The Bush administration acknowledged for the first time yesterday that President Bush should not have alleged in his State of the Union address in January that Iraq had sought to buy uranium in Africa to reconstitute its nuclear weapons program.

The statement was prompted by publication of a British parliamentary commission report, which raised serious questions about the reliability of British intelligence that was cited by Bush as part of his effort to convince Congress and the American people that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction program were a threat to U.S. security.” Washington Post

I never even logged the news about the British parliamentary commission report. Ho hum — the intelligence used to convince the public was unreliable. The current item, on the other hand, is noteworthy because of the underlying, arrogant assumption that the time is right to deflect further criticism by admitting the deception… a safe assumption given that the White House has surely noticed there has been not one — count ’em, not one — bit of serious political fallout from the lies.