Yeah, he got “elected” because the Supreme Court stopped the recall before it could be proven otherwise, with a decision so shaky even the majority opinion said it shouldn’t be used for establishing precedent. :rolleyes: Real reassuring, that.
Oh, no, of course not, and that non-competitive-bidding $9 billion open-ended Iraqi reconstruction contract awarded to Haliburton has absolutely nothing to do with Dick Chenecy’s position as Veep. Geez Louise, the whole Whitewater witchhunt got launched on less credible evidence than this…
Oh, doofy me, I thought we should have waited for the evidence before starting the war. The fact that we have to go scrabbling for evidence after the shooting is over speaks volumes about how little we had beforehand.
Unfortunately, that’s all shifting the goalposts after the fact, and that’s not kosher. Bush, Cheney, Powell, Rice, Rumsfeld, et al were all insisting just six months ago that war had to be waged because Saddam Hussein had “massive stockpiles” of WMDs all over the place, that Saddam could launch a strike within 45 minutes, blab blab blab. No one was arguing for war because Saddam might have three blueprints and an anthrax recipe in his filing cabinet, and any attempts to claim that now is simply revisionist history.
Sam, you’ve already been spanked publicly in this forum already for this nonsense. Your inability to grasp this fact and admit that the Bush Administration is backpedaling like mad only supports the claim that conservatism is a mental disorder.
Look: We don’t KNOW what happened to them. That’s what these documents may show. If, for example, they show that 72 semi-trailers full of Vx and Anthrax crossed the border into Syria, then that WILL be corroboration of exactly what Bush said. If the documents show that AFTER Powell made the U.N. case X tons of material were taken to a facility and destroyed to deprive the U.S. of a casus belli, then that will ALSO corroborate exactly what Bush said. Saddam was under no obligation to keep all his weapons so that the world could see them. Once war was inevitable, he may very well have made the decision to go to pllan ‘B’, which would be to start a guerilla war, and destroy all evidence of WMD so that the Americans would take a PR hit on the world stage and at home, in hopes of forcing them out of the country. That’s at least a plausible scenario, and we don’t have the evidence yet.
Or, they may even point to underground burial sites containing those very massive stockpiles. Or, they may hint that the stockpiles are there, but we can’t find them. See, if this current guerrilla war was part of the pre-invasion strategy of Saddam, then doesn’t it make sense that he may have had his trusted Fedayeen hide the weapons, so that they could still be used when the time was right? We don’t know.
This is all a big mystery to me. It’s not jut the Bush administration that claimed the weapons were there - it was every major western intelligence service. They’re all baffled. You take the fact that they haven’t been found as ‘proof’ that the administration lied, it’s all a put-up to start a war to help some rich cronies, yadda yadda yadda. I think that’s just hysterical. It doesn’t pass the logic test.
As I understand your argument, the chain of events is that the Bush administration faked a whole bunch of evidence, presented a false case to the world, and invaded a country so that the Vice President could divert some reconstruction money to his buddies. Along the way, they talked the governments of Australia and Britain to join the conspiracy. But they were too stupid to plant some evidence in the country, so after the invasion they…what? Hoped no one would ask for evidence?
The whole thing is preposterous. Reasonable people will AT WORST think that this was some sort of intelligence balls-up. That the administration had pre-judged Iraq as a threat to the United States, and through sheer power of persuation and selective intelligence reporting got two other governments, congress, and the American people to go along with it. Even that sounds fishy, to me.
Frankly, I think everyone was surprised that chemical weapons weren’t used during the war, and even more surprised that they haven’t turned up those WMD. I think the Bush administration was surprised most of all. I think Colin Powell, George Bush, Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, and Condoleeza Rice were certain that those weapons were there, because the vast preponderance of intelligence says that it was.
So, it’s a mystery. One which we will eventually get to the bottom of, and then we’ll know. The possible solutions to me are,
A) Saddam deceived the world into thinking he had weapons he didn’t have, in order to raise his stature in the Arab world. He never thought the U.S. would follow through with an invasion.
B) The weapons were there, and were destroyed on the eve of war.
C) The weapons are still there, but have either been moved into Syria or are buried somewhere.
D) Saddam recognized that the weapons themselves were too dangerous to keep around, so his weapons program consisted of a distributed array of dual-use facilities that could be used to generate the weapons in short order. If that’s the case, then at least some of the U.N. presentation would be wrong.
E) Saddam honestly thought the weapons were there, because he was being fed a line of BS from his subordinates. It wouldn’t be the first time that a dictator was told what he wanted to hear in the face of the facts.
Your scenario, that this is all a big con job to funnel money to evil corporations, isn’t even on the logical radar screen. It’s a leftist masturbatory fairy tale, and nothing else. It makes no sense.
Spank me, baby. Go for it. Tell me just how nuts the above message sounds compared to yours, and we’ll let the forum decide.
But thanks for not letting me down. I knew the cheap shot had to be somewhere in your message. Next time, don’t make me wait until the end, okay? It makes me nervous.
Sam, you might have just a little credibility if you could summarize others’ arguments in substance, and accurately, rather than with the wrong, and unusually (even for you) high snideness content of, that last one. No, the scenario you say rjung is offering is not what he, and most of the rest of us, have been trying to get you to consider honestly for quite some time now. The accusation is not “just” that it was a money-grab for Halliburton, or even primarily, but that they were so determined to do what they did that they filtered all evidence that way. And you still sidestep this: They did not know what they said they knew. That cannot change after the fact.
Your handwaving dismissal of even what you say the argument is does not reflect the fact that there is considerably more evidence for it than there is for your confidence (or is it simple hope?) that “the truth” will emerge from Kay’s remarkably-tardy stuff.
It isn’t a “mystery” for those who can smell the coffee. We’re already at the bottom of it.
ElvisL1ves: That’s not a refutation. Come on. Please? Just humor me. It must be incredibly obvious to you. So tell me - which piece of evidence did Bush offer that has been 100%, categorically disproven?
Hazel-rah: That is also not a refutation. Could you please refute it? Just calling something stupid does not a refutation make.
Come on, guys. If I’m so stupid and out to lunch, this should be a turkey shoot.
Also not a refutation. Come on, let’s be specific. This is a little different than Santa Claus. This is the considered opinion of the intelligence services of the largest country on the planet. They can’t be dismissed so easily.
I’ve heard a lot of yelling screaming about lies. As far as I can tell, the whole case for “Bush LIED to us!” boils down to, “we haven’t found the weapons yet.”
I can’t think of a single piece of evidence that has been refuted. Maybe I missed it - it’s certainly possible. Maybe I’m just not thinking straight tonight. That’s possible too. So come on… humor me. Show me one piece of evidence that Bush offered to the American people that can be categorically shown to be a lie.
Rather than forcing everyone to go through the pedantic contortions of inverting the usual responsibility for burden of proof, and insisting that evidence, rather than claims, be refuted. Why don’t you give us an example of just one administration claim about the imminent threat of Iraq’s WMD’s that has been borne out by the evidence ? Pick something you still believe with heart and soul, and we’ll see how it stands up.
If you had said, “So, where the proof of WMD?”, or I had said, “They’re definitely there!”, then you’d be right. The burden of proof would be on those making the claim. From that standpoint, I would say, “don’t have the proof yet, but I’m waiting for it.”
However, if you make the claim that BUSH LIED!, and that it’s already been proven, then it’s up to you to show your proof of that.
Now, if you guys want to scale back your hysteria and modify your opinion into, “Bush hasn’t presented the evidence for the weapons that he claimed was there”, then I’d agree with you, because that has been my position all along. And if there were no ongoing investigations, and no prospects for evidence to be released soon, then I might even escalate my opinion to, “we appear to have been mislead.” And I would act accordingly in the next election.
However, since the administration appears to be in the process of presenting their evidence, and it is being amassed while we speak, I will await the trial before determining their guilt or innocense. I believe that this is the reasonable position.
Ahh, but I did ask for proof of WMD’s before the war, and it was never delivered; despite promises that it would be. Seems a bit self-serving to try to start a new and unrelated debate at this point in time, when the last time we let Bush slide on the evidence, he rushed off and started his war. Why should we change the rules of evidence now that the war is over ? Bush claimed certainty on the imminent threat posed by Iraq nearly a year ago now, and still we have nothing that stands up to the light of day. Whether the president lied, or was deluded about what he “knew” makes little difference in terms of the consequences we face. We were certainly mislead.
Perhaps Bush can come up with an underground uranium enrichment facility, vials filled with weaponized Anthrax, or medium range missiles stuffed with nerve agents and aimed at Tel Aviv. However at this late date, such a discovery is hardly likely to come about as a result of the putatively ironclad intelligence he possessed when he told us about the reasons we had to be in such a hurry to invade.
You claim that the evidence “is being amassed while we speak”. I ask, what happened to the last batch of evidence we were promised ?
You claim that “the administration appears to be in the process of presenting their evidence.” I’ve seen nothing new in weeks. Do you have a cite ? The trial is happening NOW, and the administration is late to the courtroom.
I believe that it’s a reasonable position to be unhappy about this tardyness.
And that’s the assertion I would like some proof for. We were ‘certainly mislead’. That implies intent to decieve the people into believing a threat exists when the administration knew it didn’t. Do you have evidence for that?
As far as I can tell, the BUSH LIED! crowd’s evidence is this: WMD have not been found. That’s pretty much it. No one knows why. No one in government has come forward and said, “This was a lie.” I know of no evidence that would allow you to draw the conclusion that the administration fabricated a casus belli.
Whether the administration is ‘too late to the courtroom’ depends on the quality of the evidence being prepared, and the reasons why they were late.
If they were late because the Fedayeen hid all of those weapons, and they are discovered in six months, your rash judgements are going to come back and bite you. On the other hand, if the best the administration can come up with when they finally present their case is a few dual-use labs and some old lab equipment, then I will want some serious answers.
How can you say that? What information do you have that allows you to draw that conclusion? Hell, they just found 50 fighter jets buried in the sand. Why is it so unreasonable to believe that the Fedayeen did a midnight transfer and burial of the WMD stockpiles? Is this beyond believability? If so, why?
As for scientists coming forward… As I said, many of them are. But also, Iraq is still a pretty damned dangerous place, and those scientists have to live there. People are being assassinated as we speak for helping the coalition. It’s not surprising that some scientists are reticent. It also wouldn’t be surprising to find out that the handful of scientists who really knew what was going on were killed by Saddam’s goon squads so that they couldn’t give details to the U.S.
The point is, we don’t know. I know that you see this as an opportunity to hammer the administration and claim flat-out that this proves they’re a bunch of warmongering bastards and those of us who believed them are dupes who lacked your superior judgement. But the fact is, we just don’t know. If you want to make positive statements about who lied to who, and flatly claim that this was all a pack of lies, I expect evidence. If you can’t provide it, I suggest you wait for it. That’s what I’m doing.
Not at all. No intent to deceive is needed in order to mislead. One need only get ones facts wrong, and take the country down a path that was not necessary or warranted given the actual state of affairs at the time. If a sea captain truly believed that the earth was flat, claiming irrefutable evidence, and took us on a trip to see the edge, he would be misleading us. He may or may not have deceived himself, or tryed to deceive us, but however it happened, we were deceived by that claim of irrefutable evidence, and mislead into taking the trip.
Sam, do you think you could do me a favor and be just a little bit more disingenuous? Your arguments are getting to be too easy to refute.
For starters, why don’t you do us a favor and name a single piece of evidence presented by the administration that supported their claims. Maybe I’m not thinking straight this morning, but I can’t think of a single piece of evidence Bush offered to the American people, period.
On the other hand, I can think of numerous claims Bush (and his administration) made about Iraq (and its “WMDs”) that have turned out to be woefully misleading, if not downright false. I listed a few of them earlier in this thread, and you’ve studiously avoided them. It’s tiresome posting them over and over and over again, so I won’t bore you. Instead, I’ll just focus on the claims made by the Bush administration concerning the dreaded “aluminum tubes.”
On January 28th, 2003, in his State of the Union address, Bush said:
The claim that these tubes were “suitable” for nuclear weapon production was reiterated by Colin Powell in his address to the UN:
Now, both these speeches contain claims that Iraq is continuing to develop nuclear weapons, and both claim that the aluminum tubes are evidence of these covert Iraqi programs. But how well do these claims withstand critical inspection?
According to this article, in December, at least a month before Bush’s speech:
So: Bush claimed that the tubes were “suitable for nuclear weapons production.” How true is this claim?[ul][li]”* The intercepted tubes were too narrow, long and thick-walled to fit a known centrifuge design.”[/li]
[li]” Aluminum had not been used for rotors since the 1950s.”[/li]
[li]” Iraq had two centrifuge blueprints, stolen in Europe, that were far more efficient and already known to work. One used maraging steel, a hard steel alloy, for the rotors, the other carbon fiber.*”[/li]
[li]”the government’s centrifuge scientists – at the Energy Department’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory and its sister institutions – unanimously regarded this possibility [i.e., that the tubes were intended for use as centrifuge roters] as implausible.”[/ul] [/li][QUOTE]
** In late 2001, experts at Oak Ridge asked an alumnus, Houston G. Wood III, to review the controversy. Wood, founder of the Oak Ridge centrifuge physics department, is widely acknowledged to be among the most eminent living experts.
Speaking publicly for the first time, Wood said in an interview that “it would have been extremely difficult to make these tubes into centrifuges. It stretches the imagination to come up with a way. I do not know any real centrifuge experts that feel differently.” **
[/QUOTE]
All of this evidence points toward one conclusion: that the Bush administration knew the tubes were really unsuitable for use in the production of nuclear weapons, but chose, by means of careful rhetorical manipulation, to mislead the general public into believing the opposite.
Powell claimed, “* Most U.S. experts think they are intended to serve as rotors in centrifuges used to enrich uranium.*” This was false; the consensus among experts, both in and out of the US, was that they tubes were not intended for such a purpose – including – the experts attached to the State Department’s own Bureau Intelligence and Research. Powell, head of the State Department, apparently ignores the conclusion of his own intelligence bureau when it contradicts the administration’s line.
He continued, “* First, all the experts who have analyzed the tubes in our possession agree that they can be adapted for centrifuge use.*” While technically true, this claim is extremely disingenuous. In the words of Wood:
To this date, the administration has been unable to produce such an explanation.
Powell stated, ”* What we notice in these different batches is a progression to higher and higher levels of specification, including, in the latest batch, an anodized coating on extremely smooth inner and outer surfaces.*” The gradual progression of “levels of specification,” contradicts the claim that the tubes were to be used in centrifuges, since such use would require substantial modification; so why increase the specifications of a product that you’re already planning to radically modify? While it is extremely far-fetched that the tubes could be used in producing weapons-grade nuclear material, they were on the other hand perfectly sized for the rockets Iraq was known to be developing. Powell knew this to be a fact before he made his UN presentation.
Again, the “anodized coating” supports the claim that they were for use in rockets.
Now, Sam – if you’ll deign to reply to me – how much more evidence do you need to convince you that the particular claims made by the administration regarding these tubes were purposefully misleading?
I wasn’t convinced of the Bush admin’s intentional mislead ing until I came across the Office of Special Plans, (otherwise known as the Office of Iraq Plans) which was founded in Oct 2001 to make the case for invading Iraq. The OSP was founded because our established professional agencies weren’t coming up with intelligence that justified the invasion of Iraq.
The decision to use the September eleventh tragedies to justify the invasion of Iraq occurred on September eleventh. It was the infamous “Pearl Harbor event” that’d been discussed by the PNAC.
The admin willfully ignored the advice and planning of our established intelligence and military agencies in favor of advice and planning from the OSP that was based on what were known to be faulty, unreliable, and untrustworthy information and sources to make a case for the invasion of Iraq.
Sam, maybe this has to be on a more elementary level for you.
The burden of proof is on the people who promoted the war, who gave us reasons for it, and who therefore supported it. The evidence isn’t there, and we already know they didn’t know what they said they knew at the time they wanted us to believe it. We know that, and so do you. You asked for something that we know cannot be true? Try anything that Bush & Co. said they knew about Saddam’s being an imminent threat to the US - as you damn well know, and for some reason are being simply obstinate about, they did not know. There is no possibility otherwise.
Now you’re trying to shift the game to “Well, it could have been true”, and you’re demanding proof that it wasn’t. When actually done the favor of getting some, you’re then trying “Well, maybe something else was true, and maybe the Kay stuff will show it - so prove that wrong, too!” Sorry, pal - you provide the evidence and we’ll consider it. But there isn’t any. No, you won’t get yet another repeat of the last year’s worth of Iraq/Qaeda discussions here - if you haven’t tried to digest what you’ve been told before well enough to restate it accurately, even snidely, then you won’t now, will you?
Just to reiterate: The burden of proof is yours, for anything you might have to say that would justify all these deaths. Until you’ve met the burden of proof, even partially, there is absolutely no reason for anyone to take your assertions seriously. Is that clear?
