Masquerading as news on the other side of the world, this rather embarrassing, desperate labor came up easily at a Google-provided string of newspaper articles on Iraq. Half of it is a slaughter of straw men, the other half a dubious attempt to slide in rhetoric and simple conjecture as incontrovertible, contrary evidence.

Any question of Iraq's complicity in the September 11th attacks was not addressed by the administration, let alone offered as justification for Saddam's deposition.

Lynch's ambulance fired upon by American forces? Quite unlikely, the claim part of a tasteless and thoroughly debunked attempt at wrecking one of the more notable moments of the engagement.

And those covered trucks exactly matching Colin Powell's description of mobile weapons labs? Out comes the meme that they were merely clandestine units for creating hydrogen, just like Grandma used to make, for weather or artillery balloons; this, despite the fact that hydrogen is best known for its transportability, or that the machinery - the machinery hidden inside trailers - is decidedly unsuited for creating hydrogen (a fact general undisputed but, as in the questioned article, simply sneered at - after all, why distrust Saddam Hussein?).

More egregious is an attempt to use the famous misquote. Three months after the fact, there is no excuse but disingenuousness, although malice might be a more fitting motive, as the paper has gone one step further with an out-and-out "This wasn't the enemy we wargamed against."

The blue ribbon for the most humorous transmogrifications of distorted opinion into fact goes to the conclusion that since the Allied occupation is overseeing a reengagement of Iraq's oil wells in addition to the administration of revenues thereof, including a possible universal trust fund, the resource isn't truly in the hands of Iraqis - as if some bank teller would be exchanging crude barrels for dinar by the hour. On the subject of chemical weapons used or exposed during military action, no anti-war sources who used the possibility as a reason against action are cited.

Good for a laugh and an exercise in reminding oneself of the facts but also a hard look at what continues to animate the left, in absolute irrecognition of what has transpired and what is being accomplished. "A scene unimaginable," indeed.

UPDATE: Bryon Scott took the time to fisk the entire wishlist. Good man. Good patient man. (From IP.)