On March 18, 2003, President George W. Bush sent a letter/report to the U.S. Congress in which he claimed that the war with Iraq “was necessary to protect the national security.” (1) That message has been denounced as a “blatant fraud!” (2) Since then, the explosive Downing St. Memos have been released. They show that the intelligence to go to war with Iraq was "fixed around the policy." Iraq didn’t have any WMD, ties to Al Qaeda or any connections to the 9/11 tragedy. It was all a pack of disgusting lies, along with the ultra-carnard that Saddam Hussein had attempted to buy enriched uranium from Niger in order to build a nuclear weapon. (3) These lies were all concocted by the Bush-Cheney Gang, Neocon wise guys, and Bush’s poodle, UK’s P.M. Tony Blair, in order to justify their blood-stained scheme. (4)

I see a parallel in a recent event in the world of sports, where deception has also reared its ugly head. This situation, however, lacks the horrific consequences of Bush's monstrous lies to Congress and to the American people. Raffy Palmeiro is a Baltimore Orioles, who only a few weeks got his 3,000th major league hit and joined an exclusive club of baseball legends. On Aug. 1, 2005, however, Palmeiro’s life got turned upside down when he was suspended for 10 days for violating Major League Baseball’s policy for using steroids, a banned substance. His lame response: “I never 'intentionally' used steroids...” Most experts who were consulted on the matter didn’t buy it. Dr. Bill Howard, a sports medicine surgeon, at Baltimore’s Union Memorial Hospital, said of his alibi, “I just flat don’t believe it.” (5)

Palmeiro is the same baseball player who appeared before the House Committee on Government Reform, on Capitol Hill, on March 17, 2005, and swore under oath, “I have never used steroids. Period. I don’t know how to say it any more clearly than that. Never.” The panel was looking into the growing abuse of steroids by young people across the country. The Committee then considered Palmeiro “a model witness.” His testimony was so compelling that he was appointed to an advisory panel, whose goal is "to address the growing problem of steroid abuse by youth." Now, Rep. Christopher Shays (R-CT) said these new revelations [about Palmeiro] are an extreme disappointment.” (5) If Palmeiro's conduct showing that he does use steroids, after all his pious public posturing to the contrary, is an "extreme disappointment," than what in the name of justice should be the response on Capitol Hill to Bush's serial lies about the Iraqi War? How about placing him in the dock in an impeachment trial before the House or Representatives and charging him with committing "high crimes and misdemeanors?" (6)

More on Bush's deceptions: Constitutional lawyer, John C. Bonifaz, in a letter of May 22, 2005, to Rep. John Conyers (R-MI), wrote, “The recent release of the Downing Street Memo provides new and compelling evidence that the President of the United States has been actively engaged in a conspiracy to deceive and mislead the United States Congress and the American people about the basis for going to war against Iraq...If the evidence revealed by the Downing Street Memo is true, then the President's submission of his March 18, 2003 letter and report to the United States Congress would violate federal criminal law, including: the federal anti-conspiracy statute, 18 U.S.C. - 371, which makes it a felony "to commit any offense against the United States, or to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose..."; and The False Statements Accountability Act of 1996, 18 U.S.C. - 1001, which makes it a felony to issue knowingly and willfully false statements to the U.S. Congress. The House of Representatives has a constitutional duty to investigate fully and comprehensively the evidence revealed by the Downing Street Memo and other related evidence and to determine whether there are sufficient grounds to impeach George W. Bush, the President of the U.S. A Resolution of Inquiry is the appropriate first step in launching this investigation.” (1)

Recently, H. Res. 375, a "Resolution of Inquiry," was introduced by feisty Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA). If passed by the House of Representatives, it would require the White House and State Department to transmit all information relating to the communications with the officials of the U. K. between Jan. 1, 2002, and Oct. 16, 2002, "relating to the policy of the U.S. with respect to Iraq." As of this date, it already has over 40 cosponsors. (1)

Ironies abound with this dual saga of Bush's lies and Palmeiro's half truths. The latter's incident has rated front page coverage and banner headlines in the Baltimore Sun. (5) It also appears to have produced for the Sun more articles from news, sports and political angles, than did the launching of the war with Iraq itself back on March 19, 2003! By comparison, when the Downing St. Memos were first revealed, in early May, 2005, the Sun buried that important story so deep in its paper that only a political junkie could have located it. If only the Sun, and others in the flagship print media, would live up to their highest journalistic duties and insist on holding Bush fully accountable for his abuses of power. If that did happen, then just maybe the country could get to the bottom of Bush's apparent violations of our Constitution and laws and bring him, and his other coconspirators, to the bar of Justice, and also, mercifully, end this unjust Iraqi war. (7)

Finally, with respect to Palmeiro, it was in a shocking book by Jose Canseco, an ex-baseball player and jock, that the finger was first pointed at him for using illegal steroids. Palmeiro has vigorously denied those charges. Nevertheless, Canseco related in his expose' how he and Palmeiro were both team mates during the 1992-1993 seasons, with the American League's Texan Rangers baseball team. His book is titled, "Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant 'Roids, Smash Hits, and How Baseball Got Big." In it, he wrote, "Not long after I got there, (Arlington, Texas), I sat down with Rafael Palmeiro...and educated [him] about steroids...I personally injected [him] many times, until [he] became more familiar with how to use a needle..." Canseco added how the owners of the Texas Rangers would have seen us all getting bigger before their eyes, starting within weeks after I joined the team. But they never made an issue of it, or said anything to me or to any of us about steroids." One of co-owners of the Texan Rangers during that period of alleged rampant illegal drug use and repeated deception by supposedly Canseco, Palmeiro and other Rangers' baseball players was our current president: George W. Bush!

Notes:

1. http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/

2. http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/5/

3. http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/619/

4. http://antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=6343/

5. Baltimore Sun, August 2, 2005.

6. http://zzpat.tripod.com/cvb/

7. As of this date, 1,820 brave Americans have died in the Iraqi War, over 15,000 more have been wounded, and at least, 26,000 innocent Iraqis have been slaughtered. The cost to U.S. taxpayers is put at 5 billion and rising.

© William Hughes 2005.

William Hughes is the author of “Saying ‘’No’ to the War Party” (IUniverse, Inc.). He can be reached at liamhughes@comcast.net.