Time for an Explanation

Now that the White House has admitted that President Bush unilaterally declassified parts of a (faulty) intelligence report to justify going to war in Iraq and to discredit Ambassador Joseph Wilson's report, the American people deserve an explanation about why such a step was taken. Arlen Specter, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said as much yesterday on "Fox News Sunday."

"I think that there has to be a detailed explanation precisely as to what Vice President Cheney did, what the president said to him, and an explanation from the president as to what he said so that it can be evaluated." He added "We ought to get to the bottom of it so it can be evaluated by the American people. ... The president may be entirely in the clear, and it may turn out that he had the authority to make the disclosures which were made," but "'it was not the right way to go about it because we ought not to have leaks in government."

I agree with Senator Specter; President Bush and Vice President Cheney should offer a full explanation of how this decision to declassify was taken and why - and how the declassified information was to be distributed to the presss. It's an important question, and one which after many years of taxpayer-funded investigations, we are all entitled to having answered.