Bush History-Prominent GOPer & Military Expert Blasts Bush Admin Iraq Failures, 1/5

Some signs on this date of Bush giving up his failed 'stay the course' Iraq policy (2007). A prominent GOP military expert has blasted Bush Iraq failures, admitting to surprise at such incompetence. Also connections win out over experience in a key homeland security post(2006). Is experience really necessary? It's only Homeland Security. And another good date for Bushisms.

More details, from the 2009 Bush Blunder Calendar ...
http://poorgeorgesalmanac.com/?p=1341

Today's category: Bushisms, Corruption/Conflicts of Interest, Incompetence, Iraq

365 Reasons to Celebrate the Obama administration - New Bush blunders daily
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365 Reasons to Celebrate the Obama administration

:hi:

Really FUD. I appreciate your occasional stop-bys and encouragement. You are ColbertWatcher have been really great.

I disagreed with the Iraq War, and to that end I hold both parties that signed off on the war equally responsible for their actions. But there is no denying that there has been a remarkable turnaround in the past couple of years. Violence has decreased dramatically, the Iraqi security forces are growing in capability and responsibility, elections have been held and their government is arguably busier than our own, and extremist groups have turned against the foreign jihadists they had formerly allied themselves with and begun participating in the political process. The situation there is nothing compared to what it was. And if we're being honest, we never lost a single battle in Iraq in the first place. Should we have been there? No. But the simple fact is that the actual war was only four weeks long, and we steamrolled our adversary. The rest was a protracted security and rebuilding operation.

It's not time to let go, it's time to demand answers and give out penalties.

We are going to have a hard time giving out penalties when we are guilty of sending our troops to war along with the Republicans, and are guilty of convincing the public that Saddam was a threat along with the Republicans, and are guilty of arguing for Saddam's possession of WMD's before, during, and after Bush argued the same point, based on the same consensus among our intelligence community that this was the case. We were 100% complicit in what happened in Iraq and our leaders never took a stand until it became politically expedient to do so... which means they were not really taking a stand at all (Kucinich aside). I don't think Obama would have taken a stand if he had been around at the time to be put on record, either. He has voted along the party line 96% of the time so I have a hard time believing he would have gone out on a limb and opposed the entire party as we supported the invasion. It's easy to take a stand after the fact, when you didn't have to be on record when it mattered.

Much of the intelligence at the time was often ignored leading up to the war. The only information talked about was info, however dubious, that let the admin talk of the certainty of nukes in Iraq. Read the deceipt of Conde Rice below, and Dick Cheney also. The vote of Congress was like the vote of a jury who had only been presented with the prosecution's case, and not the defense. The fault of Congress is thinking their president wouldn't deceive them about a matter as important as sending our young off to war. Bush had no trouble doing so, it turned out

Your defense of the Bush administration is admirable, but it is crystal clear they deceived us and Congress. For example the Bushies told Congress of centrifuge work Saddam was supposed to be doing based on some tubes ....

According to the NY Times: “Energy Department officials ticked off a long list of reasons why the tubes did not appear well suited for centrifuges. Simply put, the analysis concluded that the tubes were the wrong size - too narrow, too heavy, too long - to be of much practical use in a centrifuge. What was more, the analysis reasoned, if the tubes were part of a secret, high-risk venture to build a nuclear bomb, why were the Iraqis haggling over prices with suppliers all around the world? And why weren't they shopping for all the other sensitive equipment needed for centrifuges?” The U.N. nuclear agency, the IAEA, reached the same conclusion

The facts might indicate one thing but on Sunday, September 8th 2002 Condoleezza Rice is quoted as saying just the opposite of what the experts have already told our government. Ms. Rice tells CNN that the tubes “are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge programs” According to a subsequent NY Times story: “Almost a year before, Ms. Rice's staff had been told that the government's foremost nuclear experts seriously doubted that the tubes were for nuclear weapons, according to four officials at the Central Intelligence Agency and two senior administration officials

On Sept. 8, 2002, Cheney said of Hussein on NBC's "Meet the Press": "We do know, with absolute certainty, that he is using his procurement system to acquire the equipment he needs in order to enrich uranium to build a nuclear weapon." (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A20194-2004Feb6.htmlOur own nuclear experts were saying at the time that these tubes were almost certainly NOT for this purpose! CHENEY WAS LYING

This thing happened over and over again. The administration deceived the people and deceived Congress by presenting only the evidence that supported war and keeping quiet on strong doubts such as what our nuclear experts thought (see above).

To say "we steamrolled our adversary. The rest was a protracted security and rebuilding operation" is a real distortion of what happened. The Bush admin was warned that securing Iraq after "we steamrolled our adversary" would be very very difficult and a large force would be needed. THE ADMIN IGNORED THOSE WARNINGS, the most famous of which came from the Army's top officer General Shinseki. In addition, there was ridiciulously little planning for what was to be done once we finished steamrolling. The INCOMPETENCE IS STUNNING. As a result the violence continued for YEARS LONGER than it had to, THOUSANDS DIED who never should have had the Bush administration showed the basic competency expected when you start a war. It was a terrible abdication of Bush's responsibilities as commander in chief. Terrible.