The Raw Story | Senate Intelligence chairman quietly 'fixed' intelligence, and diverted blame from White House over Iraq

The scandal widens to include the intelligence committee.

The Raw Story | Senate Intelligence chairman quietly 'fixed' intelligence, and diverted blame from White House over Iraq: "Senate Intelligence chairman quietly 'fixed' intelligence, and diverted blame from White House over Iraq

Larisa Alexandrovna

Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, President George W. Bush issued an order to the Central Intelligence Agency, Department of Defense, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the State Department, and his cabinet members that severely curtailed intelligence oversight by restricting classified information to just eight members of Congress.

'The only Members of Congress whom you or your expressly designated officers may brief regarding classified or sensitive law enforcement information,' he writes, 'are the Speaker of the House, the House Minority Leader, the Senate Majority and Minority Leaders, and the Chairs and Ranking Members of the Intelligence Committees in the House and Senate.'

The order is aimed at protecting 'military security' and 'sensitive law enforcement.'

But what was said to be an effort to protect the United States became a tool by which the Republican chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee Pat Roberts (R-KS) ensured there was no serious investigation into how the administration fixed the intelligence that took the United States to war in Iraq or the fabricated documents used as evidence to do so.

Timeline: How Roberts helped fix pre-war intelligence
Coupled with limited access to intelligence documents, RAW STORY has found that Roberts and a handful of other strategically-placed Washington players stymied all questions into pre-war intelligence on Iraq and post-invasion cover-ups, including the outing of a CIA covert agent, by using targeted leaks and artfully deflecting blame from the White House."

Unfortunately, this list of eight would include Democratic minority leaders Daschle and Gephardt, followed by Pelosi, and ranking Democrats Jay Rockefeller, and Nancy Pelosi followed by Jane Harmon.

Over 100 Groups Urge President to Enforce Anti-Prostitution Policy to Aid Sexually Exploited Women and Children

This headline should read "Liberals stupidly allow Bush to frame aids education as pro-sex trafficking.

Over 100 Groups Urge President to Enforce Anti-Prostitution Policy to Aid Sexually Exploited Women and Children: "diet diet
News at eDiets relations

Over 100 Groups Urge President to Enforce Anti-Prostitution Policy to Aid Sexually Exploited Women and Children

WASHINGTON, Aug 8, 2005 (U.S. Newswire via COMTEX) -- In a joint letter to President Bush, over 100 women's, health and policy organizations have urged him to protect victims of human trafficking and 'stand firm on legislation and policies that require groups receiving certain federal grants to provide written assurance that they oppose prostitution.'

The letter brings into sharp focus a contentious debate over how to best aid prostituted persons and sex trafficking victims. Some governments and groups favor the so-called 'harm reduction' approach that emphasizes supplying sexually exploited persons with condoms and trying to teach negotiating skills. The U.S. government instead promotes an abolitionist approach that opposes prostitution as inherently harmful and degrading and actively supports the rescue and restoration of sexually exploited individuals, most of whom are women and children.

The U.S. policy-supporting letter was delivered by the Christian Medical Association ( CMA, http://www.cmda.org ) to President Bush's domestic policy advisor, Claude Allen. The letter counters the contentions of some activist groups, expressed in a letter sent to Mr. Bush in May, calling for the President not to enforce the anti-prostitution pledge policy, which was passed by Congress (the United States Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Act of 2003) and signed into law.

Consistent with that law, President Bush issued a National Security Presidential Directive (NSPD-22) that asserted, 'Our Policy is based on an abolitionist approach to trafficking in persons... . The United States Government opposes prostitution and any related activities, including pimping, pandering, or maintaining brothels as contributing to the phenomenon of trafficking in persons.'"

Of coarse the harm reduction approach in no way endorses sex trafficking(actually sex slavery} but by focusing on legalization, rather than the fact that Bush isn't allowing them to give information about safe sex, the people who oppose Bush on this make it look that way.