Can you say that with a Texas accent?
As a liberal Kerry supporter, I tend to agree with you… but not because Democrats are dumb, or uninformed, or dishonest, or what have you… but because it’s a frickin’ political campaign, in which everything (or so it is commonly believed) needs to be presented in as simplified a fashion as possible.
“Bush lied about WMDs” is a lot punchier than “Bush rushed into action without exhausting all diplomatic channels, and he trumped up the evidence for invasion, including, but not limited to, overexpressing his level of certainty about the presence of WMDs”.
(Although I think the whole Powell-at-the-UN thing should not be overlooked… even if “Bush Lied” isn’t necessarily literally true, “Bush was disastrously wrong, for whatever reason” is)
There is one minor problem with this argument. At the time of the invasion, the UN inspectors had been to many of the sites the CIA (or Chalabi, actually) had identified as holding WMDs. They found nothing. Blix, who thought there were weapons also, became convinced that they were not there, at least not to the extent claimed by the US. Bush knew this. (Or should have.) So, what to do if you are going to war because of the imminent threat posed by WMDs. Wait to see if there are indeed any, or rush to war faster before the evidence that you were full of crap becomes too clear. No prizes for the correct answer.
BTW, though Iran was of course against the invasion, does any one doubt they were laughing their asses off that the Great Satan took care of their biggest enemy for them?
Well, the reason many of us were convinced Iraq had WMD’s was because the President of the United States told us they did and we didn’t think he’d lie about a thing like that. I presume George Bush isn’t claiming he heard himself swear it was true.
And if George Bush made a mistake this size once how do we know what mistakes he might make in another four years? What if he’s reelected and sometime around 2006 someone convinces him there’s a good reason to declare war on China? Are we supposed to believe he’s learned his lesson now and won’t declare another war unless he’s really really sure he’s got the facts right?
I doubt it. While I’ve little doubt they’re pleased that Saddam’s no longer around, I’ve also little doubt that they’re more than a little nervous about the fact that the Great Satan has a couple divisions of mechanized troops uncomfortably close to their border.
Non sequitur. The word “they” in my sentence refers to “the whole world”, as it is a direct reponse to your earlier post. You responded as though “they” refers to Kerry.
Do you have any evidence to back up your assertion? I’m familiar with the claims that Chirac said he would never support military action in Iraq, and the conjecture that it was because of France’s ties to Iraq, if that’s what you’re referring to, but that has been debunked.
Oh, I disagree. He very much did. In fact IIRC, the Bush Administration set up their own seperate organization to make the case for Iraq, did they not?
I don’t think the president personally “massaged” the data. Cherry-picked is a better description, perhaps. What he did was meet with various officials and strongly urged them to come up with a reason to invade Iraq. I’m not really following you regarding the sub-committee; are you saying that took place before Bush began trying to make a case for invading Iraq? I don’t see how, since according to Clarke and O’Neill, that started from the very beginning of Bush’s presidency.
I guess that depends whether you consider Richard Clarke and Paul O’Neill to be credible sources
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/01/09/60minutes/main592330.shtml
I can quote Clarke if you like, but I’m sure you know what he’s had to say on the subject, so I don’t want to waste everyone’s time.
Well I certainly agree with you that there was no compelling reason that we just HAD to invade Iraq at the moment we did. But I didn’t really think the democrats were ignoring that point. Kerry’s meme has been “Bush RUSHED to war without a plan”. Surely you’ve heard him say that; he’s said it a million times. Isn’t that precisely the point you’re making? That Bush rushed to war? Not so much the fact that he lied, but the fact that he didn’t need to go to war in the first place? I’m just not seeing where democrats are ignoring that point.
Borrowing from Wesley Clarke and inserting a few of my own ideas:
[ul]Bush jumped to the conclusion that Saddam was partially to blame for 9/11[/ul] [ul]Bush jumped to the conclusion that there was a working Saddam/Al Qaeda relationship[/ul] [ul]Bush jumped to the conclusion that Saddam was this close to a nuclear bomb (remember the tubes?)[/ul] [ul]Bush (well, Cheney) jumped to the conclusion that we would be greeted as liberators[/ul] [ul]Bush jumped to the conclusion about “mission accomplished”[/ul] [ul]Bush jumped to the conclusion that you could impose democracy on people who are being unwillingly occupied[/ul] [ul]Bush jumped to the conclusion that inspections wouldn’t work and pulled out Blix and company to start his damn fool war[/ul]
Let’s think of some more!
True, so let’s consider how they might make themselves less nervous. Oh, I don’t know, maybe Develop Nuclear Weapons???
Well, if this and this story are to be believed (and I admit that they haven’t been shown to be true, but they haven’t been falsified either), then behind the scenes Iran might not only have been for the invasion but might have been helping to engineer it:
As this story broke back in May and then disappeared, I was hoping we would hear more about it before the election.
I misunderheard you then…I thought you were refering to Kerry et al, not The World™ here.
Well, I’m unaware its been ‘debunked’, but no…thats not what I was refering too here. I can’t believe you want a cite that there were countries out there who were dragging their feet or wanted to keep the status quo in Iraq as opposed to an invasion. To me this is a frivolous request for a cite so I’m going to ignore it.
As to the ‘debunked’ part, my understanding was the investigation into the Oil for Food program was ongoing…funny that you have debunked this before the investigation is done. Can you read the future perhaps??
They very well might have…however, whether Bush et al set up their own separate organization to make a case for Iraq or not (and I have no idea if they did or not), the Senate and Congress still get their info from the CIA/NSA, etc…just like the president does. They don’t get their information directly from Bush, which is what it seems to me you are implying.
Well, I agree with you and have said so before…I think the President and his merry men also cherry picked through the data, taking the stuff that made their case and ignoring stuff that didn’t. I also agree that after 9/11 Bush focused (stupidly) on Iraq and set out to make a case against them as a reason for war. I’m not denying any of that blowero. However, the data and analysis that the President looked at about WMD was the same that was available to the Congress and the Senate.
Said intellegence sub-committee’s are always there to look at stuff too sensative for the full house and Senate, so yes, they were certainly there before Bush decided to go to war with Iraq. Bush didn’t MAKE them (i.e. the intellegence sub-committee’s) just to go to war with Iraq blowero, which is how I’m reading your paragraph. They are ALWAYS there. And the data/assessments that they can request from our intellegence organs is exactly the same as whats presented to the president. Your cite from Clark and O’Neill is irrelevent…it just says Bush et al had an agenda as far as Iraq goes. So what?
What you’d need to cite, if you can, is something showing that Congress/Senate received massaged or false data from the President (or at the Presidents instructions…or from anyone else for that matter) that showed WMD data different than their overall TRUE assessment…i.e. that the data and the assesment they (the intellegence sub-committee’s) were seeing was ‘cherry picked’ or flat out made up. Do you have such a cite because again, I’m unaware of it.
Well, in fact I DON’T believe everything Clark/O’Neill has to say, but its irrelevant in any case as its not what I was asking you for. Whether or not Bush et al had an Iraq agenda (which I think they DID after 9/11), the data and analysis of our various intellegence organs was available to the Senate and Congress, same as the President. They both drew the same conclusion (i.e. that Iraq had WMD) from that data. Why this is important I still don’t know. You claim that Democrats aren’t focused on the ‘Bush Lied!’ meme, yet you persist with this. What DIFFERENCE does it make if the President and Congress/Senate thought there were WMD in Iraq? If there were WMD would justify the invasion?
Well, you say this, yet you still persist in the ‘Bush Lied’ meme above…i.e. somehow Bush was able to show false or massaged data to Congress and the Senate about Iraq having WMD. I know WHY they do it…its because it plays to the more radical element of their base, yet also to the moderates (i.e. If we only had a plan, etc etc).
Look at your own statement above…“Bush RUSHED to war without a plan”. Think about that statement for a second. To me it says that the war was OK if we only had a plan. Certainly its not saying ‘Bush Lied!’, but its still along the theme…this time that Bush lead us to war without a plan…but the WAR was still ok. I also heard Kerry, several times in the debates, say that Bush led us to war on false pretenses…i.e. ‘Bush Lied!’. But none of it gets to the true point…whether Iraq had WMD or not the US STILL DIDN’T NEED TO INVADE IRAQ! And I haven’t seen many Democrats hitting that theme…probably because they think that message will play badly with the moderate centrists and independants.
-XT
Strike this one. I’d wager good money that Bush knew Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11, but tied the two merely to sell the war. Bush and his NeoCon buddies have been targeting Iraq long before 1/20/2001…
Aw, Jeez. You may be right but, since Bush is at least pretending he thought that, I think it’s only fair we get to hold it against him. Politicaly speaking this one’s a lot easier to put accross and, besides, the speculative truth — that he knowingly and deliberately lied about it in order to con us into a war — isn’t exactly an improvement from the Republican standpoint.
And, if you’ve — heaven help you — read my other posts, you ought to have a pretty good idea of my estimation of Bush’s truthfullness.
Oh, well sorry I asked you for evidence to back up your bald assertions. I thought this was Great Debates. 
I didn’t say there were no countries that didn’t want to invade; that’s beyond obvious. I asked you for a cite on your implication that there was some sort of malfeasance with respect to certain countries refusing to support an invasion because they were corrupt. If you make such an implication, I expect you to at least provide some details.
Your choice. It doesn’t speak well for your argument, though. Not only can’t you come up with a cite, you haven’t even named the countries you are accusing of malfeasance.
Strawman.
Strawman.
Again, I disagree. Bush, in effect told the intelligence agencies, “Find me a way to invade Iraq.” You would have us believe that this had no effect on the intelligence that they would come up with. To the extent that you’re arguing Congress should have been more savvy with respect to the ‘evidence’, and should have opposed Bush, I agree. But I disagree with your characterization that both Bush and Congress were presented with the same “raw data” and both formed the same conclusion independently. That’s just not how it went down.
Well then they would have had to have met during Clinton’s tenure, since Bush was always planning to invade Iraq.
Strawman.
I don’t understand how you can say it’s irrelevant. You specifically asked me if I had any evidence that Bush influenced the intelligence agencies to make a case for invading Iraq. We have not one, but TWO former members of the administration who say that Bush DID. You’re putting the cart before the horse. Bush told them to make a case for invading Iraq FIRST, then they came up with the intelligence. You’re presenting it backwards.
Sorry, I don’t know what you’re trying to say here.
I suspected as much. And that raises the question of what evidence, if any, you would accept. I have my doubts that it’s possible for anything to make you change your mind.
Well, no - it may not be what you thought you were asking for, but the way you worded it certainly didn’t make it clear.
I understand how you could disagree, but I don’t understand how you think it’s irrelevant if Bush told the intelligence agencies what evidence to look for. Clarke was supposed to be the person IN CHARGE of that, and he contends that he specifically told Bush and Rumsfeld that we didn’t need to go after Iraq, and that Bush persisted ANYWAY. I just can’t see how you think that’s irrelevant - how you think that would have no influence on what the CIA was doing in their intelligence gathering.
I don’t follow you.
Well, no - I said democrats aren’t ignoring the other point, which was your contention.
Well, yes - I believe that was the reason Bush played up the WMD angle. I think he did that for exactly that reason - to justify the invasion. You and I know it still wouldn’t have justified it, but that doesn’t change the fact that Bush reasoned that it did.
I’ve explained my reasoning very clearly, yet you persist with this strawman. Why?
Well I think an invasion of Iraq would have been o.k., but only if we had gone through the right process. Bush’s fatal error was that he tried to work with the UN, wasn’t immediately successful, and then just basically said, “Screw you guys, I’m gonna do it anyway.” That was a HUGE mistake. Bush even said himself, before he was elected, that he was against “nation building”. Unilateral nation-building is just a bad idea. IF you’re going to use military force for the purpose of “liberating” people, you HAVE to have international support.
I don’t understand why you don’t think he should be allowed to make both points. He’s saying that THE WAY BUSH DID IT was wrong, not that ousting Saddam was ipso facto wrong. What’s wrong with making that distinction?
Yeah, well I do see your point here. Obviously Kerry can’t say that we never should have invaded Iraq, because that would be at odds with his vote to give Bush the authority to do so. Additionally, as you say, it would most likely alienate the centrists.
I don’t have time to find the cites now, but there was some discussion about this issue in regards to the aluminum tubes issue after the New York Times published their long tome on this a few weeks ago. I think the article said or implied that the Congress was not made aware of the debate regarding the aluminum tubes issue…or at least not fully aware of it. And, at that time, in subsequent articles, it was reported that some of Kerry’s security advisors were pointing out (on one of the Sunday morning talk shows as I recall) that indeed Congress is not privy to all of the intelligence that the President has.
Maybe someone can dig this whole discussion up.
We also have some N.Y. Times articles written before (or right at the start of) the war. See here and look under “Raising Doubts about Intelligence” and look at the March 23rd, 2003 article titled “C.I.A. Aides Feel Pressure in Preparing Iraqi Reports” along with some of the other articles there that were written prior to that.
Surely it is uncertainty that creates the most danger in international relations. So Bush’s decisive action has removed the uncertainty of the situation (Saddam may or may not have given the weapons to terrorists) and moved to a far more certain, and therefore less dangerous situation (terrorists walk off with weapons) 
Registration is required on that cite. 
Is this the full Congress or the intellegence sub-comittee? Certainly the full Congress wouldn’t have the same intellegence as the President. My understanding though is that the intellegence sub-committee is privy to pretty much everything.
blowero, I just lost a long post in reply to your last post…I’ll try and re-create it tonight time permitting.
-XT
Oh, geez…Suck it up, man! It’s the New York Times. It is worth the (free) price of admission. Here’s a little preview from the March 23, 2003 article:
I think the claim is that they are not but I have to admit that I am not sure on that.