I Hate Dialysis Message Board
Off-Topic => Off-Topic: Talk about anything you want. => Topic started by: Bill Peckham on March 16, 2008, 09:04:39 PM
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I know we've talked about this from one angle or another but it's worth another thread. Personally I am not particularly comfortable talking about the Iraq war with people. But people's lives are at stake - nearly Four Thousand soldiers have lost their lives in combat in Iraq (not counting accidents and contractors) so the issue is as important as ever. Even if if it makes us uncomfortable I think we have to talk about it; we owe a little bit of discomfort (and plenty more) to the guys and gals in the service fighting on our behalf. We may never agree but I appreciate Bigsky for a willingness to talk about it, to say what they're thinking.
Of course I live in Seattle so the chances are that if I have a random conversation on the street (like the one today), I'll be the least liberal person in the conversation. However, I run in some suit and tie circles where the perspective is more likely to support the President, so I've heard thoughtful analysis from both sides of the issue. Here is a blog post from Mathew Yglesias at the Atlantic, this says what I am thinking http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/03/a_failure_of_strategy.php:
Ilan Goldenberg's right to be troubled [http://www.democracyarsenal.org/2008/03/its-not-the-exe.html] by this New York Times retrospective on Iraq [http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/16/opinion/16intro.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin]. There are some good pieces in here, but it's striking that they're all focuses on the execution of the war and none treat the strategic issue of Iraq.
But Iraq has been, first and foremost, a strategic miscalculation based on a disastrously wrongheaded conception of the strategic challenge revealed on 9/11/01. The United States had a chance to implement a focused, disciplined effort to go after al-Qaeda and remove the threat but instead George W. Bush, aided and abetted by a wide swathe of elites, chose to go in for a broad-brush vision of a "war on terror" whose centerpiece would be the invasion and occupation of a country that had nothing to do with 9/11 and no meaningful relationship with al-Qaeda. The costs of that decision have been enormous, not just in terms of the tragedy that's played out for American soldiers and Iraqis of all stripes, but in terms of the opportunity cost of totally reorienting America's foreign policy and defense priorities away from useful things and toward Iraq instead.
Today, America faces not just political choices about the future of our Iraq policy, but also choices about whether future policy in other areas will continue to be guided by the strategic vision that led us into Iraq, or whether we'll return to something sounder. To just take the invasion for granted and argue about the handling of the occupation obscures much more than it reveals. Warren Strobel for McClatchy does a much better job of highlighting the big picture [http://www.mcclatchydc.com/227/story/30413.html].
We need to take a fresh look at the situation and really consider what is in the best interest of the United States. We'll have an election here in the US in just 7 months and the difference between the two parties on this issue - What to do in/about Iraq? - could not be more distinct. Usually in the US we have elections where the issues are not that well defined, this election the issues big and small are addressed in fundamentally different ways by the two parties. At the center of the election, rightfully, is Iraq.
I think we have to reorientate American foreign policy and I think the Democrats - Obama or Clinton, but particularly Obama - offer the best opportunity going forward on January 21st , 2009. McCain is too close to current policy to make the necessary changes. Obama would offer us good options that no other President would have available.
How do you see the situation?
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Obama would offer us good options that no other President would have available.
How do you see the situation?
I think most politicians are liars. They tell us what we want to hear and then once they are in Office everything changes.
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But Iraq has been, first and foremost, a strategic miscalculation based on a disastrously wrongheaded conception of the strategic challenge revealed on 9/11/01
I think this is one of the best ways i have heard the war described. Whether you believe this war is right or wrong, you have to admit, the reason the American Citizens were told why we were there ended up not being entirely true. Now, on the same issue -- in the process we helped a country get rid of an evil tyrant... which is a good thing, it's helping to rebuild that country that is getting obsurd...
Wether you believe in the war or not, or believe in any of the candidates or not, you have to admit, this election will change our world. I agree with Bill, I have many friends over seas (and more specifically in France - where our relationship has been hurt greatly over the past 8 years) who feel that Obama will open foreign policies back up and heal some broken relationships... Which is one of the most important things right now.
I don't know how anyone is going to fix the mess in Iraq, we are in way too deep to immediately pull out, but we can't stay forever, it's ruined lives, made widows out of 19 year old girls, and all but destroyed the rest of the worlds faith in us. Something has to be done.
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The Bush Administration has led America into disgrace with the rest of the world.The audacity of the U. S. to think they had a right to invade another country and get rid of their devil dictator. It was not our place to do it, the
Iraqi people should have done this on their own. It was the wrong war, the wrong foe and the wrong time, as was
mentioned in the article. There were no weapons of mass destruction or links with al Quieda.
We were lied to. Now we are depending on the next Presdent to clean up this mess. And that is almost an impossibility.
We must have a President who will carefully intercede for us and gain back the respect of the world. Therefore,
I truly believe, that Clinton or McCain would be our best bet They each have the experience and are level headed
enough to go about this awesome task. Obama, I am sorry to say, is young and inexperienced. And some of his
proposed tactics scare me to death. America needs to be very, very careful who she elects to get our country
back in shape. I am sorry, I know this position makes some people very angry, but this is my viewpoint the situation.
Mimi
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The Bush Administration has led America into disgrace with the rest of the world.The audacity of the U. S. to think they had a right to invade another country and get rid of their devil dictator. It was not our place to do it, the
Iraqi people should have done this on their own. It was the wrong war, the wrong foe and the wrong time, as was
mentioned in the article. There were no weapons of mass destruction or links with al Quieda.
We were lied to. Now we are depending on the next Presdent to clean up this mess. And that is almost an impossibility.
We must have a President who will carefully intercede for us and gain back the respect of the world. Therefore,
I truly believe, that Clinton or McCain would be our best bet They each have the experience and are level headed
enough to go about this awesome task. Obama, I am sorry to say, is young and inexperienced. And some of his
proposed tactics scare me to death. America needs to be very, very careful who she elects to get our country
back in shape. I am sorry, I know this position makes some people very angry, but this is my viewpoint the situation.
Mimi
My how LITTLE you even know about the subject to come up with that!
You should quit relying on ignorant liberal media outlets spewing bs misinformation about the subject.
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The Bush Administration has led America into disgrace with the rest of the world.The audacity of the U. S. to think they had a right to invade another country and get rid of their devil dictator. It was not our place to do it, the
Iraqi people should have done this on their own. It was the wrong war, the wrong foe and the wrong time, as was
mentioned in the article. There were no weapons of mass destruction or links with al Quieda.
We were lied to. Now we are depending on the next Presdent to clean up this mess. And that is almost an impossibility.
We must have a President who will carefully intercede for us and gain back the respect of the world. Therefore,
I truly believe, that Clinton or McCain would be our best bet They each have the experience and are level headed
enough to go about this awesome task. Obama, I am sorry to say, is young and inexperienced. And some of his
proposed tactics scare me to death. America needs to be very, very careful who she elects to get our country
back in shape. I am sorry, I know this position makes some people very angry, but this is my viewpoint the situation.
Mimi
My how LITTLE you even know about the subject to come up with that!
You should quit relying on ignorant liberal media outlets spewing bs misinformation about the subject.
Well if I know so LITTLE about the subject,BigSky, why don't you tell us what you think. Then we will find out
how ignorant you are on the misinformation.
Mimi
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Well if I know so LITTLE about the subject,BigSky, why don't you tell us what you think. Then we will find out
how ignorant you are on the misinformation.
Mimi
The US has no disgrace in the matter.
Fact of the matter more countries signed onto the Iraq war than signed onto Desert Storm. The big exceptions would be those that got busted in breaking UN sanctions with Iraq. (France, Germany, Russia, China)
US thought it had the audacity to invade Iraq?
Buy a freaking clue. FACT of the matter was Iraq time and time again broke UN resolutions FORBIDDING Iraq from threatening member states. The very FACT that Iraq time and time again attacked US jets gave us EVERY RIGHT UNDER INTERNATIONAL LAW and UN RESOLUTION to take action. This is one of several reasons that entitled the US to take action. UN Resolutions SPECIFICALLY AUTHORIZED member states to take ANY action necessary to enforce resolutions against Iraq.
BTW to date over 750 WMD munitions have been found in Iraq. So you can quit with the disingenuous claims that NO WMD's were found at all. It may not have been the massive stockpiles that were said to have existed but that is neither here or there because it was not up to us to prove Iraq had any WMD at all. It was for them to prove they no longer had ANY WMD at all as required by resolution. Also the fact of the matter is that Iraq did have links to Al-Qaeda and in fact has had them since Iraq's involvement in the 93 WTC bombing. Not to mention documentation that British Journalists found in Iraq during the first stages of the war that conclusively showed Iraq indeed had meetings with Al-Qaeda which AGAIN were something Iraq was FORBIDDEN to have at all by UN resolution.
So if anyone seems ignorant in this matter. It is definitely you Mimi!
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From FOX News 3/11/08: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,336730,00.html
Pentagon Study of 600,000 Iraqi Documents Finds No Link Between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein
WASHINGTON — A forthcoming Pentagon study has found no operational link between Saddam Hussein and Usama bin Laden's Al Qaeda terrorist network.
McClatchy Newspapers reports that the study, expected to be released later this week, is based on an extensive review of more than 600,000 Iraqi documents that were seized after the U.S.-led war in Iraq in 2003.
While there was no link to Al Qaeda, the investigation revealed that Saddam's regime gave some support to other terror groups in the Middle East, U.S. officials told McClatchy on condition of anonymity. But he targeted those he considered his own enemies, including Shiite Muslims, Kurds, exiles and others, the news service reported.
Sponsored by the Pentagon, the report found no "direct operational link" between Saddam's government in Iraq and bin Laden's Al Qaeda terror ring before the U.S. invasion, an official told McClatchy.
The Bush administration put forth the argument that there was a connection between Saddam and bin Laden when it made the case to go to war with Iraq after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.
"Iraq has been, first and foremost, a strategic miscalculation based on a disastrously wrongheaded conception of the strategic challenge revealed on 9/11/01." Strategic miscalculation - thought things would turn out one way and instead they have turned out to be a disaster.
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Wether we agree or not how we got there.. the point is.. we need to get our boys (and girls!) out of there!..
We went in and made a mess.. yes.. a mess....IMHO....but so be it..
Daddy Bush didnt do it right and now the sins of the father have visited upon the son and we are paying for it in leaps and bounds with lives, the economy, etc. Historically...(for the most part) get a Rep in and they will try to fix the economy with a war..(and greedy oil mongers they are!)..
Going green is a bad word around Reps cause they rely on the oil... remember who's family was allowed to fly around while we all sat on our tushies renting cars to get around?
McCain is too military..
Obama will have no choice but to rely on who he surrounds himself since he really unfortunately is not well versed in this area. His ideals are great though..
Hillary.. well..without sounding like I'm on a feminist movement.. cause trust me.. I'm not... might be the way to go.
All politicians lie... it's like picking the lesser of two evils to me.. I'm one of those that voted for Perot.. cause running a government should be business minded.
In the end..I hope and pray.. that we pull out of there quickly... and then brace ourselves... we have been fortunate to not have the troubles to the extreme other countries do. Though now a days...anything is a given..
My only point to my post is to get our kids out of there and let the UN do their job properly and not always have us leading the way each and every friggen time. Why did we jump out ahead of the UN? Why have a UN then to begin with?
Ok.. i'm getting a major headache..my boy turns 18 this May and has to sign his selective service forms.. and although.. on his dad's side of the family, its a long history of service... and I would love and support my son if he chooses to enlist.. its not a mother's dream when they first count fingers and toes at birth.
And no.. don't go there with me.. I'm the VFW Ladies Aux President for my post and the Secretary for the District...I do loads of volunteer work for the Vets.. and If we are to do anything at all..and spend any more money .. it should be on those.. that came back and need our help. I see them, I've fed them.. I'm always helping and doing all sorts of fundraisers..My pet project is the snoball express and the Children's Home for those kids that lost a parent.
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That was a wonderful post Mysty. Thank you for it. I totally agree. And good for you for helping the Vets and others.
And thanks Bill I was just about to do some quotes on the link.
BTW BigSky, the weapons found were thought to be manufactured before 1991. The chemical weapons were not in useable condition. A report given by Rep. Pete Hoekatra in June, 2006 says this does not reflect a capacity that was built up after 1991. These munitions are not the WMD that this country and the rest of the world believed Iraq had and not the WMD for which this country went to war.
And what does the world think of us? The post 9/11 perception in Europe is that the U. S. is acting solely in its own interest without regard to the interests of traditional allies including 68% of Italians, 73% of the British, 80%of the French and 85%of Germans. (Numbers from the Nat'l Public Radio.) As far as I'm concerned that is disgrace.
How ignorant is that, BigSky?
Mimi
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Thank you Mimi..
And to bring the point home..
http://www.ksdk.com/video/default.aspx?aid=67740&sid=138863&bw=hi&cat=70
Legacy of Ashes... this.. is how this nation thanks some of our Veterans...
I was always taught to take care of your back yard first 'fore you look over at your neighbors.
This..is what's important.... to me.. I speak for me.
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BIGSKY FOR PRESIDENT!!!!
Mimi this subject has been discussed and re-discussed in this forum- just do a search and you will have ample evidence of both Mr. Peckham's views and Bigsky's also- with plenty of others thrown in.
Mysty-the UN is corrupt, we can't wait for it to act- it is not in American interests to do so. (and thanks for all you do for our troops!)
Personally, I hope the Democrats lose- they probably won't...but I think it will be a very expensive lesson for the American people. can you say... SOCIALISM?
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That was a wonderful post Mysty. Thank you for it. I totally agree. And good for you for helping the Vets and others.
And thanks Bill I was just about to do some quotes on the link.
BTW BigSky, the weapons found were thought to be manufactured before 1991. The chemical weapons were not in useable condition. A report given by Rep. Pete Hoekatra in June, 2006 says this does not reflect a capacity that was built up after 1991. These munitions are not the WMD that this country and the rest of the world believed Iraq had and not the WMD for which this country went to war.
And what does the world think of us? The post 9/11 perception in Europe is that the U. S. is acting solely in its own interest without regard to the interests of traditional allies including 68% of Italians, 73% of the British, 80%of the French and 85%of Germans. (Numbers from the Nat'l Public Radio.) As far as I'm concerned that is disgrace.
How ignorant is that, BigSky?
Mimi
Umm the whole concept of Saddam not complying with destruction of wmd has been going on since 1991. DUH
You might note that the UN NEVER said Saddam could have one, two, some, a few,or a couple of WMD. IT SAID NONE! Is that concept a bit much for you to grasp?
Actually they were WMD as classified by the UN. In fact US troops got sick from sarin exposure when insurgents used one as a bomb did they not. So evidently they were usable to some degree now huh!
From the very beginning there was a long list of things this war was going to be over. So the innuendo that it was over only WMD is disingenuous.
Damn right we should act in our interest. Saddam wasnt the one trying to commit terrorist attacks on the Italians or British. Nor was he trying to commit it on the French or Germans who where violating UN sanctions by illegally trading with Iraq. We were the ones in his cross hairs. Not them. Since they were not in his cross hairs, they have NO right to question what we did.
Saddam committed acts of war on the US and we acted. We NEVER have to apologize for defending ourselves from terrorists.
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I am putting out the lawn chairs and getting the popcorn out...This should be good.
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"According to Bob Woodward, during a conversation about Iraq, George Bush once told Republican leaders, 'I will not withdraw even if Laura and Barney* are the only ones supporting me.'"
No worries, George! Bigsky will be there to make it a foursome! ;)
*For anyone (possibly overseas) who might be wondering, Barney is the president's dog.
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:lol; xtrememoosetrax!!!
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That was a wonderful post Mysty. Thank you for it. I totally agree. And good for you for helping the Vets and others.
And thanks Bill I was just about to do some quotes on the link.
BTW BigSky, the weapons found were thought to be manufactured before 1991. The chemical weapons were not in useable condition. A report given by Rep. Pete Hoekatra in June, 2006 says this does not reflect a capacity that was built up after 1991. These munitions are not the WMD that this country and the rest of the world believed Iraq had and not the WMD for which this country went to war.
And what does the world think of us? The post 9/11 perception in Europe is that the U. S. is acting solely in its own interest without regard to the interests of traditional allies including 68% of Italians, 73% of the British, 80%of the French and 85%of Germans. (Numbers from the Nat'l Public Radio.) As far as I'm concerned that is disgrace.
How ignorant is that, BigSky?
Mimi
Umm the whole concept of Saddam not complying with destruction of wmd has been going on since 1991. DUH
You might note that the UN NEVER said Saddam could have one, two, some, a few,or a couple of WMD. IT SAID NONE! Is that concept a bit much for you to grasp?
Actually they were WMD as classified by the UN. In fact US troops got sick from sarin exposure when insurgents used one as a bomb did they not. So evidently they were usable to some degree now huh!
From the very beginning there was a long list of things this war was going to be over. So the innuendo that it was over only WMD is disingenuous.
Damn right we should act in our interest. Saddam wasnt the one trying to commit terrorist attacks on the Italians or British. Nor was he trying to commit it on the French or Germans who where violating UN sanctions by illegally trading with Iraq. We were the ones in his cross hairs. Not them. Since they were not in his cross hairs, they have NO right to question what we did.
Saddam committed acts of war on the US and we acted. We NEVER have to apologize for defending ourselves from terrorists.
Allow me to correct YOUR ignorance, I think you will find, it was Osama Bin Laden operating possibly from Afghanistan or Pakistan borders that actually committed or organised terrorist attacks on US soil and not Saddam at all. Saddam may have attacked Kuwait originally which is when US troops got involved in the Gulf Wars to protect oil interests and of course, the sovereignty of Kuwait.
Maybe the figures should be explained a bit better about percentages here. 73% of people in the UK believe they were misled by the government and the leader of that government at the time when he said that that Saddam did have WMD. Before he left government, Tony Blair, our previous Prime Minister admitted that there was no evidence to support this and that he and the cabinet had acted on a report which said it was "highly likely there were WMD's which could reach the UK in a matter of minutes."
Please folks get your facts right before you start ranting and raving.
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Allow me to correct YOUR ignorance, I think you will find, it was Osama Bin Laden operating possibly from Afghanistan or Pakistan borders that actually committed or organised terrorist attacks on US soil and not Saddam at all. Saddam may have attacked Kuwait originally which is when US troops got involved in the Gulf Wars to protect oil interests and of course, the sovereignty of Kuwait.
Maybe the figures should be explained a bit better about percentages here. 73% of people in the UK believe they were misled by the government and the leader of that government at the time when he said that that Saddam did have WMD. Before he left government, Tony Blair, our previous Prime Minister admitted that there was no evidence to support this and that he and the cabinet had acted on a report which said it was "highly likely there were WMD's which could reach the UK in a matter of minutes."
Please folks get your facts right before you start ranting and raving.
Very true.. I keep up with politics in the UK..Since they are one of our biggest allies. Thing is yes.. we were attacked.. but not by the COUNTRY.. but by the idiot that George SR.. didnt get right and now JR is doing no better. Hell we put Hussein in power! Hello.. where was the brain cell in that choice!..
The whole thing reeks ...it was not well planned out.. it was a knee jerk reaction.. the UN might be corrupt.. what government isnt but.. but.. the point is... those biggies in the UN have to agree.. not us go out as a single calvary and pull in favors from UK, Canada and such.. that was wrong.....
And I understand not wanting the Democrats in office Glitter.. and i will defend your right to your choice...I personally am registered Democrat.. but I vote the person.. not the party...right now.. they all look like loosers to me....its a matter of picking the lesser of the evils in ones own mind..... that or I'm tossing in the towel... moving into the boonies and forgetting society and civiliization... I'm soooo fed up with all the corruption....
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Well BigSky DUH- the UN never said Bush could go to war either, but he DID.
So one bomb that the insurgents used AFTER
we invaded their country and killed their citizens. DUH
And - there were other things the war was going to be over, but the main reason we went to war was the
face that the Govt. scared us to death about WMD And also claims that Saddam was linked to 9/11.
That is the ingenuous and sincere fact.
I never said we shouldn't protect ourselves or that we needed to apologize. Neither do I want to see the U. S.
go down in history books as war mongers.
Mimi
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Allow me to correct YOUR ignorance, I think you will find, it was Osama Bin Laden operating possibly from Afghanistan or Pakistan borders that actually committed or organised terrorist attacks on US soil and not Saddam at all. Saddam may have attacked Kuwait originally which is when US troops got involved in the Gulf Wars to protect oil interests and of course, the sovereignty of Kuwait.
Maybe the figures should be explained a bit better about percentages here. 73% of people in the UK believe they were misled by the government and the leader of that government at the time when he said that that Saddam did have WMD. Before he left government, Tony Blair, our previous Prime Minister admitted that there was no evidence to support this and that he and the cabinet had acted on a report which said it was "highly likely there were WMD's which could reach the UK in a matter of minutes."
Please folks get your facts right before you start ranting and raving.
Actually Matty you are wrong. I will let you slide because you are not American and do not know the history of Saddam and his attacks and attempts.
It seems you are one of the masses who associate the word terrorist attack with only that of 9/11. Sorry but we are not talking 9/11 here nor are we talking about Osama and his acts of 9/11 or his prior terrorist attacks on the US.
We are talking attacks and attempted attacks by Saddam. Such as when Saddam took 177 Americans hostage, or when Saddam bombed US officials overseas, or when Saddam tried to poison food and water supplies of US troops in Saudi or the fact Saddam tried to acquire smallpox as to infect people to send to the US and start a modern day plague. Even the fact that Saddam tried time and time again to shoot down US jets.
Well BigSky DUH- the UN never said Bush could go to war either, but he DID.
The UN didnt have to say we could go to war. UN resolutions SPECIFICALLY AUTHORIZED MEMBER STATES TO USE ANY MEANS NECESSARY to enforce resolutions. Shall I define the word "any" so you understand?
So one bomb that the insurgents used AFTER
we invaded their country and killed their citizens. DUH
Hmm one more than the freaking NONE they were too have now huh!
And - there were other things the war was going to be over, but the main reason we went to war was the
face that the Govt. scared us to death about WMD And also claims that Saddam was linked to 9/11.
That is the ingenuous and sincere fact.
Not even close. We went to war because of 9/11, not because Saddam was linked to 9/11. You should be ashamed you did not understand the difference.
I never said we shouldn't protect ourselves or that we needed to apologize. Neither do I want to see the U. S.
go down in history books as war mongers.
Mimi
Actually you did. It may not have been those words outright. But when you come up with the bs line of:
"The audacity of the U. S. to think they had a right to invade another country and get rid of their devil dictator. It was not our place to do it...snip"
That is EXACTLY what you are saying!
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Kit I'm with you :beer1;
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I am saying this meekly because I hate this debate and name calling---so just a quick :twocents; from me. I have taught both Iran and Iraq children and came to know their parents. I have never had one say anything put positive things about our involvement. These families want freedom from tyranny and to not live their lifes in fear. Not saying who politically is right or wrong; just looking at the human factor. Politics and religion--my two least favorite subjects.
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Wither - to dry up or fade. This thread is actually instructive. The interest in the fact that there is an Iraq war, going on right now, has faded. Is it because there is no agreement on how it is we got here? The people involved will have to answer for themselves. Bush is pretty young and fit, if his dad is a guide he'll have the next two or three decades to explain what happened. We can only answer for our actions and avoiding the issue, not reading about it, not talking about it is a poor choice in my opinion. I'm not sympathetic of those who feel everything that needs to be said has been said. One it's not true and two you have to go out of your way to read this - if you've made up your mind then read one of the other 200 or so posts a day here on IHD (incredable).
It's the five year anniversary. I think it is worth a moment to reflect. Christopher Hitchens asks some interesting questions in his piece here http://www.slate.com/id/2186740/ This is a good question to think about: "the very thing that most repels people when they contemplate Iraq, which is the chaos and misery and fragmentation (and the deliberate intensification and augmentation of all this by the jihadists), invites the inescapable question: What would post-Saddam Iraq have looked like without a coalition presence?"
It's unknowable but would it have been worse if we had pulled back to northern Iraq and let the Baath Party sort it out once we found Saddam in his spider-hole? I think we would have avoided a lot of heartache and be in a better position today with regard to Iran. I think we still have that option except now we've entrenched the shiites but that really is water under the bridge. We're not getting that one back. Iraq and Iran will be strategic allies in the 21st century.
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I agree with you Bill, but I would hate to get banned from the board. :'(
Mimi
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As we mark the five year anniversary it is worthwhile to look back, remember where we were in April/May of '03
“Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed.” - President Bush, 5/1/03
“It’s clear that the end is very much in sight. And, today I think Americans should be very proud of their leadership.” – John McCain, 4/9/03
Here is a summary of the Iraq war's impact - mostly in their own words http://nsnetwork.org/node/257
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:usaflag;
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Here is a summary of the Iraq war's impact - mostly in their own words http://nsnetwork.org/node/257
Bad form IMO for a site to try to lay claim to as being authority such as the claim of their name: National Security Network and taking quotes and not putting them into context of the speech they were used with or responses to questions that were posed to them.
It's unknowable but would it have been worse if we had pulled back to northern Iraq and let the Baath Party sort it out once we found Saddam in his spider-hole? I think we would have avoided a lot of heartache and be in a better position today with regard to Iran. I think we still have that option except now we've entrenched the shiites but that really is water under the bridge. We're not getting that one back. Iraq and Iran will be strategic allies in the 21st century.
If we would have pulled to Northern Iraq and just went after Saddam (and his sons) only post Iraq would be very much a mess and millions of Iraqis would have been tortured and or killed by the Baath party.
While Saddam would have been gone the party would have remained and there were just as many blood thirsty people in the wings that would have made sure their position did not change.
Just as the US and the coalition failed to support the first Iraqi uprising after Desert Storm which caused millions to be tortured and killed, the same more likely than not would have occurred in a post Saddam world without US and Coalition intervention to have a government of the people in Iraq.
Iran and Iraq will be limited allies in any manner. While they may have something in common on religion. There is too much history between the two of them to be true allies. Not to mention that the people of Iran are not arabs and are viewed differently by the people of the middle east since most of the middle east and northern africa are arabs.
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Remember we can have a debate and not call each other names in the middle of the argument.
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Here is a summary of the Iraq war's impact - mostly in their own words http://nsnetwork.org/node/257
Bad form IMO for a site to try to lay claim to as being authority such as the claim of their name: National Security Network and taking quotes and not putting them into context of the speech they were used with or responses to questions that were posed to them.
Each quote comes with a link taking you to the context of the statement. In what case does the context of the quote change the meaning of the statement? Does it matter that President Bush was wearing a flight suit, standing on the USS Abraham Lincoln and had a giant banner behind him that said "Mission Accomplished" (as someone who makes banners I find it curious that an aircraft carrier would have the ability to produce an over sized banner) when he said “Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed.”
I don't think anyone who is quoted has walked back from those statements? I think Rummy still thinks "stuff happens".
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Each quote comes with a link taking you to the context of the statement. In what case does the context of the quote change the meaning of the statement? Does it matter that President Bush was wearing a flight suit, standing on the USS Abraham Lincoln and had a giant banner behind him that said "Mission Accomplished" (as someone who makes banners I find it curious that an aircraft carrier would have the ability to produce an over sized banner) when he said “Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed.”
I don't think anyone who is quoted has walked back from those statements? I think Rummy still thinks "stuff happens".
Ohh please. The reason it was done like that is because you know as well as I know the vast majority of people who read it will never click on each link and thereby will run with their own idea of what was said.
You brought up the "banner" and that is the perfect example.
That banner signified on thing. The combat operations with Iraq (Saddam) was over. It had nothing to do with the eventual fight with terrorists in Iraq but yet liberals point to the banner incident as some premature claim of victory by Bush. Fact is the fight with terrorists is ENTIRELY separate and different from what our combat operations were against the government that was run by Saddam.
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Each quote comes with a link taking you to the context of the statement. In what case does the context of the quote change the meaning of the statement? Does it matter that President Bush was wearing a flight suit, standing on the USS Abraham Lincoln and had a giant banner behind him that said "Mission Accomplished" (as someone who makes banners I find it curious that an aircraft carrier would have the ability to produce an over sized banner) when he said “Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed.”
I don't think anyone who is quoted has walked back from those statements? I think Rummy still thinks "stuff happens".
Ohh please. The reason it was done like that is because you know as well as I know the vast majority of people who read it will never click on each link and thereby will run with their own idea of what was said.
You brought up the "banner" and that is the perfect example.
That banner signified on thing. The combat operations with Iraq (Saddam) was over. It had nothing to do with the eventual fight with terrorists in Iraq but yet liberals point to the banner incident as some premature claim of victory by Bush. Fact is the fight with terrorists is ENTIRELY separate and different from what our combat operations were against the government that was run by Saddam.
It's great to be back to what the meaning of is, is. Kinda like catching the Frisbee, without considering the alligator.
I'll ask again, in which case does the context of the quote change the meaning of the statement?
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Remember we can have a debate and not call each other names in the middle of the argument.
Where was that done?
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Remember we can have a debate and not call each other names in the middle of the argument.
Where was that done?
In civilization! :clap;
Ohh you mean name calling? I didn't see any.
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Just a little friendly reminder to play nice.
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Recent articles of interest...
This one by Leonard Pitts http://www.miamiherald.com/851/story/461978.html
This one by Ana Menendez http://www.miamiherald.com/news/columnists/ana_menendez/story/461888.html
Just a couple of different views.. and how the younger generation on the second one.. have turned a blind eye to what affects their world.
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I believe the name calling if any was edited already. Play nice and get on with the debate.
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Ilan Goldenberg flags Bush (http://www.democracyarsenal.org/2008/03/bushs-james-bon.html) talking an unusually strong brand of nonsense:
President Bush: Out of such chaos in Iraq, the terrorist movement could emerge emboldened -- with new recruits, new resources, and an even greater determination to dominate the region and harm America. An emboldened al Qaeda with access to Iraq's oil resources could pursue its ambitions to acquire weapons of mass destruction to attack America and other free nations.
Ilan focused on the implausibility of al-Qaeda gaining control over Iraq's oil fields (they're not in the Sunni Arab parts of Iraq, among other things). I would also note that were this bizarre scenario to unfold, it would be pretty trivial for the U.S. military to capture or control any AQI-held oil fields -- a poorly equipped guerilla force can't defend a fixed position in the open.
On top of that, though, this business about al-Qaeda securing a recruiting boon from us leaving Iraq is bizarre. According to MNF-Iraq, (http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/03/profile_of_a_suicide_bomber.php)the occupation of Iraq is the main fact driving recruits to join AQI. Absent the occupation, there's no recruiting pitch. Pearl Harbor was a boon to U.S. military recruiting, VJ Day wasn't. And what's this business about them acquiring "an even greater determination to dominate the region and harm America." Does Bush really think they lack determination now?
It's striking how much of conservative thinking about national security these days centers around subjective factors -- determination, emboldening, "claiming victory" -- rather than on objective assessments. Objectively speaking, withdrawing from Iraq would cut off a major line of recruiting for al-Qaeda while simultaneously freeing up vast quantities of American manpower and other resources. How "bold" that makes al-Qaeda leaders feel (and you've got to figure these p*ckers were pretty "emboldened' already when they blew up the twin towers, right?) has nothing to do with anything.(http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/03/president_knownothing.php)
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Hi Bill, and anyone else who is interested,
Interesting series in Slate (the online magazine) last week:
To mark the fifth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, Slate asked a number of writers who originally supported the war to answer the question, "Why did we get it wrong?"
Here's the link: http://www.slate.com/id/2186757/
Several of the essays discuss the subject of good intentions gone awry, and I feel that cumulatively, the series does a good job of grappling with the many complexities of the situation. If only there were simple answers . . . . sigh . . . .
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Hi Bill, and anyone else who is interested,
Interesting series in Slate (the online magazine) last week:
To mark the fifth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, Slate asked a number of writers who originally supported the war to answer the question, "Why did we get it wrong?"
Here's the link: http://www.slate.com/id/2186757/
Several of the essays discuss the subject of good intentions gone awry, and I feel that cumulatively, the series does a good job of grappling with the many complexities of the situation. If only there were simple answers . . . . sigh . . . .
I saw the series too emt. I think you can not overstate the impact of that moment in time, weeks before an election 14 months after September 2001. The advise often given to people applies to governments too - don't make big decisions when you're mad.
One thing I think about is: if the Iraq policies were doomed to failure, how would the war's advocates ever know? Many seem to imagine that if this or that decision was made differently then things would have unfolded in a way more favorable to our interests. I think once the decision was made to go in, the policy had already failed. Assuming the actual goal was a stable Iraq that would serve as a model to the rest of the Arab middle east: that was never possible via coercion.
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Pentagon Study of 600,000 Iraqi Documents Finds No Link Between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein
Seems to be a different view on the IDA report.
Iraqi Documents Show al Qaeda Ties
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=2D96881B-4DEB-4619-A1B1-C68584D5878C
Not to mention these nuggets of the past.
ABC News has learned that in December, an Iraqi intelligence chief named Faruq Hijazi, now Iraq's ambassador to Turkey, made a secret trip to Afghanistan to meet with bin Laden. Three intelligence agencies tell ABC News they cannot be certain what was discussed, but almost certainly, they say, bin Laden has been told he would be welcome in Baghdad.(1999)
From the 1998 Federal Indictment by the Clinton Justice Department against Osama bin Laden
"Al Qaeda reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al Qaeda would not work against that government, and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al Qaeda would work cooperatively with the government of Iraq.''
It would seem it was the Clinton Administration who made the link long before Bush was in office.
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Sure count the Pentagon report as unreliable and everything published by a neocon think tank as unimpeachable. I don't think very many voters will find reports from the David Horowitz Freedom Center very persuasive.
David Horowitz began the Center for the Study of Popular Culture in 1988 to establish a conservative presence in Hollywood and show how popular culture had become a political battleground. Over the next 18 years, CSPC attracted 50,000 contributing supporters and established programs such as The Wednesday Morning Club, the Individual Rights Foundation, and Students for Academic Freedom.
FrontPage Magazine, the Center’s online journal of news and political commentary has 1.5 million visitors and 620,000 unique visitors a month (65 million hits) and is linked to over 2000 other websites. DiscoverTheNetworks.com, launched in 2005, is the largest publicly accessible database defining the chief groups and individuals of the Left and their organizational interlocks. DTN has had more than 8 million visitors so far this year.
Since 2003, the Center has promoted an Academic Bill of Rights to support students’ academic freedom, and free the American university from political indoctrination and renew its commitment to true intellectual diversity. In 2006, the Center established another organization, Students and Parents for Academic Freedom in K-12 schools, modeled on the university campaign and with the same agenda: to take politics out of the public school classroom.
In 2006, the Center’s Board of Directors decided to change the name of the organization to the David Horowitz Freedom Center.
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Sure count the Pentagon report as unreliable and everything published by a neocon think tank as unimpeachable. I don't think very many voters will find reports from the David Horowitz Freedom Center very persuasive.
Horowitz never wrote the article nor employed the person who wrote it.
Before you try telling me about the Pentagon report bill, Try reading it. You will see how the headline misconstrued what the report actually talked about.
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I am one who feels we need to let this take its course. We can not allow the terrorist's to regain control of Iraq. There is a lot of positive things happening there and we must continue to help them. For me it is kinda like when you decide you need a new kitchen. When the project starts everyone is OK with it. But then like most projects you run into piping or electrical problems that weren't anticipated and the job takes longer then you thought and the wife and kids are getting sick of washing and cooking in the basement waiting for it to be done. It will be done but, additional time and patience must be applied....Boxman
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Sure count the Pentagon report as unreliable and everything published by a neocon think tank as unimpeachable. I don't think very many voters will find reports from the David Horowitz Freedom Center very persuasive.
Horowitz never wrote the article nor employed the person who wrote it.
Before you try telling me about the Pentagon report bill, Try reading it. You will see how the headline misconstrued what the report actually talked about.
In case anyone is wondering what is this conspiracy between AQ and Saddam, BigSky is talking about: today, the Wall Street Journal (the once conservative bastion) placed itself firmly among the conspiracy theorists with an editorial claiming that the new report “buttress[es] the case that the decision to oust Saddam was the right one“:
Five years on, few Iraq myths are as persistent as the notion that the Bush Administration invented a connection between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda. Yet a new Pentagon report suggests that Iraq’s links to world-wide terror networks, including al Qaeda, were far more extensive than previously understood.
Naturally, it’s getting little or no attention. Press accounts have been misleading or outright distortions, while the Bush Administration seems indifferent. Even John McCain has let the study’s revelations float by. But that doesn’t make the facts any less notable or true.
The editorial goes on to claim that the new report is “inconvenient…for those who want to assert that somehow Saddam could have been easily contained and presented no threat to the U.S.” Leaving aside whether anyone has claimed that Saddam presented “no threat,” the point is that we now know that Saddam didn’t represent nearly the threat that the Bush administration claimed, and that Saddam’s “relationship” with Al Qaeda amounted to little more than a shared hatred of the United States.
More to the point: Does anybody seriously believe that if the report had demonstrated a significant Saddam-Al Qaeda connection, as the Wall Street Journal claims, that Bush administration officials would not trumpet that fact from the rooftops? Of course they would. But, as even the Bush administration now knows, there was no significant connection between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda; those who argued that there was are now exposed as dissemblers and frauds, and they are very upset about it.
Transcript from Thursday, Richard Perle attempted a similar sleight-of-hand on the Charlie Rose program.:
PERLE: When you look at the actual report, what it concludes is that Saddam’s intelligence had connections with terrorists all over the place.
ROSE: But that’s not Al Qaeda. I understand the differences but it’s not Al Qaeda. The issue here is Al Qaeda, was it not?
PERLE: It included relationships with organization affiliated with Al Qaeda. Any number of such organizations.
ROSE: Affiliated In what way?
PERLE: In the way that they were supporting individuals who were part of organizations that were linked to Al Qaeda.
from the Wonk Room http://thinkprogress.org/wonkroom/2008/03/24/wsj-saddam-al-qaeda/
In the way that they were supporting individuals who were part of organizations that were linked to Al Qaeda. I suppose that is what the Pentagon report meant when it concluded (PDF link) http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/images/03/14/saddam.terrorism.pentagon.pdf
In the period after the 1991 Gulf War, the regime of Saddam Hussein supported a complex and increasingly disparate mix of pan-Arab revolutionary causes and emerging pan-Islamic radical movements. The relationship between Iraq and the forces of pan-Arab socialism was well known and was in fact one of the defining qualities of the Ba’ath movement.
But the relationships between Iraq and the groups advocating radical pan-Islamic doctrines are much more complex. This study found no “smoking gun” (i.e. direct connection) between Saddam’s Iraq and Al-Qaeda.
In the way that they were supporting individuals who were part of organizations that were linked to Al Qaeda.
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You might well note bill that Iraq was forbidden from supporting, talking or meeting with ANY terrorist or terrorist group.
Also of note the threat was bigger than a shared hatred of the US. IE Clinton bombing of Sudan might give you a hint.
Time and time again reports like this state to the effect that no collaborative operational relationship existed between the two on 9/11 ONLY.
Which then somehow gets distorted that there were no links or talks between the two at all. Asshat Al Gore was a good one at distorting such stuff.
Also as to the federal indictment.
The indictment disclosed a close relationship between al Qaeda and Saddam's regime, which included specialists on chemical weapons and all types of bombs, including truck bombs, a favorite weapon of terrorists.
"Al Qaeda also forged alliances with the National Islamic Front in the Sudan and with the government of Iran and its associated terrorist group Hezbollah for the purpose of working together against their perceived common enemies in the West, particularly the United States. In addition, al Qaeda reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al Qaeda would not work against that government and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al Qaeda would work cooperatively with the government of Iraq."
You might note shortly after the US embassy bombings Clinton bombed the Sudan factories bin laden was associated with and his camps in Afghanistan
"Bin Laden had been living [at the plant], that he had, in fact, money that he had put into this military industrial corporation, that the owner of the plant had traveled to Baghdad to meet with the father of the VX program." --Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen, Clinton Administration
U.N. ambassador Bill Richardson appeared on CNN and pointed to "direct evidence of ties between Osama bin Laden" and Sudan's Military Industrial Corporation. "You combine that with Sudan support for terrorism, their connections with Iraq on VX, and you combine that, also, with the chemical precursor issue, and Sudan's leadership support for Osama bin Laden, and you've got a pretty clear-cut case."
Since you hold the New York Times is such high regard bill.
New York Times revealed the contents of an Iraqi Intelligence document that discusses the Iraq-bin Laden "relationship" and plans for bin Laden to work with Iraq against the ruling family in Saudi Arabia. The document states that "cooperation between the two organizations should be allowed to develop freely through discussion and agreement." The Iraqi document, which refers to the period of the first Clinton term, has been "authenticated by the U.S. government," according to the front-page story.
Even Saddam's son Uday published in his paper "Babel" that Iraq and Al-Qaeda were meeting.
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No one says Iraq in January of 2002 presented no danger. The documents show that he was a typical danger. An average danger, in a dangerous world.
What has happened because we chose to attack Iraq is so extremely bad that Iraq would have had to have been a danger a few magnitudes larger than it was to contemplate our actions. Like a thousand times bigger danger, to even risk what has happened.
To even risk the possibility of being in the situation we find ourselves in, let alone get us here, simply to risk putting the United States in this position Iraq would have had to pose a thousand times greater danger to the US than it did.
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No one says Iraq in January of 2002 presented no danger. The documents show that he was a typical danger. An average danger, in a dangerous world.
What has happened because we chose to attack Iraq is so extremely bad that Iraq would have had to have been a danger a few magnitudes larger than it was to contemplate our actions. Like a thousand times bigger danger, to even risk what has happened.
To even risk the possibility of being in the situation we find ourselves in, let alone get us here, simply to risk putting the United States in this position Iraq would have had to pose a thousand times greater danger to the US than it did.
Hmm so in other words how many more 9/11's would it have taken bill before you deemed fighting terrorists necessary?
Saddam was removed and it went well in terms of war.
As far as what we are doing now in Iraq fighting terrorists was bound to happen somewhere sooner or later. We couldnt just ignore the problem with them forever as you seem to suggest.
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No one says Iraq in January of 2002 presented no danger. The documents show that he was a typical danger. An average danger, in a dangerous world.
What has happened because we chose to attack Iraq is so extremely bad that Iraq would have had to have been a danger a few magnitudes larger than it was to contemplate our actions. Like a thousand times bigger danger, to even risk what has happened.
To even risk the possibility of being in the situation we find ourselves in, let alone get us here, simply to risk putting the United States in this position Iraq would have had to pose a thousand times greater danger to the US than it did.
Hmm so in other words how many more 9/11's would it have taken bill before you deemed fighting terrorists necessary?
Saddam was removed and it went well in terms of war.
As far as what we are doing now in Iraq fighting terrorists was bound to happen somewhere sooner or later. We couldnt just ignore the problem with them forever as you seem to suggest.
ah so now it's not just connection to AQ - In the way that they were supporting individuals who were part of organizations that were linked to Al Qaeda. - it is responsibility for 9/11 that you are assigning to Iraq/Saddam. Total BS.
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ah so now it's not just connection to AQ - In the way that they were supporting individuals who were part of organizations that were linked to Al Qaeda. - it is responsibility for 9/11 that you are assigning to Iraq/Saddam. Total BS.
I never assigned any responsibility to Saddam for 9/11 nor did I say he was involved with Al-Qaeda on 9/11.
The stuff you make up sometimes is frightful. :o No wonder you do not understand the issue.
So just how many 9/11 type attacks should occur before we fight terrorists bill?
Should we wait until 10,000 are dead? 20,000 dead? Maybe a smallpox epidemic? Maybe a mushroom cloud over a US city?
What is it?
BTW bill. Just so you know. All Al-qaeda members are terrorists, not all terrorists are members of al-qaeda, ohh and saddam was a terrorist.
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ah so now it's not just connection to AQ - In the way that they were supporting individuals who were part of organizations that were linked to Al Qaeda. - it is responsibility for 9/11 that you are assigning to Iraq/Saddam. Total BS.
I never assigned any responsibility to Saddam for 9/11 nor did I say he was involved with Al-Qaeda on 9/11.
The stuff you make up sometimes is frightful. :o No wonder you do not understand the issue.
So just how many 9/11 type attacks should occur before we fight terrorists bill?
Should we wait until 10,000 are dead? 20,000 dead? Maybe a smallpox epidemic? Maybe a mushroom cloud over a US city?
What is it?
BTW bill. Just so you know. All Al-qaeda members are terrorists, not all terrorists are members of al-qaeda, ohh and saddam was a terrorist.
Hmm so in other words how many more 9/11's would it have taken bill before you deemed fighting terrorists necessary? They're not all one big group of terrorists. If AQ had, god forbid, continued to attack us - " more 9/11's" in your words - it would have added zero to the reasons for attacking Iraq. You say " nor did I say he was involved with Al-Qaeda on 9/11" then why would additional 9/11s from AQ make attacking him a better idea?
Saddam was a normal threat. A normal danger. 9/11 did not change how dangerous he was. We stopped fighting the terrorists who attacked us when we went into Iraq.
Simply saying he was part of the same enemy or could be the same or I don't even know what you're saying anymore. AQ's actions did not make Saddam more of a danger. Before and after 9/11 Saddam was an normal danger in a dangerous world. Had AQ continued to somehow attack us Saddam would still have been a normal danger.
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Afghanistan and Iraq are and have always been havens for terrorists. Saddam was a mass murderer and a terrorist. A normal threat, as you say. I say doubtful more like a major timebomb. We took the fight to them as any normal right minded thinking country would after they have been attacked numerous times. Almost 100% of the country was for the US to go after the terrorists. Now because it became tougher, and 4000 solders are dead all you bleeding heart liberals take up the other side because it makes you "feel good" to say I am against the war now that, that is the popular way to think. No matter what kinda of name you call a terrorist, they are still that. With their ultimate goal to hurt the people of the USA. They have not attacked us since 9/11 can you explain that or maybe could it be because of our actions taken so far....Boxman
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Afghanistan and Iraq are and have always been havens for terrorists. Saddam was a mass murderer and a terrorist. A normal threat, as you say. I say doubtful more like a major timebomb. We took the fight to them as any normal right minded thinking country would after they have been attacked numerous times. Almost 100% of the country was for the US to go after the terrorists. Now because it became tougher, and 4000 solders are dead all you bleeding heart liberals take up the other side because it makes you "feel good" to say I am against the war now that, that is the popular way to think. No matter what kinda of name you call a terrorist, they are still that. With their ultimate goal to hurt the people of the USA. They have not attacked us since 9/11 can you explain that or maybe could it be because of our actions taken so far....Boxman
You're conflating two different things - Iraq and Afghanistan are two separate issues - particularly before we went in but even now. Sunni (Wahabi) Taliban, Shiite (current) Iraqi government, Baathist Sunni minority (previous) Iraqi government. Three totally different problems. Throwing them in all together is self defeating - we are defeating ourselves. It is not as if every American needs to understand the differences but certainly the people making decision on our behalf ought to be able to distinguish among the various groups - who all have very different ideas of how to organize the world.
I, like many people in 2002, swallowed hard and accepted we had to give the president the benefit of the doubt. He cynically took advantage of our desire to believe the person who holds his office. He betrayed my trust. That gives me no joy. AQ has not attacked us is a spurious justification - there is no way to know. It is clear that many more people would like to take a shot at us now because we went into Iraq. That will be true for the rest of Bush's grandchildren's lives (and all the other American kids) - they will be in more danger for as long as they live because he chose to go into Iraq.
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Hmm so in other words how many more 9/11's would it have taken bill before you deemed fighting terrorists necessary?
They're not all one big group of terrorists. If AQ had, god forbid, continued to attack us - " more 9/11's" in your words - it would have added zero to the reasons for attacking Iraq. You say " nor did I say he was involved with Al-Qaeda on 9/11" then why would additional 9/11s from AQ make attacking him a better idea?
Saddam was a normal threat. A normal danger. 9/11 did not change how dangerous he was. We stopped fighting the terrorists who attacked us when we went into Iraq.
Simply saying he was part of the same enemy or could be the same or I don't even know what you're saying anymore. AQ's actions did not make Saddam more of a danger. Before and after 9/11 Saddam was an normal danger in a dangerous world. Had AQ continued to somehow attack us Saddam would still have been a normal danger.
No one has said they are one big terrorist group. Nor did anyone say anything about Al-Qaeda being the only one to commit more 9/11 style attacks.
Saddam a normal threat you claim. Really now? How many other countries tried to send homicide bombers to the US? How many other countries tried to acquire smallpox to infect people and send to the US? How many other countries tried to poison food and water supplies of US troops in Saudi? How many other countries tried time and time again to shoot down US jets enforcing resolutions?
You have a warped sense of reality if you think that constitutes a normal threat or danger.
This "normal" threat view you have of saddam is the very same EXACT view that was taken of Al-Qaeda as they committed one terrorist attack after another on the US. That view resulted in 9/11!
For you to suggest we should have given this same approach to saddam and waited until he finally got lucky and committed his own 9/11 style attack before we acted is baffling. :o
AQ has not attacked us is a spurious justification - there is no way to know.
We do know because history has shown us.
From 93-2001
93 WTC bombing
Bombing of USS Cole
Bombing of US Embassy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania Embassy
Bombing of Kohbar Towers
Bombing of US Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya
9/11- Plane flown into Pentagon
9/11-2 planes flown into 2 WTC's
9/11- Flight 93 deliberately crashed into the ground.
9/12/2001- 03/28/2008
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Claim: Iraq has consistently demonstrated its willingness to use force against the US through its firing on our planes patrolling the UN-established "no-fly zones."
Reality: The "no-fly zones" were never authorized by the United Nations, nor was their 12 year patrol by American and British fighter planes sanctioned by the United Nations. Under UN Security Council Resolution 688 (April, 1991), Iraq's repression of the Kurds and Shi'ites was condemned, but there was no authorization for "no-fly zones," much less airstrikes. The resolution only calls for member states to "contribute to humanitarian relief" in the Kurd and Shi'ite areas. Yet the US and British have been bombing Iraq in the "no-fly zones" for 12 years. While one can only condemn any country firing on our pilots, isn't the real argument whether we should continue to bomb Iraq relentlessly? Just since 1998, some 40,000 sorties have been flown over Iraq.
Claim: Iraq is an international sponsor of terrorism.
Reality: According to the latest edition of the State Department's Patterns of Global Terrorism, Iraq sponsors several minor Palestinian groups, the Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). None of these carries out attacks against the United States. As a matter of fact, the MEK (an Iranian organization located in Iraq) has enjoyed broad Congressional support over the years. According to last year's Patterns of Global Terrorism, Iraq has not been involved in terrorist activity against the West since 1993 - the alleged attempt against former President Bush.
Claim: Iraq tried to assassinate President Bush in 1993.
Reality: It is far from certain that Iraq was behind the attack. News reports at the time were skeptical about Kuwaiti assertions that the attack was planned by Iraq against former President Bush. Following is an interesting quote from Seymore Hersh's article from Nov. 1993:
Three years ago, during Iraq's six-month occupation of Kuwait, there had been an outcry when a teen-age Kuwaiti girl testified eloquently and effectively before Congress about Iraqi atrocities involving newborn infants. The girl turned out to be the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador to Washington, Sheikh Saud Nasir al-Sabah, and her account of Iraqi soldiers flinging babies out of incubators was challenged as exaggerated both by journalists and by human-rights groups. (Sheikh Saud was subsequently named Minister of Information in Kuwait, and he was the government official in charge of briefing the international press on the alleged assassination attempt against George Bush.) In a second incident, in August of 1991, Kuwait provoked a special session of the United Nations Security Council by claiming that twelve Iraqi vessels, including a speedboat, had been involved in an attempt to assault Bubiyan Island, long-disputed territory that was then under Kuwaiti control. The Security Council eventually concluded that, while the Iraqis had been provocative, there had been no Iraqi military raid, and that the Kuwaiti government knew there hadn't. What did take place was nothing more than a smuggler-versus-smuggler dispute over war booty in a nearby demilitarized zone that had emerged, after the Gulf War, as an illegal marketplace for alcohol, ammunition, and livestock.
This establishes that on several occasions Kuwait has lied about the threat from Iraq. Hersh goes on to point out in the article numerous other times the Kuwaitis lied to the US and the UN about Iraq. Here is another good quote from Hersh:
The President was not alone in his caution. Janet Reno, the Attorney General, also had her doubts. "The A.G. remains skeptical of certain aspects of the case," a senior Justice Department official told me in late July, a month after the bombs were dropped on Baghdad...Two weeks later, what amounted to open warfare broke out among various factions in the government on the issue of who had done what in Kuwait. Someone gave a Boston Globe reporter access to a classified C.I.A. study that was highly skeptical of the Kuwaiti claims of an Iraqi assassination attempt. The study, prepared by the C.I.A.'s Counter Terrorism Center, suggested that Kuwait might have "cooked the books" on the alleged plot in an effort to play up the "continuing Iraqi threat" to Western interests in the Persian Gulf. Neither the Times nor the Post made any significant mention of the Globe dispatch, which had been written by a Washington correspondent named Paul Quinn-Judge, although the story cited specific paragraphs from the C.I.A. assessment. The two major American newspapers had been driven by their sources to the other side of the debate.
At the very least, the case against Iraq for the alleged bomb threat is not conclusive.
Claim: Saddam Hussein will use weapons of mass destruction against us - he has already used them against his own people (the Kurds in 1988 in the village of Halabja).
Reality: It is far from certain that Iraq used chemical weapons against the Kurds. It may be accepted as conventional wisdom in these times, but back when it was first claimed there was great skepticism. The evidence is far from conclusive. A 1990 study by the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College cast great doubts on the claim that Iraq used chemical weapons on the Kurds. Following are the two gassing incidents as described in the report:
In September 1988, however - a month after the war (between Iran and Iraq) had ended - the State Department abruptly, and in what many viewed as a sensational manner, condemned Iraq for allegedly using chemicals against its Kurdish population. The incident cannot be understood without some background of Iraq's relations with the Kurds...throughout the war Iraq effectively faced two enemies - Iran and elements of its own Kurdish minority. Significant numbers of the Kurds had launched a revolt against Baghdad and in the process teamed up with Tehran. As soon as the war with Iran ended, Iraq announced its determination to crush the Kurdish insurrection. It sent Republican Guards to the Kurdish area, and in the course of the operation - according to the U.S. State Department - gas was used, with the result that numerous Kurdish civilians were killed. The Iraqi government denied that any such gassing had occurred. Nonetheless, Secretary of State Schultz stood by U.S. accusations, and the U.S. Congress, acting on its own, sought to impose economic sanctions on Baghdad as a violator of the Kurds' human rights.
Having looked at all the evidence that was available to us, we find it impossible to confirm the State Department's claim that gas was used in this instance. To begin with, there were never any victims produced. International relief organizations who examined the Kurds - in Turkey where they had gone for asylum - failed to discover any. Nor were there ever any found inside Iraq. The claim rests solely on testimony of the Kurds who had crossed the border into Turkey, where they were interviewed by staffers of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee...
It appears that in seeking to punish Iraq, the Congress was influenced by another incident that occurred five months earlier in another Iraqi-Kurdish city, Halabjah. In March 1988, the Kurds at Halabjah were bombarded with chemical weapons, producing many deaths. Photographs of the Kurdish victims were widely disseminated in the international media. Iraq was blamed for the Halabjah attack, even though it was subsequently brought out that Iran too had used chemicals in this operation and it seemed likely that it was the Iranian bombardment that had actually killed the Kurds.
Thus, in our view, the Congress acted more on the basis of emotionalism than factual information, and without sufficient thought for the adverse diplomatic effects of its action.
Claim: Iraq must be attacked because it has ignored UN Security Council resolutions - these resolutions must be backed up by the use of force.
Reality: Iraq is but one of the many countries that have not complied with UN Security Council resolutions. In addition to the dozen or so resolutions currently being violated by Iraq, a conservative estimate reveals that there are an additional 91 Security Council resolutions by countries other than Iraq that are also currently being violated. Adding in older resolutions that were violated would mean easily more than 200 UN Security Council resolutions have been violated with total impunity. Countries currently in violation include: Israel, Turkey, Morocco, Croatia, Armenia, Russia, Sudan, Turkey-controlled Cyprus, India, Pakistan, Indonesia. None of these countries have been threatened with force over their violations.
Claim: Iraq has anthrax and other chemical and biological agents.
Reality: That may be true. However, according to UNSCOM's chief weapons inspector 90-95 percent of Iraq's chemical and biological weapons and capabilities were destroyed by 1998; those that remained have likely degraded in the intervening four years and are likely useless. A 1994 Senate Banking Committee hearing revealed some 74 shipments of deadly chemical and biological agents from the U.S. to Iraq in the 1980s. As one recent press report stated:
One 1986 shipment from the Virginia-based American Type Culture Collection included three strains of anthrax, six strains of the bacteria that make botulinum toxin and three strains of the bacteria that cause gas gangrene. Iraq later admitted to the United Nations that it had made weapons out of all three...
The CDC, meanwhile, sent shipments of germs to the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission and other agencies involved in Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs. It sent samples in 1986 of botulinum toxin and botulinum toxoid - used to make vaccines against botulinum toxin - directly to the Iraqi chemical and biological weapons complex at al-Muthanna, the records show.
These were sent while the United States was supporting Iraq covertly in its war against Iran. U.S. assistance to Iraq in that war also included covertly-delivered intelligence on Iranian troop movements and other assistance. This is just another example of our policy of interventionism in affairs that do not concern us - and how this interventionism nearly always ends up causing harm to the United States.
Claim: The president claimed last night that: "Iraq possesses ballistic missiles with a likely range of hundreds of miles; far enough to strike Saudi Arabia, Israel, Turkey and other nations in a region where more than 135,000 American civilians and service members live and work."
Reality: Then why is only Israel talking about the need for the U.S. to attack Iraq? None of the other countries seem concerned at all. Also, the fact that some 135,000 Americans in the area are under threat from these alleged missiles just makes the point that it is time to bring our troops home to defend our own country.
Claim: Iraq harbors al-Qaeda and other terrorists.
Reality: The administration has claimed that some Al-Qaeda elements have been present in Northern Iraq. This is territory controlled by the Kurds - who are our allies - and is patrolled by U.S. and British fighter aircraft. Moreover, dozens of countries - including Iran and the United States - are said to have al-Qaeda members on their territory. Of the other terrorists allegedly harbored by Iraq, all are affiliated with Palestinian causes and do not attack the United States.
Claim: President Bush said in his speech on 7 October 2002: " Many people have asked how close Saddam Hussein is to developing a nuclear weapon. Well, we don't know exactly, and that's the problem..."
Reality: An admission of a lack of information is justification for an attack?
me: Who do you suppose laid all that out on the floor of the House in Speech before the US House of Representatives, October 8, 2002? Someone not intimidated by the cynical timing of the vote. Someone not brow beaten by the administration's despicable use of fear.
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Claim: Iraq has consistently demonstrated its willingness to use force against the US through its firing on our planes patrolling the UN-established "no-fly zones."
Reality: The "no-fly zones" were never authorized by the United Nations, nor was their 12 year patrol by American and British fighter planes sanctioned by the United Nations. Under UN Security Council Resolution 688 (April, 1991), Iraq's repression of the Kurds and Shi'ites was condemned, but there was no authorization for "no-fly zones," much less airstrikes. The resolution only calls for member states to "contribute to humanitarian relief" in the Kurd and Shi'ite areas. Yet the US and British have been bombing Iraq in the "no-fly zones" for 12 years. While one can only condemn any country firing on our pilots, isn't the real argument whether we should continue to bomb Iraq relentlessly? Just since 1998, some 40,000 sorties have been flown over Iraq.
UN authorized member states to use ANY MEANS NECESSARY TO ENFORCE RESOLUTIONS AGAINST Iraq.
As such it is illogical that member states needed to go back to the UN to get authorization to use any means necessary.
Claim: Iraq is an international sponsor of terrorism.[/b]
Reality: According to the latest edition of the State Department's Patterns of Global Terrorism, Iraq sponsors several minor Palestinian groups, the Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). None of these carries out attacks against the United States. As a matter of fact, the MEK (an Iranian organization located in Iraq) has enjoyed broad Congressional support over the years. According to last year's Patterns of Global Terrorism, Iraq has not been involved in terrorist activity against the West since 1993 - the alleged attempt against former President Bush.
Truth
Iraq was forbidden to support or contact ANY terrorist or terrorist group by the UN.
Despite this he continued to do so.
Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship provided headquarters, operating bases, training camps, and other support to terrorist groups fighting the governments of neighboring Turkey and Iran, as well as to hard-line Palestinian groups. Saddam Hussein gave safe haven to a Al-Qaeda member who participated in the 93 WTC bombing.
All of which were violations of UN resolutions.
Claim: Iraq tried to assassinate President Bush in 1993.
Reality: It is far from certain that Iraq was behind the attack. News reports at the time were skeptical about Kuwaiti assertions that the attack was planned by Iraq against former President Bush. Following is an interesting quote from Seymore Hersh's article from Nov. 1993:
Three years ago, during Iraq's six-month occupation of Kuwait, there had been an outcry when a teen-age Kuwaiti girl testified eloquently and effectively before Congress about Iraqi atrocities involving newborn infants. The girl turned out to be the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador to Washington, Sheikh Saud Nasir al-Sabah, and her account of Iraqi soldiers flinging babies out of incubators was challenged as exaggerated both by journalists and by human-rights groups. (Sheikh Saud was subsequently named Minister of Information in Kuwait, and he was the government official in charge of briefing the international press on the alleged assassination attempt against George Bush.) In a second incident, in August of 1991, Kuwait provoked a special session of the United Nations Security Council by claiming that twelve Iraqi vessels, including a speedboat, had been involved in an attempt to assault Bubiyan Island, long-disputed territory that was then under Kuwaiti control. The Security Council eventually concluded that, while the Iraqis had been provocative, there had been no Iraqi military raid, and that the Kuwaiti government knew there hadn't. What did take place was nothing more than a smuggler-versus-smuggler dispute over war booty in a nearby demilitarized zone that had emerged, after the Gulf War, as an illegal marketplace for alcohol, ammunition, and livestock.
This establishes that on several occasions Kuwait has lied about the threat from Iraq. Hersh goes on to point out in the article numerous other times the Kuwaitis lied to the US and the UN about Iraq. Here is another good quote from Hersh:
The President was not alone in his caution. Janet Reno, the Attorney General, also had her doubts. "The A.G. remains skeptical of certain aspects of the case," a senior Justice Department official told me in late July, a month after the bombs were dropped on Baghdad...Two weeks later, what amounted to open warfare broke out among various factions in the government on the issue of who had done what in Kuwait. Someone gave a Boston Globe reporter access to a classified C.I.A. study that was highly skeptical of the Kuwaiti claims of an Iraqi assassination attempt. The study, prepared by the C.I.A.'s Counter Terrorism Center, suggested that Kuwait might have "cooked the books" on the alleged plot in an effort to play up the "continuing Iraqi threat" to Western interests in the Persian Gulf. Neither the Times nor the Post made any significant mention of the Globe dispatch, which had been written by a Washington correspondent named Paul Quinn-Judge, although the story cited specific paragraphs from the C.I.A. assessment. The two major American newspapers had been driven by their sources to the other side of the debate.
At the very least, the case against Iraq for the alleged bomb threat is not conclusive.
Whom invaded whom without provocation and whom continually lied for 12+ years?
From declassified CIA report on the subject.
On 15 April 1993, a team of terrorists was arrested by Kuwaiti authorities for plotting to assassinate former President George Bush during an official visit to Kuwait City on the previous day. The two leaders of the team confessed to Kuwaiti authorities and later to US investigators that they had been recruited: trained: and equipped with arms, explosives, and false passports by Iraqi intelligence agents based in Basra. Forensic tests conducted by US experts proves conclusively that the explosive devices were identical to others recovered before and after the Kuwait event and were known to have been manufactured by Iraq.
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Around half a million Iraqi documents were captured by Coalition forces after the liberation of Kuwait and they serve to show the full extent of the repression. Among the documents can be found:
* orders to execute owners of houses bearing anti-Iraqi slogans.
* orders to kill on sight any civilian caught on the streets after curfew or anyone involved in any resistance activity.
* orders to use machine guns, grenade launchers and flame throwers against civilian demonstrators.
14 people were convicted of the attempt on Bush Sr.
The evidence was so convincing that President Clinton ordered missile strikes against Iraq as retaliation.
Claim: Saddam Hussein will use weapons of mass destruction against us - he has already used them against his own people (the Kurds in 1988 in the village of Halabja).
Ahem, It was the anti-war people who first brought this claim up as to why we should not hold saddam accountable.
Reality: It is far from certain that Iraq used chemical weapons against the Kurds. It may be accepted as conventional wisdom in these times, but back when it was first claimed there was great skepticism. The evidence is far from conclusive. A 1990 study by the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College cast great doubts on the claim that Iraq used chemical weapons on the Kurds. Following are the two gassing incidents as described in the report:
In September 1988, however - a month after the war (between Iran and Iraq) had ended - the State Department abruptly, and in what many viewed as a sensational manner, condemned Iraq for allegedly using chemicals against its Kurdish population. The incident cannot be understood without some background of Iraq's relations with the Kurds...throughout the war Iraq effectively faced two enemies - Iran and elements of its own Kurdish minority. Significant numbers of the Kurds had launched a revolt against Baghdad and in the process teamed up with Tehran. As soon as the war with Iran ended, Iraq announced its determination to crush the Kurdish insurrection. It sent Republican Guards to the Kurdish area, and in the course of the operation - according to the U.S. State Department - gas was used, with the result that numerous Kurdish civilians were killed. The Iraqi government denied that any such gassing had occurred. Nonetheless, Secretary of State Schultz stood by U.S. accusations, and the U.S. Congress, acting on its own, sought to impose economic sanctions on Baghdad as a violator of the Kurds' human rights.
Having looked at all the evidence that was available to us, we find it impossible to confirm the State Department's claim that gas was used in this instance. To begin with, there were never any victims produced. International relief organizations who examined the Kurds - in Turkey where they had gone for asylum - failed to discover any. Nor were there ever any found inside Iraq. The claim rests solely on testimony of the Kurds who had crossed the border into Turkey, where they were interviewed by staffers of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee...
It appears that in seeking to punish Iraq, the Congress was influenced by another incident that occurred five months earlier in another Iraqi-Kurdish city, Halabjah. In March 1988, the Kurds at Halabjah were bombarded with chemical weapons, producing many deaths. Photographs of the Kurdish victims were widely disseminated in the international media. Iraq was blamed for the Halabjah attack, even though it was subsequently brought out that Iran too had used chemicals in this operation and it seemed likely that it was the Iranian bombardment that had actually killed the Kurds.
Thus, in our view, the Congress acted more on the basis of emotionalism than factual information, and without sufficient thought for the adverse diplomatic effects of its action.
Eye witness's who survived attacks clearly identified Iraqi planes as those that had gassed the villages.
Of which one burn victim said: "We saw the (Iraqi) planes come and use chemical bombs. I smelled something like insecticide."
Claim: Iraq must be attacked because it has ignored UN Security Council resolutions - these resolutions must be backed up by the use of force.
Reality: Iraq is but one of the many countries that have not complied with UN Security Council resolutions. In addition to the dozen or so resolutions currently being violated by Iraq, a conservative estimate reveals that there are an additional 91 Security Council resolutions by countries other than Iraq that are also currently being violated. Adding in older resolutions that were violated would mean easily more than 200 UN Security Council resolutions have been violated with total impunity. Countries currently in violation include: Israel, Turkey, Morocco, Croatia, Armenia, Russia, Sudan, Turkey-controlled Cyprus, India, Pakistan, Indonesia. None of these countries have been threatened with force over their violations.
Red herring. Issue is Iraq, not what others may or may not have done. Especially since Iraq was the one who invaded another country with provocation and tried to attack Saudi Arabia, and Israel.
Claim: Iraq harbors al-Qaeda and other terrorists[/b].
Reality: The administration has claimed that some Al-Qaeda elements have been present in Northern Iraq. This is territory controlled by the Kurds - who are our allies - and is patrolled by U.S. and British fighter aircraft. Moreover, dozens of countries - including Iran and the United States - are said to have al-Qaeda members on their territory. Of the other terrorists allegedly harbored by Iraq, all are affiliated with Palestinian causes and do not attack the United States.
Actual truth was that Iraq did in fact harbor Al-Qaeda that committed the 93 WTC bombing after he fled the US after the bombing.
Claim: President Bush said in his speech on 7 October 2002: " Many people have asked how close Saddam Hussein is to developing a nuclear weapon. Well, we don't know exactly, and that's the problem..."
Reality: An admission of a lack of information is justification for an attack?
Another red herring. Numerous reasons were laid forth in the case for action in Iraq. To try to point to this as being the only reason for action is disingenuous and repugnant to say the least
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me: Who do you suppose laid all that out on the floor of the House in Speech before the US House of Representatives, October 8, 2002? Someone not intimidated by the cynical timing of the vote. Someone not brow beaten by the administration's despicable use of fear.
You didn't even guess. That was in 2002. October 2002. By a Representative facing election (as were all Representatives). From Texas.
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me: Who do you suppose laid all that out on the floor of the House in Speech before the US House of Representatives, October 8, 2002? Someone not intimidated by the cynical timing of the vote. Someone not brow beaten by the administration's despicable use of fear.
You didn't even guess. That was in 2002. October 2002. By a Representative facing election (as were all Representatives). From Texas.
I didnt guess cause I give a sh*t less who it was.
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A little more fat to chew on. Is this really a concern or just propaganda?
http://edition.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/08/08/gingrich/index.html#cnnSTCVideo
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If we were to follow McCain/Gingrich's vision for a new Imperial era and 100 years occupation they'll keep taking swings at us until they connect. But we can change the framework. We can point where the root of the problem lies - not in Iraq. Not in Iran. But in Saudi Arabia. The money for those schools he talks about comes from Saudi Arabia not Iran or Iraq. The hijackers on 911 came from Saudi Arabia not Iran or Iraq. We have a President who literally kisses the Saudi leaders while they fund another generation of indoctrinated children.
The President of Iran is a figure head pointing to him as a threat is propaganda; there is no evidence that the Mullahs who control Iran are immune to world pressure and incentives. We had an excellent opportunity to continue to work with them in 2003. Iran was helping us in 2002 and offered us a deal in the build up to our going into Iraq - we're the ones who decided after our apparent ease in marching to Baghdad that we did not need to work with them.
The idea that we are in more danger today than we perceived in the 1950s is crazy. Not looking back with hindsight, but the view from the United States in the 50s was that we would have a nuclear exchange with the Soviet Union. I know that there were plenty of people going around at the time talking about loosing American cities (plural). There were serious proposals about how we had to spread out across the country instead of clustering in cities - to make it harder for the soviets to kill large groups of Americans. Robert Heinlein for one lectured that we must do this now to save ourselves before it is too late. We practiced duck and cover. We built a huge network of shelters. We prepared to be nuked.
We do not face a greater threat from Islam than we did from the Soviet Union. It's not even close. There is a threat. If we had spent the resources we flittered away in Iraq on nonproliferation and other non-sexy, boring but critically important work (http://obama.senate.gov/press/070628-obama_lugar_sec/) we'd be so much safer that it would not come up in foreign policy discussions. As soon as we have a Democratic administration (Democratic in the sense of both meanings) we can start to rebuild the alliances and institutions that can defuse the hatred the current administration has fueled.
Is this a real concern or propaganda? It's a little of both but the implied solution in Gingrich framework is unsustainable. We can not be an Imperial power. We can not fight the entire world. The current administration has made us much less safe by fueling the radicals, by proving their point. Pulling back from the precipice will take time but we can do it. If GIngrich was to run in October it would be a good thing - I can think of no other one thing that would do more to ensure strong Democratic majorities in 2009.