The Bush administration is not given to admitting its mistakes. So it was a mild shock when, on national television, the National Security Advisor admitted they were wrong about WMD in Iraq. It started like this: Stephen Hadley, the National Security Advisor was being interviewed by Wolf Blitzer on CNN LATE EDITION. Blitzer suggested that when all was said and done, the president was responsible for bad intelligence on WMD.

Hadley must have been cheering internally over the question. He couched his answer by implicating the Senate, world leaders, and the Clinton Administration as fellow believers about Iraq having a WMD program. Then, with three words, he returned fire toward the Democrats by admitting, "We were wrong," about WMD in Iraq. The administration put everyone on notice that when and if they go down the road of Monday morning quarterbacking on the WMD issue they were going to be seen as 'flip-flopping' their position.

There is no better source than the National Security Advisor to the President for confirming there were no WMD even if the response was more a political maneuver than an administration coming to terms with another mistake.

We never would have initiated Operation Iraqi Freedom without the fear of WMD. When we were ramping up in 2002 to invade Iraq in March 2003, the key element inciting the American people for war was the fact we believed Saddam had Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD). The administration played to those fears. Saddam had used them in the past against his own people and against the 'peace-loving' fanatics of Iran. Great arguments to convince a nation still reeling from 9/11.

The administration is right. Everyone believed Saddam had WMD. But, the issue isn't that everyone believed Saddam had WMD. The issue is whether bits and pieces of information were cherry-picked and hand-fed to validate the war.

WMD was the excuse to invade Iraq because it rallied the American people behind an invasion of a country that had nothing to do with 9/11. If the administration had simply argued that the world would be a better place without Saddam, the American people would have agreed (but might have also pointed out that Osama in Afghanistan is the one we want). The administration could have added that taking out Saddam would start a domino effect where sowed seeds of democracy would spread like wildfire across the Middle East. The American people would have said, "So what? We want Osama's head on a pike." The argument that invading Iraq will free the Iraqi people, we would have said, "Let them free themselves." Those reasons, as good as they are, would have refocused America on the hills between Afghanistan and Pakistan where the person responsible for 9/11 remains free.

Leaders are human, but we trust them to put the American people above their own agendas. And, when they make mistakes we want leaders with the integrity to admit responsibility. As Hadley pointed out in the interview with Blitzer, the President takes full responsibility for the hard decisions he has made. In Washington where blame and responsibility is as slippery as grease in a hot skillet one has to admire those willing to admit mistakes. Unfortunately, it is a quality that is gaining a lot in experience.