History re-written again.Follow

Bush the Decider has said a squillion times at least, that Iraq is the Central Front in the ****. He's used it in many speeches, usually with other phrases designed to 'scare' the voter into submission, "fight them over there, rather than have them follow us back to the VaterLand Homeland", and similar. (I'm sure the Iraqis would have been agreeable to this strategy, if anyone had bothered to ask them).

Anyway, in the latest Whitehouse press breifing. this exchange ensued....



My Bold.

WTF?

the Bullshat coming out of these guys is relentless.


So. To summarise :-

Plan.

a. Invade Iraq to remove WMD threat. Oops! None there. But we'll stay and fix up some of the stuff we broke.

b. We'll disband the army and civil service, create hundreds o' thousands of unemployed peole in a country awash with guns and other weaponry (that we cant be ***** to guard)

c. We can't leave now 'cos Al Qeada has entered the country and is fomenting the violence. "its the central front on terror etc."

d. Well, as we're here, we'll kill the ex-President and his mates and some of his family. Success! But we can't leave 'cos theres chaos in the streets.

e. Ummm...well we'd like to leave, really we would. But we can't you see, because we havnt finished building our Embassy yet. Or our dozen or so 'enduring bases'. and besides, its the Central front of the ****....

f. Ah, Dammit! we were just about to leave, elections are done all is well, turning point blah blah, milestone reached blah....chaos in streets and sectarian violence 100's dying everyday...better stay and 'keep order', you know.....

g. We'll have a final money shot surge, to kill or capture all the evil-doers and then we'll leave...

h. The 'surge', destined for total failure is continuing to segregate people who not only used to live next door to each other, but used to marry each other too. Iraqis want the US out. The US people want the US out. But, "well we cant leave yet, the chaos and violence would be terrible".

i. ummm....well we'd like to leave, but the only reason we're still here is because, err...Al qeada has decided to make it the central front, and if we leave then they will use the opportunity to

Tony Snow again,



Wheres all this leading?

Does anyone still believe that "If the United States leaves Iraq things will really get bad." is a valid argument for the US to still be there?

The Bush administration loves the people of Iraq. How much more destruction, killing and torturing do you need to be convinced of that? We can't leave because of the violence. We can't leave until we have assured that peace returns to our dear comrades in Iraq. TRUE/FALSE

It seems to me that the Whitehouse is in the process of moving the goalposts again.

When the surge fails, what is going to be the next reason for not leaving?

It would appear that the next excuse is going to be "we'd like to leave, Really, we would, but we cant because Al qeada will rule the world from their Iraqi based caliphate."

Its gone from a coupla dozen men on planes, to 'mushroom clouds', to a 'global caliphate that wants to rule the world'.




And you rekkon I need a tinfoil hat?

Just goes to show, that if the Lies ar big enough, and repeated often enough, then (enough of) the people will fall for it every time.

It just never stops, so I gave up getting upset over such things long ago.

I think she's talking about your posting. Maybe you should take the initiative and STFU.

First off Helen Thomas is notorious for obnoxiously twisting words around during WH press briefings. She rarely has an actual point or relevant question, but kinda floats around like a hawk waiting for someone to say something that she can twist semantically to make an attack with. The previous White House Press Secretary feel into her little traps pretty much continiously. Snow is quite a bit better, but she does occasionally "get him".

This was one of those times. He's talking about what Al-queda is saying *today* with regard to Iraq. She's comparing that to *our* views/statements from the past. He was specifically talking about a recent tape released from Al-queda. She made a big deal because their statement was semantically similar to others made (in the opposite direction though) by the US administration in the past.

Um. Yeah. Iraq has been the "central front" in the War on Terror from day one (well, almost day one). Tony was talking about how Al-queda has now made it their central front as well (per their own recent statement). That's not to say that Al-queda hasn't been fighting there all along. That's not to say that Iraq hasn't been a key point all along. He's specifically saying that Al-queda has not openly stated that it is and is presumably putting all their international effort behind it rather then just allowing some locals to cause trouble with some minor guidance from one of their guys as they've done in the past.

But hey! Rhetoric sells well I guess. That's what Helen is best at.



Isn't it? Are you seriously suggesting that if the US just up and left tomorrow that there'd be no global repercussions? Care to support that assertion?




The goals of the Whitehouse with regard to Iraq have never changed. Not once. The measurement of success by those opposed to the war in Iraq has changed constantly though. You really should look at your own "side" first on this one.



That will depend entirely on how you choose to define "fails". See. Your "side" will label any result a failure no matter what happens. We could see a 90% reduction in attacks and you'd still call it a failure and demand that the troops come home.

It's not a magic fairy wand. Maybe you shouldn't set your expectations so high that they can't be met? Just a thought...



Which is exactly what we were told from the start. What part of "prevent Iraq from being a state that supports and harbors terrorists" did you not get when it was uttered 4+ years ago by President Bush? That kinda requires that we remove the current regime *and* make sure that the replacement isn't a puppet state for Al-queda. You can't just look at one and ignore the other...



Gone from? Look the language has changed, but the fundamental underlying cause and reason for us to be in Iraq has not. Stop getting so hung up on words. Why we're there hasn't changed. Why it's important that we're there hasn't changed. Why it's important that we don't leave this job half done *really* hasn't changed.

No matter how much you want to make it seem like it has, it really hasn't.





Funny. I was going to say the same thing, but about your position. Lies about why we went to Iraq, told not by the Bush administration, but by those against the war in order to convince people we went there for the wrong reasons. Lies about what our goals are (again to convince people that we're there for the wrong reasons). Lies about the dangers of Al-queda. Lies about what alternatives we have (actually, just a shocking lack of alternatives from the other side, but what do you expect?). Lies about the progress being made in Iraq (actually, a constantly moving set of goalposts so that we never "succeed" according to those telling the lies).

Want me to go on? Want me to show you the changes over time? Want me to show you the predictions made by the anti-war folks prior to the war's start? Then the predictions made after those predictions didn't come true? Then the talk about how we were failing to rebuild Iraq that magically stopped when the levels of electricity, phones, and water all rose above pre-war levels. Then the talk of other infrastructure which also magically stopped when the infrastructure (hospitals, schools, fire, police) all reached higher then pre-war levels. The predictions of poor voter turnout that were wrong. The predictions that they'd never get a constitution written. Also wrong. The predictions that they'd never ratify it. Also wrong. The silly conspiracy theories about the Iraqi oil, that never happened.

But hey! There's been significant fighting among some of the factions in Iraq (almost entirely the result of the growing call for withdrawal here in the US of course!), so highlight that instead. And um... Bush said Iraq was the central frong on the War on Terror and now Al-queda's saying it too! See. We predicted that... Kinda. Sorta.

Weak sauce. However, the chanting crowds don't ever seem to notice how weak their own arguments are...

You're so full of crap. Seriously... How you can write that with a straight face, I'll never understand.

I'm not going to even bother replying to these stupid lies and distortions, just like I don't bother replying to people who say 9/11 was done by the Free-Masons, cos its seriously on the same level.

The Iraq war has lasted longer than the US's involvement in WWII. Remember that. It's been over *4 years* now. And in those 4 years of feeling queasy, for us, or getting murdered, for the Iraqis, not much has been achieved.

Though I read Condo was finally talking to Iran, so I guess at least they are learning. Slowly.

Come on, 1 more year of these nut-jobs, and then we're done.

Normality.

It sounds like such a foreign concept.

Bin Laden and Zawahiri stated numerous times pre 9-11 that there goal was to get the United States stuck in a war in the middle east and fight them like they did the Russians in Afghanistan.

They stated it numerous times, in videos, in edicts, while talking to journalists.

It is nice to see that in Bush's rush to fulfill his personal desire to oust Hussein he and his administration completely ignored this fact. +Now the US is stuck in a situation that exactly what Al-qaeda wanted, with absolutely no outs that can be viewed as anything but failure and no chances of winning outside the slim chance of a diplomatic and political victory of the Iraqi govt somehow becoming workable without US involvement before January 1st 2009.

Doesn't make her question any less valid because you don't like the way she asked it.

A twinge of pride hits me when someone, finally, in the press corp asks a real question. Not some ********* fluff.

Nah, she got a ******** dance around answer about ****. His normal ****.

What part of "shaky alliance of factions in Iraq will turn to militarization if they think the US is leaving" do you find unreasonable? So much so that you wont even discuss it? Talk about burying your head in the sand...


Seriously. Why do you think that the Iraqi-on-Iraqi violence has gone up in Iraq over the last year or so? It's not insurgents or terrorists attacking US troops. Those attacks have been pretty constant in rate. The increase in violence (and massive increase in casualty rate) has been entirely from Iraqis killing Iraqis. Why are they doing it? It's not all about religion. That's the simplistic answer fed to people like you so you'll swallow the "we can't do anything about it" line.

Look deeper.

I have to agree that sitting in Iraq on a war footing isn't going to do any good. Then again, neither is throwing up our hands in disgust and leaving.

We're trying to fix the mess that was started long before King Bush took office. I blame Carter for fUcking Iran in the ***, which started the current trend of "hate the west". W. is only fanning the flames, even though he's trying to fix things...at least that's what I'm hearing. Maybe when you watch it backwards it says something different, like some of the records that I used to own.

This isn't to say that W. is fixing anything, because well, he's not that I can see.

Question! How can you have a "War on Terror"? Isn't terrorism going to be around as long as people hate eachother and have different ideals?

"We're at war with Al Qui-whatever" you say? Well from what I can gather, all anyone has is assumptions and "fears" as to where they might be. /yawn

Osama Bin Laden was last sighted in Paskistan, yet the Pakistanie government won't let us search for him, shall we invade them too?

As to you people and your little oil theory, might as well invade Venezuala since most of our oil comes from there, NOT the middle east as the media portrays.

I hate politics...

Paulsol, you might wanna take a look at this.

5 countries in 7 years.

I guess it's a good thing Iraq scrweed-up so badly after all.

Every cloud...