THERE IS A STRANGE PAIRING of positions on the left.

The first is that Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda were not connected. The work of Stephen F. Hayes and Thomas Joscelyn in THE WEEKLY STANDARD, which is supported by other serious investigative reporters such as Claudia Rosett has already established beyond any reasonable doubt that there was a web of connections, but the combination of the left’s indifference to inconvenient facts and the international version of the soft bigotry of low expectations–an Arab dictator couldn’t have had a sophisticated intelligence service capable of hiding such matters–make it an article of faith among Bush haters that there was no connection.