CNN actually dares to put one foot outside the circle this morning. Shocking! Such valor! Such Bravery! Such daring!!

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush and his top aides publicly made 935 false statements about the security risk posed by Iraq in the two years following September 11, 2001, according to a study released Tuesday by two nonprofit journalism groups. [emph added]

"In short, the Bush administration led the nation to war on the basis of erroneous information that it methodically propagated and that culminated in military action against Iraq on March 19, 2003," reads an overview of the examination, conducted by the Center for Public Integrity and its affiliated group, the Fund for Independence in Journalism.

According to the study, Bush and seven top officials -- including Vice President Dick Cheney, former Secretary of State Colin Powell and then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice -- made 935 false statements about Iraq during those two years.

The study was based on a searchable database compiled of primary sources, such as official government transcripts and speeches, and secondary sources -- mainly quotes from major media organizations.

It’s just astounding that the official media is actually getting around to discovering what patriotic Americans have been screaming about for six years. The ostriches of Big Media were terrified of the vindictive Bu$h malAdministration. The outing of Valerie Plame was in fact the tip of the iceberg, and perhaps one day we’ll be fortunate enough to have our own Truth and Reconciliaition Commission, and Americans will learn the truth about the criminal cabal that has worked tirelessly to destroy our country’s democratic traditions, and turn it into a fascist corporate state.

He has repeatedly said that despite the intelligence flaws, removing Hussein from power was the right thing to do.

Ahem.

I submit in evidence the history of our failed imperial mistake, leavened with the hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis and many thousands more maimed, the two million internal Iraqi refugees and another two million who fled the country, the almost 4,000 dead Americans, the 30,000+ wounded and maimed American soldiers, and the estimated 100,000 who have suffered some form of traumatic brain injury. Add to that the money we’ve sunk so far in the sands of Iraq (probably close to a trillion if you add in all the incidentals) and the two or three trillion more we will pay over the next 30 years as we pay compound interest on our loans from the Chinese and Japanese.

And for all this cost we removed a dictator with a useless military that had its teeth pulled in Gulf War I.

Some journalists -- indeed, even some entire news organizations -- have since acknowledged that their coverage during those prewar months was far too deferential and uncritical," the report reads. "These mea culpas notwithstanding, much of the wall-to-wall media coverage provided additional, 'independent' validation of the Bush administration's false statements about Iraq."

Note carefully that CNN has merely reported this study, and not said (as they should)

“Yeah, and we were some of the most egregious news sources that sold you the Bu$h “false statements.”

Even now, no one in the media has the courage to call it “lies.”