Oops. Innacurate U.S. report on terrorism was 'big mistake', Powell says.

 

I guess it sucks when people actually bother to check the numbers you put out in a report, especially when that report is the basis for administration claims that we are winning the war on terror.

 

Excerpts:

 

The April report said attacks had declined last year to 190, down from 198 in 2002 and 346 in 2001. The 2003 figure would have been the lowest level in 34 years and a 45% drop since 2001, Bush's first year as president.

 

"It's a very big mistake. And we are not happy about this big mistake," [Powell] added.

 

The department has said that one of the mistakes was that only part of 2003 was taken into account.

 

When the annual report was issued April 29, senior administration officials used it as evidence the war was being won under Bush.

 

"We weren't saying terrorism has gone away. The report clearly says terrorism is a main problem facing the world today. We've got to continue going after terrorists," Powell said.

 

"But based on the data we had within the report, there was a suggestion that the number of incidents had dropped and it was the lowest since 1969," he added. "That turns out not to have been correct. We were wrong. We will correct it."

That's one way to fight those terrorist statiticians. Buy hey, it was an honest mistake by our government.