Bill Delahunt: “if I can, if the gentleman would yield, what I would like to do is try to emphasize that these questions have been posed…”

“if I can, if the gentleman would yield, what I would like to do is try to emphasize that these questions have been posed by Republicans as well as Democrats regarding intelligence, whether it was manipulated, or whether it was used in a selective fashion. Now, I am going to begin by quoting the former Secretary of State, Colin Powell, who back in June of 2004 in an interview had this to say about the issue of intelligence: In recent weeks, Powell has apologized for at least 2 lapses regarding information about Iraq and terrorism. In a recent Meet the Press appearance, Powell said that he had relied on faulty intelligence when he told the United Nations in 2003 that Iraq had biological weapons. It turned out that the sourcing was inaccurate and wrong and, in some cases, deliberately misleading. I want to repeat that this evening, because I believe it is important that the American people pay attention to the former Secretary of State's use of words here: In some cases, deliberately misleading. Now, he does not go on to explain who did the misleading, whose responsibility it was to review the intelligence, to ensure that the sources were reliable, whether there was manipulation. But what I find interesting, Mr. Speaker, is that we are here on this floor asking these questions years, years after Democrats have asked for full and exhaustive investigations, inquiries, and oversight hearings. We have not had a single oversight hearing.…”