Tenet Produces Another Meaningless Cloud of Words

While George Tenet may be weak in some areas, he is quite skilled in others: for instance, blathering on and on and on without actually saying anything. For instance, see here. And here's another example, from NPR yesterday:

NPR: Why was that [that the pre-war UN inspections found nothing] disregarded?

TENET: Well, it's not disregarded. First of all, the inspections regimes themselves had eroded considerably over the course of time. We didn't have anytime anywhere access. We were limited to sites that we had previously visited. Nobody believed we were going to find things at sites the Iraqis had previously declared to the UN. So, tell me something we don't know. The question ultimately is, if you believed as we believed, that he was deceived and hiding, where is this stuff? Okay? So, it's not a question of not factoring it in. It's not a question of -- you know, having a terrible -- I thought we had a pretty good relationship with the UN and supporting them. But that's not how Iraq worked, Mary Louise.

To the degree it's possible to tease any meaning out of this—e.g., that UNMOVIC wasn't allowed to go wherever they wanted—it is of course complete bullshit. But mostly it's just white noise.