The commission led by Judge Laurence Silberman and former Sen. Charles Robb, predictably found serious flaws in the operation of the nation's intelligence agencies, but made no judgments on how the president and his Cabinet used or misused the information it received about Iraq's weapons programs. Critics contend that the administration had a longstanding plan for launching an invasion of Iraq regardless of what the intelligence agencies produced. The panel made recommendations for the reorganization of the nation's 15 intelligence agencies, but offered no view on holding accountable those responsible for what many view as the most serious intelligence failure in U.S. history.

The Bush administration's honoring and promotion of key officials answerable for the flawed intelligence, provides insight into the priorities of a White House seemingly uninterested in accountability. Between The Lines' Scott Harris spoke with former CIA analyst David MacMichael, who assesses the findings of the presidential commission and the importance of learning the truth about why our nation went to war.

Read David MacMichael's article about the presidential credibility gap online, "Credibility Gap? More Like an Abyss," The Foreign Policy in Focus, March 21, 2005

Related links:

• "Bush Threw Us a 'Curveball': Report Shines a Light on 'Crazy' Iraqi Informant," by Robert Scheer, the Los Angeles Times, April 5, 2005
• "WMD Commission -- Yet Another Intelligence Failure," by Rahul Mahajan, CommonDreams.org, April 1, 2005
• "Bush, Cheney, Get Their Whitewash," by Matthew Rothschild, by The Progressive, April 2, 2005
• "Honest Intelligence Needed," by Ray McGovern, the Miami Herald, April 1, 2005
• "WMD Commission Continues the Stonewall for Bush," by David Corn, www.Davidcorn.com April 1, 2005
• "The 9/11 Secret in the CIA's Back Pocket," The agency is withholding a damning report that points at senior officials, by Robert Scheer, the Los Angeles Times, Oct. 19, 2004
• "The New Pentagon Papers," A high-ranking military officer reveals how defense department extremists suppressed information and twisted the truth to drive the country to war, Salon.com, March 10, 2004
• "Cracks in the Empire: Compilation of Washington insiders speaking out on Bush administration policies and actions," by Anna Manzo and Scott Harris, Toward Freedom, Summer 2004
• "Clarke's Take on Terror," 60 Minutes, March 21, 2004
• "A White House 'Adept at Revenge,'" The Associated Press, March 27, 2004
• Project for the New American Century's Letter to President Clinton on Iraq, Jan. 26, 1998 Urges President Clinton to remove the threat that Iraq poses by stating a strategy to do so in his "upcoming State of the Union Address."

Talks to renew the nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty, or NPT, begin in May, but the Bush administration and other nuclear powers, are reported to be unconcerned about its future. If the NPT is abandoned, its demise could pave the way for an unprecedented explosion of nuclear weapons proliferation across the globe.

Dr. Helen Caldicott is a pediatrician and anti-nuclear weapons activist. She founded the Nobel Prize-winning Physicians for Social Responsibility in 1978 because of her grave concern over the medical impact of nuclear weapons on the human race. Caldicott, who went on to found the Nuclear Policy Research Institute in 2002, was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts. Between The Lines' Scott Harris spoke with Dr. Caldicott about the current danger of nuclear weapons proliferation and the U.S. effort to militarize outer space

Dr. Helen Caldicott is author of "The New Nuclear Danger, George W. Bush's Military Industrial Complex," published by the New Press. Contact Dr. Caldicott's Nuclear Policy Reserach Institute at (202) 822-9800 or visit their website at www.nuclearpolicy.org

Related links:

• Physicians for Social Responsibility at www.psr.org or call (202) 667-4260.

Critics Question Safety of Radioactive Waste Storage
at Power Plants and Proposed Repositories

Interview with Kevin Kamps,
head of the Radioactive Waste Project
for the Nuclear Information and Resource Service,
conducted by Melinda Tuhus

Headlines last week disclosed the debate between the National Academy of Sciences and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission about the best way to store high-level radioactive waste until it can be moved to a permanent storage site. For years, the government has moved forcefully to establish Yucca Mountain in Nevada as the nation's permanent nuclear waste repository. But recent news stories have revealed potential problems with the Yucca Mountain site, including fabricated test reports. Environmentalists and state officials in Nevada have long opposed the construction of the Yucca waste site.

The Yucca Mountain project is now years behind schedule, and waste keeps building up at nuclear plants around the U.S. Two dozen plants have moved some of their radioactive fuel waste into dry cask storage. The nuclear industry says it has a redundant layered safety system to prevent accidents or terrorist attacks, but opponents point to several close calls since the near meltdown at Pennsylvania's Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in 1979.

Between The Lines' Melinda Tuhus spoke with Kevin Kamps, who heads the Radioactive Waste Project for the Nuclear Information and Resource Service. He outlines some of his group's concerns about the safety of temporary storage facilities at the power plants and at an Indian reservation in Utah that may soon be approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

For more information, call (202) 328-0002 or visit the group's website at www.nirs.org

This week's summary
of under-reported news

Compiled by Bob Nixon

• On April 1, hundreds of anti-immigration activists, many of them armed, gathered in Tombstone, Ariz. for a monthlong mission to intercept illegal immigrants trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border. ("U.S. Vigilantes Begin Border Stake-Out," The Guardian, April 2, 2005)
• Campaign finance reform legislators are targeting politically powerful independent 527 groups, like America Coming Together and Progress for America, requiring them to register as political action committees and obey the soft money ban passed by Congress. ("The Fall of the 527," In These Times, April 18, 2005)
• Rogue police officers in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil being blamed for a massacre that killed 30 people in an apparent "payback" for an investigation into police corruption and brutality that resulted in the arrest of eight officers suspected of killing two men. ("Police Suspected in Rio Massacre," Associated Press, April 2, 2005; "Night of Terror in Rio's Fluminenese," Amnesty International press release April 1, 2005)
  

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Credits:
Senior news editor: Bob Nixon
Program narration: Denise Manzari
News reader: Bill Cosentino
Segment producers: Melinda Tuhus
Distribution: Anna Manzo, Harry Minot, Jeff Yates, Bill Cosentino
Senior Web editor/producer: Anna Manzo
Web producer: Jeff Yates
Newswire editor: Hank Hoffman
Executive producer: Scott Harris
Theme music: Mikata

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