ON SUNDAY’S Meet The Press Tim Russert asked his guest, Michael Scheuer, to respond to questions concerning his first book from 2002, Through Our Enemies’ Eyes. In it, as I pointed out in an earlier article, Scheuer cites numerous pieces of evidence that substantiate the Bush administration’s claim that Saddam’s Iraq had a relationship with al Qaeda. However, in his recent media appearances, Scheuer now gives the impression that there is no evidence that there was a relationship.

Tim Russert asked Scheuer about this apparent contradiction; his response left much to be desired. Scheuer’s response does, however, illustrate one of the many problems Porter Goss and the Bush administration face in their attempt to reform the intelligence community. When asked about his analysis in 2002, Scheuer responded (in part), “I certainly saw a link when I was writing the books in terms of the open-source literature, unclassified literature, but I had nothing to do with Iraq during my professional career until the run-up to the war.” (emphasis added)