Gore's solution to the Iraqi problem

[Ringo]

So what if Al Gore had won the last election (and he didn't - he lost, get over it)? Where would we be with Saddam now?

Should Al have taken over the reigns from Bill Clinton, where would we be with Iraq? The daily bombing runs just continue with no resolution in sight? Perhaps a renewal of inspections? By French rules?

How would Al have solved this problem?

[kniz]

:D He would have invented a solution.

[Tejota]

Most likely a new sanctions regime. Possibly coercive inspections. Something appropriate to the minimal threat that Saddam presents.

To even ask the question is to make a mistake. Because the whole scale of the Iraq 'problem' is mostly a con job from the Bush administration.

Without their relentless hype and misinformation campaign, there would be no Iraq 'problem' that required a solution during a a Gore first term. Probably not during a second term.

Saddam has never threatened the US. He hasn't threatened anyone outside his own country since he lost Gulf war I. His support of terrorism is limited to Palestine (i.e. no threat to the US). His weapons programs are making negative progress on most fronts. (i.e. he had more weapons and more successful programs 12 years ago than today). Most experts think He has no nuclear weapon program at all. And since a nuke program is the easiest type to detect remotely, this is likely the case.

Hell he hasn't even been able to control his own airspace since the Gulf war.

A Gore administration would have given proper weight to Iraq instead of manufacturing a crisis. A Gore administration would have had the support of the world as a result of Saddam did begin to represent a realistic threat.

Oh, and Gore did win the election. He just lost the lawsuit. Though perhaps that's what you meant. I'll get over it as soon as we have a elected president again.

[Hazel]

The reality in which we'd be living had Gore not been gyped out the Presidency would be very different from, and IMO noticably better than, the one we're in now. It isn't just that we would not be at war now, although that's a major thing. Bush has been hard at work trying to give the religious right everything it wants. No Democratic President would try to please that particular constituency.

[Hazel]

Good post, Tejota! I'll never "get over" the Presidency being handed to the guy who came in second.

[Apos]

---Saddam has never threatened the US.---

Not technically true. Trying to kill a former president? Targeting and firing on British and U.S. aircraft policing a U.N. enforced no-fly zone?

Not exactly huge attacks on us, but certainly not a matter of sitting peacefully around either.

[Tejota]

Originally posted by Apos
---Saddam has never threatened the US.---

Not technically true. Trying to kill a former president? Targeting and firing on British and U.S. aircraft policing a U.N. enforced no-fly zone?

Not exactly huge attacks on us, but certainly not a matter of sitting peacefully around either.

A former president. Who was not in the US at the time. And there's some question whether he was really the target of that bomb in the first place. Certainly he was nowhere near the explosion when it went off. If he tried to attack GHWB, then it was personal rather than an attack on the US; He waited until after Bush left the government to act.

As for firing on US and British aircraft. They were violating his airspace at the time. Saddam (impotently) defending his airspace is never going to be a threat to the US.

[Brutus]

'Coercive Inspections'? What a stupid concept. And gee, new sanctions would do the trick, I bet. Nevermind that we catch undeserved flak from the unwashed masses regarding the current sanctions, lets try some more?


Problems should be resolves, not dragged along for decades. GW has the right idea. I'd like to hope that Gore would have shown similiar backbone, but who knows. He probably would have wasted more time with the UN.

[SPOOFE]

A former president. Who was not in the US at the time.
So?

As for firing on US and British aircraft. They were violating his airspace at the time.
No, he wasn't. It stopped being his airspace when the UN imposed the "no-fly zone" sanctions.

I never though I'd ever see someone stoop so low as to become a Hussein Apologist. At least, not until several decades after the nutjob dies.

[vanilla]

Has Gore made any comments on the war lately?

[Azael]

I never though I'd ever see someone stoop so low as to become a Hussein Apologist. At least, not until several decades after the nutjob dies.


Me too, pathetically naive statements like this one turn my stomach.

ie.


Most likely a new sanctions regime. Possibly coercive inspections. Something appropriate to the minimal threat that Saddam presents.


Thank God he didn't get elected... We could have done better than Bush certainly but not with the spineless appeasement policies described here. Sanctions? Coercive inspections? Give me a break. What's next... a group hug?

[scm1001]

Originally posted by SPOOFE
So?


No, he wasn't. It stopped being his airspace when the UN imposed the "no-fly zone" sanctions.



NO! the UN has never supported the no fly zone. That was a purely arbitary decision by the US and Britain. The no fly zone has no legitamancy in International Law and Iraq had every "right" to shoot at the planes violating its airspace.

As to being an apologist for Saddam, I never thought I would be until pushed by ill-informed posters and aggressive US foreign policy

[RandySpears]

No, he wasn't. It stopped being his airspace when the UN imposed the "no-fly zone" sanctions.

I don't know the timing of this incident of which you speak, but to my knowledge the "no-fly" zones originally were set up by the US/UK and sanctioned by the UN only long after they were a fact.

Anyone?

[RandySpears]

scm1001:

Aha! Thanx for the info.

[Beagle]

NO! the UN has never supported the no fly zone. That was a purely arbitary decision by the US and Britain. That is the difficult part of being the only members of the Security Council who actually do anything. Sometimes we have to do things like establish our own ceasefire agreements. We contacted Cameroon, Syria, and Pakistan, they were in dispose.

[Jackknifed Juggernaut]

Quite simply, Gore would've understood that Iraq agreed to UN resolutions. There are no agreements between Iraq and the US. Therefore, only the UN (and not the US) has the authority to determine if any of Iraq's actions violate the resolutions. And more importantly, only the UN can determine whether these violations warrant any military action.

Bush understands this too. He just chooses to ignore it.

[scm1001]

Beagle,
The US is big enough to do what it wants, e.g. invade countries, set up no fly zones etc without UN support etc. However, it should not then go on and on about Iraq breaking UN resolutions, and it shouldn't be suprised when someone shoots back

[ElvisL1ves]

What, nobody has said "He'd make a plan and he'd follow through / That's what Albert Gore would do"?

No, seriously, US foreign policy would have kept on the same course it had been since 1945. Iraq would have remained an annoying but contained back-burner issue, as it had been since 1991. The anti-terror campaign, if 9/11 had happened at all (ref. Bush's disdain for tracking the Al Qaeda threat he had been briefed on), would have been an international cooperative effort and the main focus of the efforts of the civilized world. He wouldn't have been able to even consider a massive military campaign, because he and Clinton were engaged in gutting the military they hated back to total ineffectiveness (insert smilie here). And there would be a host of RW yammerers blasting his patriotism and integrity, while constantly on the search for gotchas.

Dammit, Al, quit screwin' around and get yer butt back in here.

[SuaSponte]

T'hell with Gore. The person we need now is Rudy.

Sua

[Apos]

---I never though I'd ever see someone stoop so low as to become a Hussein Apologist.---

I guess you weren't born yet when he was our big brutal buddy, from Carter to Reagan.

[Age Quod Agis]

Tejota:
Most likely a new sanctions regime. Possibly coercive inspections. Something appropriate to the minimal threat that Saddam presents.

To even ask the question is to make a mistake. Because the whole scale of the Iraq 'problem' is mostly a con job from the Bush administration.

Without their relentless hype and misinformation campaign, there would be no Iraq 'problem' that required a solution during a a Gore first term. Probably not during a second term.

Saddam has never threatened the US.Uh, not exactly true.
Al Gore to the Council on Foriegn Relations (http://cfr.org/publication.php?id=4343), Feb. 12, 2002:

1) "There are still governments that could bring us great harm. And there is a clear case that one of these governments in particular represents a virulent threat in a class by itself: Iraq."

2) "As far as I am concerned, a final reckoning with that government should be on the table. To my way of thinking, the real question is not the principle of the thing, but of making sure that this time we will finish the matter on our terms."Still think Gore would have gone with "coercive sanctions," or "treated Iraq like a minimal threat?" Still think the image of Iraq as a threat to the US is a result of a Bush con job?Tejota:
Oh, and Gore did win the election. He just lost the lawsuit. Sorry for the hijack, but I never understand what people mean when they say this. Are you referring to the fact that Gore won more popular votes? If so, do you realize that's not the same thing as winning the election, which is determined according to electoral college votes? I still haven't seen a count that said Gore won enough electoral college votes to win the election. If you have one, a cite would be appreciated.

[ElJeffe]

Still think Gore would have gone with "coercive sanctions," or "treated Iraq like a minimal threat?" Still think the image of Iraq as a threat to the US is a result of a Bush con job?


Actually, yeah, I do. The level of threat from Saddam wasn't notably greater post-2000 than it was prior. (Note that I'm not saying Saddam wasn't a threat that should've been dealt with prior to 2000, just that the threat didn't really increase.) Clintonian policy was to pretty much ignore Saddam. I see no reason to believe Gore would've done anything to rock the boat. Sure, Gore can mouth off now from the safety of post-defeat irrelevance, but that says nothing about what he would've done if he'd been elected.


Jeff

[Age Quod Agis]

Is it just me, or did that get shot down remarkably quickly?

[Sofa King]

Said ElJeffe

Clintonian policy was to pretty much ignore Saddam.

I'm afraid not. In fact, Clinton appears to have wholeheartedly adopted Bush the Elder's plan to use the CIA (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/longterm/iraq/stories/newsweek032398.htm) to sponsor an overthrow of the Iraqi government.

In 1996, the CIA was nearing its goal of sponsoring a Kurdish uprising in Iraq when Hussein got wind of what was going on. He successfully bagged close to a hundred CIA-sponsored coup-plotters and rolled tanks into the Kurdish strongholds which were planning a guerrilla uprising.

Saddam Hussein simply moved too fast for the United States to react, and just like that most of the clandestinely nurtured support for the United States was wrecked.

But Bill Clinton didn't fail to knock over Iraq for lack of trying. Bill was just the sort of guy who doesn't pronounce the "b" in subtle, if you know what I mean.

[Kempis]

I think Gore would have invaded Afghanistan like GWB and would have pushed more at the UN for better inspections, though I think he would have failed to get anything with teeth past the French and Russians just like GWB.

After that he would have made some token military gestures to save face and then blame the failures on a lack of support from a Republican congress.

And for absofrickenlutely certain the war protests would have been about 1/10th the size they are now.

-k

[ElwoodCuse]

Originally posted by Hazel
Good post, Tejota! I'll never "get over" the Presidency being handed to the guy who came in second.

You know, say what you want about Mike Moore (I myself disagree with him a lot and think he is often guilty of attention whoring), but can anyone provide conclusive proof that he lied in his chapter about the 2000 election? Not where he confuses the popular vote and the electoral college (which I agree is stupid and tends to discredit anything else he has to say), but specifically, the part about how thousands of blacks in Florida were illegally denied the right to vote because they merely had the same name or something as a convicted felon? Or about how Fox News, which he claims is run by a Bush crony, was the first to declare that Bush won Florida?

[Sam Stone]

The fact is, we have no idea what Al Gore would have done.

Pre-9/11, Gore was more of a hawk on Iraq than Bush was. Bush was the 'isolationist' who was skeptical of 'nation-building'. Gore, on the other hand, was part of the Clinton Administration which adopted regime change in Iraq as its official policy.

After 9/11, Gore has made statements both agreeing with and criticizing the Bush Administration's plan to topple Iraq. Bill Clinton has done the same. Hillary Clinton openly supports President Bush.

Joe Lieberman, who would have been Gore's Vice President, is probably the biggest hawk on Iraq in the Democratic party.

Given all that, I believe that Gore would have done exactly what Bush did, and advocated the military overthrow of Saddam's regime.

The question is whether he would have stuck with it in the face of U.N. opposition like Bush did.

Of course, you could also ask whether Gore would have even had the same amount of U.N. opposition that Bush had.

But either way, I believe it would have been the Gore Administration's policy to seek an invasion of Iraq.

[IEatFood!]

Oh, and Gore did win the election. He just lost the lawsuit. Though perhaps that's what you meant. I'll get over it as soon as we have a elected president again

Please keep the "reasoning" here limited to known facts. The only people who still believe that are out of date on that, and simply regurgitating popular leftist rhetoric.
On a personal note, I did vote for Gore (Not a demcrat, just liked Gore better...), & was disheartened when he lost after all that tension, but the truth is that most of those "uncounted votes" were for Bush Jr anyway, so I don't see how that would have helped.

Sam, you are peobably right, but we all have to keep in mind that a lot of Bush Jr's ideology on Iraq is based on what those around him are up to (Powell, Rumsfeld, et al), more than anything else.
With Gore, we would likely have had a different bunch in charge there, so that of course confuses the issue further still...

[Zenster]

Well, I believe we should ...

[Six months later]

Maybe ...

[Four weeks later]

Do ...

[Three weeks later]

Something ...

[Two weeks later]

... maybe ...

[tilly]

First of all I am a life long Democrat who voted for Gore. He lost plan and simple. The way our electoral system is set up it has worked beautifully since its conception. We have popular vote and electoral vote to balance in case of an issue just like the one that evolved in the last presidential election.

To wine about this is beyond pathetic and the worst breach of gentlemanly manors. It makes me ashamed of some of those in my party and after the last presidential debockle and the the extensive behavior of Clinton almost wanting to change parties if I did not think I would be removed from the family will….

I voted for Gore and I have never been so glad he lost in all my life. I have never been a yellow dog democrat in the sense of just blindly voting for a straight party ticket. I have never agreed with everything any one politician has done even those in my own family (we have quite a few). I vote for the person not the party.

I voted against Hillary “I could not tell the truth if my life depended on it” Clinton for the senate (I was a registered voter in NY at the time of her run) and would not have voted for that women for dog catcher…

I do not agree with everything that Bush does (nafta, some budget issues etc…) however on the war issue I support him 100%…

All I have to say is thank god for Reagan, Bush Sr. and those baron senators such as Stennis (d-miss), who while chairman of Arms Service and Appropriations had the respect of his constituents on both sides of the fence and tacked down military contracts and money flow issues through 2012 that helped negate the Clinton administrations neglect of Arms Service even before they arose.

Stennis left the senate after 43 years of service starting with Truman in 47, at the end of the Reagan era. He wanted to make sure that even though he was not there to oversea his baby (the military) that she would have a trust fund to take care of her in case a custodian did not give her the attention she should always have for the defense of this country.

Of course that is why he is the only US Senator that has a Nemitz Class Nuclear Aircraft carrier named after him because he is the father of America’s modern navy (his favorite branch of the military)…..

He was everything a statesmen should be. Low key, not boastful, never getting out in front of cameras unless he had to and watchful of all but very seldom criticizing those he disagreed with in public but hashing out the issues in the cloak room of a Senate as oppose to airing dirty laundry and making an ass out of ones self in public..(i.e Dashel)

Al Gores father would have been appalled at his son’s lackadaisical attitude. He was a fine statesmen who like Stennis had the utmost respect for what the strength and force of a mighty military presence meant to this country and without it we would not be the supper power we are today….

I raise my glass to those baron senators (Long, Russell, Stennis, Eastland, Gore Sr., Byrd, Thurman, Helms, Heflin, Goldwater to name a few) who insured that America remained the presence she should always be through her the size and strength of military….

Lets hope that those who sit in their seats in the future will see their wisdom and yet learn from their mistakes and use it to make this country even greater for our future generations instead of sitting around playing partisan politics for personal gain while it all pisses away …..

[Epimetheus]

Originally posted by scm1001
Beagle,
The US is big enough to do what it wants, e.g. invade countries, set up no fly zones etc without UN support etc. However, it should not then go on and on about Iraq breaking UN resolutions, and it shouldn't be suprised when someone shoots back

scm1001, meet Frank. 6'8, 350lbs of pure muscle and he loves to use em. He is a big boy, and he has convinced himself that you are doing some bad things. According to you, since he is big enough, he can do what he wants. Have fun together.

[Shodan]

if scm1001 has been pulling the stuff Saddam has been pulling, I would like to welcome Frank to the team - the police don't seem willing to do much about it.

Regards,
Shodan

[kniz]

If Gore had been elected, he would have had a tete-a-tete (http://www.tete-a-tete.cjb.net/) with Saddam and Chirac and convinced them both that the manufacture of weapons of mast destruction should cease. And on the economy he would have...

[scm1001]

EPI, frank sounds just my sort of guy. Is he single?

[djwalker]

Originally posted by Ringo
So what if Al Gore had won the last election (and he didn't - he lost, get over it)? Where would we be with Saddam now?

Should Al have taken over the reigns from Bill Clinton, where would we be with Iraq? The daily bombing runs just continue with no resolution in sight? Perhaps a renewal of inspections? By French rules?

How would Al have solved this problem?

Who?

[Evil Captor]

Well, for one thing, I bet Gore would have prosecuted the war against al-Qaeda more vigorously instead of going after Iraq after the Afghanistan dust-up.

But basically, I don't know what Gore would do, because Gore is very, very smart. Whereas Bush is kinda predictable. I just ask myself WWJD? What Would a Jackass Do?

[vanilla]

We wouldn't be at war now had my candidate won....

[december]

Originally posted by Evil Captor
I just ask myself WWJD? What Would a Jackass Do? You can scoff, if you wish...at Vice President Gore occasionally wearing a bracelet that asks WWJD? ("What would Jesus do?")... http://www.allsoulsnyc.org/publications/newsandopinion/what-would-jesus-do.htm

[Epimetheus]

Originally posted by scm1001
EPI, frank sounds just my sort of guy. Is he single?

You avoid my point.

Might does not make right- School yard bullies don't have free reign over the other kids, though they think they might.

Personally I am ashamed to live in a country that thinks it can do what it wants just because it is stronger than everybody else. I am also surprised and a bit disapointed that anybody on this message board would not recognize this fact. Especially one as apparently as intelligent as you appear to be.

The next time somebody steals your purse and or wallet I will just laugh at you and say- He was bigger than you, you deserved it. Anytime you get pushed around at work because you are smaller than that person, anytime you are out somewhere and some guy or woman that is bigger takes your parking spot, steps in front of you in line, or any other form of bulling and you bitch about it online here- I will remember this philosophy of yours. If you are big enough to enforce it, you have the right to do anything morally. Screw the little people.

[Hazel]

I agree with the suggestion that 9/11 might not have happened had Gore been President. He might have paid more attention to whatever signs and hints may have been pointing toward a planned terrorist attack on the US. In which case it may have been possible to prevent the attack. And in the absence of that terrorist attack, would we now be at war with Iraq? It seems likely that we would not be. One reason Bush was able to go ahead with this war is that he has half the country believing that Saddam was behind 9/11 and therefore supporting the war.

OTOH, if Gore did want to attack Iraq, he would probably have gone about it more the way Bush Sr. did, rather than the way Bush Jr. has. He would talk to other heads of state personally, or send representatives to do so, and build a real coalition. And he would have sought UN approval. He would have gone ahead with the war only if he could accomplish these two things: a real coalition of developed nations & UN backing. Would he hve accomplished those things? I have no idea.

Why do I hold these opinions as to what Gore would have done? Because it's my opinion that just about any President other than Bush Jr. would have acted as I've described a hypothetical President Gore acting.

[Hazel]

Originally posted by ElwoodCuse
You know, say what you want about Mike Moore (I myself disagree with him a lot and think he is often guilty of attention whoring), but can anyone provide conclusive proof that he lied in his chapter about the 2000 election? Not where he confuses the popular vote and the electoral college (which I agree is stupid and tends to discredit anything else he has to say), but specifically, the part about how thousands of blacks in Florida were illegally denied the right to vote because they merely had the same name or something as a convicted felon? Or about how Fox News, which he claims is run by a Bush crony, was the first to declare that Bush won Florida?

I do believe that thousands of black voters were deliberately disenfranchized via the "felon list" provided by a private company.

At first, I assumed that the Palm Beach ballot fiasco was a genuine mistake, but I've come to wonder if it really was. Could such a poorly designed ballot really be just dumbness and/or bad judgement?

If FL had come up with a legitimate way to remove from the rolls only people who actually had FL felony convictions (and not people with misdemeanor convictions, and not people whose names were similar to people on the list), OR

If West Palm Beach had not switched to the weird ballot that decieved so many people into unintentially voting for Buchanan, OR

If they had done a complete recount of the whole state*,

Gore would have won FL, and therefore the election.

It isn't just that Gore won the popular vote, although any system that allows the guy who got the 2nd highest number of votes to be the winner is, IMO, seriously flawed. It's that Bush was not the legitimate victor in Florida. He's in the White House today because (a) Florida screwed up their election, and (b) a Supreme Court majority managed to come up with a convoluted, "doesn't apply to any other case" decision that gave victory to the guy they preferred.


*You may remember that a news media group did their own recount and, months after the election, announced the results. The results were that if FL had completed a recount of only those districts that Gore asked to be recounted, Bush would have won, but that if a complete recount of the whole State had been done, Gore would have won. This result was widely reported as "Bush won" or "Bush would have won anyway, even if they'd comleted the recount" (the recount that was stopped). To me, the important point, the point the headlines obscured, is that Gore was the actual winner. Bush is the actual President (the Supreme Court declared him the winner, he was sworn in, he occupies the White House) -- but he should't be.

[Ringo]

ElvisL1ves, are you postulating that 9/11 might not have even happened had Al managed to lawyer his way into a win in the last electioon?

I think the "minimal threat" disinformation has beem addressed. But what are "coercive sanctions" above and beyond what were already ineffectually in place?

Hazel, a quick read (http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/will112102.asp) to bring you up to speed on how it came to pass that Dub won the election. Also, see tilly's post above.

So, it seems from what I've seen so far in this thread that Gore might have been a bit more proactive than Clinton, who seemed happy to leave it with a no-fly zone bombardment regime and no inspections - let successor (whom, as far as he knew, might've been Gore) figure it out. I have never been exposed to any information that indicates that the 9/11 attacks would not have happened should there have been another President. Liberal, conservative, whatever - al-Qaeda sees us as all the same, and the planning for that attack predated results of the last election.

So, I'm not at all convinced we wouldn't be at war today should Al Gore have won the election.

Perhaps this is an exercise in futility.

[Evil Captor]

I would say the odds are better that 9/11 wouldn't have happened if Gore had been President. Not because al-Qaeda wouldn't have tried it, but because Gore and his appointees would have been more likely to pay attention.

Let's face it -- Bush is a man of limited intelligence and very strong convictions. This means he will prosecute any decision he makes vigorously, which is a good thing. But it also means that he's unlikely to come up with good decisions, especially if doing so requires him to take into account facts or ideas that challenge his convictions. The odds are he'll make bad decisions most of the time.

Attacking Afghanistan after 9/11 was a gimme -- the Taliban was al-Qaeda's biggest supporter and we had friends in the coutnry through our support of the Afghan's durign the Russian incursion. I'm sure Gore would have done the same.

I'm also pretty sure Gore wouldn't have attacked Iraq. He would have correctly seen it as a case of changing horses in midstream.

In short, he wouldn't have been stupid like Bush has been. He would have gone after our attackers, al-Qaeda and their supprters, and prosecuted them with much more vigor than Bush has.

This is proof that it DOES make a difference who's in the White House and that you shouldn't elect stupid men to the Presidency, especially if their minds have snapped shut years ago.

You can draw your own conclusions about those who voted for Bush in 2000.

[ElvisL1ves]

Originally posted by Ringo
[b]ElvisL1ves, are you postulating that 9/11 might not have even happened had Al managed to lawyer his way into a win in the last electioon? "Might" being the key word, yes, as several other posters have suggested (I wouldn't even answer except that you addressed me specifically). It's well-established how seriously the Clinton administration saw the threat from Al-Qaeda, although it's arguable that even they didn't take it seriously enough.

But it's also well-established that Bush dismissed the warnings he was given in his briefings ("This foreign policy stuff is a little frustrating"), as part of his determination to do exactly the opposite of whatever the beast Clinton had done. The Congressional committee to study the origins of 9/11 still hasn't convened, though, and won't under GOP leadership, so we aren't ever going to know more, much less be sure.

"Lawyered his way in" is an interesting use of transference, btw, to support the plaintiff in all legal (and extra-legal) actions that wanted the counting of votes stopped, while denigrating the party that wanted the fundamental principle of democracy upheld instead. On this board, though, there is little tolerance for people believing what they want in the face of the facts instead of because of them.