Bill Delahunt: “In the room. `` `In the 23 months I was there, I never saw anything that I would characterize as evidence of weapons of…”

“In the room. `` `In the 23 months I was there, I never saw anything that I would characterize as evidence of weapons of mass destruction,' O'Neill told Time, referring to Time Magazine. `There were allegations and assertions by people, but I have been around a hell of a long time and I know the difference between evidence and assertions and allusions or conclusions that one could draw from a set of assumptions. To me there is a difference between real evidence and everything else and I never saw anything in the intelligence that I would characterize as real evidence.' '' ``In response, a top administration official tried to dismiss O'Neill as out of the loop on weapons of mass destruction intelligence. `That information was on a need-to-know basis. He wouldn't have been in a position to see it.' '' Just imagine this. We have the President saying that the intelligence was available to everybody. Yet a top administration official in response to the assertion by Secretary O'Neill that he never saw any evidence had this to say: ``Oh, it wouldn't have been available to him.'' That to me is just inexplicable. I think we deserve an answer from the President. We deserve an answer from the administration as to what actually happened. And I would like to hear from Secretary O'Neill sometime. I think it is important.”