The Iraq War run-up: where were you in '03? Stories wanted!!!

Each February, I run a blog that commemorates the fateful day (2/5/03) when Colin Powell lied us into war... and the media called his bullshit "lemonade":

http://www.dayofshame.com/

This year, the focus will be on other people's recollections of the run-up to the war.

Do you have old e-mails or blog posts that preserved your thoughts at the time? Or do you recall any anecdotes about how you and yours were trusting or skeptical of the war drums of 2002 and 2003?

Please post yours here or via a link to your blog, or send me a private message, and a selection of them will appear on the Day of Shame site (and possibly cross-posted elsewhere).

With Super-Duper Tuesday falling on that fateful anniversary, the 5th Anniversary Fibtacular could go unheeded. So, please help us remember the day that should live in infamy.

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but the DU archives don't search '03. If they did, you could find plenty of my posts on the subject.

For the record, I was not only skeptical, I was adamantly opposed. I was writing letters, marching, and protesting about the time the IWR was being passed, up until and after troops were deployed.

into believing that Sadam ha WMD, the speech in January was the "crescendo"..... It blew my mind that I knew about the attempts to go back into Iraq by Cheny & Rumdum in 92/3 and again in the late 90's. It blew my mind that JOURNALISTS(?) didn't. It was all out there. And the press allowed that administration to dupe the American People into the war. What I find inexcusable though are the Democratic Politicians that supported Bush and the IWR, they all knew AT LEAST what I knew, but were all complicit in what they did with getting us into this war.

for voting for the AUMF to be acceptable:

http://vastleft.blogspot.com/2006/03/ok-dems-who-authorized-iraqi-war.html



Naturally, I would have preferred that Dems in Congress had looked into Bush's soul (or lack thereof), the way he claims to have done with Putin's, and could have seen that he would start bombing even if and when inspections worked. I knew it, you knew it, but I can understand that Congresspeople hadn't fully come to appreciate the sick cynicism of today's Republican Party. What kills me (and others, literally), is how many Dems still seem to think we can cross the aisle and work with these people.

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The costs of this war that are borne by America, as massive as they are, are just one part of the puzzle.

Lest I, or we, forget the suffering we've unleashed on the Iraqi people and others caught in the crossfire.

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at how the people allowed themselves to be led to war. I felt it happening: the turning point that led us down the path to nationalism and fascism, and wondered why so many of my fellow citizens, and our leaders in Congress, didn't have the courage to refuse.

and telling everyone I knew who would listen. It was odd, though, because I couldn't really talk about it openly at work because there were too many conservatives rattling their sabers. :(

There would be plenty of posts by me here, though, that would document these feelings.

that they help me try to raise awareness and stop the coming war.

Right? :):(

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Now that the dems have taken congress and keep funding the war, they tell me I'm an idiot for thinking it matters at all what we do... that it's all rigged... I try, but I get ignored or worse, laughed at.

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For me, the Powell U.N. speech and the media reaction to it was the day the music died in this country.

Here's mine, from the http://www.dayofshame.com blog, quoting a pre-war e-mail exchange:



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carrying a "no blood for oil" sign.

The whole diversion from Osama bin Laden made me angry. I didn't believe any of the B.S. about "weapons of mass destruction". In the spring of 2002 Powell had said publicly that Saddam had been contained, posed no threat to us, and had no such weapons. When Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld started quoting large statistics about stockpiles of different types of weapons like sarin gas, I knew they were lying - how could they know anything like that when there had been no U.N. inspectors there for years (and we certainly had none)? Powell's reliance on cartoonlike cardboard pictures in his U.N. speech solidified my convictions - I remember Adlai Stevenson at the U.N. showing aerial photographs - REAL evidence - of the Russian missiles in Cuba during the Cuba Missile Crises.

I got into several arguments with fairly recent acquaintences about the runup to Iraq War and fortunately it exposed them to me as nasty, vile right-wing kool-aide drinkers, so I cut them out of my life.

I believe it was in February, 2003 that I first read on the internet about the PNAC. That was frightening. It confirmed to me that the excuses for invading Iraq were bogus, and that these megalomaniacal extremists were insane. It also got me wondering about a 9/11 LIHOP scenario.

... makes you a shrill, extremist partisan. Or so goes the still-current narrative, eh?

Do you have a link to the 2002 Powell admission you describe? People should know about that.

Thanks,
lwcon / Vast Left

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Those "acquaintances" accused me of being a "pacifist" and being "brainwashed" by the "far left media" (WTF is that? They couldn't tell me). Talk about projection! Then they started trying to discredit what I said by attacking me personally. I told them where they could stuff it and that was that.

I was so shocked to hear him and realize he said nothing and had no proof.

I attended a prayer vigil outside of a church with my young child the night before we started bombing Baghad.

nt

cheered the topling of the statue as if it meant something.
Most of DU was against war. I remember protests before and after it started.
Biggest one - internatinal - febr 15 - 2003 - THE WORLD SAYS NO TO WAR - NYC was tremendous. And every world capital. Bush called us "focus groups"

What I remember most from the NY protest was how downright supportive the cops were.

The January DC protest - cold as hell, air conditioned bus - freezing our butts. The rally - didn't like it so much but the march was great! The signs! The enthusiasm! The locals' support!

On the net = somewhere on yahoo, I still have an entire archive of all the lies. Those who watched the news carefully - had the clear image of the truth. Can't imagine I was more informed than the senators.

Another memory: Paul Wellstone voted/spoke against the war. His numbers went up dramatically (in his senate race). Then he died. Then his memorial was turned into a circus by the RW-ers.
Bushco also pounced on Schroeder - the German chancellor - also elected on a NO War agenda. They didn't kill him - just failed to congratulate him.
I remember the patriotardic hysteria, MSM cheering our "shock and awe". Rummy being called "sexy" by the MSM...W pumping his fist off the record before declaring war - caught on camera...The thing in Time 2002 about bush being overheard: "Fuck Saddam he's going down"

I'll definitely be sending people to this thread to read these reminiscences.

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http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Peace-not-war/?yguid=268253950

All relevant articles preserved in their entirety