A constant source of bitter laughs for anyone not suffering Bush Derangement Syndrome is the incessant claim that Bush lied us into the Iraq war.

In fact, “Bush Lied” is one of the grand political lies of our times, cooked up as CYA by Democrats who voted for the war, a large, cowardly cohort.

This lie is so easily disproved you’d think smart folks would give it up. But no, Democrats make hay playing on the ignorance of the American voter. Once again — after the Duelfer Report, the Senate Intelligence Committee Report and the Robb-Silverman Report — Senate Democrats issued another report looking to see whether Bush cherry-picked, exaggerated blah blah blah.

The latest comes from Sen. Jay Rockefeller, who wrote the infamous, shameful memo laying out a Democrat strategy to milk the war on terror for political gain.  (These are the same folks who whine that Bush politicized the war on terror.)

Sen. Rockefeller also makes an appearance here:

A normal person would be so humiliated, he’d let the matter drop. But no…

“…in making the case for war, the administration repeatedly presented intelligence as fact when it was unsubstantiated, contradicted or even nonexistent,” he said.

There’s no question that the administration, and particularly Vice President Cheney, spoke with too much certainty at times and failed to anticipate or prepare the American people for the enormous undertaking in Iraq.

But dive into Rockefeller’s report, in search of where exactly President Bush lied about what his intelligence agencies were telling him about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein, and you may be surprised by what you find.

On Iraq’s nuclear weapons program? The president’s statements “were generally substantiated by intelligence community estimates.”

On biological weapons, production capability and those infamous mobile laboratories? The president’s statements “were substantiated by intelligence information.”

On chemical weapons, then? “Substantiated by intelligence information.”

On weapons of mass destruction overall (a separate section of the intelligence committee report)? “Generally substantiated by intelligence information.” Delivery vehicles such as ballistic missiles? “Generally substantiated by available intelligence.” Unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to deliver WMDs? “Generally substantiated by intelligence information.”

As you read through the report, you begin to think maybe you’ve mistakenly picked up the minority dissent. But, no, this is the Rockefeller indictment. So, you think, the smoking gun must appear in the section on Bush’s claims about Saddam Hussein’s alleged ties to terrorism.

Yes, and if you read Douglas Feith’s book, War and Decision, you understand how incompetent and impertinent the CIA was/is. For example, in 2002 Iraqi Kurds had captured terrorists with purported links to Al Qaeda. When a New Yorker writer visited the Kurds, they begged him to get someone from the US government to come interview their prisoners. Y’know, like have the CIA come do its job.

When their lack of follow-through came up in an interagency meeting, the CIA got huffy about it. Beyond that, Feith’s book sheds light on the difficult process of assessing risk. When AQ demonstrated they could fly airplanes into New York City, Saddam suddenly didn’t seem so remote. Far from there being a rush to war, the process was deliberate and often contentious. In short, the cartoonish figures concocted by the left were actually intelligent men and women, doing their best to serve their nation.

Rockefeller’s report came out last week and didn’t seem to make much of a stir. Maybe more will come. But probably few eyebrows will be raised because the Big Lie — “Bush lied” — has already become accepted as truth.