The announcement yesterday by Rep. Pete Hoekstra and Sen. Rick Santorum that U.S. investigators had discovered more than 500 shells containing chemical weapons -- mustard and sarin gasses -- was greeted with collective sigh by most of the media. FoxNews.com ran a rather extensive story, but The Washington Post had only a brief stuck inside on A10, and The New York Times had nothing.

Yesterday's announcement really has little effect on the larger debate. Democrats will continue to argue that we've found nada-zippo-nil WMDs, and Republicans will continue to argue that WMDs weren't the sum total of why we invaded Iraq. I firmly believe that Iraq's post-1991 WMD program was transferred to Syria in the months leading up the the 2003 U.S. invasion.

What yesterday's announcement does tell us, however, is that a decade of U.N. inspectors were inadequate to the task of ridding Saddam Hussein's Iraq of banned weapons. It also shows us how little Saddam Hussein was interested in living up to his obligations which kept him in power at the end of the First Gulf War.

Both Santorum and Hoekstra have suggested there is much more that we've discovered since the Iraq Survey Group finished up its report two years ago. I wait anxiously to see how much more they release -- and whether or not the media bothers to tell the American people about it.

*UPDATE* For those questioning my WMDs-to-Syria assertion. Look here.