Forum Overview :: Motherfucking News :: Re: Since you asked me

[quote name="Lizard_King"][quote name="Senor Barborito"]I think it would have been extremely naive to believe there were still serviceable WMD in Iraq as of September or so prior to the war, and by late February there should have been little question to someone who had given the published evidence a cursory examination.[/quote] Well, even Hans Blix thought that was the case, and he certainly had no evil Konservatives telling him what to do. [quote]First off, much can be deduced by the greater actions of the nations in question - Hussein all but broadcast in plain English, "we'll do whatever you want, just don't invade." Unlimited inspections by the UN? You've got them. Destroy an entire class of missles? On it.[/quote] Much CAN be deduced, but what you are doing is taking a conclusion and adapting the evidence to it. He lied, deceived, and did everything possible to avoid successful inspections. The only time we came close in recent history was when Bush threatened the use of force credibly, and even then Hussein blew it. The inspections were a farce and you know it. In fact, it is questionable whether the idea of inspections can ever operate in any situation where the local power doesn't want it to... [quote]Would the Bush administration ever abide by those standards if the situation were reversed?[/quote] Are you suggesting that it is in need of the same treatment as the Hussein regime? Are you suggesting that the situation could ever, in any realistic scenario, be reversed? Are you trying to get me to get all worked up about international law and other things that I don't believe in and have never used as an argument? We all know that the way the US operates, like any other, is based on realistic considerations of whose in charge. [quote]Meanwhile, the US blustered with various pieces of evidence that were proven false, specious, and in one case cribbed from a graduate student's thesis - no matter how much Hussein acquiesced, the US continued to push towards war at every turn regardless of what allies we alienated in process. Almost as though they were following PNAC's agendasheet to the letter and reasons be damned.[/quote] What is the PNAC? Moreover, recasting the situation as "Hussein the Peacemaker" is a really, really nice touch. I suppose you think Bush I "provoked" him into invading Kuwait? [quote]Nevermind that Blix and his team found barely anything. Nevermind the flimsy nature of the evidence the US presented. Then there was the matter of former inspector Ritter's <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4504072,00.html">interview</a> with the Guardian. True, Ritter had <a href="http://slate.msn.com/?id=2071502">accepted money from an Iraqi businessman</a> to make a movie about the inspections - but what that article fails to mention is that the final tally left him paying $40,000 out of his own pocket ($80,000 actually, but he took $40,000 of the money he got to make the movie as salary) to make that movie, which no propagandist would ever do. What's more, he wasn't approached about it until after he began writing in defense of Iraq and the earlier inspections in '99.[/quote] It was pretty obvious that Ritter did about a 180 in his views of Iraq. Literally. He went from viewing Hussein as someone who needed to be removed from power immediately to predicting Iraqi victory in the war. I think the <a href="http://www.e-thepeople.org/comment/39496/view">blackmail angle</a> is a far more reasonable explanation than yours. You believe the worst of all who disagree with you; I suggest you use the same standards for your allies. [quote]Too many pieces of weak evidence being waved about to make the case, too many good points against said case <a href="http://www.fair.org/extra/0305/kamel.html">overlooked</a>, and the US administration behaving very tellingly while Hussein gave in to their demands as much as he could without completely losing face? Then we have the issue of <a href="http://www.sundayherald.com/print27735">PNAC</a>'s <a href="http://www.newamericancentury.org/statementofprinciples.htm">principles</a>, and more relevant <a href="http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqclintonletter.htm">letter to Clinton on Iraq</a>.[/quote] Do you really expect me to try to argue against your religious belief in the Konservative Konspiracy (TM)? Like I say to the jackasses who trace everything to Jewish control of our government: 1. If they are running things, good job and where can I sign up? and 2. Maybe other countries could use their own Conservative/Jewish conspirators to whip them into shape. [quote]You have eyes and a brain, so do I. I predicted we wouldn't find much if anything in the way of WMD well in advance of the war based on the above and I appear to have been right. Will we still possibly find a small cache of well-hidden WMDs? We might possibly find anything. But the final measure is that the claim of Hussein being any kind of threat to anybody except his own people while we held a policy of containment upon it was false - and this was fairly obvious from the beginning. I suggested that the United States take a few cribbed notes from its rich history of toppling third world governments and apply them to Iraq <a href="http://www.caltrops.com/pointy.php?action=viewPost&pid=1423">way back then</a>, and I still maintain my belief that this would've been the correct course of action.[/quote] And I said from the very beginning that I didn't give a damn about WMD's, rather seeing the whole thing as a cover for a Middle Eastern strategy involving active US engagement. [quote] If even the the barest facts of what Ritter said in that interview were true - easily ascertained by questioning an expert on WMD - then it was a non-issue before the war and is even less of an issue now. There probably were and are very little to no <b>viable</b> weapons of any kind between UN-supervised destruction (90-95% of all WMD capability), unsupervised Iraqi destruction (unspecified percentage of the remainder), and most importantly aging for what little remains.[/quote] Then find me this alternate expert. Because Ritter is about as reliable as the Iraqi propaganda minister, and less amusing. [quote]I agree. It was not an impeachable offense because it is not a crime to lie in a State of the Union address in order to deceive the nation into an unnecessary war. Ask veronica whether or not I alternatingly laughed and swore like a sailor throughout that speech - she'll vouch for my having done so. What Bush was saying was pretty obviously false, and the actions of the United States government in any kind of diplomatic sense at the time made it very clear that this was being rammed through the policy banks like-it-or-not just like the Patriot Act. There was not and is not an excuse for not having seen this - the right certainly had its cynicism armed when Clinton was in office, and rightly so - he perjured himself regarding a trivial personal matter while sitting President and dodged Sierra Leone in a stunning display of callousness to human rights. I didn't make any excuses for him then, and I don't do so now. The right had and has MANY MORE reasons to be cynical about the actions of the current administration - the pike at the gates and the sign nailed there by the State Department, not to mention Ashcroft running roughshod over the Constitution - there is no excuse for not being so.[/quote] Um, yeah. Save the whales. Or something. [quote]There is no reason to impeach Bush, there is every reason to vote against him in the upcoming election.[/quote] ...except that the Democratic alternative will be worse in every respect. [quote] I hope some of you vote for Dean in your local primaries, and hopefully in the election in '04 - he's the left's only worthy candidate by a large measure.[/quote] Hell, if I had any money to spare I'd donate to his campaign. I like the guy, and I'll encourage a non-gun control Democrat any day of the week. [/quote]