Did "60 Minutes" Say Bush is Lying About Iraq?

Great Debates
1

The “teaser” didn’t quite set it up, just showed somebody being asked “How did the Administration do?” Answered: “I give it an A+” Well, whats this about? Dolphin control?

No, its about propaganda in support of war. Reviewing the “incubator” scandal of the Gulf War I in comparison to some whoppers served to the public by the Bushistas, including my all time favorite, the report that did not exist.

Now, from my somewhat left of center veiwpoint, looks to me like “60 Minutes” said that the Bushista’s are lying, trying to con the people into war, and, further, that its working.

Anybody get a different take? Anybody notice any media reaction? Anybody think it isn’t true?

2

Anybody got a cite? Or three?

3

Summary of the show.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/12/06/60minutes/main532107.shtml

It’s pointless to try to discuss whether 60 Minutes implied that the administration is trying to “con” the American people in a war solely on the basis of this summary, without having seen the show.

Luce, did you actually see the show?

4

I seen the show. The Kuwaiti babies pulled from incubators was one of the most masterful pieces of fabrication every conned on the world to drum up war support.

If Bush and his cronies have the evidence that they claim Iraq has of weapons of MD, and now with UN inspectors on the ground to find it, if they come up empty by February, it’s going to be a hard sale to go to war, even though he probably does have those weapons. If they do find the mother lode, then bye-bye Saddam.

JZ

5

It sure sounded like unadulterated bullshit to me. I think it will be impossible for me to believe much of anything Bush says after seeing the show last night. It’s going to be a long couple years…

6

I wish more people remembered this today, perhaps they wouldn’t be so trusting of blindly following the gov’t push for war. Not only can’t you trust the gov’t because they lie, but because they get lied to and believe it.

7

What exactly are we debating? That Bush 43 lied about Kuwaiti incubator babies?

Do we have a specific accusation that 60 Minutes made of Bush lying, or is this just innuendo?

8

[quoteWhat exactly are we debating? That Bush 43 lied about Kuwaiti incubator babies?[/quote]

That would be Bush 41, father of Bush 43. As I recall, the Kuwait royalty hired a New York marketing firm to help them sell the U.S. on the idea of war against Iraq, and some genius came up with the baby incubator story.

I don’t know what we’re debating, but I am getting a lot of memories from a dozen years ago. Worse than being lied to, we (the U.S. public) were treated like halfwit children with short memories.

Remember in 1990 when the State Department started telling us that Saddam Hussein was Hitler? I’m sure many of you, like me, said, “Gee, why didn’t you mention that during the decade we’ve been supporting him in his war against Iran?”

So we went to war. Then we stopped, and Bush 41 accepted a peace agreement that left Hussein firmly in power.

So if Hussein was Hitler, it was clear that Bush was no FDR.

Now we’re being fed various new lines of bullshit. I haven’t heard anything from Bush 43 about how many tens of billions such a war is likely to cost, or how many dead U.S. soldiers he’s willing to accept, or how long we’ll have to occupy the country, or the likelihood that war would lead to more terrorism, not less.

I’m not filled with confidence.

9

As to specifics: the show centered around the idea of propaganda, it use and misuse by the Bush Admin. There were three specific topics touched on, none of which will be an surprise to frequent posters/combatants on these hallowed boards.

One, the alleged meeting between Al-Queda guy and an Iraqi intellilgence guy, offered in support of the contention that Iraq was mixed up in 9/11. Two, the aluminum tube thing, about how aluminum tubes that have no possible use other than the production of uranium-type nukes. And third, my own personal favorite, The Report That Didn’t Exist, which Our Leader offered as proof positive that the Iraqi’s were very close to producing nukes.

60 Minutes went on to document that there was no proof whatever of any of these. They further went on to note that the propaganda was effective nonetheless, as roughly 2/3 of Americans believe that Iraq was involved with 9/11.

There are any number of possible debateable themes here, first and foremost would be, naturally, the legitimacy of propaganda and/or lying in support of war. (I’m agin it)

Another point of interest is wondering about the politics of 60 Minutes as it reflects on its status as a media whore. Just recently they did a big puff piece on Woodwards positively fawning book on Bush. And, as you all probably know, none of these incidents are “news”, they have been public knowledge for some time now. So why?

Maybe Dan Rather was accosted in the hall by the ghost of Edward R. Murrow.

10

FWIW, it seems likely to me that 41 believed it. It’s easy to convince people of things that already fit their world view. So, if he ever used that as an excuse for the war, he was as much a victim of the lie as anybody.

11

Well, We didn’t go to war with Iraq because of incubators, and we aren’t considering war with Iraq because they were mixed up in 9/11, and your description of the 1998 UN report is not quite accurate.

So maybe this is liberal spin by 60 Minutes.

Regards,
Shodan

12

No claim was offered that we went to war with Iraq “because of incubators”. It was pointed out how public opinion shifted strongly in favor of such with the “news”. Its an old trick, in WWI, if you are to believe things on face value, every army involved made sport of bayoneting babies.

My description of the 1998 UN report may not be quite accurate. However, I am not President of the United States, performing what ought to be his duty: the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth. One notes, in your haste, you have neglected to point out in what way my description is inaccurate. Perhaps at the same instant you can find a way to make Mr. Bush’s use of it legitimate. Good luck.

As to “liberal spin” by 60 Minutes, well, that’s quite another question, isn’t it, and a darned interesting one too. As I noted, they had just broadcast a long report on Mr. Woodwards paen to Bush as a Leader of Men. I hardly think gushing reports on Our Churchill qualifies as “liberal spin”. Rather, I thought that previous piece was a revolting bit of knee-pad journalism on Mr. Woodwards part.

There is one succinctly qualifying distinction: the “propaganda” piece involved verifiable facts, whereas the Woodward piece was largely impressionistic, centering around Woodwards awe and wonder for the Man Who Fell Up. Feh!, as they say in Lubbock.

13

I don’t know about 60 minutes, but I’ll fucking say it.

Bush is a liar, and he’s not even a good liar. His latest bullshit assertion about having “solid evidence” for Iraq’s WMD’s is the latest example. D’Iulio’s recent revelations have shown us that this administration is concerned only with politics, and has no use whatever for facts. They have decided that war is good for politics and that’s the end of it. Bush has been caught lying several times already in regards to Iraq, and he’s lying now. There obviously IS no evidence for WMD’s in Iraq and this latest charade is just an inept and ill advised attempt to bluff Saddam into copping to stuff that the Bushistas HOPE Iraq is doing.

Well guess what, Saddam has called their bluff and made them look like idiots. He’s given them a statement that there ARE no WMD’s, and invited them to actually SHOW their “solid evidence” to the contrary (which does not exist).

So the Bushies are claiming that “Well, we HAVE evidence… really, really GOOD evidence. BOY is this good evidence…but…er…um, we can’t show it to you because…um…that would…um…compromise national security…yeah, THAT’S it, national security, THAT’S the ticket.”

The truth doesn’t matter. The big lie works. If you tell the same lie often enough, people will believe it. People are stupid, especially Americans. Americans believe in John Edward, for fuck’s sake. If it’s on TV, it must be true. The appalling servility of the media in going along with every bit of horseshit that Bush inc. flings at us is simply unforgivable.

I predict that sometime soon, W. will go on TV, and give a self-righteous, self-serving speech justifying his order to invade Iraq. He will claim that Iraq has WMD’s, but will further claim that he has no obligation to PROVE this.

In other words, we will be asked to go to war on nothing but the say so of a PROVEN, MULTIPLE LIAR.

And the sad thing is…it will work. People will believe it. People are stupid, especially Americans.

14

Are you an American?

Actually, I don’t think it is working as well as the corporate media would like you to think. The anti-war movement is growing, and people are wary of getting into a new war. It is only by scaring people that they become willing to believe their leaders when they talk about threats.

And, this is by no means the only lie that Bush has told. There are a whole series of lies and distortions that Bush has repeated, that have gone unchallenged in the corporate media or by the so-called opposition party.

Bush has stated that the IAEA reported that Iraq was 6 months away from developing a nuclear weapon, a blatant lie.

Bush has attempted to link Iraq to al Queda and international terrorist organizations, a link that does not exist.

Bush has claimed that Iraq kicked out the U.N. weapons inspectors in 1998, a blatant lie.

Bush has claimed that the U.N. has mandated the patrolling of “no-fly zones” in Iraq, a blatant lie.

He has also propagated numerous deceptions that don’t rise to the level of a blatant lie. For example, he stated in his speech to the U.N., that if Iraq were to obtain a softball-sized chunk of weapons grade uranium that it would be able to develop a nuclear weapon within six months. This is true, but is equivalent to saying “if Iraq has a nuclear weapon it will have a nuclear weapon.” Making the actual bomb is pretty easy, it is getting the fissile material that is the hard part.

The Bushites have lied continuously about Iraq’s compliance with weapons inspectors, neglecting the fact that by the end of 1998, Iraq had been complying fully with UNSCOM, and was about to be cleared of all WMD capacity.

And so on.

The point is that if we had an honest press that actually acted as a check on power, as opposed to being the stenographers of power, or if we had an opposition party, these lies would be exposed to the people. As it stands, Bush is able to repeat lie after lie without consequence.

15

Apparently Bush is not the only liar to occupy the White House.

Report: Presidents Washington through Bush may have lied about key matters.

16

Yeah, but let’s face it. Most Americans can’t find Iraq on a map, name their own senators, or spell spaghetti. 70% of Americans believe in angels. The O’Reilly factor is the top rated cable news show in the counry. Garth brooks is the top selling musician of the last twenty years. The Left Behind books are big best sellers. People think that the Pet Psychic is really a pet psychic.

People who watch any news at all are a minority. People who read newspapers are true rarae aves. Americans are an exceptionally spoiled and uninformed people. I say this with shame, not with pleasure. I think that the current administration has figured out that the truth doesn’t matter. Most people will believe whatever they’re told. The ones who don’t believe will be marginalized by the media as radicals and troublemakers.

17

You have got to be shitting me. Bush 41 isn’t Bush 43, he actually played a part in choosing this country’s agenda, as opposed to just smiling and stumbling over carefully worded speeches. The first Gulf War is widely viewed in the Islamic world as a successful Western ploy to increase their influence in the Middle East. Here’s the whole story as I see it. Bush pulled the wool over the eyes of all Americans to achieve his misguided political goals.

this is kinda long, but as concise as I could manage:

Prior to 1979 Iran was the biggest US ally in the mid east, after the revolution and the exile of our puppet the Shah, we encouraged Saddam to attack the fledging Iranian state. Saddam agreed because he was interested in port access to the Persian Gulf by way of the Shatt-al-Arab waterway, which served as the Iraq-Iran border but was claimed by Iranians. Out of fear of the spread of Islamic revivalism Western powers allowed the Iraq-Iran war to go on for nearly a decade, and they were also more than happy to sell both sides arms and look the other way as Saddam gassed the Iranians. The war ended in a stalemate and Iraq emerged with a debt of $80 billion. Iraq intended to recoup those losses and get back at the US (who they believed had betrayed them by selling weapons to the Iranians) by organizing an OPEC initiative to restrict production, raising oil prices. All OPEC nations agreed except for Kuwait and the UAE, which exceeded their quotas. The ruling Al-Sabah family of Kuwait was invested lucratively in Western industries and did not want to upset their relationships. Iraq viewed this action as a Kuwaiti plot to prevent them from recovering from the war.

In addition to that, the Iraqi’s held a longstanding claim to Kuwait as a trade route to the gulf that had been cut off by the British (who annexed Kuwait, from what was previously part of the Ottoman Empire along with what is now Iraq, post WWI to cut off a German rail line that would have competed with their Suez Canal). Iraq had been claiming since the 1920s that Kuwait was rightfully theirs. All this combined with allegations of slant drilling on the Iraq- Kuwait border mitigated Saddam’s intention to capture Kuwait. So when April Glaspie, US ambassador to Iraq, allegedly implied to Saddam that the US wouldn’t interfere if he invaded Kuwait, he did so. Here’s where Bush Sr. comes into the picture. Bush immediately condemned the act and threatened a military response against his recent ally. He expeditiously staved off the diplomatic process at the UN, and purportedly told the al Saud royals that Saddam was massing troops on the Saudi border (with still unverified satellite images). The Saudi’s permitted him to base troops in Saudi Arabia, and Bush prepared to take out Saddam making a big show of America’s moral duty to help the poor Kuwaitis. Funny how the American public wasn’t made aware of America’s duty to intervene when Indonesia invaded and annexed East Timor in 1975, or when India took Goa in 1961. But then again those countries don’t have trillions in oil buried beneath them.

The war was a huge PR windfall for Bush, who squandered that political capital on poor economic policies. Saddam was left in power, and left with his military to slaughter tens of thousands of Kuridish rebels who had been encouraged by the US to aid in his overthrow. Oil kept flowing from the region except for Iraq who was sanctioned and could only trade restricted quantities to countries other than the land of SUVs. Those sanctions incidentally have made conditions in Iraq nightmarish, Saddam and his hundreds of thousands of cronies are as rich as ever and the other 90% of the population is starving, living in a state of despair, and rooting for OBL to shake things up and knock us down a few dozen pegs. Now Bush part deux intends to use a new war with Saddam as a smokescreen for his failings domestically and to serve as proof positive of ‘decisive’ and ‘proactive’ measures in the “War on Terror.” And coincidentally those Iraqi oil fields can be moved back up to full production and start pumping for the good old US of A.

To the OP, so here’s the rub: Bush Sr. got away with it, why shouldn’t Jr. expect to as well.

18

Holy shit, cainxinth, what a great overview of the last twenty years of US/Iraq policy. You’re right on the money. Great job. Thanks.

19

—Funny how the American public wasn’t made aware of America’s duty to intervene when Indonesia invaded and annexed East Timor in 1975, or when India took Goa in 1961. But then again those countries don’t have trillions in oil buried beneath them.—

Ah, so Bush 41 is responsible for something that DIDN’T happen in the Kennedy administration? The Ford administration (I believe)?

Not that I don’t agree that any serious commitment to human rights and or national borders should have had us involved in those conflicts too, but I don’t see what the case is for opposing us stopping Iraq’s annexing of Kuwait, incubator babies or no (by the way, a coming HBO movie features that myth as if it were a reality, with the scummy Iraqis trying to cover it up). Sure, Saddam was left in power… but we stopped an obvious violent takeover of a soverign nation, whatever we might think about either nation involved. I don’t think that’s a bad thing.

And to be fair, if Bush DID have good evidence, and released it publically in order to win over the U.S. public more solidly PRIOR to an invasion… it would tip Saddam off to exactly what our intelligence on him knows, what it does not, and probably partially revealing HOW we know as well.

—And coincidentally those Iraqi oil fields can be moved back up to full production and start pumping for the good old US of A. —

Never quite understood this particular conspiracy theory. Is the idea to flood the market with oil to drive DOWN prices to please SUV drivers? Or is it to restrict the oil, and then risk major disruptions via war, to limit prices and make oilmen rich? Is it magically both at once?

However, as far as propaganda, remember that OSI initiative (the one that was supposed to seed foriegn media with propaganda: quoth “developing plans to
provide news items, possibly even false ones, to foreign media
organizations.”) that took so much flak that they cancelled it? Turns out that “cancelled” meant “went ahead and started it, just not under the same name.”

Here’s Donald: “And then there was the Office of Strategic Influence. You may recall that. And ‘oh my goodness gracious isn’t that terrible, Henny Penny the sky is going to fall.’ I went down that next day and said fine, if you want to savage this thing fine I’ll give you the corpse. There’s the name. You can have the name, but I’m gonna keep doing every single thing that needs to be done and I have.”

20

Indonesia was still occupying East Timor in 1991. In fact, the occupation continued, with full U.S. support, until 1999.

Nothing per se bad about that. The problem is that the stated goal of removing Iraq from Kuwait could have been done without a war, and was accomplished in 24 hours. The U.S. then mercilessly and systematically destroyed Iraqi society.

The idea that Iraq poses a threat is ludicrous, whether or not Saddam is building a chemical weapon in some dank cave 4 miles underground.

It is not about obtaining access to oil. It is about control of Iraq’s resources, which are vast.
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