Pentagon investigates Pentagon. Pentagon concludes that Pentagon's pre-war intel not illegal

[ck4829]

Wow! What an impartial investigation, right? :sarcasm:

"The investigation by acting inspector general Thomas F. Gimble found that prewar intelligence work at the Pentagon, including a contention that the CIA had underplayed the likelihood of an al-Qaida connection, was inappropriate but not illegal. The report was to be presented to Levin's panel at a hearing Friday.

The report found that former Pentagon policy chief Douglas J. Feith had not engaged in illegal activities through the creation of special offices to review intelligence. Some Democrats also have contended that Feith misled Congress about the basis of the administration's assertions on the threat posed by Iraq, but the Pentagon investigation did not support that. Two people familiar with the findings discussed the main points and some details Thursday on condition they not be identified.

Levin has asserted that President Bush took the country to war in Iraq based in part on intelligence assessments — some shaped by Feith's office — that were off base and did not fully reflect the views of the intelligence community."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070209/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/iraq_pentagon_intelligence

Of course, all the RW blogs to be abuzz with "Well, this debunks the Liberal Conspiracy Theorists", bunch of dolts.

[rodeodance]

1. and from the WJ: Ethics be damned

.......But only "some of the information" in those briefings was "supported by available intelligence," the summary said. The version of the briefing presented to senior Bush officials, it said, contained different information than a presentation to the CIA. Left out of the version for the CIA, the inspector general said, was "a slide that said there were 'fundamental problems' " with the way the intelligence community was presenting the evidence.

While Pentagon officials said in responses cited in the summary that no senior policymakers mistook these briefings as "intelligence assessments," the inspector general said that administration officials had indeed cited classified intelligence that allegedly documented a close al-Qaeda-Iraq relationship.

The policy office, the summary stated, "was inappropriately performing Intelligence Activities . . . that should be performed by the Intelligence Community."

The summary recommended no action within the Defense Department because, it said, the current collaboration under new leadership at the Pentagon and the intelligence community "will significantly reduce the opportunity for the inappropriate conduct of intelligence activities outside intelligence channels."

Staff writer Karen DeYoung contributed to this report.

[pecwae]

2. Like the IG inspections

in the Army where we'd get days or even weeks advance notice to get it together in order to pass. Worthless.

[LynnTheDem]

3. As long as lying us into inading & slaughtering people isn't illegal!

I feel much better now! And of course George "The Decider" bUsh can just change laws at his whim, so nothing he & his minions do is ever "illegal".

Wait...wasn't everything Hitler did "legal"?

[rman]

4. I'm still waiting for legislation that allows civilians to investigate themselves

when they are suspected of a crime - "without outside interference", of course.

If self-regulation is good enough for corporations and the military, then it's good enough for civilians.

[Joe Fields]

5. That's not all they (cough, choke) investigated.

One of yesterday's headlines read that the investigation into abuses of detainees at Gitmo had concluded that no wrongdoing was committed by any soldiers. The article went on to point out that investigators only interviewed guards and other soldiers at the camp, and that no detainees had been interviewed in the investigation process.

Some "investigation," huh?