Richard Cohen on the Bushies' withholding of info on North Korea's nuclear program -- and the Administration's constant dissembling

Their Little Secret (washingtonpost.com) Not so, it turns out. An important piece of information was withheld -- from me, from you and from our representatives in Congress. I am reminded of the so-called secret bombing of Cambodia during the Vietnam War. Secret from whom? Not from the Cambodians. They surely noticed they were being bombed. Not from the North Vietnamese. They knew, too. The ones in the dark were the American people.

Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice deny that news about the North Korean program was withheld for political reasons. Bush needed time to study the matter, they insist. But he had plenty of time -- and some of that time Congress was engaged in the Iraq debate, playing the role of the oblivious board of directors. Bush is not that slow a learner. In fact, it was he -- remember? -- who included North Korea in his "axis of evil." What did he know then?

It would be one thing if this were an isolated example of the Bush administration either exaggerating threats -- the imminence of an Iraqi bomb, for instance -- or forgetting to mention one that already exists, such as the North Korean program. But this administration keeps one set of books for itself and another for the public and Congress. It's Enron on the Potomac.