Step away from all of the politics for a moment...Follow

That's like saying you can't support firefighters without supporting fires.

Thought it up as far as I know, but my brain tends to be a sneaky thief. I might have heard it before.

Dude, we sold him WMD. He didn't use them on us. Used them on the Kurds. He was a bad, bad man. He certainly had crap loads of them in Gulf War I, and he didn't use them. Invading Iraq allowed any WMD he *might* still have had to migrate into terrorist hands. Terrorists who *will* use them against us. Ergo, invading Iraq made the US less secure.

This is not what I, alone, think. This is what the intelligence community testified to before congress - before the war.

Why oh why did no one listen?

The fact that little green men are not on Pluto hasn't been factually established either.

Right now let me take the stand that there are no little green men on Pluto.

It has also not be factually established that Bush started the war because he has a personal reason to kill Saddam.

Does the obivious have to be in black in white?

Huh? The same congress that then voted to authorize full military force in Iraq? The same congress that includes Kerry (who voted for the war in case you're still confused). Kinda doesn't put a good face on the "Kerry wouldn't have gotten us into Iraq" position, does it?


The "intelligence community" did not testify any such thing to anyone, either in Congress, or the Executive. The 9/11 commission cleared that little bit up quite nicely. They reported their findings and their conclusions. Their conclusions were that Iraq was a threat to the US, due to their past use of WMD, their presumed present possession of WMD, and their presumed resumed production and use of WMD if UN sanctions were removed.

That's what Congress was told, and that's what they reacted to. And that was only *one* reason of many for the war. If you actually read the resolution, you'll find 29 different reasons listed. IIRC, only like 5 even mention WMD, and only 2 of those mention them in the present tense (ie: Saddam "has WMD").

Please stop trying to make it sound like current possession of WMD was the sole reason for going to Iraq. It simply is not true. It never was true. Just because you and most of the rest of the US citizenry is too lazy to actually become informed on the issue and find out the full reasons is no excuse. Our Congress, and the Executive, were informed, and did make their decisions based on that information. Pretending that they made the decision based on what *you* know of the situation is just silly.


Oh. And the lack of ICBMs is irrelevant folks. Once again. Read the freaking resolution. One of the points talked about is the potential to use terrorists as a delivery system for WMD produced in Iraq. They didn't need ICBMs, and no one in Congress *thought* that ICBMs were the theat. Again. Your ignorance as to why Congress voted to go to war is no excuse. All it means is that you are unqualified to argue the topic.

Please stop trying to make it sound like current possession of WMD was the sole reason for going to Iraq. It simply is not true. It never was true. Just because you and most of the rest of the US citizenry is too lazy to actually become informed on the issue and find out the full reasons is no excuse. Our Congress, and the Executive, were informed, and did make their decisions based on that information. Pretending that they made the decision based on what *you* know of the situation is just silly.


The Republicans lied, misled, and did everything they could to establish Iraq as a direct threat to the US, and tied to 911.

Now that it's clear that all of that was a poorly executed sham, people are pissed off.

It's going to cost them the election.

Funny how trying to exploit the ignorance of the American People comes back to bite you in the *** like that, isn't it?

Kerry would never have gone to Iraq. In point of fact, pretty much NO ONE but Bush would have.

It was an aligning of a certain specefic constelation of neo-con zealots who should never have been in positions of power all at the same time.

There was a large chain of coincidal events that led to it even being possible, starting with Cheney being put in charge of an accelerated transition team after the '00 election and having disproportinate power to place his fellow neo-cons in high level jobs.

If the election had been a landslide for Bush, I don't think we'd have gone to Iraq. The echo chanmber wouldn't have been there and someone could have pointed out the obvious disasterous potential consequneces.

That depends on how we restructure Iraq. If ten years from now the mass of the population of Iraq has jobs, running water, electricity, phone service, the Internet, a non-corrupt police force, court system, free press, etc. then they probably won't be too keen on another dictator.


Yeah, we could use the model we have for helping Russia move towards Capitalism. That worked out well.



If, on the other hand, we (the US and hopefully soon the UN) are not able to help them to achieve these things, then they probably won't be too happy that their 8 year-old cousin died in a bomb blast to make their lives worse. They might even hold killing their cousin against us.


Iraq will be a muslim theocracy in ten years. I'd say it's about 95% likely.

Please expound, I don't the the connection between how a landslide victory would have averted going to war in Iraq.


Sure. Look, going to war in Iraq wasn't Bush's idea. I know that's a common assumption when we debate this stuff, but it wasn't. Bush on his own wouldn't have gone into Iraq. It wasn't no his long term agenda of things to accomplish.

It was on Cheney's and the close circle of like minded people that work in the Bush administration. Those people work in the administartion because Cheney was given power to appoint them as head of the transition team. A less rushed transition would have led to a more ballanced team being put in place, a team that wouldn't have had a radically pro-Isreal neo con tinge to it.

Specfically, Scooter Libby, Wolfowitz, Kissenger, Pearle and their subordanates.

Libby and Pearle would likely have had much lower level jobs and their influence on Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz (who would likely have had a sub Depuety position as well) was greatly magnified by the intimate access they were alowed. Pearle particularly.

Without that influence and that echo chamber of agreement that Iraq had to be invaded, the process that led us to that enagement would have been very, very, diffrent.

I'm not an expert, but I think you're being a bit negative just because the Rs are in charge rather than the Ds.


No, it's a cold blooded assesment of the situation.


How much does your percentage change if Kerry is elected?


Not at all.

If it makes you feel any better, Iran will no longer be a theocracy by 2045.

Ah. They "lied". Yet oddly, everything they said was an echo of what the best intelligence we had at the time said was true.

Funny how you kept saying: "Wait until the 9/11 commission proves that Bush lied", right up until they proved that he didn't. Now, you just keep harping that he lied, hoping desperately that despite a bipartisan group determining that he didn't that maybe if you just keep saying it enough, some people will believe you.

"mislead". Ok. I can sorta grant you that. But no more then any politician allowing the public to believe a simplified version of the facts if it works for them. At what point did the burden of politics become convincing a public that they shouldn't agree with what you want to do, but not because it's wrong but because they aren't agreeing for the right reasons.

If the people believe that the war was purely about current possession of WMD in Iraq, it's because it was the simplist thing to focus on, and it was the "sexy" story that fit nicely into a 10 second soundbit on the evening news.

Meanwhile, anyone who wanted to read the transcripts of the speaches would know all the other reasons we went to war. Anyone who wanted to inform themselves about the reasons for war need only take 30 seconds on google to find out. It's not like your government has hidden it from you. The reasons are listed in the war powers resolution Congress signed.


It is not the Bush administrations job to tell people not to agree with their agenda, regardless of *why* they agree with it. Honestly, if you believe it's "right" to go to war with Iraq, and you're trying to convince the people and Congress to go to war, and you list off all these reasons, and send tons of documents and intelligence to Congress and all other interested parties on the arguments for war, but the thing that everyone chooses to focus on is the current existence of WMD, should you stop the process and correct them? Should Bush have said: "Nope. I'm not going to go to war until everyone in the country can correctly list off all the reasons why we are going".


Um... That's ridiculous. No sane person would expect that. Yet you do. Look. The people who should have been bringing that up were the Dems, and/or anyone opposed to the war. Where were they in 2002? Where was the voice of opposition saying that we should be fully informed about the reasons for war? Where were the folks demanding that we talk about more then just WMD? Oddly, they were silent. Or more correctly, they were there, but they were drowned out by every news organization in the country repeating 2 sentences out of a 30 minute speach over and over, convincing the people that was all it was about. I'm sorry, but if you didn't have an issue with the public's perception of Iraq in 2002, then it's clear mudslinging to have an issue with it now.

It's not like the members of congress though that it was wrong to sign the war powers act until the "people" had a full understanding of why we were going to war either. They knew. It's in the document. Isn't that what's really important?


You're basically arguing that Bush is "bad" because he allowed people to not inform themselves about what was going on in politics. Um. That's not his job. It's your job as a citizen to inform yourself. If you think that the war was about finding WMD in Iraq, then you are not fully informed. Your government did not hide the facts from you. They were there for anyone to discover for themselves. I'm just curious at what point we call a politician a liar, not because he hid any information, but purely because some people chose not to actually read it? Madness.


It's pure rhetoric and you know it. The whole argument is built of hot air and nothing else. It sounds good on a bumper sticker, but simply doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Kinda like most of the Dem platform this election year. Sad really...

You're basically arguing that Bush is "bad" because he allowed people to not inform themselves about what was going on in politics


Nope. I don't have a moral oppinion on the matter.

I just think it's funny that by misleading the average voter to gain support in polls for his actions he's going to loose the election.

Declicously funny, actually.

What kind of a response was that Smash?

I write a post which consists primarily of the message: "Hey. All the information about why we went to war was readily available to anyone, so if you didn't know, it's not your governments fault", and all you respond to is that I made mention of you stating at some point that the 9/11 commission would find that Bush lied?

Pathetic.

Ok. Look. It's irrelevant. Let's pretend I didn't even say it. From this point on, you never said anything about how the 9/11 commission would show Bush lied.


That still does not change the fact that the 9/11 commission proved that Bush did not lie. It does not change the fact that despite this, you still continue to say that Bush lied.

Can you please explain that? How many times do I have to keep pulling out the definition of lie before you stop arguing this point. The last time we did this, we got right to this point, you ******* about me correcting me about you lying, I commented on how you keep doing it no matter how many times I corrected you, and then you stopped posting on the thread.

How many times are we going to do this Smash? How many times will you drop the subject when I prove you wrong, only to make the exact same claim in another thread, forcing me to correct you again?

Are you that completely unable to learn from your mistakes? Are you an idiot that must keep doing the same things over and over? If you were in a psych experiement, you'd be the guy who'd keep pushing the bar and getting shocked over and over because well... maybe this time something different will happen.


Lame. Here. I just want you to say it once:

"Bush did not lie about Iraq and WMD".

Just do it. It's the truth. If you can't bring yourself to say that, how about you at least stop saying Bush lied. It's just makes you look moronic.