Lawrence O’Donnell’s contentious interview with Condoleezza Rice

Rice persists with debunked pretext for war that Saddam Hussein posed threat to U.S.

Video

Lawrence O’Donnell: Condoleezza Rice on lessons from Iraq (MSNBC “The Last Word,” May 5, 2011) — The former Secretary of State sat down for an exclusive interview with MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell. The two had a must-see conversation about the lessons learned from the Iraq war and much more. (11:50)

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5/19/2011 News update

‘Terror and Fear’: Twin Bombs Kill 27 at Police Station in Iraq

First explosion drew people into the parking lot; second blast struck minutes later

Iraqi security forces inspect the scene of a bombing in Kirkuk, 180 miles north of Baghdad, Iraq, on Thursday, May 19, 2011. (Photo credit: Emad Matti / AP)

May 19, 2011

KIRKUK, Iraq — Twin bombs that lured policemen out of their fortified headquarters in a northern Iraqi city killed 27 people on Thursday, most of them police officers.

Scores were wounded in the double blasts in Kirkuk, and a third explosion 45 minutes later on a road to a city hospital brought the number of injured to at least 70, said provincial health director Siddiq Omar.

The ethnically mixed city of Kirkuk, claimed by Arabs, Kurds and Turkomen, is one of the more politically volatile parts of the country. U.S. officials have long worried about what will happen in the city and region when American forces pull out of Iraq, as they’re scheduled to do by the end of this year.

Eyewitness Adnan Karim described “chaos of terror and fear” at a parking lot outside the police compound in central Kirkuk where the first two bombs went off.

“I saw a lot of dead bodies, burned dead bodies,” said Karim, who owns a small shop about 100 yards from the police building and ran to the parking lot after the first explosion. The second one came about three minutes later, he said, and then “ambulances began to evacuate casualties of dead bodies and injured people.” …

The double blasts killed 27 people, most of them policemen, and wounded more than 62, he said. It also blew out the windows of the police headquarters, where officials frantically tried to evacuate workers and find victims. …

The third bomb, planted on a road, set cars and trucks ablaze when it exploded about 550 yards away, targeting a police patrol near a mosque, said [Kirkuk police Capt. Abdul Salam] Zangana, who oversees security units at the hospital where the dead and wounded were brought. Zangana said eight people were wounded in that blast. …

A Sunni lawmaker from Kirkuk, Omar al-Jabouri, said the city had experienced a recent jump in kidnappings and attacks on police officers, and that the deteriorating security situation reflects the tensions between Kirkuk’s three main ethnic groups. …

Full story

An injured boy is treated at a hospital after a car bomb in Kirkuk, 180 miles north of Baghdad, Iraq, Monday, May 23, 2011. Iraqi police say a car bomb exploded in the northern city that is rife with ethnic tensions, killing and wounding several bystanders. (Photo credit: Emad Matti / AP via Daily Telegraph)

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Related reports on this site

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Tony Blair says he has no regrets over Iraq war (MSNBC, Jan. 29, 2010) — Tony Blair appeared before a public inquiry seeking to learn lessons from the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. (03:17)

Bush-Cheney ‘Hell Bent’ on War (Nov. 27, 2009)

Anti-war protesters from the Stop the War group wear masks depicting British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, right, former President George W. Bush, center, and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, left, outside the conference center where the Iraq war inquiry was taking place in central London, Tuesday, Nov. 24, 2009 . (Photo credit: Lefteris Pitarakis / AP)

Iraq War Plan Soon After 9/11 (Nov. 22, 2009)

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Six Wars in Iraq (March 22, 2009)

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Bush’s case for war (MSNBC, March 19, 2009) — Rachel Maddow reviews the case the Bush administration made for war in Iraq and corrects the revisionism being perpetrated by Bush loyalists. (07:14)

Bush Rewriting History on Iraq? (Jan. 13, 2009)

Some of the documents turned over to the U.N. by Iraq prior to the U.S. invasion.

Iraq: Intelligence and Policy Failure (Dec. 10, 2008)

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Bush is history (MSNBC, Dec. 9, 2008) — Countdown’s Keith Olbermann lists why White House talking points designated to cast President Bush in a positive light actually serve as a reminder of the president’s many faults and shortcomings. (04:51)

Iraq ‘Biggest Regret’ — Bush (Dec. 2, 2008)

Video

Bush’s exit interview (NBC Nightly News, Jan. 12, 2009) — President George W. Bush delivered an at-times defiant speech in which he expressed regret and discussed some mistakes he has made while in office. Chuck Todd reports. (04:00)

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FROM THE ARCHIVES: One Year Ago — May 10, 2010

Cascade of Violence in Iraq

Residents gather at the site of a bomb attack in Basra, southeast of Baghdad, on Monday, May 10, 2010. (Photo credit: Atef Hassan / Reuters)

One year ago today, I reported that a cascade of bombings and shootings hit at least 10 cities and towns in Iraq, killing at least 100 people — mostly in Shiite areas — in Iraq’s deadliest day thus far in 2010.

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FROM THE ARCHIVES: Two Years Ago — May 10, 2009

Bachmann ‘Wingnut of the Week’

Two years ago today, on May 10, 2009, I reported that CNN’s John Avlon, in the inaugural edition of American Morning’s “Wingnuts of the Week” segment, named U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann a charter member of the Wingnut Hall of Fame.