Letter to the Editor

The following was a letter to the editor I wrote and had published in the Memphis Commercial Appeal - They supply the title. The content is pretty self-explanatory, but let me just say that it just goes to show how the Media manipulates what we know and how we form our opinions.

*No space available for real news*

Almost daily, I see a letter in this space attacking the president for the "ill conceived," "deceitful," "illegal," etc., war in Iraq.

I personally dislike President Bush and believe he has set back the Republican Party and the conservative movement at least two generations, with the help of Republicans in Congress who were so bad they lost the majority in both houses. One of the big reasons for the destruction of the president and the party was the media's coverage of the war in Iraq and the lack of WMD.

A couple of weeks ago, I found an Associated Press story online about the secret removal of almost 600 tons of yellowcake uranium from 20 miles south of Baghdad to Canada (July 6 article, "Nuclear seed removed from Iraq"). Of course, the article made a point to say that the uranium was not weapons grade but also failed to note that it is the material of choice to create weapons-grade uranium.

I remember like it was yesterday in 2003, when former ambassador of the Clinton administration Joseph Wilson (Valerie Plame's husband) wrote an op-ed in The New York Times stating that he found no evidence that Iraq had purchased, or tried to purchase, yellowcake uranium from Niger, where Wilson was sent by President Bush to find such evidence.

There was also intelligence offered by the Bush administration about Iraq trying to buy 50,000 to 60,000 aluminum tubes used in centrifuges to enrich yellowcake.

Wilson's op-ed was the beginning of the downfall of the Bush administration.

Now, it's obvious there was no need to secure the uranium, just a need for the aluminum tubes, since it is now known Iraq had the uranium. Where were the front-page headlines that almost 600 tons of yellowcake uranium were found in Iraq? Were the American press and this newspaper afraid the truth might help to validate the reason for the war in Iraq?