Does Anybody Remember Ritter?

David Corn, Washington editor of "The Nation," and Michael Isikoff, investigative correspondent for "Newsweek," were guests on the Diane Rehm show discussing their book "Hubris." They spoke of the faulty intelligence that the White House used to justify its invasion of Iraq. Both are good journalists and write well. Rehm was quite good at interviewing them, challenging their assertions.

I remembered the details as they reviewed them, the Niger yellow cake, the stories from Iraqi "dissidents" predicting a popular uprising, the predictions of a quick war, the smoking gun in the form of a mushroom cloud, Colin Powell presenting the case to the UN.

I also remember Scott Ritter a former Marine intelligence officer turned UN weapons inspector. Isikoff and Corn didn't mention Ritter this morning. I hope they included him in their book.

I saw Ritter on the O'Reilly Factor wherein the bellicose host derided Ritter and questioned his patriotism. Ritter persevered through the interview insisting that there were no WMD and certainly no nuclear program.

Later that night I saw him on Nightline where a less confrontational host asked Ritter why, if what he said was true, didn't Saddam Hussein just tell the UN there weren't any weapons instead of playing the game. Ritter said that Hussein needed to maintain the threat of the existence of WMD to keep his enemies away and his people in line.

Here we are years later, thousands of Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed, the region is destabilized and Iran has emerged as the major power in the region. It seems that Ritter was right all along and yet no one wants to remember his Cassandra warnings.

Ritter was instead dismissed as a crackpot and called a traitor by CNN. An MSNBC newscaster suggested Ritter turn in his passport and move to Iraq. The vitriol was impressive, a foretaste of this administration's tactics in the 2004 election. Heck, the president all but called the Supreme Court traitors for ruling against his kangaroo tribunals during a speech announcing that 14 real terror suspects were being shipped to Gitmo.

A Republican who said that he voted for Bush in 2000, Ritter has been vocal in his criticism of the Bush policies in the Middle East since the war in Iraq began. He has allegedly said that a war with Iran is inevitable, that UN Ambassador John Bolton's speech announcing a unilateral move against Iran has already been written.

Let's hope this time he's a crackpot.