Help Wanted! Intelligent Liberal

Hi, Slim. You'll excuse me for replying to you when I intended to reply to FM: I guess I'm neither liberal nor intelligent.FM's logical sleight of hand here involved inverting the original question: the crucial point is not whether one could prove WMD did not exist in Iraq, but whether or not Bush & Co. proved they did after having claimed they could.Despite a massive effort that diverted large numbers of critically important intelligence officers during the early stages of the invasion, they could not. Yet they claimed to have "slam dunk" proof prior to the invasion.Did they lose that proof, or did they lie? Whew! This poor non-liberal will have to concentrate very hard to figure that one out!Maybe it's in the same file cabinet as the Al Qaeda-Saddam connection clinchers.It is amusing to watch the Bush administration press the claim that Democrats, now critical, once agreed with Bush based on the exact same intelligence to which Bush himself was privy--this is clearly untrue. The executive branch oversees every intelligence-gathering organization, and their reports are subject to that branch's pleasure or displeasure. The intelligence reports that were presented to Congress and to the world were based on forgeries, frauds, and exaggerations; they also lied via the omission of strong doubt contained in the original intelligence analysis.The even more remarkable notion--that the WH has proof of Iraqi WMD but refrains from divulging it--is a particular delight. FM, apparently, has been graced with a few crumbs from the executive table, and wishes the boss would share the bounty with us all. I understand randman and Tal are similarly blessed with this largesse; I only hope their loose lips don't get them in trouble like Scooter!Do you suppose we have a new Super Dooper Snooper Ray that will be compromised if the WMD information is shared? I don't either, and neither, apparently, do most Americans, based on recent poll results regarding Bush, his penchant for lying, and his conduct of this war.Thanks for your patience, Slim. FM, I'll hit the right button next time. Good luck in your search for intelligence.

"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line."
- President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program."
- President Bill Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998"We must stop Saddam from ever again jeopardizing the stability and security of his neighbors with weapons of mass destruction."
- Madeline Albright, Feb 1, 1998"He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983."
- Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb, 18, 1998"[W]e urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs."
Letter to President Clinton.
- (D) Senators Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, John Kerry, others, Oct. 9, 1998"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process."
- Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998"Hussein has ... chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies."
- Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999

That's a pretty interesting strawman you've just knocked down, Francis. I hope you didn't work too hard putting it up.I don't recall any liberal claiming seriously that absolutely no weapons have been found in Iraq. What I have heard is that the weapons we did find were the weapons we knew he had decades ago, the weapons that had been successfully contained by the inspections process; the weapons that we had successfully kept out of the hands of terrorists with the strategies we'd been implying. And that's true.Now, if you believe that a canister of Sarin, so degraded that the two GI's who got a faceful of it by accident suffered nothing worse than a few day's bedrest, constitutes an appropriate casius belli for invasion, then I'd like you to make that moral calculus explicit for me.If you believe that an invasion to keep weapons out of the hands of terrorists when an invasion was the only thing that would cause Saddam to put the weapons into the hands of terrorists - an invasion where, upon invading, we totally ignored the weapons we did find, so that they later fell into the hands of terrorists - constitutes an intelligent war policy and a successful occupation, then I'd like to see you make that case, as well.But if you're argument is merely "libs say Bush lied, but they agreed in 2003!" then you're a lot dumber indeed than the liberals you so frequently decried. The reason that I assert that you were not truthful in your call to engage an "intelligent liberal" is because you're clearly not intelligent enough yourself to debate with one.

So, your position is that absolutely nothing happened in Iraq between 1998 and 2003?

Well, Francis, I would have been happy to point out the lie, but you didn't post any quotes from the liar.You can quote Democrats saying such stuff all day--the talking points from the GOP Panic Squad began circulating more than a week ago. I've seen all these--and more--already. I'm not a Democrat, so you can quote Democrats saying stupid things all night, and it won't bother me a bit.The Gulf War and international inspectors had vitiated Saddam's WMD programs before 9/11; the inspectors said so clearly before the invasion: the WH treated them with contempt, and Bush said he had proof to the contrary. Bush said Saddam was in league with Osama. Bush said many, many things that turned out to be false. Yet he claimed to have proof of them all. Where is that proof? Where did it go? Bush didn't just fail to find WMD in Iraq--he said he already had incontrovertible proof and then failed to find the WMD.Now, if I tell a bunch of nice-but-naive guys from the small town of Hooter, IN, that they can turn their school ties in for titties at Hooters, and they go and try to do that, they were played for fools.But I would be the liar.

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"It's hard to admit the truth."
-randman

Your mention of a strawman is merely Ad Populem.My last post illustrates the many times the Clinton Administration insisted that Iraq had WMD and/or was a threat. If Bush lied, why does Clinton get a pass? The truth is that Husain did have a WMD program even if it wasn't in mass production. To say otherwise is no different than saying Osama was not in Afghanistan. Keep in mind that Iraq shares a border with Syria which openly supports the current terrorist activities. GEN Tommy Franks was also assured by multiple Arab heads of state and top dignitaries that Iraq had a WMD program.In order to accurately make the claim that Bush lied you must be able to prove that he made a statement that he knew was false. This is something which no one has submitted any evidence to support. Does this forum have a policy requiring evidence to support our arguments or are we just discussing your opinions?Edited to add tag.This message has been edited by Francis Marion, 11-17-2005 10:38 PM

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I find it amusing that the opinions of Soldiers with ground truth differ from those of the cozy on the couch crowd.

An appeal to the popularity of a position instead of to its merits? How did I do that? Because he didn't start a war? Because he didn't fabricate or exaggerate evidence, nor did he conceal contradictory or mitigating information from public view?And anyway, who said Clinton got a pass? I think he handled Saddam pretty poorly during his term. I certainly never voted for him. Maybe you noticed, though, that he isn't the president anymore? And that he was already impeached?I mean, what else do you want to do to the guy? Imprison him? Fines? Why are all you people obsessed with attacking Clinton? Exactly how is Clinton relevant to the discussion? Bush, 2/8/2003:

quote:

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Iraq has also provided al Qaeda with chemical and biological weapons training.

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Defense Intelligence Agency document, Feburary 2002:

quote:

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The document, an intelligence report from February 2002, said it was probable that the prisoner, Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, "was intentionally misleading the debriefers" in making claims about Iraqi support for Al Qaeda's work with illicit weapons.

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So. We have Bush repeating claims from a source he knew was telling lies. When you repeat a lie that you know is a lie, and you tell it like it's true, you're a liar.

Francis Marion writes:

quote:

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In order to accurately make the claim that Bush lied you must be able to prove that he made a statement that he knew was false.

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"The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."George W. Bush, January 28, 2003, State of the Union address.This same statement was originally in a speech Bush was to give on October 7, 2002 in Cincinnati. However, the statement was removed (in the fifth draft) by then CIA director George Tenet due to intelligence that it was false.Note, this was more than six months after former Ambassador Wilson's report that the supposed attempt by Iraq to obtain uranium from Niger was unsupported.Note, there was no need to bring up this claim in the first place as Iraq already had plenty of uranium. What it lacked was the means to enrich it."Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production."George W. Bush, January 28, 2003, State of the Union address.The IAEA's report said the precise opposite.Shall we get to the lies about his tax cuts going to the middle class?

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Rrhain

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Thank you for your submission to Science. Your paper was reviewed by a jury of seventh graders so that they could look for balance and to allow them to make up their own minds. We are sorry to say that they found your paper "bogus," specifically describing the section on the laboratory work "boring." We regret that we will be unable to publish your work at this time.

1) I am not a democrat, and so quoting them means as much to me as quoting other reps that said the same thing. I'm wondering where disputing Bush became synonymous with liking dems?2) None of your quotes suggests that these people believe he had WMDs at all. They are all clearly suggesting he had them at one time, used them at one time, and is interested in them again, and indeed had programs to get them. The concern is that his ambitions be thwarted as they gained any real promise. You will note that not one of your quotes supports full invasion to this end, and one seems to counter that idea.3) Bush and Co made specific statements which suggested factual knowledge... not vague possibilities. The facts are out now that they did not have the knowledge that they suggested in the run up to the war. Whether they were lies or gross exagerations is merely semantical hairsplitting. They knew they were overplaying what they knew in order to convince the US populace to accept a program they would not otherwise accept.4) If you want to play the quote game, what about these..."... the sanctions exist -- not for the purpose of hurting the Iraqi people, but for the purpose of keeping in check Saddam Hussein's ambitions toward developing weapons of mass destruction. We should constantly be reviewing our policies, constantly be looking at those sanctions to make sure that they are directed toward that purpose. That purpose is every bit as important now as it was ten years ago when we began it. And frankly they have worked. He has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbors. So in effect, our policies have strengthened the security of the neighbors of Iraq..."
- Colin Powell, Feb. 24, 2001"The sanctions, as they are called, have succeeded over the last 10 years, not in deterring him from moving in that direction, but from actually being able to move in that direction. The Iraqi regime militarily remains fairly weak. It doesn't have the capacity it had 10 or 12 years ago. It has been contained. And even though we have no doubt in our mind that the Iraqi regime is pursuing programs to develop weapons of mass destruction -- chemical, biological and nuclear -- I think the best intelligence estimates suggest that they have not been terribly successful. There's no question that they have some stockpiles of some of these sorts of weapons still under their control, but they have not been able to break out, they have not been able to come out with the capacity to deliver these kinds of systems or to actually have these kinds of systems that is much beyond where they were 10 years ago."
-Colin Powell, May 15, 2001"... in terms of Saddam Hussein being there, let's remember that his country is divided, in effect. He does not control the northern part of his country. We are able to keep arms from him. His military forces have not been rebuilt. "
-Condoleeza Rice, July 29, 2001Those were Bush's main people. If you support Bush, then there is reason for me to question how that squares with the later statements they and Bush made regarding Iraq.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

Bump.You've been given examples of Bush lying. We can continue to give examples of other people in the Bush administration lying. Do we not all remember Cheney saying that the relationship between Iraq and Al Qaeda was solidly established only to have Bush contradict him later? How about the infamous claim of Rove that "we know where the weapons are"? Well, if we did, why haven't we found them?Back to Bush: How about Bush's claims that Hussein was refusing to let the inspectors in to do their jobs when on the very same day, the weapons inspectors destroyed a set of missiles due to their range exceeding limits imposed by the surrender from the first Gulf War (video of which played on the evening news)? How did they manage to do that when they weren't allowed in?We're waiting. You asked for examples of Bush lying. You've now been given many examples. What is your response?

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Rrhain

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Thank you for your submission to Science. Your paper was reviewed by a jury of seventh graders so that they could look for balance and to allow them to make up their own minds. We are sorry to say that they found your paper "bogus," specifically describing the section on the laboratory work "boring." We regret that we will be unable to publish your work at this time.

Admirable, but don't hold your breath.I suspect ol' Francis found the liberals here a little too intelligent.

Well, to be fair to Francis, in his opening post he did give his definition of an intelligent liberal: an intelligent liberal is one who does not bring up inconvenient facts.I am beginning to suspect that you were right all along, crashfrog; Francis is tired of building his strawmen to knock down, so he was hoping to find someone else to build them for him.Maybe he'll have better luck if he gets one of his conservative friends to pretend to be a liberal.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

I'm not very knowledgable with politics, but I do enjoy reading a good political debate. It's been almost a month since the last post and I don't think it's time for this topic to die yet.