Bush admits mistakes in intelligence, Dr. Rice moving up

In another politically bad day for liberals, President George W. Bush admitted on Wednesday that he led the US into the war in Iraq on the basis of “wrong” intelligence. But the president insisted on the eve of Thursday’s Iraqi elections that the conflict was justified by the goal of creating a “free and democratic” country after the fall of President Saddam Hussein.

In a rare admission of a mistake, Mr Bush said: “It is true that much of the [pre-war] intelligence turned out to be wrong. As president I am responsible for the decision to go into Iraq.” But in the last of four speeches before Thursday’s election, Mr Bush strongly defended the Iraq war. “We are in Iraq today because our goal has always been more than the removal of a brutal dictator – it is to leave a free and democratic Iraq in its place.”
Mr Bush described Thursday’s poll as a “watershed moment in the story of freedom”, saying the vote would create “the only constitutional democracy in the Arab world”.
The speeches have outlined the administration’s military, economic and political strategy for Iraq. In a letter to Mr Bush, 40 Democratic senators called for a “detailed plan” and called 2006 a “year of transition in Iraq.”

Elsewhere, the White House separately gave Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, authority to take the lead in planning and reconstruction efforts in conflict areas such as Iraq, in a reflection of the rise of the State Department under her leadership.

Dr. Rice is gaining more steam to prepare for possible 2008 presidential showdown between her and Hitlery ... can't wait for her to become first female U.S. president, racist liberals will go berserk, hehe