Study: False statements preceded war

[NoMoreDems-Reps]

Quote
(We need to hold our politicians to the highest standards end of debate!)

HA ha ha ha ha
And do pray tell, just who is going to do this?
Certainly not Congress, for they in their own right are as guilty of corruption as was the President and Vice President.

I was referring to us the voters! It's completely obvious that the congress
as well as most politicians are guilty of corruptions (Mostly REPS&DEMS)
but it is us (Not me, I don't vote for REPS or DEMS) who "ALLOW" these
known corrupt parties to hold office!

 

[Chanda]

Re: How to make an angry American

They voted to authorize the war. Explain how they are less culpable than Bush.

They weren't privy to the same information.

Told them based on the intelligence given to him by our intelligence gathering services. So is the CIA a bunch of liars too?

They were pressured. These interviews of CIA officers explain:

"At the time there were a lot of concerns that it (the "white paper") was being politicized by certain individuals within the administration that wanted to get that intelligence base that would justify going forward with the war.

"Some of the neocons that you refer to were determined to make sure that the intelligence was going to support the ultimate decision. Looking back on it now, as we put pieces together, it probably is apparent to some, including Paul, that it was much more politicized than in fact we realized. It wasn't a secret, though, at that time that there were certain people who were strong advocates of going to war, almost irrespective of what the intelligence was. ..."--John Brennan, Deputy Executive Director, CIA, 2001-2003

"Well, The Washington Post reported subsequent to all of this that in the late spring of 2002, the White House had called down a number of CIA professionals and told them that they wanted a document which could be used to convince the American people that the threat from Iraq was sufficiently serious that that should be our first priority. So beginning in April or May, the CIA started to put together such a document. ... That was what we got as the public version of their conditional, nuanced-with-dissent classified version."--Sen. Bob Graham, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence 2001-2003

FRONTLINE: the dark side: analysis: the october '02 national intelligence estimate | PBS

 

[CaptainCourtesy]

Allow me to be as clear as possible. This thread is a good example of 3 types of thinking:

1) Conservative partisan hacks that blame liberals for everything, refuse to think critically, and follow what their ideology says, regardless of how inaccurate it is or how narrow-minded it must be to believe it.

2) Liberal partisan hacks that blame conservatives for everything, refuse to think critically, and follow what their ideology says, regardless of how inaccurate it is or how narrow-minded it must be to believe it.

3) Liberals, conservatives, and all those in between, who think critically, examine situations rather than making knee-jerk reactions, do not base their positions on lock-step ideology, but on discerning evaluation, and refuse to play the mindless and pointless blame game at each and every opportunity.

It should be easy to pick out who here falls in each category. Heck, it is usually pretty easy to pick out which politicians fall into each category.

 

[Chanda]

Allow me to be as clear as possible. This thread is a good example of 3 types of thinking

There are 4 types. The fourth is based on naivety or an unawareness of Bush's history of deceit and corruption, and his family history of war profiteering.

 

[Sir Loin]

Re: How to make an angry American

Hummmmm, there is one thing you are forgetting and that is that bushs lies cost thousands of our Troops lives and the others didn't.

*****DING DING DING DING*****

We have our 1st “Bush Lied” poster who admits that someone before him was lying too. However inadvertent. Naturally all the “liars” implicated are not held accountable to the “lives lost” argument. Rather convenient that.

I 'hope' that is important to you.

Pluck your magic twanger for me Froggy. Hope springs eternal on the melodrama scale of zero.

And of course you do know that Saddam was said to have WMD but they were none found in 1998.

As for congress voting to invade Iraq they did that because of the "LIES" bush told them.

Yes, they did that because of the lies “Bush” told them, making all those democrats what? Brain dead Bush zombies? You mean to say that your elected leaders were not aware that it was all a lie when they voted? The Bush Pixie dust fogged their eyes?

What a group of morons you have put your faith in, and my how they let you down. You are not angry about this? Hey, it ain't their fault….these sheeple that represent you and the nation were “led” astray, but only by Bush and only Bush should answer for the “lies”.

I await the sophist story of victimization you have to offer. This should be quite complicated and convoluted. I await your “wisdom” Obi-Wan.

Cue the X-Files theme set to pipe organ.

 

[bhkad]

Why would Bush give the green light to try to bomb Saddam 2 days before the invasion?


This should stop some of the knee jerking reactionary postings.

 

[Hundebolg]

Re: How to make an angry American

*****DING DING DING DING*****

We have our 1st “Bush Lied” poster who admits that someone before him was lying too. However inadvertent. Naturally all the “liars” implicated are not held accountable to the “lives lost” argument. Rather convenient that.


Pluck your magic twanger for me Froggy. Hope springs eternal on the melodrama scale of zero.



Yes, they did that because of the lies “Bush” told them, making all those democrats what? Brain dead Bush zombies? You mean to say that your elected leaders were not aware that it was all a lie when they voted? The Bush Pixie dust fogged their eyes?

What a group of morons you have put your faith in, and my how they let you down. You are not angry about this? Hey, it ain't their fault….these sheeple that represent you and the nation were “led” astray, but only by Bush and only Bush should answer for the “lies”.

I await the sophist story of victimization you have to offer. This should be quite complicated and convoluted. I await your “wisdom” Obi-Wan.

Cue the X-Files theme set to pipe organ.

Indeed. While the Bush and Blair administrations created the lies, there was consistent and this time *real* evidence against their claims, like the UN assesments of the Iraqi situation. The liberal-fascist hawks including Hillary Clinton or "pulitzer prize" winner Thomas Friedman simply chose to ignored it and instead joined the drumbeat for the atrocious murder of over half a million innocent children. While Bush and Blair are the main culprits and should be tried for their war crimes, the liberal-fascist hawks should also be officially denounced as part of the warmonger camarilla and be ousted from decisionmaking and hatespeech in civilized democracies in all future.

 

[Hundebolg]

Why would Bush give the green light to try to bomb Saddam 2 days before the invasion?

Because of his lack of honor and lack of civilized western values.

 

[aquapub]

Allow me to be as clear as possible. This thread is a good example of 3 types of thinking:

1) Conservative partisan hacks that blame liberals for everything, refuse to think critically, and follow what their ideology says, regardless of how inaccurate it is or how narrow-minded it must be to believe it.

2) Liberal partisan hacks that blame conservatives for everything, refuse to think critically, and follow what their ideology says, regardless of how inaccurate it is or how narrow-minded it must be to believe it.

3) Liberals, conservatives, and all those in between, who think critically, examine situations rather than making knee-jerk reactions, do not base their positions on lock-step ideology, but on discerning evaluation, and refuse to play the mindless and pointless blame game at each and every opportunity.

It should be easy to pick out who here falls in each category. Heck, it is usually pretty easy to pick out which politicians fall into each category.

:boohoo:

Jesus, do you ever stop crying about people daring to deviate from your sheep-like lockstep centrism? God forbid anyone conclude anything that falls in favor of one side or another, or (gasp) often falls on one side or another.

Any such person must be wrong and deserving of constant smears. :notlook:

I'm going to start a thread on this in the section it belongs in: Media Bias.

 

[Donc]

:boohoo:

Jesus, do you ever stop crying about people daring to deviate from your sheep-like lockstep centrism? God forbid anyone conclude anything that falls in favor of one side or another, or (gasp) often falls on one side or another.

Any such person must be wrong and deserving of constant smears. :notlook:

I'm going to start a thread on this in the section it belongs in: Media Bias.

A troll for a troll?

 

[dixon76710]

Re: How to make an angry American

Quote:
Originally Posted by RightOfCenter
They voted to authorize the war. Explain how they are less culpable than Bush.

They weren't privy to the same information.

In the fall of 2002, as Congress debated waging war in Iraq, copies of a 92-page assessment of Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction sat in two vaults on Capitol Hill, each protected by armed security guards and available to any member who showed up in person, without staff.

But only a few ever did. No more than six senators and a handful of House members read beyond the five-page National Intelligence Estimate executive summary
washingtonpost.com: Congressional Oversight of Intelligence Criticized

As well, I suspect the information that Congress was not privy to only further supported the case for war.

 

[RightinNYC]

Okay, I can understand your hesitation here, but can you provide us with which assertions were actually TRUE?

Plenty of the other reasons cited for the war are still true. Saddam was still a bellicose dictator who killed his own people, shot at US planes, defied UN orders, and had full intentions of resuming WMD programs as soon as it would be viable to do so.

 

[RightinNYC]

:boohoo:

Jesus, do you ever stop crying about people daring to deviate from your sheep-like lockstep centrism? God forbid anyone conclude anything that falls in favor of one side or another, or (gasp) often falls on one side or another.

Any such person must be wrong and deserving of constant smears. :notlook:

I'm going to start a thread on this in the section it belongs in: Media Bias.

He's not criticizing partisanship, he's criticizing idiocy. There are plenty of people who are very strong partisans in both directions who are intelligent enough to look at things analytically.

 

[Sergeant Stinger1]

Re: How to make an angry American

They voted to authorize the war. Explain how they are less culpable than Bush.
---
How many times do I have to say this???
:liar2Bush :yes:*****LIED***** to Congress and thats why they voted for bush to invade Iraq!


Told them based on the intelligence given to him by our intelligence gathering services. So is the CIA a bunch of liars too?

---
Who ever gave the faulty information are liars too because as bushs hand picked commish stated there were NOT any WMDs and Saddam-Iraq were NOT an IMMENENT THREAT!
Theres no excuse from any branch of Gov. and no excuse for bush either to have 4,000 of our Troops killed on a LIE!!!

 

[DeeJayH]

Interrogator: Invasion Surprised Saddam, Tells 60 Minutes Former Dictator Bragged About Eluding Capture - CBS News
(CBS) Saddam Hussein initially didn't think the U.S. would invade Iraq to destroy weapons of mass destruction, so he kept the fact that he had none a secret to prevent an Iranian invasion he believed could happen. The Iraqi dictator revealed this thinking to George Piro, the FBI agent assigned to interrogate him after his capture.

Saddam still wouldn't admit he had no weapons of mass destruction, even when it was obvious there would be military action against him because of the perception he did. Because, says Piro, "For him, it was critical that he was seen as still the strong, defiant Saddam. He thought that [faking having the weapons] would prevent the Iranians from reinvading Iraq," he tells Pelley.

kind of counters the BS accusation of alleged LIES as opposed to incorrect statements that later proved to be false

 

[CaptainCourtesy]

:boohoo:

Jesus, do you ever stop crying about people daring to deviate from your sheep-like lockstep centrism? God forbid anyone conclude anything that falls in favor of one side or another, or (gasp) often falls on one side or another.

Any such person must be wrong and deserving of constant smears. :notlook:

I'm going to start a thread on this in the section it belongs in: Media Bias.

Read #3, aqua and then show how I only focused on centrism. But since you are unable to get yourself out of your myopic, blinder-like positions, I'm certain you refused to read that. I discussed critical thinking, there, but you got annoyed. Hmmm...interesting. You saw #1, immediately got defensive, and attacked rather than addressing the post on it's content.

Oh, and stop following me around the forum, attacking my posts. :laughat::neutral:

 

[CaptainCourtesy]

He's not criticizing partisanship, he's criticizing idiocy. There are plenty of people who are very strong partisans in both directions who are intelligent enough to look at things analytically.

Thank you. I'm glad to see someone got what I was saying. Liberal, conservative, or in between, critical thinking is key.

 

[Bergslagstroll]

kind of counters the BS accusation of alleged LIES as opposed to incorrect statements that later proved to be false

A important fact that should have come up in the debate preceding the war. That Iraq was military very weak and convincing Iran that Iraq had wmd was one of few option to prevent from attacking. Something that should have been obvius to everyone. But instead could Bush dominate the debate with his talk about Iraq as a great and iminenent threat. Even if the weapon inspector didn't found no wmd.

Basicly Bush disrepected you Americans. That after 9/11 both the American people and the media joined behind your president and the democrats realise the importance of bi partisan. But instead of accepting the great responsibility that comes with that situation and the need for united action. Your president instead decided to push the agenda for war against Iraq instead on very shaky basis. How badly the Bush propaganda and exploit of 9/11 collided with reality can be seen from the fact that USA had almost no allies in the war. That yes some foreign goverments joined the war but with few actually soldiers and in almost all those countries a large majority was against the war.

 

[bhkad]

If not a liar, incompetent, which is worse?

Try, "neither."

PBS FRONTLINE: THE DARK SIDE

INTERVIEW WITH DICK CLARKE

Tell me the story about the post-Gulf War discovery and the vice president --

During the course of the first Gulf War, one of the things I did at the request of the secretary of state [James Baker] was to plan for what became the U.N. Special Commission that would go into Iraq after the war and look for weapons of mass destruction. In the first few months of that commission, it was filled with American and British special forces and intelligence officers dressed up in civilian clothes and carrying the U.N. flag.

One of the early operations we planned was a raid on what was the Agricultural Ministry but we had reason to believe was actually something else. And it was a surprise. We went there, broke down doors, blew off locks, got into the sanctum sanctorum. The Iraqis immediately reacted, surrounded the facility and prevented the U.N. inspectors from getting out.

We thought that might happen, too, so we had given them satellite telephones. They translated the nuclear reports on site into English from the Arabic and read them to us over the satellite telephones. My secretary stayed up all night transcribing these reports from Baghdad. What they said, very clearly, was there was a massive nuclear weapons development program that was probably nine to 18 months away from having its first nuclear weapons detonation and that CIA had totally missed it; we had bombed everything we could bomb in Iraq, but missed an enormous nuclear weapons development facility. Didn't know it was there; never dropped one bomb on it.

We prepared this report so that when the secretary of defense [Cheney] and the secretary of state arrived in the morning, it was on their desk. I know that Dick Cheney that morning looked at that report and said, "Here's what the Iraqis themselves are saying: that there's this huge facility that was never hit during the war; that they were very close to making a nuclear bomb, and CIA didn't know it." I'm sure he said to himself, "I can never trust CIA again to tell me when a country is about to make a nuclear bomb."

So he's probably carrying that bone in his throat for eight years out of government.

There's no doubt that the Dick Cheney who comes back into office nine years later has that as one of the things burnt into his memory: that Iraq wants a nuclear weapon; Iraq was that close to getting a nuclear weapon; and CIA hadn't a clue.

FRONTLINE: the dark side: interviews: richard clarke | PBS

 

[bhkad]

Just a question to the people who say Bush intentionally lied about the WMD's:

Are you really of this opinion, or are you arguing the point because you just want to argue?

 

[Chanda]

"I know that Dick Cheney that morning looked at that report and said, "Here's what the Iraqis themselves are saying: that there's this huge facility that was never hit during the war; that they were very close to making a nuclear bomb, and CIA didn't know it." I'm sure he said to himself, "I can never trust CIA again to tell me when a country is about to make a nuclear bomb."

What's your point? That the administration is justified in bombing every country that wants a nuclear bomb? If Cheney didn't trust the CIA, there were IAEA and UN inspections in Iraq, and those worked.

Here is a more significant portion of Richard Clarke's interview:

"I think we knew prior to 9/11 that there was serious interest in having something happen with Iraq. People would joke around the water cooler in the West Wing Situation Room, that "We're flying all these planes over Iraq every day, blowing up their radar sites. Maybe ... they'll shoot one down, and that will give us the provocation we need to do war."

"Beginning on the night of 9/11, we have the secretary of defense and others talking about going to war with Iraq. I think we knew pretty much that week that the probability of finding a justification for going to war with Iraq was high on their agenda.

Well, the president wandered into the Situation Room, totally unscheduled, just to say, "Hi. Keep it up! Good work!"-- raise everybody's morale. [He] saw me and dragged me and a few others into the conference room and started talking about Iraq, and having me go through all the evidence that we had piled up from the weeks and months before to see if there was a connection between what had happened on 9/11 and Iraq.

And he said: "Saddam! Saddam! See if there's a connection to Saddam!" And this wasn't "See if there's a connection with Iran, and while you're at it, do Iraq, and while you're at it, do the Palestinian Islamic group." It wasn't "Do due diligence." It wasn't "Have an exhaustive review." It was "Saddam, Saddam." I read that pretty clearly, that that was the answer he wanted.

I said to him, "We have already done that research prior to the attack" -- in fact, we'd done it a couple of times -- "and there's nothing there." And the facial expression back was, "That wasn't the right answer."

 

[bhkad]

What's your point? That the administration is justified in bombing every country that wants a nuclear bomb? If Cheney didn't trust the CIA, there were IAEA and UN inspections in Iraq, and those worked.

Here is a more significant portion of Richard Clarke's interview:

"I think we knew prior to 9/11 that there was serious interest in having something happen with Iraq. People would joke around the water cooler in the West Wing Situation Room, that "We're flying all these planes over Iraq every day, blowing up their radar sites. Maybe ... they'll shoot one down, and that will give us the provocation we need to do war."

"Beginning on the night of 9/11, we have the secretary of defense and others talking about going to war with Iraq. I think we knew pretty much that week that the probability of finding a justification for going to war with Iraq was high on their agenda.

Well, the president wandered into the Situation Room, totally unscheduled, just to say, "Hi. Keep it up! Good work!"-- raise everybody's morale. [He] saw me and dragged me and a few others into the conference room and started talking about Iraq, and having me go through all the evidence that we had piled up from the weeks and months before to see if there was a connection between what had happened on 9/11 and Iraq.

And he said: "Saddam! Saddam! See if there's a connection to Saddam!" And this wasn't "See if there's a connection with Iran, and while you're at it, do Iraq, and while you're at it, do the Palestinian Islamic group." It wasn't "Do due diligence." It wasn't "Have an exhaustive review." It was "Saddam, Saddam." I read that pretty clearly, that that was the answer he wanted.

I said to him, "We have already done that research prior to the attack" -- in fact, we'd done it a couple of times -- "and there's nothing there." And the facial expression back was, "That wasn't the right answer."

What I am telling you (and this must be the 20th time I have said it and it still comes as news to those who aren't paying attention) is that the Israelis have a right to live free from existential threats from their mortal enemies who have tried to destroy them in the past.

When the WMD's could not be 100% denied efforts were taken to gain that assurance but Saddam resisted the inspections repeatedly and acted as if he was hiding WMD's. When you look at the risk that represented you would have to choose to be cautious.

And then there's this little matter of Iraq regime change being a matter of official US policy.


tBlog - The Viceroy's Fuguestate

Yesterday, Clinton signed into law HR 4655, the "Iraq Liberation Act of 1998."

In a presidential statement, issued by the White House,
Clinton said:

"This Act makes clear that it is the sense of the Congress
that the United States should support those elements of the Iraqi
opposition that advocate a very different future for Iraq than the
bitter reality of internal repression and external aggression that the
current regime in Baghdad now offers. . . . . . . My Administration, as required by that statue, has also begun to implement a program to compile
information regarding allegations of genocide, crimes against humanity,
and war crimes by Iraq's current leaders as a step towards bringing to
justice those directly responsible for such acts."​

[...]

The president of the INC's Executive Council welcomed Clinton's
signature of the Iraq Liberation Act, in an Oct 31 statement that began
by condemning Saddam's suspension of UNSCOM monitoring, while hailing
the president's signing of the legislation and thanking the US Congress.

The statement concluded:

"Saddam is the problem and he cannot be part of any solution in Iraq. Therefore, President Clinton's action today is the most appropriate response to Saddam. Let him know that Iraqis will rise up to liberate themselves from his totalitarian dictatorship and that the US is ready to help their democratic forces with arms to do so.

Only then will the trail of tragedy in Iraq end. Only then will Iraq be
free of weapons of mass destruction."​

Clinton Signs Iraq Liberation Act

He was involved in terrorism (and PLEASE don't tell me I have to school you on THAT TOO!), economic scandal, Human Rights abuses and threatening his neighbors with WMD's.

That they did not exist does not matter just as a bank robber can be charged with armed robbery by only holding a hair comb in his pocket but making the teller believe it's a hand gun.

Yes, they wanted him gone and for several good reasons. Yes, the threat was real enough to make Israel nervous. Yes, he gave them reason to get him gone. Yes, the whole world believed he had WMD's.

Too bad for him.

And too bad that you can't figure this out after 4+ years.

 

[Chanda]

Yes, the whole world believed he had WMD's.

Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice didn't believe it:

Colin Powell, February 2001: "[Saddam] has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbors. So in effect, our policies have strengthened the security of the neighbors of Iraq."

Condoleeza Rice, July 2001: "We are able to keep his arms from him. His military forces have not been rebuilt."

[you tube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0wbpKCdkkQ[/you tube]

 

[Billo_Really]

What I am telling you (and this must be the 20th time I have said it and it still comes as news to those who aren't paying attention) is that the Israelis have a right to live free from existential threats from their mortal enemies who have tried to destroy them in the past.

When the WMD's could not be 100% denied efforts were taken to gain that assurance but Saddam resisted the inspections repeatedly and acted as if he was hiding WMD's. When you look at the risk that represented you would have to choose to be cautious.

And then there's this little matter of Iraq regime change being a matter of official US policy.


tBlog - The Viceroy's Fuguestate



Clinton Signs Iraq Liberation Act

He was involved in terrorism (and PLEASE don't tell me I have to school you on THAT TOO!), economic scandal, Human Rights abuses and threatening his neighbors with WMD's.

That they did not exist does not matter just as a bank robber can be charged with armed robbery by only holding a hair comb in his pocket but making the teller believe it's a hand gun.

Yes, they wanted him gone and for several good reasons. Yes, the threat was real enough to make Israel nervous. Yes, he gave them reason to get him gone. Yes, the whole world believed he had WMD's.

Too bad for him.

And too bad that you can't figure this out after 4+ years.

Do you ever get tired of being wrong?

 

[Thorgasm]

For all of you people who are whining about the buck stopping on Bush's desk, why not try upholding the Constitution. It is Congress's duty to declare war, not the President's. Thanks Gulf of Tonkin.

You wanted your guy to have that power, but you don't want him to have the responsibility. It's shameful and hypocritical.