No WMD found in Iraq.
Because of that, Democrats are trashing Bush in US and Tories are trashing Blair in UK.
Is it not a supreme irony?
Does it not prove conclusively that the whole “missing WMD” issue is fueled by political opportunism?
New battleline is charted from Los Angeles to Dover: US Democrats and UK Tories against US Republicans and UK Labor.
Who will win?
Oh, gosh darn those Democrats! And those Tories!
How could they think that going to war was in itself “political opportunism”?
How dare they question our fearless leaders, when we can’t be bothered to!
What is your debate here? 
WMD hysteria is so last year. What your seeing today is bamboozled and hungover partygoers examining their excesses in the cold light of reason’s new dawn.
One of the roles of opposition is to oppose.
If a government flouts international law and misleads its electorate on a matter as grave as proposed justification for invading a sovereign nation, then it is the Opposition’s duty to demand an explanation.
This is not about whether or not the opposition believes regime change is a valid sole justification for war, but about a governement omitting to say so and proposing a different, false justification instead.
Agreed, to demand an explanation and investigation of any mishap is opposition’s sacred duty. However, you must know quite well that they didn’t dwell on that aspect at all and went to such extremes as demanding PM resignation in UK or making it one of the main issues in US elections.
Masterful touch. Quite true. Still, I don’t see the present situation as most people coming to their senses; I see it as a pendulum swinging full bore to the opposite side. Shall we call it “No WMD hysteria”?
We differ there. I think the system has a lot of internal friction built in that inhibits large swings, except in the event of a catastrophe.
The Project for a New American Century has been working on the invasion of since at least 1997, yet president Bush came in on an isolationist platform opposed to “nation building.” It looked as if the neocons were making few inroads at all during the summer of 2001. They could not figure out a way to sell America on taking out Saddam; and then bin Laden’s attack “changed everything.”
In the absence of a visceral counter-catastrophe, it’s going to take a hell of a lot of pushing to get the American middle back to any semblence of its earlier non-interventionist leanings. Somewhere on the path from where we were in 2000, to where we are today lies the “sensible” position. We probably disagree on exactly where that is, but things have swung way too far in the direction of preemptive attacks and preventative wars.
We differ there. I think the system has a lot of internal friction built in that inhibits large swings, except in the event of a catastrophe.
The Project for a New American Century has been working on the invasion of since at least 1997, yet president Bush came in on an isolationist platform opposed to “nation building.” It looked as if the neocons were making few inroads at all during the summer of 2001. They could not figure out a way to sell America on taking out Saddam; and then bin Laden’s attack “changed everything.”
In the absence of a visceral counter-catastrophe, it’s going to take a hell of a lot of pushing to get the American middle back to any semblence of its earlier non-interventionist leanings. Somewhere on the path from where we were in 2000, to where we are today lies the “sensible” position. We probably disagree on exactly where that is, but things have swung way too far in the direction of preemptive attacks and preventative wars.
I think nobody in right mind will argue that UK Tories would do anything different than Blair have done in relation to Iraq. Therefore, for them to demand Blair resignation over “missing WMD” is the pit of hypocrisy and political opportunism. Thus, the question becomes: are US Democrats driven exclusively by political opportunism on “missing WMD” issue, and how hypocritical are they? My answer: 100%
You are, of course, entirely welcome to your opinion, we encourage that sort of thing around here. We do, however, favor fact-based opinion, hence you tend to operate at a disadvantage. Case in point: you aver that the Tories would have acted no differently than did Blair. All well and good, but in your haste to defend the Shining One, you have neglected to offer any evidence that this might be so. Have you such? Or are you talking out of your Nixon?
Actually, 23 of 51 Democrats in the Senate voted against the Iraq war resolution, and 133 out of something like 205 Democrats in the House voted against the war.
So the total amount of hypocracy in the Democratic party at the moment is around fifty percent.
The total amount of lunacy within the Republican ranks certainly exceeds 75 percent, however, given the number of folks who are willing to embarass themselves by arguing that it makes no difference whatsoever to the President’s case for war if WMD are never found.
I find it incredible that anyone would for a moment conbsider this issue to be one of liberal vs conservative or tories vs labor. Do you not understand the significance of our leaders misrepresenting the need, justification, or end result, of taking us to war?
Do not the hundreds killed and the thousands wounded in our own armies (not to mention the 10,000 or so dead Iraqis) deserve the truth?
The invasion of Iraq by the US and Britain is one of the biggest crimes ever committed. It doesnt take a political preference to understand unjustified killing and illegal invasions.
Our president deserves no less than prison for the damage he has done to this country even if this war came about by simple incompetence.
Personally I think greed, delusion, and personal cowardice are his real problems. The stupidity justs makes things that much more embarrassing.
How many Democrats have voted for or against Iraq invasion is irrelevant. The question is, how many are staying away from the fray now; how many are saying, “Stop the nonsense, none of us said anything about WMD absence beforehand, let’s not pretend that we knew about it all along, let’s concentrate on other issues.”
If you imply that US Democrats are doing a great service to their country by pulling it to the Left and toward themselves, then what are UK Tories doing? Performing a great service to their country, too? I must say, finding Tory apologists at the left side of US political spectrum is slightly bewildering. Lo, here comes one, and he is in earnest!
If you are seriously suggesting that the party of Thatcher would say no to Bush plans before Iraq, all I can say to you, sir, is, “WHITEWASH”!
Oh, I see. I guess in your book hypocracy means either “not keeping one’s mouth shut when their position appears to have been validated” or “pointing out what a huge blunder someone has made.”
Look, I think it is a bit silly for folks like Kerry and Edwards to argue that the United States shouldn’t have gone to war, since they voted to do exactly that (although perhaps they would have preferred that war, if proved inevitable, should have occurred under different circumstances.) In my mind, it makes them look gullible - “Vote for me! I was fooled by Bush!” But that doesn’t mean that their current position is wrong. Everyone has the right to change their mind – as some old politican once said, “Even though the facts have changed, the fact that I am right has not.”
The number of Democrats who voted against the war demostrates that there are a substantial number of people who just didn’t buy that Saddam’s possession of WMD could justify the conquest of a nation. Just because Democrats (on either side of the war) also drew the wrong conclusions from the intelligence does not mean that they have to stay mum when it comes to commenting on the political decision that the White House made in favor of war.
And I don’t give a flying f is the D’s in the US and the Tories in the UK happen to have the same position. It is a completely meaningless coincidence.
in a meeting prior to voting on giving Bush his war, congress was told that Saddam had these weapons and intended to use them. They were also told that they had drone aircraft that could be used for such purposes (though they did not mention that these were barely more than model planes incapable of carrying the weight of any weapons larger than a pea shooter).
In short Congress was manipultaed into fearing weapons that did not exist.
They should have paid more attention to the naysayers obviously but just as many republicans still have a hard time believing or even HEARING the truth, congress took him at his word and trusted his assertions.
Unfortunately Bush and his team lied. The childish simplicity of it all is the biggest tragedy here.
Not even in the last ten years, if it is one, which it isn’t. It’s certainly the most useful war, in terms of ending genocide, in quite a while. But, of course, only anti-war types care about that if they can be bothered.
When you count civilian deaths, do you keep adding to the total each time an al Qaeda fuckhead blows up a car in a nursery school, or whatever?
That’s quite possible true. But probably not for the reason you think.
Former UN official says sanctions against Iraq amount to ‘genocide’
Oh god. Don’t quote Ramsey Clark. PLEASE. First of all, the IAC (like International A.N.S.W.E.R.) is linked to the Workers World Party, second, the sanctions figures he uses (“death to more than 1,500,000 people including 750,000 children under five years of age”) are totally inaccurate. We’ve had threads about that before, actually.
Sorry.