Bizarro World

Just to make sure I've got the story straight:

1. Bush lied, saying Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear program, when it had no such intentions.
2. Bush is incompetent, because he allowed materials from Iraq's nuclear program to be removed from the country without Coalition forces noticing.

Without a trace of irony, Reuters puts the following paragraphs in the same story:

"The United Nations nuclear watchdog told the Security Council this week that equipment and materials that could be used to make atomic weapons had been vanishing from Iraq without either Baghdad or Washington noticing."

"The United States and Britain said they invaded to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction. Both countries now admit toppled ruler Saddam Hussein had no such weapons."

"Diplomats in Vienna say the IAEA is worried that these facilities, which belonged to Saddam's pre-1991 covert nuclear weapons program, could have been packed up and sold to a country or militants interested in nuclear weapons"

"In 1991, the IAEA detected Saddam's clandestine nuclear weapons program and spent the next seven years investigating and dismantling it. By the time U.N. inspectors left the country in December 1998, Iraq's covert atom bomb program was gone."

So to translate the four paragraphs, roughly:

1. Alarm! Nuclear materials loose! Bush dropped the ball!
2. There was no reason for war.
3. Saddam's former nuke program could be sold to the highest bidder!
4. What nuke program?

This is as easy to follow as John Kerry's statements on abortion. But here's what I really don't get: why did the IAEA allow Saddam to keep "dual use" nuclear equipment in the aftermath of the Gulf War? Not that I'm not reassured by the IAEA pinky-swearing that Saddam wasn't using the equipment for illegal purposes. What was the other use for this equipment that necessitated us leaving it in the hands of this madman? Was it essential to the baby-milk production industry of the 90's?

So it seems the Saddam apologists were willing to downplay the significance of the nuclear-related equipment and materials that Saddam had while there was an interest in keeping the U.S. out of Iraq. Now that Saddam has been removed and President Bush is responsible for Iraq, those same materials are now much more dangerous. Gee, wouldn't want them to fall into the wrong hands. As opposed to where they were before, under the watchful eye of the loveable mustachioed Ward Cleaver of the Middle East.

The headline on this piece should put all of Reuters' dancing around on this issue into crisper focus:

Iraqi N-sites 'stripped carefully'

Is there a good reason Reuters couldn't bring itself to put in a couple of extra letters? It's not a very long headline. I guess they're just being extra sure nobody reads an "Iraqi Nuclear Sites" headline and gets the wrong idea. God forbid.