Duelfer In The Sky With Diamonds

The new report on Iraq's missing WMD is an impressive piece of work. I'm surprised by the honesty of some sections.

But parts of it are incredibly peculiar. By this I don't mean they're false, or even that I disagree with the general ideas being expressed. They're just -- uh, how shall I put this? Let's just say: they break new stylistic ground in federal government documents.

For instance, from the introduction in Volume I:

This report will also attempt to broaden understanding by recalibrating the perspective of the reader. The Regime was run by Saddam and the calculations he made concerning WMD were based on his view of relevant related factors not ours. Optimally, we would remove the reader temporarily from his reality and time. We would collect the flow of images, sounds, feelings, and events that passed into Saddam's mind and project them as with a Zeiss Planetarium projection instrument. The reader would see the Universe from Saddam's point in space. Events would flow by the reader as they flowed by Saddam.

I... see.

Then there's this:

Ideally, the reader would see what Saddam saw. Such a transmutation is impossible. However, this report will provide the reader a handrail to grasp in the form of a time line that will also serve as a constant reminder of contemporaneous events that filled the field of Saddam's view.

Yes. When you open the doors of perception, you will see that handrails and time lines and reminders are not separate objects. All is one within the Zeiss Planetarium projection instrument.

And finally:

Complicating understanding and analysis of the former Regime's WMD is the tendency to bring our own assumptions and logic to the examination of the evidence... When considering the very different system that existed under the government of Saddam Hussein, there is a risk of not seeing the meaning and not seeing the implications of the evidence.

Analysts were asked to look for something they may not expect or be able to see. A challenge like that faced by scientists engaged in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence.

Therefore, before we begin this journey together, please buckle yourself securely into the ride, and lick the small, crudely-drawn picture of Daffy Duck on page 62.

Okay, I made that last sentence up. But here's the amazing thing: I did not make up the sentence before.

God bless the person who wrote all this. God bless them, and let's hope their next assignment is rewriting our nation's dishwater-dull tax forms.