Its almost become trite to criticize the President on his lack of clarity, lack of exit strategy and overall incompetence in performing his job. But its also important that we counter the various untruths coming from the white house. So here goes.

In a speech at the World Affairs Council this morning, Bush was asked how many Iraqi civilians have been killed as a result of the war. Bush replied confidently "about 30,000 more or less..." Probably a bit more. Everyone remembers the study released by The Lancet (british medical journal) last year which stated that 100,000 civilians had been killed mostly from airstrikes. The Lancet study.

This was widely held to be the first reliable study as it relied on U.S. and Iraqi public health experts. And this study was taken before the siege of Falluja, an attack which still holds an air of mysticism over the conduct and civlian casualities given that none of the major media organizations (except the "dreaded" Al-Jazeera) covered the siege from inside the city. In sum, the President continues to shun away from the facts on the ground in an attempt to drum up support for an immoral war.