In Sunday's Washington Post, former Senator John Edwards joined some of his fellow Democrats in coming out and "admitting" that he was wrong to vote in favor of the Iraq war resolution.

I was wrong.

Almost three years ago we went into Iraq to remove what we were told -- and what many of us believed and argued -- was a threat to America. But in fact we now know that Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction when our forces invaded Iraq in 2003. The intelligence was deeply flawed and, in some cases, manipulated to fit a political agenda.

It was a mistake to vote for this war in 2002. I take responsibility for that mistake. It has been hard to say these words because those who didn't make a mistake -- the men and women of our armed forces and their families -- have performed heroically and paid a dear price.

The world desperately needs moral leadership from America, and the foundation for moral leadership is telling the truth.

While we can't change the past, we need to accept responsibility, because a key part of restoring America's moral leadership is acknowledging when we've made mistakes or been proven wrong -- and showing that we have the creativity and guts to make it right.

The argument for going to war with Iraq was based on intelligence that we now know was inaccurate. The information the American people were hearing from the president -- and that I was being given by our intelligence community -- wasn't the whole story. Had I known this at the time, I never would have voted for this war.

This is being portrayed by many on the left as a courageous move on Edwards' part. But it is the exact opposite of courage. It is cheap, meaningless, and cowardly. It is part of the Democrats' larger effort to discredit the war effort for political gain.

All human knowledge is imperfect. Leaders must make decisions based on the information they have available at the time the decision is made. There's nothing cheaper or easier than looking back with 20/20 hindsight and saying "if I had known then what I know now, I'd have done things differently." And since Edwards current position is aligned with the anti-war views of the Democratic party base, the flip-flop costs him nothing. There's nothing courageous about being for a war when it's politically popular, then switching to the other side when things get tough.

Edwards can't even manage to be consistent within one editorial. He argues for more troops and fewer troops in the same article. On that score too, he's trying to have it both ways. It's "I voted for the $87 billion, before I voted against it" all over again.

Remember, the rationale for the war was not simply a belief that we would find warehouses full of stockpiled WMD in Iraq. Re-read the Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq.

In Iraq, the United States removed a brutal dictator who was a state sponsor of terrorism and continued to pursue weapons of mass destruction. Given the knowledge available to the president at the time, the decision to depose Saddam Hussein and liberate Iraq was the right one. Those who supported that decision have absolutely nothing to apologize for.

Update: Michelle Malkin has an excerpt of a speech President Bush is to give this evening, reiterating his remarks from Friday's Veterans Day speech. An excerpt of the excerpt:

Some of our elected leaders have opposed this war all along. I disagree with them, but I respect their willingness to take a consistent stand. Yet some Democrats who voted to authorize the use of force are now rewriting the past. They are playing politics with this issue and sending mixed signals to our troops and the enemy. That is irresponsible.

Exactly.