Zawahri, al Qaeda’s No. 2 figure, asked followers to spread the terror group’s messages.

“I asked God for the men of jihadi media to spread the message of Islam and monotheism to the world and spread real awareness to the people of the nations,” al-Zawahri said.

Videos playable on cell phones are increasingly popular in the Middle East. The files are transferred from phone to phone using Bluetooth or infrared wireless technology.

Clips showing former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s execution in December 2006 showed up on cell phones soon after his death. In Egypt, images showing police brutality have been passed around via cell phones including one video that showed an arrested bus driver being sodomized with a stick by police in the fall 2006.

Video and audio tapes from various Islamist groups including al Qaeda are available on militant Web sites but require a computer and a fast Internet connection — often rare in the region — to download.

But the eight videos currently available to download to cell phones by al-Sahab range in size from 17 megabytes to 120 megabytes, requiring phones to have large amounts of free data capacity. Al-Sahab has promised to release more of its previous video messages in cell-phone quality formats.

The terror network has been growing more sophisticated in targeting international audiences. Videos are always subtitled in English, and messages this year from bin Laden and al-Zawahri focusing on Pakistan and Afghanistan have been dubbed in the local languages, Urdu and Pashtu.

In December, al Qaeda invited journalists to send questions to al-Zawahri. The invitation was the first time the media-savvy al Qaeda offered outsiders to “interview” one of its leaders since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Another Dearborn Terrorist Overlooked By The Liberal Media

The Dearborn connection still being ignored by those charged with our nations security. Here is a high level espionage case where the culprit was providing services for Saddam. Another arguement for not only controlling immigration, but citizenship grants as well.

When will the people of the country and the leaders take a firm stance and kick these people out of our country. Revoking of US Citizenship is allowable and should be inforced when people commit crimes against our country.

Clearly there is a problem in Dearbornistan and it needs to be addressed before it is too late.

One third of Dearborn, Michigan’s population of an estimated 100,000 in this Detroit suburb ar Muslims. There is a large concentration of Iraqi and Lebanese immigrants among the Muslim population there. Doubtless many of them are loyal Americans, you would think, else wise why would the FBI throw a bear hug around the community and do outreach to them, or the embattled head of the DHS customs and border security chief Julie Myer’s rush out there to speak at a Dearborn Hezbollah ’social club’. The recent guilty plea by illegal immigrant, marriage fraudster and Hizbollah ‘mole’ in the FBI and CIA, Lebanese Muslim Nada Nadim Prouty. This Muslim community doesn’t think twice about making contributions to charities or zakat that front for terrorist groups in the Middle East.

Now we have the case of Ghazi Al-Awadi, 78. According to this AP report Ghazi is a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Iraq. He plead guilty in July to acting as an agent of the government of Iraq under Saddam’s regime passing on information to the executed dictator’s intelligence service. He got sentenced to 18 months in the Federal pen. He could have received upwards of 51 months.

Get this he was released from jail in 1996 after serving six years in a manslaughter conviction for stabbing son-in-law.

Clinton Against Iraq War From Outset – Hillary’s Run For President That Is…

On the campaign trail for Hillary, Bill is now saying that he never supported the Iraq War… His press people are spining the statement to reflect his long term views. What a POS, his wife already has been caught up in  a firestorm for her support, at least she has the balls to say she did support it, but changed her mind. Bill is lying and saying he never did support it, but when called out on past support of the war, now it is his long term view…

By the way, the longer term view his press agents are spewing is crap. His long term view that weapons inspectors should have been given more time is moronic, considering they had the eight years of Clinton’s Presidency and the additional 2 years under Bush, a Decade to determine the truth.

Considering Hillary is using Bill’s time in the White House and his policies, or lack there of, as part of her experience platform, I would say she has about as much experience as Bill does with being faithful….

Bill Clinton Says He Opposed Iraq War From the Outset

Former president Bill Clinton said on Tuesday that he “opposed Iraq from the beginning,” apparently glossing over the more nuanced views of the war he has expressed over time. Clinton made the remarks while campaigning for his wife in Iowa – a largely anti-war state for Democrats — as he expressed bitterness over getting a tax cut with money that could have been spent on the military.

“Even though I approved of Afghanistan and opposed Iraq from the beginning, I still resent that I was not asked or given the opportunity to support those soldiers,” Clinton said. He said he “should not have gotten” the tax cuts he received as a wealthy earner.

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton voted to authorize the war in Iraq, and has never apologized for her vote, even as the Democratic nominating process has reached fever pitch and she has been drawn into a three-way tie with more ardent Iraq war foes, Sen. Barack Obama and former Sen. John Edwards.

Both the former president and his wife have grown increasingly critical of the war’s management in recent years. Both have also pointed to their remarks, made before the invasion, in which they said they would like to see weapons inspectors finish their work in Iraq before launching an attack – a distinction that has allowed both Clintons to claim consistency on Iraq.

Sen. Clinton has, at times, even cited the experience her husband had dealing with the Iraqi regime in the 1990s as one reason she gave Pres. Bush the benefit of the doubt when she voted for the war in 2002.

Jay Carson, a spokesman for the Clintons, pointed to those comments about weapons inspections as evidence that the former president was not trying to rewrite history. “As he said from the beginning and many times since, president Clinton disagreed with taking the country to war in Iraq without allowing the weapons inspectors to finish their jobs,” Carson said.

But past remarks made by the former president do leave open a question about how fervently Clinton opposed the war in real time and before it grew widely unpopular. In immediate hindsight, Clinton did not sound like a fierce critic. “I supported the president when he asked for authority to stand up against weapons of mass destruction in Iraq,” Clinton said on May 18, 2003, during a commencement speech at Tougaloo College in Mississippi.

–Anne E. Kornblut