Bush Forcefully Attacks Iraq Critics

President Bush strongly rebuked congressional critics of his Iraq war policy Friday, accusing them of being "deeply irresponsible" and sending the wrong signal both to America's enemy and to U.S. troops.

"The stakes in the global war on terror are too high, and the national interest is too important, for politicians to throw out false charges," Bush said in his most combative defense yet of his rationale for invading Iraq in March 2003.

Bush's charges brought a forceful response from senior Democrats in Congress, who accused the president of misleading the country about the justification for war. Sen. John Kerry D-Mass., who ran unsuccessfully against Bush last year, accused the president of playing "the politics of fear and smear."

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