Ex-aide says Rice misled U.S. Congress on Iran

[KennedyGuy]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070214/pl_nm/iran_usa_dc

"WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice misled the U.S. Congress when she said last week that she had not seen a 2003 Iranian proposal for talks with the United States, a former senior government official said on Wednesday".

snip

"Testifying before the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee last week, Rice told lawmakers who asked about Leverett's previous public comments and writings on the Iranian proposal: "I don't know what Flynt Leverett's talking about."

She faulted him for not telling her, "We have a proposal from Iran and we really ought to take it."

snip

"Leverett said that then-Secretary of State Colin Powell, in a discussion about the Iranian proposal, told him he "couldn't sell it at the White House." This was evidence it had been discussed there, he said.

The proposal was transmitted to the White House in May 2003 by the Swiss ambassador in Tehran, who represented U.S. interests there. Washington has not had diplomatic relations with Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

According to a copy of the proposal posted on the Washington Post Web site and cited by Leverett, it contains considerable detail about approaching issues of central interest to the United States and Iran".

[Tom Joad]

1. Why is congress not calling it bullshit then? Are they going to be fooled again?

Can we expect another "sincere" apology from Edwards in the year 2011?

Why do we know this, and congress&^%!* does not?

[Greeby]

2. Chairman Lantos, you better be readying a charge of perjury nt

[Tom Joad]

3. Lantos is not known for adherence to truth. Liar from way back.

http://www.counterpunch.org/terrall1025.html

Lantos' Big Lie:
The Pro-War Congressman Calls for Replacing Saddam with a Pro-West "Dictator"

by BEN TERRALL

California Congressman Tom Lantos has never been accused of understatement. But he may have set a new personal record for bombast when, as quoted in the September 30, 2002 edition of the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz, he told Minister of Knesset Colette Avital, "My dear Colette, you won't have any problem with Saddam. We'll be rid of the bastard soon enough. And in his place we'll install a pro-Western dictator, who will be good for us and for you."

After U.S. activists publicized the story, Lantos called it a "total fabrication". He added, "I am amused by the comments Ha'aretz attributes to me, because they fly in the face of my lifetime of work. I am a firm supporter of democracy."

Since I have been working with Lantos' anti-war/pro-civil liberties challenger Maad Abu-Ghazalah, I e-mailed MK Colette Avital for clarification. I received the following response:

" I can confirm that the story is accurate. In fact, I myself was surprised and pained by Congressman Lantos' comments. Since he is a friend of Israel and I have had a long friendship with him, I did not want to react to his denial, or to further embarrass him. Sincerely, Colette Avital, M.K."

For readers of John MacArthur's excellent "Second Front: Censorship and Propaganda in the Gulf War," this latest duplicity comes as no surprise. MacArthur details how, as Chairman of the Human Rights Caucus in 1990, Lantos helped organize hearings at which the infamous "baby incubator" invention was peddled to the U.S. congress and public. Lantos introduced a Kuwaiti woman who claimed to have witnessed Iraqi soldiers killing babies by ripping them from incubators in a Kuwait hospital. He neglected to mention that the young woman was the Kuwaiti Ambassador'S daughter and her testimony had been manufactured by public relations firm Hill and Knowlton, under contract to the Kuwaiti Royal Family. Hill and Knowlton thoughtfully provided rent-free office space and financial support to Congressman Lantos' Human Rights Foundation.

As point man among the Democrats for Bush II'S war plans, Lantos worked equally hard in recent hearings to sell the younger Bush'S insane "pre-emptive" war, seeming physically unable to stop making overheated references to Nazi Germany and World War II on a daily basis. He outlined his vision by saying, "I foresee the total crushing of extremist Islamists and their allies," adding Bush's campaign should go on as long as it takes "to destroy all terrorist groups" and to create "regime changes in countries that harbor them."