Timber
Based upon that war itself can be classified as a WMD which it no doubt is. However, not by the present definition.
Political semantics used in rhetoric to fool some of the people all of the time or all of the people some of the time.
I find it very hard to believe how the definition of WMD is changing with the realization that there are none in Iraq, or none found yet. I suppose I'm guilty of assuming everyone had the same vision I had during that time before the attack on Iraq. They were visions of Saddam with his finger on the little red switch, grinning gleefully as he destroys large numbers of innocent people. This is the way I heard the warnings from the White House.....doom was certain if we didn't act quickly. We didn't have the time to wait until our allies agreed with us. I find it very hard to believe that Bush would have gotten the support he did from the Congress and the American people if they had not believed that what was meant by WMD meant exactly what we were encouraged to believe it meant. Quibbling aside, this administration was either horribly misinformed (which I doubt) or they lied in order to go right on, impulsively risking the lives of innocent people. In fact it's this administration's responsibility that so many innocent people have been killed. It was really George Bush with his little finger on the switch, all itchy to pull the trigger. Remember that smirk he got during the debates before the 2000 election when he talked about capital punishment? Disgusting that he is trying to cover it up now. unbelievable....
The truth and this administration are strangers. Someone should for the sake of all of us introduce them to each other.
The very people who crucify Clinton for changing the definition of sexual relations now use the same technique for WMD's.
Difference being in Clinton's case we have a stained dress...in GWB's case a devastated country, dead people all over the place and a total loss of respect for our country globally.
But I'm sure Bill has had another blowjob since then, and I'm also sure GWB will start a third war if he gets a chance.
Genocide and war=All American, Red White and Blue patriotism.
Blowjob= Satanic erosion of all America stands for.
Any questions?
very good, Bear.......and IMO absolutely on target.
No one in The Current Administration is "changing the definition of WMD". Asserting that such is the case is itself a Weapon of Mass Distraction.
1) Saddam had and used WMD
2) Saddam was required to provide proof he had complied with International Mandate to divest himself of WMD and associated capabilities.
3) He failed to do so, whether by design or any other reason.
Where's the problem? I submit the greatest failing of The Current Administration in the matter was that it allowed itself to be swept along with popular misperception and misdirection. The issue was never that Saddam was hiding WMD, the issue was, and remains, that Saddam defied the obligation placed on and accepted by him to provide verification he had properly disposed of known, catlogued, and as yet unsatisfactorily accounted for, WMD materiel and associated developmental and production capability.
I submit the lying, obfuscation, misdirection, and trumping-up-of-charges comes not from The Current Administration, but from its critics. The Current Administration is guilty of letting itself play the game by rules made up by others as the game progressed. That disingenuousness and lack of determined focus on the part of The Current Administration was incredibly stupid. I have no reservation they did the right thing, but I take strong exception to their having done the right thing for the wrong reasons.
Much the same sort of sophistry and subversion of fact exists in the popular myth that the impeachment of Clinton revolved around his affair with Lewinsky. The conviction and sanctions levied against him specifically address his having been proven to have lied under oath in the matter of Jones vs. Clinton. The text of the lie, the personages or events comprising the circumstance of the lie, nor any other aspect of the lie, simply are not germaine. The issue was that a lie, irrespective concerning what or whom, uncontestably was issued while under oath, a simple fact now clouded irretrievably by spin.
The trumping in both instances is that of spin over reality. Perception really is everything, in the mind of the public.
timberlandko wrote: I submit the lying, obfuscation, misdirection, and trumping-up-of-charges comes not from The Current Administration, but from its critics.
Nah, Timber.
Bush is a liar -- and this entire fiasco has been lie piled on lie right from the beginning.
I know you are a conservative -- and I recognize that you might want to defend this pathetic administration with all the ammo in your arsenal, but don't go overboard.
He is a liar. His advisors were liars.
This thing has been a fiasco -- and will continue to be a fiasco until this group is thrown out of office.
timber, It's not so easy to skirt around the claims that this administration used about WMD's and their locations. Did they just disappear? Come on, get real!
timber, If you're buying this administration's justifications for going to war with Iraq, why are they now talking about "terrorism' and the "Iraqi People?"
What is real is that this administration may well have acted in good faith, based on available evidence and on apparently corroborative though erroneous information supplied to them by supposedly trusted, or at least credible, third parties, which disinformation may have been provided with malicious intent and which was not accorded sufficient scrutiny. I do not say that IS the case, I posit that it MAY be the case. I rather suspect that in fact it indeed is the case, and I expect near-term developments indicative of such. I posit that The Current Administration BELIEVED, and acted on, invalid information. They did not lie; they were merely wrong in the assumptions from which they proceeded. That in itself calls to question their competence.
On such a vast scale, from every possible quarter - right. I have a 12, 15 and 18 year old. I don't accept this from them either. What happened to accountablility?
Doubt grows over prewar intelligence
Upcoming Kay report is already stoking skepticism of prewar claims, which are under fire in Congress.
By Peter Grier | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
WASHINGTON – Some seven months after the US invaded Iraq, criticism of the intelligence used to justify that attack is only intensifying. House Intelligence Committee members recently wrote to the director of central intelligence, George Tenet, complaining of "inadequate information" to back administration claims of Iraqi ties to Al Qaeda, and possession of weapons of mass destruction
You can't fool our congress they are sharp as a dull butter knife.
http://csmonitor.com/2003/0930/p01s01-usfp.html
Yes, this administration used bad information to start the war that eventually killed about 7,000 Iraqis. They did not confirm first hand the information they received from exiles from Iraq. Any court of law will question using that kind of information as a legal defense. Hearsay is not enough to justify the killing of innocent people.
It is if you are bound to go to war anyway.
If there were any possibility of being wrong, they had the responsibility to make sure it was confirmed by our own intelligence. Saying they "believed" is insufficient to start a preemptive war. They must "know" without doubt.
After all, they know where they are hidden. If we could only get Blix out of the way..........
It does appear to me more that they were duped, not that they were duplicitous. While perhaps absolved thereby of one failing, they would be appropriately subject to approbation and sanction for the other. Sorta outta the frying pan into the fire, I would think, and if my suspicions prove out, I'll be quite happy to stoke the fire. One way or another, heads should roll over this. I suspect some will, but I am under no delusion that the proper ones will get the axe. We're gonna see lots of "Plausible Deniability", I imagine. Oddly enough, the situation as it appears to be developing affords The Current Administration significant opportunity to bolster its position in The Public Mind. If "The Handlers" are as ruthless, self-serving, wiley and cagey as they are by some alleged to be, that is just about a given.
Quote:It does appear to me more that they were duped, not that they were duplicitous
Who was duped, who was duplicitous. I say the administration was duplicitous and the congress was duped, as were many of the American people.
Timber,
Saddam may or may not have had WMD; no one has provided definitive proof either way. Bush made it seem, however, that Saddam not only HAD them, but that he was poised to use them against us in the immediate future. This was Bush's justification for pre-emptive invasion. We invaded Iraq on the basis of what we THOUGHT we knew about Saddam's arsenal.
What about what we DEFINITELY know about North Korea ? That it positively has nuclear weapons. That it absolutely has the capability to target and reach the west coast with those weapons.
What about what we DEFINITELY know about Saudi Arabia ? That it harbors and finances terrorist organizations. That all the 911 participants were almost all Saudis.
Why no pre-emptive strikes in those cases ?
I believe we invaded Iraq because we could. (Saddam was the perfect villain.) And because it was and always had been part of the Cheney-Rumsfeld agenda, perhaps to "send a message", perhaps for oil, perhaps for flag-waving political benefits.
I am a proud American, I love my country, I support using our troops in defense of our country, but .... this invasion was not about defending anything, except perhaps W's political a ss.
It took a long time for the truth about Vietnam to come out. I hope we can get at the truth much sooner in this case.
