Abramoff, Rove, basketball and the War in Iraq

Here's another well-written gem I wanted to help prevent from falling into "the memory hole." It's from a Truthout column today by William Rivers Pitt titled (optimistically) "The Tipping Point."

Congressman Henry Waxman, minority chair for the House Government Reform Committee, released a massive batch of emails from Abramoff to various Washington DC power players. In one, dated March 18, 2002, Abramoff wrote, "I was sitting yesterday with Karl Rove, Bush's top advisor, at the NCAA basketball game, discussing Israel when this email came in. I showed it to him. It seems that the President was very sad to have to come out negatively regarding Israel, but that they needed to mollify the Arabs for the upcoming war on Iraq."

"The upcoming war in Iraq," wrote Abramoff casually, one year and two days before the invasion was undertaken. It seems those "few staff-level meetings" availed Abramoff of some significant information. How this criminal came to know war in Iraq was coming before the rest of the world did is something that deserves a great deal of intense scrutiny.

Yeah, that should raise some eyebrows. The event in question took place six months after the 9/11 attacks, and yet it was common knowledge that the White House was planning war with Iraq. In fact, there never seemed to be much doubt to me at the time, but this is pretty good evidence that the whole UN trip and diplomacy act was just for show.

It's also a pretty good indication that Abramoff, rather than being a renegade lobbyist and criminal, was part and parcel of the White House/Rove propaganda operation.

Meanwhile, Financial Times reports that there were 82 contacts between Rove and Abramoff. That would mean that statements made by White House spokesmen from the podium IN THE WHITE HOUSE were nothing but bald-faced, straight-up lies. I guess that's one way to restore honor to the Oval Office. Not the best way, of course, but it is Dubya's way.

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