This editorial was originally published by the Houston Chronicle and was distributed by The Associated Press.

The winds of war, and the manpower and machines to unleash them, are gathering rapidly around Venezuela.

In January 2003, the Houston Chronicle Editorial Board published those very words with one small difference. The sentence ended with “Persian Gulf.”

At the time, the Chronicle was warning against the looming invasion of Iraq.

“President [George W.] Bush, evidently on the verge of launching an attack on Iraq, has a moral responsibility to make a strong case for that path, a task he has not yet accomplished,” the Chronicle wrote. “Debatable on its face, the case that a pre-emptive strike will make us safer in the long run simply has not been made.”

It was a tough call for a p

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