Making critics look naive by distorting what they think: It works for Bush, so why shouldn't it work for Blair?

This is from a Guardian report on a Tony Blair press conference (asterisks mine):

He added: "The biggest problem ... is that a lot of people really don't believe that there is a threat arising from terrorism and weapons of mass destruction.* I think they think it is a convenient construct politically."

Asked if he should quit if no weapons were found, he said: "There has always been something bizarre about the notion that Saddam never** had any weapons of mass destruction."

*Schmuck -- nobody disputes that "there is a threat arising from terrorism and weapons of mass destruction." What we dispute is that there was a threat to the U.S., Britain, and the rest of the West and its allies arising from Iraqi terrorism and weapons of mass destruction in the past decade. We think that threat very well may have ceased to exist, or effectively ceased to exist, quite possibly because Saddam curtailed his weapons programs in response to sanctions and bombings.

**Schmuck -- no one says he never had any weapons of mass destruction. He had them. He used them. But that was a long time ago. Did he have them just before the recent war? Did he have them in the years leading up to it? Well, did he?

How exasperating....