Spirot is a neocon? Wow. What's the evidence for that spurious and completely inaccurate charge? Just because I suggest that the donkey is full of shit, doesn't make me an elephant, man. Being a neocon would require me to be partisan, which I am not. I hold the whole of the system in contempt regardless of what color the necktie is.

Clearly I was wrong about Kucinich (and others) on the issue of this particular vote. Thanks for the correction. I misunderstood Kucinich's intent and the context for his comments. (I thank loqi for eloquently providing clarity to what was obviously fuzzy for me.)

I was projecting a generalized frustration on to the wrong target. I mistook Kucinich for one of the legions of people who seek now to absolve their culpability with the excuse that they were misled then. My rant was launched from Kucinich's comment:

"Many members of Congress relied on these representations from the White House to inform their decision to support the legislation that authorized the use of force against Iraq. We all know present and former colleagues that have said that if they knew then what they knew now they would not have voted to permit an attack upon Iraq".

It is obviously difficult for me to make the case for a greater intellectual rigor when I was clearly lacking on this point with regards to my impression of what Kucinich was saying... but the question to all those that claim to have been misled is: "Were you misled because you were ignorant or could you see the truth but chose to support the lie?"

I have no patience for anybody that claimed to have been misled by the smirking chimp. The lies were clear at the time. No hindsight was necessary in order to identify the imperialist occupation agenda that was behind the invasion of Iraq. There were plenty of little boys pointing out that the emperor wore no clothes but unlike in the H. C. Andersen story, the majority chose not to heed what was obvious.

If Kucinich was the little boy, then I applaud him, and I amend my question to direct it not at Kucinich but at the Members of Congress he refers to in the above quote. I direct the question also to every journalist (or those posing as journalists), every Senator, every member of the armed forces, and to every voting citizen that claim to have been misled.

Kucinich's point is to "hold accountable those who misled this nation" and the action in question is to impeach the smirking chimp. I assume that he would not expect that action alone to solve the accountability question. The Executive and its cabal are corrupt. That's obvious.

So is Congress.

So is the Senate.

So is the Judiciary.

So is the Military.

So is the Fourth Estate.

The President did not act alone. That he lied is the thin edge of the wedge. To right this wrong merely by scapegoating Bush is illusory. What is more troubling to me is the masses' collaboration with the lie; what is most frustrating is the disingenuous complaint of "we were misled". He led those that followed exactly where they wanted to go.