Lets stick to reason and facts not personal attacks. I am not saying Bush ‘acted alone’. He had millions supporting his stupid solely alone decision to kick inspectors out. He had evangelical Christians, he had neo-cons, he had the corporate heads of the news media, he had forty percent of Americans polled who didn’t care about Inspections. Sixty Percent of Americans did not support Bush’s decision on March 17 to not let inspections continue to disarm Iraq peacefully. But after the bad decision was made some of them supported our troops going into combat.
I don’t call that support of Bush’s very stupid decision that he made all on his
I posted your entire statement that I wished to address.
You told me that your actual statement was:
When a thread is closed the quote key is not available. Is there anything wrong with putting the author and the date and time in the Quote Tags.
And are you saying you don’t mean “Bush acted” when you wrote “the U.S. acted unilaterally, not to enforce U.N” even though he was the President at the time who decided to act?
I agree with you that Bush *did not enforce UN directives *when he invaded Iraq. That is great isn’t it. Why not help me bring Human Action around who says Bush was enforcing one UNSC Resolution or more when he decided to invade Iraq.
Bush et al disagreed that the resolutions were being enforced; they were convinced that Hussein was hiding weapons and deceiving the inspectors. Thus, the invasion was to enforce resolutions.
You say he was disregarding the language, I say he wasn’t, and you’re misinterpreting the language.
Also, where’s your evidence that he was defying their intent? They certainly weren’t falling all over themselves to oppose the invasion as it was happening, nor did they install any safeguards against a needless, unilateral war…like the Levin Amendment.
It really doesn’t. They are two different questions: “Who ordered the invasion of Iraq?” versus “Who is responsible for the Iraq War?”
Sure he did. He compelled compliance with various resolutions. That’s what it means to enforce something.
“Sure it did” is not an argument. Do you have an argument? Do you have an explanation of how you see that Bush was enforcing ‘all’ relevant UNSC Resolutions when the most relevant one at the time, which Bush himself endorsed and voted in favor, was ‘enforcing’ 'all relevant UNSC Resolutions at the time Bush decided to end that ‘enforcement’ and invade Iraq ‘unilaterally’ as T&D points out?
Explain how Bush was enforcing UNSC Resolutions when he had no authority to do the exact opposite of what the UNSC members determined to be the peaceful manner that Iraq would be verified disarmed.
How did Bush compel compliance with ‘all’ Resolutions when he ended inspections and invaded Iraq?
How did Bush compel compliance with ‘any’ Resolutions when he ended inspections and invaded Iraq?
Iraq was already ‘complying’ in the eyes of the majority of the UNSC Council. Compliance was already ‘compelled’ as Blix stated by the threat of use of military force.
If you have the authority to compel/enforce someone to do something (without a deadline) or you will impose a fine of $1000 dollars and then they do what they are compelled to do, and then you take their $1000 anyway - is it proper to call ‘stealing’ that $1000 ‘enforcing’ what that someone was supposed to do?
Do you? All I read is declarations that Bush didn’t enforce resolutions. I’m not going to take your word for it, and you appear to have nothing except your own opinions.
Certainly. By overthrowing the Iraqi leadership, Bush could compel compliance to any resolution he so chose.
An analogy: The United Nations passes the Left-Handed Exclusion Resolution, which requires all lefties worldwide to be moved to Canada. The resolution sets up a peaceful, orderly transfer program. Later, Congress passes the War Prevention Act, which authorizes the President to use military force if he determines it to be necessary in order to enforce the Exclusion Resolution. Months later, with the transfer program going too slowly for his tastes, the President uses the full might of the Armed Forces to forcibly remove the lefties.
Did the President enforce the Left-Handed Exclusion Resolution, within the meaning of the War Prevention Act? Absolutely.
To enforce means to ‘compel obedience to’. Bush did that. He removed Iraq’s ability to defy the resolutions, for one.
By removing Iraq’s ability to defy them, and by seizing control of the nation. The same way the U.N. would have done it if the UNSC voted to find Iraq in violation of 1441. Or would they not be enforcing 1441 either?
See above.
And? You seem to have trouble making coherent points. Compliance can be voluntary or forced; in this case it went from one to the other. In both cases, resolutions were being enforced.
You are describing enforcement, as the enforcer found to be necessary and appropriate, and using the means they were authorized to use.
Don’t play disingenuous. I said the U.S. took an action and you changed it to make it look as though I had said Bush took that action. It is your (sole) opinion that Bush acted alone and changing my statement to make it appear that I supported the notion that Bush acted alone is not an honest debating tactic. I correctly have noted that Bush acted with the complete approval of the Congress–including a large number of Democrats. By changing my statement, you pretended that I had posted support for your position, implying that I was changing my views.
You would be well advised to not twist my words and to not try to hijack this thread with more silly word-parsing.
Why didn’t you address my statement that you cited? I have not argued that Bush didn’t fake that he acted under the AUMF that was given to him. I am saying Bush was perfectly legally justified in doing anything with the US Military he wanted to do at least for sixty days. And that means that the AUMF was never a necessity for Bush if he decided to invade Iraq without a specific AUMF.
Did you already forget about Tomndebb’s opinion? It is not ‘my own’ therefore. So you are wrong about that.
I have presented several arguments that Bush did not enforce any or all UNSC Resolutions. One of which is that S.H. was complying with the UNSC which was the authoritative body that was in the process of ‘enforcing’ all UNSC Resolutions with regard to Iraq when Bush decided to end the authority’s means of enforcement to do something as Tomndebb says unilaterally not to enforce UN Directives.
You have presented nothing to dispute the truth of that or offer an explanation under any scenario where Bush could have been enforcing the inspection process that he force to come to a premature end. The ‘relevant’ UNSC Resolutions that Bush did not enforce were about ‘inspections’ and other considerations of how to disarm Iraq of WMD.
Bush could not ‘enforce’ inspections by shutting down inspections. You need to explain how your idea of enforcement works.
And yet, I used the Quote function to collect my actual statement and post it after you posted a corrupted version of it.
I don’t care that you do not appear to be capable of using a simple vBulletin command. I have simply put you on notice that since you refuse to use the Quote function, if I find you mangling any other poster’s quotes in your odd manner, I will treat it as a violation of the rule against changing statements inside the Quote tags.
I believe it would be fair of you to explain if you believe Bush and U.S.A. are not interchangeable when speaking of such things as taking the action of invading a sovereign nation with a couple hundred thousand ground troops and heavy bombardment for several days.
Bush acted/U.S.A. acted. Do you think Bush was not a part of that ‘act’?
You just wrote, “I said the U.S. took an action and you changed it to make it look as though I had said Bush took that action.” That not quite right since I didn’t take “USA” out of your statement. I was asserting that Bush is the primary and only decision maker for the USA when he decided to force an end to UNSC inspections.
An Un-hijacked thread would be I believe… where you accept that we are in agreement that Bush was acting as President of the USA (POTUS) when he/USA did not enforce UNSC inspections.
Either way, from what I read, you and I agree that Bush/USA did not ‘enforce’ UN Directives/Resolutions. I think that is a grand development for this discussion.
Have you seen my recent posts regarding what Senator Jay Rockefeller had to say about knowing all about the reality that Bush wanted war? Sen Rockefeller was not stupid to that reality when he voted yes for the AUMF. I addressed your point prior to your asking it.
Last time I checked, we were in Iraq for considerably longer than 60 days.
Which is senseless, the AUMF doesn’t say that Bush could only enforce resolutions that weren’t being adequately enforced by the UN in the UN’s opinion. It empowered Bush to use the United States’ military to enforce them, unilaterally.
He could enforce disarmament through war, and that’s what he did, be it under Resolution 1441, 687, or any other he though it was necessary to enforce through military action. That’s what the AUMF empowered him to do, and that’s why no one who passed the bill accused him of violating it, an inconvenient truth that you’ve tried over and over again to handwave away. Again, we are presented with the words and deeds of the people who passed the bill and a common-sense reading of it vs. your partisan opinions. It’s not a difficult choice.
Your posts regarding Rockefeller are bullshit. You quoted Rockefeller from 2005 rationalizing his behavior in giving Bush the authorization to go to war. (Rockefeller does get the fig leaf of protection in that he did vote for the Levin Amendment.) His claim is nothing but an after-the-fact, self-serving disavowal of his actual behavior.
My comments regarding the Democratic senators being stupid according to your scenario were sarcastic. I am pretty sure that they did know that Bush was going to war. Rockefeller pretty much admits he knew*, yet he voted for the AUMF anyway.
And despite his 2005 protestations, I have found no statement by him from March 2003 in which he told Bush to stand down or to protest that Bush was overreaching his authority. Those claims only came two years later when it was obvious to everyone that the Iraq mess had been a stupid move.
Lacking any evidence from March, 2003 of actual Democratic opposition to Bush’s clear intention to invade, Rockefeller’s claims and yours that Bush acted alone are simply the inventions of people trying to deny their involvement and responsibility.
*(He is even reported to have visited several Middle Eastern nations in January 2001 to tell them Bush intended to make war on Iraq.)
Who are you to judge that Senator Rockefeller has to ‘rationalize his behavior’? There was nothing wrong with his behavior at a time when S.H.'s regime was in violation of international law. And ‘fig leaf of protection’ for what?
Authorizing the use of military force if Iraq continued to refuse to comply with all relevant UNSC Resolutions regarding Iraq was a legitimate vote for a U.S. Senator who considers that international law should and must be enforced when an issue such as WMD in the hands of a blatant violator of international law was involved in that decision.
I’ll stick to reality and facts and reason on the “great debates” forum.
There you have claimed that I had ‘invented a scenario’ but you have not responded to my challenge of your claim.
Now you have opened the scenario door again.
And where did you get that I have a scenario that Democratic Senators were being stupid?
I think some Democratic Senators were very smart knowing that Bush really wanted war plus also knowing that Bush had the legal authority to do whatever he wanted to do against Iraq for sixty days. And Bush had already escalated air attacks on Iraq for months prior to the AUMF vote. And once a few U.S. were killed by the ‘new found’ enemy, then Americans allow nationalistic patriotism kick in.
Of Course Senator Rockefeller voted for the AUMF ‘anyway’. That is the reason I brought his interview with Chris Wallace up.
I have made no claim that Bush ‘acted alone’. I agree with Rockefeller that Congress played no part in the decision to invade Iraq no matter when that decision was made.
I am a citizen of a nation that has been shamed by his irresponsible actions.
There was everything wrong with his behavior. Knowing that Bush intended to make war on Iraq, Rockefeller joined the majority of congresscritters in giving Bush a rubber stamp approval to go wage that war. Beyond that, the AUMF, even if the “UN” clauses had been followed, was morally unjustified and a violation of the UN Charter since Iraq was not attacking any other nation and was already contained by the embargo and no-fly zones. It no longer had either the wherewithal or the intention to attack anyone.
Stick to them? You could not even find them.
Your behavior is so far divorced from reality as to suggest to several posters that you are suffering from mental issues.
The overwhelming number of things that you post as “facts” are nothing more than ill-considered opinions.
Your logic or reason is, at best, flawed.