Okay, so imagine that our soldiers HAD FOUND a HUGE STASH of WMD in Iraq.

Let's say there was a couple of primitive fission bombs, the infamous bio trucks actually WERE bio trucks with say... 50 vials of botulinum toxin, as well as 100 totally proscribed missiles.

Okay, so the WMD were there. Obviously STILL not a threat to us, with the greatest military apparatus on earth and them having no delivery route ( and their intent to use them is still up in the air too)

Iraq has been pretty quiet for 12 years and stayed contained in its borders.

Does the presence of the WMD excuse or justify Bush's annexation of Iraq?


Keep in mind the fact that Bush Sr's proxy, Ambassador April Glaspie implied the US's consent for out then-ally Iraq's invasion of Kuwait's oilfields in '90. She simply hadn't anticipated their taking THE ENTIRE COUNTRY.

That's what the weapons inspections were for, which the regime was cooperating with, according to Hans Blix.

In order for invasion and occupation to have been justified they would have had to represent an imminent threat to the US, with advacned WMD programs and an actual credible threat to attack the US.

I do not oppose preemptive war. I just set the bar very high as to when it's necessary, and I will never trust this Administration to make that decision.

Bush had no clue if anything was there in the first place.

"reliance by the United States on further diplomatic and other peaceful means alone will neither (A) adequately protect the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq"

There was no threat and they knew it at the time. They hyped it up expecting to find something, maybe even just more remnants of what Iraq had had in 1991. You can't say there's a threat if you've got no proof that the materials that create the threat actually exist. They never had that.

and was not a imminent threat. Our military's might should have been concentrated around the network that attacked us here at home. Perversely, their base country is relatively intact.

Where is their base country?

I find the 'official' explanations to these questions harder to believe every day.

and their base is somewhere in Eastasia, or whoever we've always been at war with.

I was referring to al Quaeda and Afghanistan. Who do you think was the mastermind?

All of the (SAUDI) hijackers were in AMERICA; their "base" was AMERICA; most had been living in the USA for years. The lead hijacker attended & graduated from a US university.

Al Qaeda, by the way, is a PAKISTANI group.

who was in Afghanistan at the time? And, pardon, but I didn't think there was ONE home base for al Qaeda. Didn't OBL built it up to its present prominence following our intervention and aid against the Soviets in Afghanistan?

Al Qaeda is most prominent in Pakistan, which is where the organization began.

I'm trying to understand your view.

I know OBL wasn't leading the Taleban and I'm not saying al Qaeda originated or was based in Afghanistan. al Qaeda has had to be nomadic.

We all know the hijackers were here in this country already and that various groups around the world were communicating prior to the 9/11. It doesn't matter where they were but from whom they were taking direction. He was in Afghanistan at that time and that is why I think going after him there to break up the network would've been a more understandable course of action than going after Sadaam.

This is how I've interpreted my readings. Where do we disagree?

which had nothing to do with the 911 attacks.

When a SUSPECTED CRIMINAL is residing in Canada, do you advocate bombing the shit out of Canada, and then invading & occupying Canada?

I'd guess that no, you wouldn't advocate that.

Yet had OBL been residing in Canada, Canada also has extradition laws, just like Afghanistan (and America) that NO ONE will be handed over to another nation without first being shown reasonable proof
of the suspect's guilt; and IN FACT Canada has a law that prohibits handing anyone over to ANY nation that has the death penalty.

Afghanistan offered to hand OBL over to UN or other neutral authorities if reasonable proof of OBL's guilt was produced. bush declined.

Afghanistan offered to hand OBL over to the UN or other neutral authorities, for public trial. bush declined.

And just as with Iraq, the fact is bush & his Cartel were planning to invade Afghanistan long before 911.

That, I believe, is where you & I differ on this issue.

but my point in response to the original question was: IF they had to go into a country, it should've been Afghanistan where OBL was and not Iraq, where he wasn't. I wasn't advocating bombing the crap out of EITHER country but pointing out how ironic it is for Iraq to be torn to smithereens when the mastermind behind 9/11 wasn't even there.

agreement. :)

:bounce:

buy you a beverage?

:toast: :beer:

Back atcha!

:toast: :beer:

...can I also imagine that Gore took office in Jan 2001?

That do NOT require "the Dresdening of Fallujah".

We had so many other options than invasion. Surely, if Sadaam had these weapons it would have been prudent to take action. Hans Blix was on that case, sanctions had the desired crippling effect, and we could have always done more to foster a people's rebellion.

We could have taken the motherfucker down without war and all the breakage of innocent bystanders war involves. And that is the simple truth.

Bush's blood lust knows no bounds.

and perceptions are what matter in politics. The war would not have been nearly as controversial at home and abroad if the administration's prognostications had been remotely reliable.

The rest of the world thought the invasion NOT JUSTIFIED from the start; as did half of America. It wasn't until the bombs were dropping on Baghdad that a US majority supported bush's invasion. And at that time, the vast majority of Americans still thought Iraq did 911.

So no, finding "wmd" in Iraq would not have been seen as justification...other than by the rightwingnut idiots who will insist the invasion is justified even if Jesus himself appeared and said it was not.

Support was, if I recall correctly, over 70% at the time Bush invaded. The absence of WMDs and continuing deaths of Americans is what has eroded that support to well less than 50% now.

Until the bombs were dropping on Baghdad.

"...if the Bush administration does not seek a final Security Council vote, support for a war drops to 47%."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2003-03-16-poll-iraq_x.htm

So of course bush swore up & down that he would seek a 2nd vote;

"No matter what the whip count is, we're calling for the vote. We want to see people stand up and say what their opinion is about Saddam Hussein and the utility of the United Nations Security Council. And so, you bet. It's time for people to show their cards, to let the world know where they stand when it comes to Saddam."

-3/6/03

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030306-8.html

but in fact bush LIED. And FLIP FLOPPED. Again.

"At a National Security Council meeting convened at the White House at 8:55 a.m., Bush finalized the decision to withdraw the resolution from consideration and prepared to deliver an address to the nation that had already been written."

-3/18/03

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2003/Mar/18/ln/ln11a.html

Without a 2nd UN vote, American support was a minority 47%. The US StenoMedia tried to bury that little bit of info.

The polls you site are all taken before the war and they survey whether people think Bush (at that time) should seek a second UN resolution. They don't express opposition to the war after it's outbreak, or support only "until the bombs were dropped on Baghdad," as you maintain. They instead express a preference for future policy.

The Pew research center has a chart that shows support for the war over the course of 2003. I can't manage to copy it on here but I'll provide a link and a summary of some of it's findings:

"Trends in Views about Iraq"

http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=199

April 2003 74% support decision to go to war
At the end of October support dipped to it's lowest level that year: 60%. It rebounded to 67% by the end of the year, following the capture of Saddam Hussein.


It is obviously much lower now. One CNN Gallup poll summarized on the Pew website puts support for Bush's handling of the war at only 42% (a somewhat different question from the above poll, so the comparison is not direct).

Americans do not base their views of US foreign policy on UN approval. In my view, the decline in public support for the war correlates with increasing casualties, the failure to discover WMD, and a policy that is obviously (to 42% of Americans anyway) floundering.

My point here is not that the war is legitimate. From my perspective, it is now and has always been entirely illegitimate. But most Americans have come to that view gradually. Far more than 50%--in fact 74% according to Pew's data--supported the war when it first broke out. I had many conversations with such people. Today, it's far more difficult to find people who approve of the war. The Pew and Gallup polls demonstrate that change in quantitative terms.

That poll is doing the "liberal media" SPIN; putting what's best for BUSH FIRST, regardless how many strings are attached to the result.

It FIRST lists that THE MAJORITY SUPPORT INVASION OF IRAQ(IFbushgoesfora2ndUNresolutionandIFtheworldandIFtheUNsupportstheinvasion).

THEN it progresses down to the REAL FACT; the majority DO NOT SUPPORT THE INVASION UNLESS BUSH GOES FOR A 2nd UN RESOLUTION.

So let's take that poll and UNSPIN it by putting the poll's results back INTO THE PROPER ORDER:

1. if the Bush administration does not seek a final Security Council vote, support for a war drops to 47%.


2. If the U.N. Security Council rejects a resolution paving the way for military action, only 54% of Americans favor a U.S. invasion.


3. Nearly six in 10 say they're ready for such an invasion "in the next week or two." BUT ONLY IF BUSH GOES FOR A 2nd VOTE AND IF THE UN SUPPORTS THE INVASION.

See how they took the result that had the MOST "IFs" attached and placed it FIRST in their article??? The result that was best for bush?


They gotcha.

Can you possibly be serious? The Pew polls are evidence of right wing spin but not the USA Today polls you site? I've obviously overlooked some sort of leftist takeover of USA Today.

The point is you need to pay attention to what the polls are actually asking, and when they were taken. It is beyond obvious that polls taken BEFORE the war don't provide a sampling of public opinion
for attitudes following the invasion. It's quite convenient to dismiss anything you disagree with as right wing spin. The fact dear, is that this is a right wing nation. Why would it surprise you that public attitudes should reflect that? Putting something in bold type doesn't make up for an absence of thoughtful analysis.

I feel quite ridiculous now for taking the time to find polls, copy them (trying for about 20 minutes to figure out, unsuccessfully, how to paste and copy that chart), and then writing a thoughtful response when it's clear you aren't interested in learning anything at all.

I am continually disturbed by how few Americans use reason or evidence in deciding what they believe. It is, I'm very sad to discover, as prevalent on the left as the right. No wonder Fox News has so much influence.

The Self-ID partisan breakdown of the US is about 20% liberal, 40% conservative, and 40% moderate.

The Self-ID party breakdown shows about 3 to 4 percent more Americans are Democrats than Republicans.

I overstated my point. Though Right wing media does influence political views. The Iraq invasion is a prime example. Though even Fox and Rush can't successfully spin a two-year long disaster into a success, which is why support for the war has declined dramatically.

I SAID the US Today poll is SPINNING TO THE RIGHT. And you then get snarky with me and say you musta missed a Left takeover of US Today???

YOU are the one who needs to start READING, coz you got that one ass-backwards.

And what the US Today poll says is that UNLESS bush went back to the UN for a 2nd vote, ONLY A 47% MINORITY would support his invasion of Iraq.

And THEN, IF AND AFTER bush went for the 2nd UN vote, and IF the UN still said no, THEN 54% would support the invasion.

And THEN, IF AND AFTER bush went for the 2nd UN vote, and IF the UN said yes, THEN 60% would support the invasion.

BUT UNLESS BUSH WENT FOR THAT 2nd UN VOTE ONLY A US MINORITY SAID THEY WOULD SUPPORT HIS INVASION. PERIOD.

This is NOT ME SAYING THIS, it's not MY OPINION of what Americans do or don't base their opinions on...iit is WHAT THE US Today ARTICLE SAYS. So maybe YOU should actually try READING the damn article!

THE US TODAY ARTICLE I LINKED TO SAYS VERY CLEARLY IN BLACK AND WHITE THAT ONLY A MINORITY WOULD SUPPORT BUSH'S INVASION IF HE DID NOT ATTEMPT A 2nd UN VOTE.

With me so far?

But US Today put the LAST result FIRST to make it seem like the US majority did support the invasion. THAT is rightwing SPIN.

Because the 60% support result was ONLY IF AND AFTER bush went for the 2nd UN vote, and IF the UN said YES to invading Iraq.

A fast glance or scanning of that USA Today article left people with the IMPRESSION that 60% supported bush's invasion; but that WAS NOT TRUE. USA Today DELIBERATELY SPUN their article by using that 60% majority at the VERY BEGINNING of their article AND in their TITLE. What they DIDN'T point out very clearly until last was that TWO THINGS WOULD HAVE TO HAPPEN FIRST BEFORE that 60% would support bush's invasion.

As you know, bush DID NOT go for a 2nd UN vote and the UN DID NOT say YES to invading Iraq. What IN FACT happened was the FIRST result; No 2nd UN vote, NO yes from the UN = ONLY 47% support.

MANY of the MSM articles that used this very US Today/CNN/Gallup poll DIDN'T EVEN BOTHER TO MENTION those IFs.

They simply wrote their articles saying "60% US support invasion".

and therefore cannot represent opinion "once the bombs were dropped." The poll was taken on 3/16/2003. The US began the bombing and ground invasion, that would eventually lead to the takeover and occupation of Iraq, on 3/20. http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/2003+invasion...

The poll you site is a reflection of opinion BEFORE the war, not AFTER. Let's count: 16, 17, 18, 19, 20. 20 is a higher number, and therefore comes after 16.

Even if you decide this timeline itself is a falsification of the date of the military assault on Iraq, look at the wording you yourself you. Americans "would support." "Would" is a conditional mood, signaling a future action or view. "Do support" is present tense. "Did support" is past tense. "Would support" is future conditional.

Is that slow enough for you?


These various polls are asking fundamentally different questions. The one you site signals the fact Americans wanted the US to seek a second UN resolution. The Pew polls show that, at least in nine months following the invasion, the failure to seek that second resolution did not result in the majority of Americans opposing the war. That would come later.

Clearly many Americans, like you and I, opposed the war anyway. In my view, a second UN resolution would have been important because we would not have been odds with the international community, but the fact is Saddam didn't have WMD. The war was illegitimate at its essence, and UN authorization wouldn't have changed that. I don't think a second resolution was possible: Europeans weren't ever going to sign a resolution authorizing war as long as Saddam complied with inspections, which he was doing. Bush and company wanted to invade regardless. These were irreconcilable possitions. As we well know, WMD was an excuse rather than a reason for war.

POINT of my original post!!!

I said the majority of Americans DID NOT SUPPORT bush's invasion of Iraq UNTIL AFTER the invasion started.

The poll I then cited shows that BEFORE the invasion started, the MAJORITY of Americans DID NOT SUPPORT THE INVASION.

I said WOULD support because I was speaking AS OF THE TIME the poll was taken!!!

ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH!!!

Starting fresh here...

The majority of Americans DID NOT SUPPORT bush's invasion of Iraq until AFTER the invasion started.

To back this statement up, I present the USA Today poll, taken right BEFORE the invasion started, which shows that UNLESS 2 things happened, (2 things which DID NOT in fact happen) the MAJORITY of Americans DID NOT support bush's invasion.

But MSM ARTICLES, such as the USA Today I cited, SPUN the poll results to make it seem as if the majority of Americans DID support the invasion. You had to read down thru the article to discover that in fact there were CONDITIONS SET to get that majority.

LATER...AFTER the invasion started, THEN a majority of Americans supported the invasion, which is TYPICAL for the USA.

At the start of the 1991 Gulf War, ONLY 45% of the US supported the war; it was not until AFTER the war was under way that Americans "rallied around the president and troops" and turned to a majority.

(And if I were asked to prove THAT fact, I would cite a poll from right BEFORE the Gulf War to show that BEFORE the war, a US majority DID NOT SUPPORT the War.)

and that in part relates to the failure to find WMD. The original poster asked if finding WMD would have justified the war. My point was that it would have SEEMED to justify it, and that appearances are enormously important in politics. You insisted that would have only been the case for 50% of Americans. I cited evidence showing that far more than 50%, 74% supported the war when it first began.

If my reply to you, I made it clear these polls were asking fundamentally different things, but you insisted only the Pew poll was right wing spin. We are obviously talking about different questions here, as I have now said in three posts. You evidently have picked a fight for no reason.

I have no idea wtf you're talking about.

I said BEFORE the start of the invasion a majority of Americans did not support the invasion. But that POLLS LIKE THE USA TODAY POLL I CITED did the RIGHTWING SPIN to make Americans think the majority did support the invasion.

And for every damn one of my posts since my original, that is EXACTLY AND ALL I have been saying.

Then YOU started attacking ME and I still don't have a clue wtf you're on about.

Would you be so kind as to point out where I "insisted only the Pew poll was rightwing spin", ESPECIALLY when my ENTIRE POINT of my posts has been that WHILE IN FACT the US majority did not support the invasion until AFTER it started, THE USA TODAY POLL THAT *I* CITED WAS RIGHTWING BIASED!!!

I sited a pew poll. You called it right wing propaganda. Why accuse me of falling for right wing propaganda if you point was the USA today article was spun?
Read before you become irate in the future. I've had enough of this nonsense.

NO I DID NOT call your poll "right wing propaganda"!!!

I NEVER said ONE SINGLE WORD in this entire thread about YOUR POLL.

I was talking about the USA TODAY poll that I CITED.

WHAT POST EXACTLY are YOU talking about??? If you think *I* called your poll "right wing propaganda" then YOU very obviously DID NOT read MY post(s)!!!

WHAT POST SPECIFICALLY are you falsely accusing me of having called "rightwing propaganda"???

When it is your own evidence you now say was spun? This is extremely odd.

Go back to that post and READ IT. Compare that post to MY LINK TO THE USA TODAY ARTICLE.

Gee OOPS huh. Like I said, I was talking about the USA Today poll being rightwing spin. The poll I CITED. NOT any poll YOU cited.

Yes, "extremely odd". WHEN one doesn't bother even READING MY posts but rather just starts tossing around INVALID AND FALSE ACCUSATIONS.

YOU said the poll that I cited DID NOT SAY what I said it said.

And then I posted saying YOU fell for the rightwing spin of MY POLL, the USA Today poll, the poll I CITED.

Because IN FACT that USA Today poll, the one I cited, the one YOU then claimed DID NOT say what I said it did, IN FACT said EXACTLY what I said it did:


LynnTheDem (1000+ posts) Mon Jan-24-05 06:34 PM
Response to Reply #23

28. Without a 2nd UN vote, the majority of Americans opposed bush's invasion


Until the bombs were dropping on Baghdad.

"...if the Bush administration does not seek a final Security Council vote, support for a war drops to 47%."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2003-03-16-poll...

So of course bush swore up & down that he would seek a 2nd vote;

"No matter what the whip count is, we're calling for the vote. We want to see people stand up and say what their opinion is about Saddam Hussein and the utility of the United Nations Security Council. And so, you bet. It's time for people to show their cards, to let the world know where they stand when it comes to Saddam."

-3/6/03

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/2003030...

but in fact bush LIED. And FLIP FLOPPED. Again.

"At a National Security Council meeting convened at the White House at 8:55 a.m., Bush finalized the decision to withdraw the resolution from consideration and prepared to deliver an address to the nation that had already been written."

-3/18/03

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2003/Mar/18/l...

Without a 2nd UN vote, American support was a minority 47%. The US StenoMedia tried to bury that little bit of info.


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imenja (1000+ posts) Mon Jan-24-05 11:52 PM
Response to Reply #28

40. The polls you site say something quite different


The polls you site are all taken before the war and they survey whether people think Bush (at that time) should seek a second UN resolution. They don't express opposition to the war after it's outbreak, or support only "until the bombs were dropped on Baghdad," as you maintain. They instead express a preference for future policy.

The Pew research center has a chart that shows support for the war over the course of 2003. I can't manage to copy it on here but I'll provide a link and a summary of some of it's findings:

"Trends in Views about Iraq"

http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=1...

April 2003 74% support decision to go to war
At the end of October support dipped to it's lowest level that year: 60%. It rebounded to 67% by the end of the year, following the capture of Saddam Hussein.


It is obviously much lower now. One CNN Gallup poll summarized on the Pew website puts support for Bush's handling of the war at only 42% (a somewhat different question from the above poll, so the comparison is not direct).

Americans do not base their views of US foreign policy on UN approval. In my view, the decline in public support for the war correlates with increasing casualties, the failure to discover WMD, and a policy that is obviously (to 42% of Americans anyway) floundering.

My point here is not that the war is legitimate. From my perspective, it is now and has always been entirely illegitimate. But most Americans have come to that view gradually. Far more than 50%--in fact 74% according to Pew's data--supported the war when it first broke out. I had many conversations with such people. Today, it's far more difficult to find people who approve of the war. The Pew and Gallup polls demonstrate that change in quantitative terms.






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LynnTheDem (1000+ posts) Tue Jan-25-05 12:23 AM
Response to Reply #40

44. No it doesn't. You just fell for the rightwingnut spinmachine:

***I am referring here to MY POLL; the one YOU had just previously said DID NOT SAY what I had said it said. And IF you had bothere to READ the following, and looked at my link, you would have KNOWN that, because the follwing is quoted from the USA Today poll that I CITED and has NOTHING to do with the poll YOU cited

Edited on Tue Jan-25-05 12:27 AM by LynnTheDem
That poll is doing the "liberal media" SPIN; putting what's best for BUSH FIRST, regardless how many strings are attached to the result.

It FIRST lists that THE MAJORITY SUPPORT INVASION OF IRAQ(IFbushgoesfora2ndUNresolutionandIFtheworldandIFtheUNsupportstheinvasion).

THEN it progresses down to the REAL FACT; the majority DO NOT SUPPORT THE INVASION UNLESS BUSH GOES FOR A 2nd UN RESOLUTION.

So let's take that poll and UNSPIN it by putting the poll's results back INTO THE PROPER ORDER:

1. if the Bush administration does not seek a final Security Council vote, support for a war drops to 47%.


2. If the U.N. Security Council rejects a resolution paving the way for military action, only 54% of Americans favor a U.S. invasion.


3. Nearly six in 10 say they're ready for such an invasion "in the next week or two." BUT ONLY IF BUSH GOES FOR A 2nd VOTE AND IF THE UN SUPPORTS THE INVASION.

See how they took the result that had the MOST "IFs" attached and placed it FIRST in their article??? The result that was best for bush?


They gotcha.

***************

I was answering to YOUR POST saying the POLL I CITED didn't say what I had said it did.

NOWHERE at any time did I comment AT ALL about ANY poll you cited.

NEXT TIME try to READ more carefully BEFORE you toss around accusations at someone.

I acknowledged from the outset your polls surveyed opinion before the war. The ones I noted gave opinions afterward. I said they asked fundamentally different questions. You used the USA Today poll to reply to my post that said: "Support was, if I recall correctly, over 70% at the time Bush invaded. The absence of WMDs and continuing deaths of Americans is what has eroded that support to well less than 50% now." They do not refute that point, since they survey opinion before the war, not at the time of invasion or afterward.

I, in a subsequent post, then provided polls that showed the point I made was correct. My point was never that your polls didn't survey opinion before the war, rather that they didn't refute the point I was making about opinion since the war. I noted, now for the 6th time, the various polls we have used asked fundamentally different questions. How this can possibly signal I was persuaded by propaganda you provide from a USA today article, I have no idea.

By the way, the US did try to seek a second vote. They did not formally submit it because they could not win a majority.

My post: "The polls you site are all taken before the war and they survey whether people think Bush (at that time) should seek a second UN resolution. They don't express opposition to the war after it's outbreak, or support only "until the bombs were dropped on Baghdad," as you maintain. They instead express a preference for future policy.

The Pew research center has a chart that shows support for the war over the course of 2003. I can't manage to copy it on here but I'll provide a link and a summary of some of it's findings:

"Trends in Views about Iraq"

http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=1... "

I go on to summearize the findings.


Your subject headings: "No it doesn't. You just fell for the rightwingnut spinmachine"

You sited polls asking one question, I cited polls asking another questoin that supported the point I was making. End of story.

The polls you site say something quite different

I thought you meant the POLL (only 1) I cited DID NOT SAY what I'd said it said.

I KNOW the USA poll was done right BEFORE the invasion; OBVIOUSLY that would be the poll I would choose to use when my ENTIRE POINT of my OP was that the majority DID NOT SUPPORT bush's invasion UNTIL AFTER the invasion started.

Choosing a poll taken AFTER the invasion WOULD NOT have been proof of my point! Polls done AFTER the invasion DID show majorities approving. Which is what I said; US majority DID NOT SUPPORT bush's invasion BEFORE the invasion started.

The USA Today poll I cited SHOWS EXACTLY THAT; without trying for a 2nd UN vote, ONLY 47% WOULD SUPPORT an invasion. That was just DAYS before the actual invasion.

The next polls that I know of were done AFTER the invasion had started.

Now I'm assuming that actually your post title of "The polls you site say something quite different" was not you saying my post differed from the actual poll I had cited.

I was, in that case, in total error thinking you were telling me that my post & my poll said 2 different things. And THAT is what I was referring to when I said MY POLL, the USA Today poll, was RW spin.

Got it settled now?

The american WMD's are breathtaking in their scope, with even precedents
of using them. Loosely defining "conventional" bombing as not a WMD,
and DU as not a chemical weapon is really aberrant at best.

In a fair comparison, there can be nothing but embarassment and hubris
but certainly no justice in pretending that the american war criminals
are anything but pretentious liars.

even then. Why can't an independent sovereign country have weapons, if other countries can? People may argue about Saddam Hussein being a baddy etc. I still wouldn't buy it. That's why the arguments for war were so ridiculous being based on WMD. WMD? So what?

Russia,
China,
Pakistan,
North Korea,
etc. -

Just because they have weapons.

Fortunately for us, Bush will soon reach the limits of empire. There is only so far one can stretch the US Military or grow the national debt.

the hysterical language being used. It was more than just WMD. It became "terror weapons" and so on. So when the US and Russia built up huge stockpiles in the Cold War, were they known as "WMD" or "terror weapons" then? No, they were simply "nuclear", "biological" or "chemical" weapons. Or simply "unconventional" weapons. But no, they had to invent scary sounding terms when it came to Iraq. "terror weapons" my arse. And then, you couldn't believe all the idiots in the media and the workplace who kept going on about "WMD!...WMD!...help America save us...!" It was all a nightmare...

Or was that the plan all along?

How long do you think it would take them to smoke 100 tons of good weed?

Do you think they'd share any of their good fortune with the iraqi people?

Probably, the good hearted soldiers would share... and likely violence
would go down in those areas. :-)

First of all, If they had any legitimate evidence of what they were accusing Saddam of doing, we would have had a real coalition. Hell, maybe Saddam would of backed down... but then they couldn't get their war so that was unacceptable on any level.

Secondly, even if they had some leftover chemicals (which I suspected) it wouldn't have justified this stupid invasion and the incompetent planning involved with it. They desperately wanted to find something to justify the war to the public, but no WMD's were to be found, so they changed the reason for war and claimed they were acting on the best intentions.

It's irresponsible to go to war on a paranoid hunch. Especially when you plan for the best, and promise the moon.

Claiming we are spreading democracy, while being best friends with the Sauds, Kuwait, Pakistan, etc... is a fucking joke at best.

that the Pentagon didn't think to plant them there. Jeez.

Don't think for a minute that Russia, Japan, China, Germany, and France didn't start watching Iraq from space the minute we got there. Moving in large stores in sealed vehicles and guys in protective suiting moving vehicles showing a lower infrared trace on the way out then the way in, (less demand on the engine), would have been caught by at least one of the satellite watchers.

Planting them was never really much of an option, once a large part of the industrialized world said no.
The Professor

Tempting as it might be to actually plant some of this crap and point to it later, Scott Ritter and others have noted that the precursor chemicals used to make WMDs are pretty closely tracked, often have signatures, and have a definite period of effectiveness. So if we came across 50 tons of "fresh" sarin nerve gas, the immediate questions that would be asked are "how old is it?", "where was it made?", and "what was used to make it?"

Then you'd start getting into the controlled substance import/export logs of various countries, and things would get messy quickly.

Does that justify another nation invading us? After all, we're also the only nation in human history who has used REAL "wmd"...nukes.

Britain has WMD; they also gassed the Kurds (and various other Iraqis).

Should we invade and occupy Britain?

bush's illegal immoral WAR OF AGGRESSION was NOT a LAST RESORT.

War must ONLY be as a LAST RESORT and ONLY against IMMINENT ATTACK.

Iraq wasn't attacking us; Iraq wasn't threatening us; Iraq wasn't a threat to us. Therefore NO JUSTIFICATION WHATSOEVER for bush's WAR OF AGGRESSION, "wmd" or not.

http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=54278

IRAQ WENT EURO NOVEMBER 2000

Posted By: TruthPassion <Send E-Mail>
Date: Thursday, 19 August 2004, 10:32 p.m.

In Response To: MISSION FAILURE? Dollars vs. Euros REAL Reason for Iraq (Moonrings)

I have always felt this was at least part of the reason for the war on Iraq, especially as Saddam Hussein started trading in euros in November 2000. Perhaps that hastened an already planned war?

However, I am not sure now that this was the SOLE reason. UNLESS Faction 2 needed to ensure that OPEC kept trading in petrodollars in order for them to be able to continue the fight against Faction 1 (NWO).

Here is an article explaining when Iraq starting trading oil in euros.

THE DOLLAR, THE EURO AND THE WAR
Copyright 1999-2002, StarIQ.com

See:

http://www.stariq.com/pagetemplate/article-printer.asp?pageid=4437

One unpublicized reason for the war in Iraq is the danger that the euro may replace the dollar as the world's currency of choice for international trade.

IRAQ SWITCHES FROM DOLLAR TO EURO

On November 6, 2000, while Americans were distracted by the controversial Florida presidential vote count, the Iraqi government switched from dollars to euros to sell oil. Until that point, the dollar had been THE currency of international trade. With the American military, the mightiest the world has ever known, prevailing, our tax dollars will again go to work funding US corporations to rebuild Iraq from the rubble, and the dollar will be restored as the currency exchanged for Iraqi oil. But one consequence of the war may be other oil-producing nations replacing dollars with euros. Such a changeover was believed possible before the war. Some insiders now believe it's inevitable. Even if the US military conquers every major oil-producing nation on the planet, it will not restore the goodwill that elevated the dollar in the first place. The Bush Administration has blown that goodwill away for the foreseeable future.

and another link:

"However, the best article was written by William Clark in in January 2003, before the war started."

See: http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/RRiraqWar.html

Revisited - The Real Reasons for the Upcoming War With Iraq:
A Macroeconomic and Geostrategic Analysis of the Unspoken Truth
by William Clark
wrc92@aol.com
Original Essay January 2003
-Revised March 2003
-Post-war Commentary January 2004

SNIP

"Although apparently suppressed in the U.S. media, one of the answers to the Iraq enigma is simple yet shocking. The upcoming war in Iraq war is mostly about how the CIA, the Federal Reserve and the Bush/Cheney administration view hydrocarbons at the geo-strategic level, and the unspoken but overarching macroeconomic threats to the U.S. dollar from the euro. The Real Reasons for this upcoming war is this administration's goal of preventing further OPEC momentum towards the euro as an oil transaction currency standard, and to secure control of Iraq's oil before the onset of Peak Oil (predicted to occur around 2010). However, in order to pre-empt OPEC, they need to gain geo-strategic control of Iraq along with its 2nd largest proven oil reserves. This essay will discuss the macroeconomics of the `petrodollar' and the unpublicized but real threat to U.S. economic hegemony from the euro as an alternative oil transaction currency. The following is how an individual very well versed in the nuances of macroeconomics alluded to the unspoken truth about this upcoming war with Iraq:

"The Federal Reserve's greatest nightmare is that OPEC will switch its international transactions from a dollar standard to a euro standard. Iraq actually made this switch in Nov. 2000 (when the euro was worth around 82 cents), and has actually made off like a bandit considering the dollar's steady depreciation against the euro. (Note: the dollar declined 17% against the euro in 2002.)

EVERY country with similar capabilities. China, North Korea, Israel, India, the Saudis, you name it. It's an asinine justification.

I'm suprised he didn't have "wmd" as a country with that much oil has a right to defend itself.

If terrorists can highjack and then slam a plane into the Pentagon,

THE FUCKING CENTER OF OUR DEFENSE

then they can certainly sneak a dirty bomb or a vial of smallpox into America, especially with what Bush has done to ignore securing our borders.

Iraq had nothing to do with...

Oh, never mind - why bother explaining anything to idiots who don't know the facts in the first place.

OK - I'll try one more time:

Iraq had NOTHING TO DO WITH 911! NOTHING! Get that thru your thick skull.

Afghanistan had NOTHING TO DO WITH 911! NOTHING!

ALL of the 911 "terrorists" and "hijackers" were SAUDI ARABIAN!

We just attacked 2 countries that had absolutely NOTHING to do with any of it JUST BECAUSE BUSHCO HAD TO ATTACK SOMETHING, ANYTHING!

GET IT?!?!?!?!

Get it through your thick skull: Your conspiracy theories are bogus.

We just attacked 2 countries that had absolutely NOTHING to do with any of it JUST BECAUSE BUSHCO HAD TO ATTACK SOMETHING, ANYTHING!


OBL was hiding in Afghanistan. Should Bush have gone into Afghanistan before he left? OF COURSE. But going in there was the right thing.

Should we have gone after OBL? Of course we should be pursuing him.

BUT GET THIS. Al-Qaeda is NOT the only group that wants to attack Americans. Certainly, they're one of the most dangerous, and invading Afghanistan hurt them badly, but if we keep going after Al-Qaeda and ignoring the rest of the terrorists who DO want to hurt us, it won't do us any good.

AND GET THIS. The highjackers were Saudi Arabian, but Saudi Arabia isn't protecting Al-Qaeda. They didn't represent SA.

Should we have planned better? Of course.

Should we have built a REAL coalition? Of course.

Should we have pursued all other options before going to war? Of course.

But if WMD's had been in there, and thus easy to access for terrorists (Saddam's regime was corrupt enough that they could have bribed some security guards for access to them), then they would have been a threat to America, and would have been needed to be taken out.

Guess what, they weren't. So Bush lied to the nation to get us into an unjust war and screw us all the hell over.

EVERYTHING I stated in my post HAS BEEN PROVEN TO BE THE TRUTH!

You have proven you only believe the sound of your voice, no matter what facts are presented to you to show your arguments have no basis in fact.

So the US can just go into Canada, France or any other country we deem necessary to go after one or two or more persons because we can?

Then you would, of course, approve of any other country's forces doing the very same thing here, right?

Because most of these "terrorists" were living - FOR MANY YEARS - here in the good old USA!

Oh my god, save us from such "logic" as yours.

and killing a whole lot of innocent people for, because if they have WMD a terrorist could steal the materials for a dirty bomb, which by the way kills by causing PANIC.

Uh huh. Ok.

That's gonna make for one hell of a lot of invasions and deaths, especially using the UN definition for "WMD".

We'll have to invade ourselves too, of course. Because we have one HUGE pile of poorly guarded dirty bomb material and a shitload of chemical and bio weapons. And we have terrorists residing right here in the good ol US of A.

You of course are signed up with the US military?

All those invasions...if you feel they'd all be justified, which you must do, otherwise you'd be a total hypocrite to say invading Iraq would have been justified if WMD were found, then you'll want to join up.

Oh and by the way, you should get in touch with the CIA, Mossad, MI5, MI6 and definitely teh bushCartel, because every intell agency around said often and clearly, even George Tenet said it, that Hussein WAS VERY UNLIKELY to give any terrorist ANYTHING.

Apparently YOU have better intell on that subject than they do. They'd LOVE to have whatever proof you have, they've been desperately seeking such for over 2 years now.

Oh yes one other thing; the yellowcake Iraq had, under UN lock & key for a decade? The dirty-bomb material? It was safely under UN lock & key...UNTIL bush's invasion when bush didn't bother giving orders to secure the site for weeks (until the IAEA went public about it).

So in fact bush's invasion made it MUCH EASIER for any terrorist to get hold of dirty-bomb material than Saddam Hussein could possibly have done.

THEY HAD NONE OF THE PROOF THAT THEY CLAIMED THEY HAD!

NONE!

We have been proven right. THEY HAVE BEEN PROVEN LIARS!

PEOPLE, OUR COUNTRYMEN, ARE DYING FOR LIES!

They are wasting their lives for LIES! Every single one of them.

"What ifs" and other such fantasies serve no useful purpose.

The bushco policy of "preemption" has been proven WRONG!

It wasn't the mere existence of WMD's that was the threat, it was the Bush Admin's emphatic insistance that Saddam had been cavorting with al-Qaeda and might hand those weapons over to them.

The threat wasn't that SADDAM might use them, it was that he would give them to those that had already attacked us several times before.

As for the current "liberating the Iraqi's" defense, I hear almost no one in the media asking Bush if it was okay when his dad supported Saddam *while* he was doing all those things.

There never were any.

Every intell agency around the world, even Israel's Mossad, have consistantly said there were NO TIES.

Every intell agency around the world has also consistantly said Hussein was VERY UNLIKELY to give any terrorist anything.

We KNEW THIS BEFORE bush's invasion.

So what "threat" from "al Qaeda ties" were you referring to???

Anyone who thinks there *WOULD* have been an invasion of
Iraq if they had, had WMD is out of their minds.

If the elections are a complete failure, they may do something to show they have a valid reason for slaughtering thousands of human beings, such as a *discovery* of WMD. Cops use "throw down guns" why wouldn't Bush, Rummie et al, plant WMD?

If not a miraculous discovery of WMD, then it will be some other *reason* or *victory* to justify the next 80 billion Bush steals from us.

... the fundamentalist Islamic movement is. Saddam had no overriding ideological opposition to the United States or western way of life. Conversely, his domestic enemies whom we have strengthened hate us passionately. In '91 I told everyone around me would not take out Saddam for this reason and was astounded by the pure idiocy of doing so on this occasion.

It ain't moral. It's just reality.

:7

Altho hey, that deficit of ours is growing awful big awful fast...perhapw 30%? :D

stockpile, left ungaurded outside of Bagdhad, so it's being used now for those bombs that are killing so MANY people!!!!

Not to mention various other kinds of weapons that Saddam didn't have.

Al Qaeda Who?

This so SO HORRIBLE!!!!!

just dropped the entire story like a hot tamale.

A telly station in (IIRC) Minnesota happened to have film footage proving that the explosives were still at the site AFTER bush's invasion and AFTER the first batch of troops had moved through and on to Baghdad, leaving the entire site (previously safe and secured and monitored for years by the UN) wide open to all and sundry to help themselves.

And help themselves they did; and it's our troops that have paid & are paying the price for the incredible incompetence of bush. Which of course is why the MSM immediately dropped the story once it was proved that bush f*cked up yet again.

But, now, there is none.

Canada has WMD; would we be justified in invading & occupying Canada and killing 40,000-100,000 Canadians? No coz they never threatened to attack us? Neither did Iraq.

How about the UK? The UK even gassed the Iraqis in their UNPROVOKED first invasion and occupation of Iraq.

And especially by using the UN definition of "WMD", which bush & the rightwingnuttery prefer to use as it's the lowest bar, the list of nations that DON'T have any "WMD" would be far smaller than a list of those who do.

How's the "some justification" holding up for us to invade and occupy 80-some nations? :D