The Red Pill

The New York Times waits a month before publishing a letter from Wesley Clark that correct Paul Krugmans article claiming the Bush White House was pushing a Saddam Hussein link to 9-11 the same day the attack occurred. By the way, I was already aware that this Krugman guy was a Bush-hating type, but he's connected with Enron?? Who can take this guy seriously?

OpinionJournal - Best of the Web Today:
"Back in June, we noted that Bush-haters and Saddam-defenders were seizing upon a vague comment by Wesley Clark, a retired general and prospective Democratic presidential candidate, to justify their contention that BUSH LIED!!!!!! and said Saddam Hussein was behind the Sept. 11 attacks. Clark told NBC's Tim Russert that he'd received a phone call on Sept. 11--he didn't say from whom--urging him to argue publicly for such a link.

Anti-Bush fantasists simply assumed that Bush was behind the phone call Clark described. Here's former Enron adviser Paul Krugman:

Gen. Wesley Clark says he received calls on Sept. 11 from 'people around the White House' urging him to link the attack to Saddam Hussein.

That Krugman column ran July 15. Yesterday the Times published this letter from Clark:

I would like to correct any possible misunderstanding of my remarks on 'Meet the Press,' quoted in Paul Krugman's July 15 column, about 'people around the White House' seeking to link Sept. 11 to Saddam Hussein.

I received a call from a Middle East think tank outside the country, asking me to link 9/11 to Saddam Hussein. No one from the White House asked me to link Saddam Hussein to Sept. 11. Subsequently, I learned that there was much discussion inside the administration in the days immediately after Sept. 11 trying to use 9/11 to go after Saddam Hussein.

In other words, there were many people, inside and outside the government, who tried to link Saddam Hussein to Sept. 11.

So Krugman turns out to have been engaging in a bit of dowdification. Also odd about this, as blogger Donald Luskin notes, is that the letter is dated July 18, but the Times didn't get around to publishing it until yesterday, 26 days later."