This comes from Bob Fertik, our friend at Democrats.com. Seems the media jumped on a story about terrorists coming into the US on student visas. This is expected to be something Bush focuses on in his misState of the Union message and is the latest attempt by Bush to boost his sagging popularity (now finally dipping below Nixon's lowest low) using fear. There are two problems with this. First, people aren't turning to him and trusting him when he whips up the fear machine. They actually realize that if they are still afraid, it shows he has failed. But more importantly, it seems the whole story is based on one single document that has been unsubstantiated. This is reminiscent of the use of false intelligence reports to claim that Iraq was getting enriched uranium from Africa which was used as a (false) excuse to justify invasion. That was also unsubstantiated rumor.

So here, in Bob Fertik's words, is the scoop:

The incomparable Joseph Cannon has once again scooped the media by discovering the Big Lie that will be the centerpiece of Bush's SOTU: the fictional tale of an Al-Zarqawi plot (under direct written orders from Bin Laden and Al-Zawahiri) to send 19 terrorists into the U.S using student visas.

After reviewing the three published versions of this story [see Fertik's diary for his review of each version], it's perfectly clear there are no credible facts - no independently verified documents, no identified witnesses, and no suspects. The whole story hinges on a single document, which was not seen by any of the reporters and probably does not exist.

Doesn't anyone in the Corporate Media remember the utterly bogus Niger forgery (created by Michael Ledeen and his Italian intelligence cronies) that helped launch the war - and led to the Wilson-Plame scandal that put Scooter Libby on trial?

...

Also note the vague references to "suspects" in all the reports. Were any "suspects" captured or even identified? Of course not - they never existed.

This Big Lie first appeared as an "exclusive" on ABC News, the rightwing propaganda network that produced the bogus 9/11 documentary that used completely fictionalized scenes to blame Bill Clinton for everything and George Bush for nothing. ABC's "reporter" is Pierre Thomas, a name I've never encountered in any credible reporting on intelligence.

It was then "confirmed" by the New York Sun, a rightwing newspaper run by rich neocons, under the byline of Eli Lake, another new name in "credible" intelligence reporting.

The story got a third boost from Reuters, a propaganda arm of Tony Blair's lying government, which has also been caught lately publishing lies.

And it got a fourth boost from Rupert Murdoch's leading propaganda organ, Fox News.

And CBS News bought the story as well.

Mysteriously, none of the nation's leading newspapers reported the story - not the New York Times, the Washington Post, or the Los Angeles Times. But the Washington Post performed its propaganda duty by running an op ed by Liz Cheney attacking leading Democrats citing the threat from al-Zarqawi and al-Zawahiri. A coincidence? Hardly.

This whole "plot" is just a fantasy - like all the other terrorist plots "uncovered" by the Busheviks, from Jose Padilla's dirty bomb "plot" to the Miami losers' "plot" to bomb the Sears Tower. (I'll leave it for other bloggers to document all the bogus plot atrocities since 9/11.)

Here is my challenge: if this isn't a Big Lie, then Bush or ABC or the Sun or Reuters should put the original documents on the Internet for everyone to read and get top intelligence officials to make unqualified, unambiguous statements under oath and penalty of perjury before the Senate or House Intelligence Committees.

Personally I bet there is no document, and I also bet there is no intelligence official who would testify under oath about it.

Here's the ultimate proof: if this story was real, it would have been vetted by the 16 intelligence agencies and included in a National Intelligence Estimate. But the administration just welched on its promise to produce a NIE on Iraq because the 16 agencies refused to endorse this bullshit story concocted by Karl Rove just in time for the State of the Union.

Care to write and call the media and ask them why they are spreading unsubstantiated rumors as truth?