Weekly Review

By Roger D. Hodge

CIA director George Tenet testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee and again took responsibility for President Bush's false claim that Iraq tried to buy uranium from Niger, but he admitted that he didn't know the claim, which he successfully removed from at least one of the president's previous speeches, would be included in the State of the Union address. Tenet said that his staff should have told him about it.¹ It later emerged that the White House and the CIA had negotiated over the line, which "the CIA knew to be incredible." The White House, one senator said, wanted to know "how far you could go and be close to the truth."² President Bush said that "the intelligence I get is darn good intelligence and the speeches I have given are backed by good intelligence,"³ and he told a group of surprised reporters that Saddam Hussein had refused to permit weapons inspectors to return to Iraq: "And we gave him a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in. And therefore, after a reasonable request, we decided to remove him from power."⁴ A White House official noted that the president "is not a fact checker."⁵ British prime minister Tony Blair addressed the United States Congress and predicted that history will "forgive" him even if weapons of mass destruction are never found in Iraq. He received 19 standing ovations; after the first one he responded: "This is more than I deserve and more than I'm used to, frankly."⁶ Dr. David Kelly, a British Ministry of Defense scientist who was accused of being the source of news reports that the British government had doctored its intelligence on Iraq, was found dead two days after he was interrogated by a parliamentary committee.⁷ Amid calls for his resignation, Prime Minister Tony Blair was asked by a reporter whether he had "blood on his hands."⁸

General John Abizaid, the head of U.S. forces in Iraq, admitted that his troops face "a classical guerrilla-type campaign" and said that troops might have to double their expected tours of duty in order to pacify the country.⁹ Several U.S. soldiers complained on television that morale was low and that they wanted to go home. "If Donald Rumsfeld were here, I'd ask him for his resignation," said one. "I would ask him why we are still here," said another. "I don't have any clue as to why we are still in Iraq."¹⁰ "This is the future for the world we're in at the moment," a special assistant to Donald Rumsfeld said about the unrest in Iraq. "We'll get better as we do it more often."¹¹ A new study found that fast foods with high fat and sugar content "alter brain biochemistry with effects similar to those in powerful opiates such as morphine."¹² The Department of Homeland Security announced that Microsoft was chosen as its exclusive supplier of desktop and server software;¹³ shortly thereafter Microsoft acknowledged a critical security flaw that permits hackers to take over computers running the latest version of its Windows operating system.¹⁴ Vertebrae of a plesiosaur, a long-necked sea reptile that lived 150 million years ago, were found at Loch Ness, in Scotland.¹⁵

The Bush Administration revised its estimate of the federal budget deficit for the current fiscal year and said it was likely to be $455 billion.¹⁶ American teenagers were having a hard time finding summer jobs,¹⁷ and it was noted that the current job-market contraction is the worst since the Great Depression and that Bush could well become the first president since Hoover to leave office with fewer people working than when he took office.¹⁸ North and South Korean troops had a gunfight at the border.¹⁹ North Korea announced that it has made enough plutonium to construct several nuclear bombs,²⁰ and United Nations weapons inspectors said they had found traces of enriched uranium in samples taken in Iran.²¹ Federal authorities said that 1,100 pounds of ammonium nitrate, the explosive chemical used to blow up the Oklahoma City federal building, were stolen from quarries in Colorado and California.²² The Justice Department said that it will defy an order by a federal judge to allow Zacarias Moussaoui, who is being tried in connection with the September 11 attacks, to cross-examine a captured Al Qaeda member who is a witness in the case.²³ An internal Justice Department report identified 34 "credible" complaints of civil-rights violations by department employees related to new powers under the USA Patriot Act; more than one thousand complaints were reviewed.²⁴ Pat Robertson called on his disciples to mount a "prayer offensive" against the Supreme Court aimed at forcing three of the justices, who Robertson said have "opened the door to homosexual marriage, bigamy, legalized prostitution and even incest," to retire.²⁵ Ariel Sharon, the prime minister of Israel, traveled to Norway but refused to visit Oslo.²⁶ Israel's transportation minister offered to provide buses to take Palestinian prisoners to the Dead Sea, "whence they will not return."²⁷ A German tourist was arrested for trying to steal a crematorium door from a former Nazi death camp in Poland.²⁸ British scientists built a better, baitless mousetrap that uses plastic mixed with a high concentration of chocolate essence.²⁹ Newly declassified documents revealed that during the Cold War British scientists planned to bury ten nuclear land mines in Germany. The plan, code-named Blue Peacock, was abandoned in 1958, after it was judged to be "politically flawed."³⁰ A truck driver stopped in the middle of Interstate 65 in Knoxville, Tennessee, took off his clothes, and ran around naked.³¹ Ireland's environmental minister called for a tax on chewing gum.³² Australian researchers found that masturbation prevents prostate cancer.³³