Slate's Bizbox
chatterbox: Gossip, speculation, and scuttlebutt about politics.

Whopper of the Week: G.W. BushThe case of the "Mission Accomplished" banner.

By Timothy Noah
Posted Friday, Oct. 31, 2003, at 6:11 PM ET

"Q: Mr. President, if I may take you back to May 1st when you stood on the USS Lincoln under a huge banner that said, "Mission Accomplished." At that time you declared major combat operations [in Iraq] were over, but since that time there have been over 1,000 wounded, many of them amputees who are recovering at Walter Reed [Army Hospital], 217 killed in action since that date. Will you acknowledge now that you were premature in making those remarks?

"A: Nora, I think you ought to look at my speech. I said, Iraq is a dangerous place and we've still got hard work to do; there's still more to be done. And we had just come off a very successful military operation. I was there to thank the troops.

"The 'Mission Accomplished' sign, of course, was put up by the members of the USS Abraham Lincoln, saying that their mission was accomplished. I know it was attributed somehow to some ingenious advance man from my staff—they weren't that ingenious, by the way [italics Chatterbox's]."

—President Bush at his Oct. 28 press conference.

"It was the Navy, the people on board the ship who had the idea of this banner and made the suggestion, because they wanted to have a way to commemorate the fact that these sailors and the crew on board the ship had completed their mission, after a very lengthy deployment. … And they asked—they asked if we could help take care of the production of the banner. And we more than happy to do so [italics Chatterbox's]."

—Presidential spokesman Scott McClellan at his Oct. 29 press briefing.

Got a whopper? Send it to . To be considered, an entry must be an unambiguously false statement paired with an unambiguous refutation, and both must be derived from some appropriately reliable public source. Preference will be given to newspapers and other documents that Chatterbox can link to online.

Whopper Archive:
Oct. 17, 2003: Grady Little
Sept. 16, 2003: John Ashcroft
Sept. 5, 2003: Christy Whitman
Aug. 29, 2003: Donald Rumsfeld
Aug. 22, 2003: Arianna Huffington
Aug. 8, 2003: Howard Dean
July 25, 2003: Condoleezza Rice
July 18, 2003: President Bush
July 10, 2003: Donald Rumsfeld
June 27, 2003: Remembering Strom
June 20, 2003: Billy Bulger
May 30, 2003: Ari Fleischer
May 23, 2003: Donald Rumsfeld
May 19, 2003: Un-Whopper: Ari Fleischer Tells Truth!
May 2, 2003: Peggy Cooper Cafritz
April 17, 2003: Eason Jordan
March 7, 2003: John Kerry
Feb. 28, 2003: Ari Fleischer
Feb. 14, 2003: Bill O'Reilly
Feb. 7, 2003: Saddam Hussein
Jan. 31, 2003: Karl Rove
Jan. 23, 2003: Bill Frist
Jan. 17, 2003: Naji Sabri
Jan. 10, 2003: Rod Paige

(Click here to access the Whopper Archive for 2002 and here to access the Whopper Archive for 2001.)

Print This ArticlePRINTDiscuss this in The FrayDISCUSSEmail to a FriendE-MAIL
Share on FacebookPost to MySpace!Share with MixxDigg ThisShare with RedditShare with del.icio.usShare with FurlShare with Ma.gnolia.comShare with SphereShare with Stumble Upon
Timothy Noah is a senior writer at Slate.
E-mail Timothy Noah at .
Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum
What did you think of this article?
POST A MESSAGE | READ MESSAGES
Washington Post
The Washington Post
OPINIONS
Topic A: Obama's Speech
| Pundits and diplomats respond.
Robinson: Sunshine in BerlinToles: Obama the UniterTelnaes: Meanwhile, McCain
PLUS » Stumped: Bring Back Bill Clinton