Before becoming Counsel to the President of the United States in
July 1970 at age 31, John Dean was Chief Minority Counsel to the
Judiciary Committee of the United States House of Representatives,
the associate director of a law reform commission, and an Associate
Deputy Attorney General of the United States. He served as Richard
Nixon's White House lawyer for a thousand days, and was charged with
obstruction of justice and spent four months in prison for his role
in the Watergate cover-up. Dean was the first to testify about the
existence of the White House taping system which eventually led to
President Nixon's demise. He is the author of "Worse Than Watergate."
Sen Byrd, "Senator Byrd: The Arrogance of Power,"
March 19, 2003
Andrew Gumbel, "Growing Evidence of Deception
by Washington," Independent (UK), April 20, 2003
Kim Sengupta and Andy McSmith, "Spies threaten Blair with 'smoking gun' over Iraq,"
Independent (UK), June 8, 2003
James Risen, "Captives Deny
Qaeda Worked With Baghdad," New York Times, June 9, 2003
Vicki Allen, "Republicans Limit Probe of Iraq Intelligence," Washington
Post, June 11, 2003
[This document contained the now infamous claim - which British
prime minister Tony Blair continues to endorse - that Saddam's
illicit weapons of mass destruction could be made ready in "45
minutes".--"Iraq dossier fiasco rolls on," Jane's, June 12, 2003]
[Tony Blair was charged with deliberately misleading the public over
Iraq's weapons of mass destruction . . .--Ben Russell, "Exposed: Blair, Iraq and the great deception,"
Independent, June 18, 2003]
[George W. Bush should be impeached for his lies about Iraqi
weapons.--Geov Parrish, "Impeachable
Offense," Seattle Weekly, June 18-24, 2003]
[Midway through 2003, there's plenty of smoke as clear evidence
emerges that President Bush and several of his top foreign policy
officials lied about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq during the
lead-up to the war. In this context, impeachment is a reasonable
idea. But with Congress run by Republicans - and with news media
all too deferential to entrenched power - the chances of a serious
investigation in Washington are very slim.--Norman Solomon, "The
Media Politics Of Impeachment," Z Magazine, June 19, 2003]
Walter Pincus, "Report Cast Doubt on Iraq-Al Qaeda Connection,"
Washington Post, June 22, 2003
["It is sort of fascinating that you can have 100 percent certainty
about weapons of mass destruction and zero certainty of about where
they are," Blix said at the Council on Foreign Relations in New
York.
. . . on Monday, Blix took aim at the Bush administration's
assertions that Washington needed more time to find Iraq's weapons.
"Three-and-a-half months for new inspections was a rather short time
before calling it a day and especially when we now see the U.S.
government is saying that, 'look, you have to have a little
patience, you know these things take time.' All right,"--Grant
McCool, "UN Arms Inspector Blix Criticizes U.S. Over Iraq,"
Reuters, June 23, 2003]
[There is no longer any serious doubt that Bush administration
officials deceived us into war. The key question now is why so many
influential people are in denial, unwilling to admit the
obvious. . . .
In particular, there was never any evidence linking Saddam Hussein
to Al Qaeda; yet administration officials repeatedly suggested the
existence of a link. Supposed evidence of an active Iraqi nuclear
program was thoroughly debunked by the administration's own experts;
yet administration officials continued to cite that evidence and
warn of Iraq's nuclear threat.
And yet the political and media establishment is in denial, finding
excuses for the administration's efforts to mislead both Congress
and the public. . . .
One important difference between our current scandal and the
Watergate affair is that it's almost impossible now to imagine a
Republican senator asking, "What did the president know, and when
did he know it?" . . .
Yet if we can't find people willing to take the risk - to face the
truth and act on it - what will happen to our democracy?--Paul
Krugman, "Denial
and Deception," New York Times, June 24, 2003]
John Dean, "Why A Special
Prosecutor's Investigation Is Needed To Sort Out the Niger Uranium
And Related WMDs Mess," FindLaw's Legal Commentary, July 18, 2003
Francis A. Boyle, "It's About the
Rule of Law: Impeaching George W. Bush," CounterPunch, July 25,
2003
Nigel Morris, "Secret emails show Iraq dossier was
'sexed up'," Independent, March 13, 2009
[ . . . to allay public suspicions about the official version of Kelly's
death in July 2003, shortly after his exposure as Andrew Gilligan's source
for the "sexed up" dossier allegations against the Blair
government.--Michael White, "On balance, there should be an inquest into
David Kelly's death: Today's letter to the Times from medical experts
reopens a can of worms that was never quite shut," Guardian, August 13,
2010]