I'm not arguing from a morality standpoint. I'm arguing against the premise that it was common knowledge that Saddam was harmless, and that only the Bush administration was stupid enough to think he had WMD.

Clinton thought Saddam had WMD, and he is assumed by many liberals to be the best and smartest chief executive since Franklin Roosevelt. Hell, when Bush Sr. attacked Iraq, Saddam actually DID have WMD, so I suppose the comparison arguments only go back so far.

Although certainly not the only solution, given an honest belief--based on the same evidence that led many others to the same conclusion--that Saddam did possess these capabilities, removing him by force was a valid option. Going back and changing history to make it look like Bush was the only one thinking this isn't going to work.

If a cop shoots someone who seems to be holding a gun on a hostage, and it later turns out it was a piece of pipe, it gets a little ridiculous for everybody in the room who also thought it was a gun to get righteous about the bad call. Maybe you were brilliant enough or clairvoyant enough to know the whole time that Saddam had no WMD, but then you weren't in Washington, were you?

And admit it. If we had found fifty nuclear warheads, your opinion of the war and Bush probably wouldn't have changed a bit.