July 31, 2005: Woodward Repeats Baseless Claim that Wilson Contradicted Himself in Report, Op-Ed

Washington Post editor and reporter Bob Woodward repeats the baseless claim that a 2002 report by former ambassador Joseph Wilson on attempts by Iraq to secure Nigerien uranium (see March 8, 2002) contradicted his 2003 New York Times op-ed criticizing the Bush administration’s use of the uranium claim to justify its invasion of Iraq (see July 6, 2003). The progressive media watchdog organization Media Matters will note that according to a Senate Intelligence Committee report (see July 9, 2004), “there appears to be no contradiction between the report and Wilson’s op-ed.… Wilson’s language [in the op-ed] closely echoes the Intelligence Committee’s description of his report.” Woodward says that according to Wilson’s 2002 report, “there were reasonable grounds to discredit” Wilson, and goes on to say that Wilson “had said something in his reports a year before that contradicted what he wrote in an op-ed piece in the New York Times.” Woodward also mocks the idea that anyone in the Bush administration wants to “trash” or “discredit” Wilson (see June 2003, June 3, 2003, June 11, 2003, June 12, 2003, June 19 or 20, 2003, July 6, 2003, July 6-10, 2003, July 7, 2003 or Shortly After, 8:45 a.m. July 7, 2003, 9:22 a.m. July 7, 2003, July 7-8, 2003, July 11, 2003, (July 11, 2003), July 12, 2003, July 12, 2003, July 18, 2003, October 1, 2003, and April 5, 2006), and goes on to say that “there were reasonable grounds to discredit him.” [Media Matters, 8/1/2005] Woodward does not reveal that he himself was an early recipient of the White House’s leaked information that Wilson’s wife is a clandestine CIA officer (see June 13, 2003).