Oh Snap! McClellan TUBs Bush & Co.

[SteveGrenard]

1) Clarke and Wilson had their own agenda and even though the libs think of them as heroes, they are just self-aggrandizing sots. Val Plame's book went straight into the cut out bin.

2) Blix was a enemy of the Bush administration from day one. He had zero intention of enforcing any repercussions for Iraq violating U.N. sanctions. Since leaving the U.N. Blix prances around as if he were Mahatma Gandhi.

3) Ritter was on Saddam's payroll. He was saying Saddam did not have WOMD's at the same time Saddam was saying that he did have them. Who would you beleive? That's a rhetorical if ever there was one.

4) Curveball was never proven to be a liar before March, 2003. It was his info that the CIA counted on way more than Chalabi.

But what a coincidence then. News flash: Since 2003 until today we still have not found any WMDs or evidence of WMDs in Iraq. So all these people with their own agendas amazingly somehow managed to be correct and the CIA, Administration and all those jumping on the war turned out to be wrong. Oh well. Still doesn't explain to me why after Saddem was hung, an election was held and no WMDs were found why we are still there? Oh, because of the insurgents? I don't remember them being a cause for war...but maybe if we went away they would also....

 

[SteveGrenard]

Had Bush 41 taken Baghdad when he had half a million troops in the theater of operations back in 1991, there would not be a Saddam in power to shoot at U.S. aircraft since Operation Desert Storm.

Agreed but has nothing to do with the reality of here/now. GHWB and all of us will have to live with that.

You didn't hesitate long enough. Imagine if Saddam had fired on Russian aircraft in the no-fly-zone because, as you say, he had no way of discerning the aircraft's country of origin.

Imagine? This is not about imagining things that didn't happen. Are you saying if Saddem fired on a Russian flight Russia would invade Iraq? But it didn't happen so why fantasize about it?
If that's what you are implying, it is speculation in the extreme.

 

[fishbob]

What is this "lie" (knew the facts to be otherwise, but intentionally deceived) Dr. Rice has told? Considering your characterization of Dr. Rice as a "weasel," your judgement is too severely impaired to render any useful analysis. But thank you for sharing your experiences with animal feces.

Pull your head out and review a few of the many discussions on this forum or some of the many articles you can find on the net.

By the way, you have some doggy doo on your shoe.

 

[Puppycow]

Welcome back!

 

[President Bush]

Uncle Daddy's worm farm

 

[easycruise]

Not like none of this has been hashed and rehashed, ec. What makes you think you are posting revelations here? You are posting mostly winger memes as Dr A called them earlier. Both sides have winger memes on this topic.

They are not one of Dawkins' memes, (not this Dr. A you mention) they are solid facts and you can't refute them. I can, however, debunk most every left-wing meme, because the Bush critics refuse to do any research on the Iraq war. At any rate, let's get on with the debunking of all your claims, shall we?

]If you want to defend your position, start first by deleting all the crap that "someone else did it too". That would be the first place to start. Because that is a Bushco circular argument. They put out the false information and tried tied to discredit the contradictory information. So anyone who "did it too" would have been going by the false picture that Bush and his admin were manipulating.

That's not a circular argument. You are forgetting that the White House is NOT in the international intelligence gathering business! That's the CIA's job. If we were "misled" by Bush, then we were also misled by all those Democrats who I just quoted. The whole world thought Saddam had WMD's, not just Bush. All the international intelligence agencies and the US Congress are not dependant on the Bush White House for their intelligence information. To say that Congress was going by Bush's false picture is just utter nonsense. BTW, I've got many more WMD quotes from people YOU probably voted for in the past.

Here's another of many..

"“There’s no question that Saddam Hussein is a threat… Yes, he has chemical and biological weapons. He’s had those for a long time. But the United States right now is on a very much different defensive posture than we were before September 11th of 2001… He is, as far as we know, actively pursuing nuclear capabilities, though he doesn’t have nuclear warheads yet. If he were to acquire nuclear weapons, I think our friends in the region would face greatly increased risks as would we."—Wesley Clark on September 26, 2002

Didn't vote for Clark? OK, how about this one..

""Saddam Hussein’s regime represents a grave threat to America and our allies, including our vital ally, Israel. For more than two decades, Saddam Hussein has sought weapons of mass destruction through every available means. We know that he has chemical and biological weapons. He has already used them against his neighbors and his own people, and is trying to build more. We know that he is doing everything he can to build nuclear weapons, and we know that each day he gets closer to achieving that goal."—John Edwards, Oct 10, 2002

In fact, it was Clinton appointee, CIA director George Tenet who was the source of the "slam dunk" intelligence that Saddam had WMD's. Heck, as we now know, Saddam was even telling his own Generals that he had WMDs!

""It's a slam-dunk case"
~ George Tenet, Clinton-appointed CIA Director, December 12, 2002

]Second, there were people objecting to the facts as they were being presented at the time. There was Clarke, Blix, Ritter, Wilson and others.

Not true....

""Iraq has declared that it produced about 8,500 litres of this biological warfare agent [Anthrax], which it states it unilaterally destroyed in the summer of 1991. Iraq has provided little evidence for this production and no convincing evidence for its destruction.
There are strong indications that Iraq produced more anthrax than it declared, and that at least some of this was retained after the declared destruction date. It might still exist.
There are also indications that the agent [VX nerve gas] was weaponised. In addition, there are questions to be answered concerning the fate of the VX precursor chemicals...
...inspectors have found at another site a laboratory quantity of thiodiglycol, a mustard gas precursor.
In addition, Iraq has refurbished its missile production infrastructure. In particular, Iraq reconstituted a number of casting chambers, which had previously been destroyed under UNSCOM supervision."
~ Hans Blix, Report to UN Security Council, January 27, 2003

""Even today, Iraq is not nearly disarmed. Based on highly credible intelligence, UNSCOM [the U.N. weapons inspectors] suspects that Iraq still has biological agents like anthrax, botulinum toxin, and clostridium perfringens in sufficient quantity to fill several dozen bombs and ballistic missile warheads, as well as the means to continue manufacturing these deadly agents. Iraq probably retains several tons of the highly toxic VX substance, as well as sarin nerve gas and mustard gas. This agent is stored in artillery shells, bombs, and ballistic missile warheads. And Iraq retains significant dual-use industrial infrastructure that can be used to rapidly reconstitute large-scale chemical weapons production."—Ex-Un Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter in 1998

Inspectors wouldn't come back into Iraq for many years after this statement. But, more recently, here's a speech that Ritter gave at Wellesley just 2 weeks before the start of the war. Bottom line, Ritter did a very poor speech and embarrassed himself.

http://www.massnews.com/2003_Editions/3_March/031703_mn_un_pedophile_at_wellesley.shtml

Joe Wilson has been thoroughly discredited. Even the Washington Post eviscerated him. An editorial headlined "A Good Leak" published in the April 9, 2006 Washington Post claims that "Mr. Wilson was the one guilty of twisting the truth and that, in fact, his report [to the CIA] supported the conclusion that Iraq had sought uranium."" British Intelligence STILL say that he sought it. BTW, Wilson and his wife's lawsuit has already been thrown out of court.

You cannot explain the Plame affair by sidetracking the issue as to whether she was undercover or not or whether Libby or Rove made the actual calls.

Would that be the same Plame that was outed by Clinton appointee Richard Armitage? LOL. Funny you didn't mention that. Moving on..

Bush clearly made no effort to sort the information out.

Ahem, it's the CIA's job to sort it out, not the White House and George Bush. But leave it to the Bush critics to try to pin it on him.

Just claiming other people didn't figure it out either ignores the fact other people didn't have control over the top Bushies who told everyone the information was solid when it wasn't.

Oh please, Tenet was the one who said it was solid! Get your basic facts straight. Besides, the Senate has it's own intelligence committee, remember? The House does too. The White House doesn't have a stranglehold over the CIA. I find it laughable that the Bush critics try to pin everything on Bush as being a great diabolical manipulator while at the same time calling him dumb and stupid. It's quite laughable.

""“As a member of the House Intelligence Committee, I am keenly aware that the proliferation of chemical and biological weapons is an issue of grave importance to all nations. Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process.""—Nancy Pelosi, December 16, 1998

And that includes the attempt by Bush to claim other intelligence departments from other countries also drew the same conclusions. They did actually, try the Downing St memo for one. And the Italians told the CIA that Chalabi was a liar.

Downing Street Memo? Oh my. You havn't done any due diligence on this one either. The DSM is just one person's recollection of a oral conversation that others were having and has since been discredited. In addition, it was the British version of events that were happening in Washington. Hardly fist hand information. And that supposed "smoking gun" was so flimsy that the news of this DSM didn't even survive past the London bombings a few days later. It was quickly dropped. Many newspapers such as the Chicago Tribune said..

""It's hard to find a smoking gun in the Downing Street memo, unless you're intent on finding one.""

They also said..

""Four months later, in November, the United Nations Security Council approved Resolution 1441, sponsored by the U.S., which required Iraq to submit to weapons inspections and disclose any elements of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons programs. This page has long argued that war could well have been averted if the UN had been willing to enforce its resolution. Six months after the Downing Street memo, UN weapons inspector Hans Blix reported in detail on Iraq's failure to cooperate with inspectors. If Iraq had cooperated, it would have defused any U.S. intention to go to war. Iraq did not.""

It's amazing that with all these facts out there, the Bush critics still say.."It's all Bush's fault". They'd rather parrot the left-wing propaganda instead of doing proper due diligence on one of the most important events of our time. Next I'll get into Saddam's terrorist connections, which the Bush bashers always try to deny, but can't explain away. Solid facts are certainly there as well. Stay tuned.

 

[aggle-rithm]

Correct me if I am wrong but if these resolutions as I suspect all had to do with making sure there were no WMDS, and there were no WMDS, I think in his twisted way of thinking Saddam felt justified in feeling that fully complying with the resolutions were not justified since there were no WMDs to which they would apply. He certainly did allow several teams of inspectors into the country and they found nothing.

When you put it that way, Saddam sounds almost reasonable! It almost makes you forget how he toyed with the inspectors, promising them access to certain sites then denying it at the last moment. He was certainly successful in creating the impression that he was hiding something.

Since no WMDs were found, it seems likely that this was all political posturing, to bolster his standing with the people of Iraq and perhaps to scare the Iranians.

About McClellan: I suddenly realized why he has the same last name as a former Mayor of Austin...he is her son! Didn't know that.

 

[Puppycow]

Senate committee: Bush knew Iraq statements were untrue

WASHINGTON— A long-awaited Senate Select Intelligence Committee report made public Thursday concludes that President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney made public statements to promote an invasion of Iraq that they knew at the time were not supported by available intelligence.

A companion report found that a special office set up by then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld undertook "sensitive intelligence activities" that were inappropriate "without the knowledge of the Intelligence Community or the State Department."

 

[Chaos]

When you put it that way, Saddam sounds almost reasonable! It almost makes you forget how he toyed with the inspectors, promising them access to certain sites then denying it at the last moment. He was certainly successful in creating the impression that he was hiding something.

Since no WMDs were found, it seems likely that this was all political posturing, to bolster his standing with the people of Iraq and perhaps to scare the Iranians.
*snip*

Saddam had his balls in a vise. If he convinced the US that he had WMD´s, they´d come bust his ass. If he convinced his fellow Arab despots, the Iranians, and his own rebellious subjects that he didn´t have WMD´s, one of them would come bust his ass. He was simply wriggling desperately to cover his previous posterior from both directions.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

1) Clarke and Wilson had their own agenda and even though the libs think of them as heroes, they are just self-aggrandizing sots. Val Plame's book went straight into the cut out bin.

2) Blix was a enemy of the Bush administration from day one. He had zero intention of enforcing any repercussions for Iraq violating U.N. sanctions. Since leaving the U.N. Blix prances around as if he were Mahatma Gandhi.

3) Ritter was on Saddam's payroll. He was saying Saddam did not have WOMD's at the same time Saddam was saying that he did have them. Who would you beleive? That's a rhetorical if ever there was one.

And yet as it turned out, the very people you are claiming here were unreliable turned out to be correct. The group who were not were all the people calling these guys liars. And since the Bush team was exposed in their attempts to discredit Wilson, and since they were caught lying about it as opposed to claiming they actually believed the tripe they tried to peddle, I'd say your assessment here just shows you are part of the target audience the war propaganda is aimed to influence.

4) Curveball was never proven to be a liar before March, 2003. It was his info that the CIA counted on way more than Chalabi.

Bull. But then, you bought the propaganda, didn't you?

I suggest you quit lying to yourself and read what the Italian Secret Service told the Bush team repeatedly about that particular piece of evidence. It was one of the most blatant lies Bush peddled given what they were told about these characters.

 

[pgwenthold]

Since I have Cicero on ignore, I will respond to skeptigirl's quote of him

3) Ritter was on Saddam's payroll. He was saying Saddam did not have WOMD's at the same time Saddam was saying that he did have them. Who would you beleive? That's a rhetorical if ever there was one.

It's a "rhetorical"? It's blatent idiocy is what it is.

On one hand, we have the "Saddam wanted everyone to THINK he had WMD" crowd. OTOH, we have the "Saddam paid Scott Ritter to claim he didn't have WMD" bunch.

That makes no sense at all. If you want people to think you have WMD, why send out a weapons inspector to tell everyone you don't? Man, it seems Saddam put an awful lot of stock in the gullibility of intelligence agencies. I mean, was he really relying on Colin Powell calling hydrogen generators "mobile weapons facilities"? How brilliant would you have to be to know that the US would be that stupid?

In the end, if Saddam wanted everyone to think he had WMD, he did a pretty poor job. The only reason it flew is because of a bunch of single-track-minded neocons who had their main goal the invasion of Iraq.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Easycruise, it's pointless to review for you the supportable facts since you chose to rely on the Republican winger memes. I think your positions have been thoroughly debunked time and time again.

Bottom line:

No WMDs, the war is a failure and has become the quagmire even Cheney said it would before he started this lying campaign to drum up public support.

Corruption is rampant from the crony contractors to the Iraqis who managed to get in on the deal. Now those same Iraqis are manipulating the US military into killing off the Iraqi's political rivals.

And every rat who jumps ship and writes a book about it seems to be saying the same thing.

Yet here you and that <30% of the public (whatever the number is down to yet I don't know) are still refusing to look at the facts, still clinging to your winger memes while you cover your ears and eyes.

Don't you care that your billions of tax dollars have been so poorly spent? Don't you care about the cronyism which accounts for so much wasting of those dollars you earned? Don't you care that we are in a quagmire and al Qaeda has regrouped thanks to Bush's incompetence? And don't you care that we are relying on Mexico to keep terrorists out because there is an open door between Mexico and the US? Any terrorist who wants in the US just has to bribe a Mexican border guard, not hard to do.

I would think that even the most right wing supporters would be a little pissed at how poorly their believed King George has failed them.

 

[SteveGrenard]

Don't you care that your billions of tax dollars have been so poorly spent? Don't you care about the cronyism which accounts for so much wasting of those dollars you earned?

Mark Greene, the former Public Advocate for NYC has recently blogged that American taxpayors should start Qui Tam suits against the government for spending their money on the basis of fraud and deception.

Don't you care that we are in a quagmire and al Qaeda has regrouped thanks to Bush's incompetence? And don't you care that we are relying on Mexico to keep terrorists out because there is an open door between Mexico and the US? Any terrorist who wants in the US just has to bribe a Mexican border guard, not hard to do.

Al Qeda was not in Iraq before we invaded it. The administration knew that these extremists were offended by such things as cartoons, toilets facing Mecca and cube shaped buildings in NYC (e.g. Apple Store). Years ago they were offended by our Navy anchoring in Yemeni waters and they were offended by our AF Base in Saudia Arabia. What do you think they would do if the U.S. invaded a Muslim nation, especially after Saddem was deposed and executed? It is not at all unexpected, therefore, that these terrorists reacted they way they have since the banner Mission Accomplished was flown as a backdrop for Bush. The peristent attack and occupation of Iraq is what drew alQeda and insurgents into the actions that killed four thousand or more of our troops. It is, indeed, a quagmire.

 

[Dr Adequate]

That's not a circular argument. You are forgetting that the White House is NOT in the international intelligence gathering business! That's the CIA's job. If we were "misled" by Bush, then we were also misled by all those Democrats who I just quoted.

Who were mislead by the Bush administration.

The whole world thought Saddam had WMD's, not just Bush.

Strange lie, whom do you hope to deceive by it?

All the international intelligence agencies and the US Congress are not dependant on the Bush White House for their intelligence information. To say that Congress was going by Bush's false picture is just utter nonsense. BTW, I've got many more WMD quotes from people YOU probably voted for in the past.

Go Obama!

I find it laughable that the Bush critics try to pin everything on Bush as being a great diabolical manipulator while at the same time calling him dumb and stupid. It's quite laughable.

Yes, I can just image you giggling a your witless straw man, possibly drooling gently the while. However, the people who elicit such hysteria in you are aware that Bush is not the entire Bush administration; and that dumb Republicans tell lies, if possible, even more frequently than the smart ones.

Downing Street Memo? Oh my. You havn't done any due diligence on this one either. The DSM is just one person's recollection of a oral conversation that others were having and has since been discredited.

Whining and lying about something is not the same as discrediting it.

In addition, it was the British version of events that were happening in Washington. Hardly fist hand information. And that supposed "smoking gun" was so flimsy that the news of this DSM didn't even survive past the London bombings a few days later. It was quickly dropped.

A particularly transparent lie, as it has, in fact, remained a bone of contention --- you, for example, appear still to be whining about it.

 

[easycruise]

Easycruise, it's pointless to review for you the supportable facts since you chose to rely on the Republican winger memes. I think your positions have been thoroughly debunked time and time again.

No, they havn't been debunked "time and time again", certainly not by you, and you refuse to debate point by point because you realize you can't offer anything substantial in rebuttal. My advice is that you should stop reading the unsupported left-wing propaganda and start using facts, logic and critical thinking and you'll perform much better in this forum. Until then, you just continue to embarrass yourself, just like you have in our prior debates.

Bottom line:

No WMDs, the war is a failure and has become the quagmire even Cheney said it would before he started this lying campaign to drum up public support.

War is a failure? Huh? We seem to be on the verge of victory, dontcha know. Wake up.

]Yet here you and that <30% of the public (whatever the number is down to yet I don't know) are still refusing to look at the facts, still clinging to your winger memes while you cover your ears and eyes.

You refuse to debate my facts and proffer any of your own and would rather speak in unsupported generalities. BTW, Bush approval rating is approx 30%. Approval rating of Bush opponents (Congress) is only 18%.

Don't you care that your billions of tax dollars have been so poorly spent? Don't you care about the cronyism which accounts for so much wasting of those dollars you earned? Don't you care that we are in a quagmire and al Qaeda has regrouped thanks to Bush's incompetence? And don't you care that we are relying on Mexico to keep terrorists out because there is an open door between Mexico and the US? Any terrorist who wants in the US just has to bribe a Mexican border guard, not hard to do.

I would think that even the most right wing supporters would be a little pissed at how poorly their believed King George has failed them.

Now I see you definitely refuse to debate and are moving on to areas where you think you might have a chance to score debate points. First we need to see you concede to all the previous FACTS I presented.

Al Qeda was not in Iraq before we invaded it. The administration knew that these extremists were offended by such things as cartoons, toilets facing Mecca and cube shaped buildings in NYC (e.g. Apple Store). Years ago they were offended by our Navy anchoring in Yemeni waters and they were offended by our AF Base in Saudia Arabia. What do you think they would do if the U.S. invaded a Muslim nation, especially after Saddem was deposed and executed? It is not at all unexpected, therefore, that these terrorists reacted they way they have since the banner Mission Accomplished was flown as a backdrop for Bush. The peristent attack and occupation of Iraq is what drew alQeda and insurgents into the actions that killed four thousand or more of our troops. It is, indeed, a quagmire.

I'm glad we invaded Iraq. I thought it was a brilliant move by Bush. It was a two for one deal. You got rid of a mass murdering megalomanical dictator and you got yourself a much better battlefield in which to fight the terrorists than the one in Afganistan. Fighting them in terrain with elevated hillsides is not conducive to a successful campaign. You also have the increased risk of friendly fire. That's how Pat Tillman got killed.

Strange lie, whom do you hope to deceive by it?

I can see you are another one who won't intelligently debate and would rather engage in ad hominem attacks.

Yes, I can just image you giggling a your witless straw man, possibly drooling gently the while. However, the people who elicit such hysteria in you are aware that Bush is not the entire Bush administration; and that dumb Republicans tell lies, if possible, even more frequently than the smart ones.

And I can imagine you frantically trying to form an intelligent debating point while recoiling in horror from an actual keen observation to which you have no response and are reduced to babbling something about George Bush not being so dumb after all.

Whining and lying about something is not the same as discrediting it.

Would you care to add something intelligent to the debate or are you only just able to call people liars and whiners while adding nothing substantial?

A particularly transparent lie, as it has, in fact, remained a bone of contention --- you, for example, appear still to be whining about it.

Ahem, Skeptigirl first brought it up as a bone of left-wing contention. Please read the forum posts for content next time before responding. She "whined" about it and I claimed it as being very flimsy and provided quotes from people who have examined it closely. That's how a debate works. Until you can understand that, we'll have to call you "Dr. Inadequate."