re: #313 palomino

Bullshit. Have you forgotten the oft-repeated mantra of “we don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud”? Condi, Cheney and practically everyone else trying to sell the war used that phrase. It has no other meaning than a clear implication that Saddam had nukes.

Hell, Bush outright implied that Iraq was a potential nuclear threat. Case in point:

Did the Bush Administration exaggerate the threat from Iraq?

It was perhaps the most compelling reason for the U.S. to go to war against Saddam Hussein — namely that he was rebuilding his nuclear weapons program. But that allegation has now come back to embarrass the President.

The White House now acknowledges President Bush should never have said this in his State of the Union address in January.

The implication that Saddam had nukes or was rebuilding Iraq’s nuclear program was known as the sixteen words controversy.