Not Totally Outrageous
Under United States penal codes, capital crimes must be judged guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. In civil cases, a preponderance of the evidence may suffice. But in the reckoning of the Bush Administration, the standard applied to information offered in justification for going to war with another country is simply that it be "not totally outrageous."
This is actually what Secretary of State Colin Powell said today in a press conference, after repeated questions about the inclusion of the erroneous Niger uranium story in the President’s State of the Union Message. Here’s the quote from the transcript:
SECRETARY POWELL: I think the President in the State of the Union address had this sentence in there and it talked about efforts on the part of Iraq to obtain uranium from sources in Africa. There was sufficient evidence floating around at that time that such a statement was not totally outrageous or not to be believed or not to be appropriately used. It's that once we used the statement and, after further analysis and looking at other estimates we had and other information that was coming in, it turned out that the basis upon which that statement was made didn't hold up. And we said so. And we've acknowledged it and we've moved on. [emphasis added]
Apparently, “not totally outrageous” was too high a bar for the bogus claim to clear when it came time for Powell to present his case to the United Nations, less than 10 days later. At that time, the Secretary stuck strictly to allegations that couldn’t be proven, misstated or misinterpreted intelligence estimates, and out-of-date assessments – all of which turned out to be erroneous, but not totally outrageous.
As to the last part of Powell’s remarks, that “we said so” (when? On Monday, three months after the war “ended”?), “we’ve acknowledged it” (ask Ari Fleischer to acknowledge it in plain language and see what you get), and “we’ve moved on.” Well, at least that last part is true, although the Secretary might notice that there’s still a little bit stuck on his shoe.
2:36:36 PM 
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