You don’t seriously dispute that Bush lied to Congress, do you?
As to the '06 vote, they were already in Iraq so the circumstances were different.
Well, considering that he outlined the Bush Doctrine to Congress and the American people explicitly, I don’t see how that can be considered criminal.
For reference: National Security Strategy of the US (Sept 20, 2002).
Calling a policy a “doctrine” doesn’t make it legal. Bottom line – Iraq was not a threat. Bush KNEW it was not a threat and had been told by every US intelligence agency it was not a threat, yet he lied to Congress and the American people and told them the intelligence said it WAS a threat. Those facts are indisputable. Whether it would sustain a literal charge of murder seems dubious to me, but let’s not pretend the invasion itself was legal under international law just because of some self-declared “doctrine.” The US has no legal right to impose deomocracy or overthrow other governments, and Iraq had nothing to do with this imaginary “war on terror.” There was no defensive reason to attack the sovereignty of Iraq, therefore it was a violation of the UN Charter, period, full stop.
Well, you said he might be criminally liable for deleting the “imminent threat” phrase from intelligent reports. I’m simply pointing out that there was nothing secretive or misleading about that since he explicitly said on a number of occasions that we shouldn’t wait until Iraq became in imminent threat.
Well, considering that the intelligence reports are classified, you really have no way of knowing that. But what he claimed was that we needed to attack before they became a threat. Now, you and I may disagree with that, but there was nothing secretive about it, and Congress knew full well what the policy was when they voted on the AUMF. Not sure about the House membership, but every Senator had access to the full, unedited NIE on Iraq if they chose to view it. Apparently only a handful did.
Then throw every member of Congress who voted for the AUMF in jail.
I said that bugliosi said that. I personally don’t know if it would make him criminally liable for murder.
He got Congress to give him authority by lying, not by his illegal, self-declared “doctrine.”
That’s not true. These particular reports are no classified anymore.
No, he claimed they already WERE a threat. That’s how he got the authority. “Attacking before they become a threat” is illegal under international law.
This is not true. They had access only to the redacted “white papers.” That’s the crux of Bugliosi’s case.
GOP Talking Points don’t seem to be working as well as they used to.
That’s why I said you claimed he might be liable…
Maybe. Or maybe he got Congress to give him the authority because they were too chickenshit to call BS on him.
Then you should have no problem citing all of them and showing us where they said Iraq “was not a threat.”
Pffft. He put so many qualifiers on the “threat” that he is always going to be able to wiggle out of that charge.
I’m not disputing that. But presidents routinely violate international law, so good luck with getting any traction out of that.
If he says so, then he’s mistaken. From the NYT: