posted on May 2, 2007 01:59:02 PM new
Haven't been able to keep up with everything here so don't know if this has already been posted. This is part of it:
And The Lies Go On
First Published 2007-05-01, Last Updated 2007-05-01 16:29:44
The current debate over Iraq avoids other fundamental issues. While Congress and the President are at logger heads over a schedule for withdrawing US forces -- as if they’re really talking about pulling all US troops in Iraq -- what about the four mammoth military bases that the United States has spent billions of dollars building in Iraq over the past four years?
One of them, Balad, North of Baghdad, covers fifteen square miles. Those bases could soon be the object of a major confrontation among Iraqi leaders, hostile to any attempt by the United States to maintain permanent bases in their country. Indeed, there’s no way those facilities could be considered “temporary,” though that’s how the Bush administration sold them to congress. And then there is the sprawling new American embassy -- the most mammoth American embassy in the world -- currently being built in the Green Zone.
It would be naive to think that the Bush administration would just walk away and leave those facilities. More likely are major troop commitments -- to back up future Iraqi governments as well as America’s influence in that vitally strategic part of the world -- commitments that may last for decades. Though these bases are certainly a subject of concern to Iraqis, they’ve been scarcely mentioned in any of the debates concerning America’s commitment to Iraq. On the other hand, though most Americans have yet to be briefed on the situation, some US troops certainly have. Recently, at one of those facilities, the massive marine base of Al-Asad in Anbar province, a visiting reporter was assured by US soldiers that American troops would be rotating though for at least the next decade.
Barry Lando is a former CBS "60 Minutes" producer and journalist with Time-Life. He is the author of Web of Deceit: The History of Western Complicity in Iraq from Churchill to Kennedy to George W. Bush (2006).
The elimination of Saddam Hussein, WMD and every other justification for the war in Iraq were all lies. The major goal of the Bush administration is not to deliver Democracy to the Middle East but rather to establish a permanent military and political presence in Iraq in order to dominate the behavior of the Middle East. The number of bases and the elaborate American Embassy there is more evidence that we are not staying in order to take care of the Iraqi people.
posted on May 2, 2007 03:28:11 PM new "Yet all the demo saw all the info that was given to Pres Bush & ALL agreed on the Iraqi plan.
That's true, Bear but I hold the Bush administration responsible because they misinformed Congress and the American people.
The political machinery in the Bush administration is responsible for the lies and propaganda about Weapons of Mass Destruction, Mushroom Clouds and the idea of imminent danger. They are responsible for linking 9/11 to Iraq, feeding the patriotic fervor of the American people who in turn pressured Congress. Do you remember how Powell served to spread the lies to the American people and Congress. With everyone misinformed and the American public in a patriotic fervor and Congress under a time limit, it's not surprising that the vote was in favor of the war.
posted on May 2, 2007 05:55:33 PM new
Dont think so Helen.
ABC: From 'Bush Lied' to Tenet Was Right - President Given No Credit for Truth
Posted by Warner Todd Huston on May 1, 2007 - 04:12.
It always amazes when the MSM congeals an entire presidential administration into a form that posits that every member of that administration is the president. Like when they claim that "Bush Lied" about the faulty intelligence that led to the presentation to the UN to garner support for the action in Iraq given by then Secretary of State Colin Powell. Yet, when the MSM wants to exonerate a single member of any particular administration, suddenly the President is forgotten as a part of the discussion and the individual administration official the press is currently in love with is held as a man responsible for his own decisions and exonerated on that basis.
This week's new media darling is former CIA chief George Tenet, one of the worst directors of the CIA we've seen in decades. The MSM have suddenly found him to be an honorable and serious man because of his newly published Bush bashing tell-all.
Remember the calls that "Bush lied" about WMDs and that he "embarrassed" Powell by forcing him to present "lies" to the UN? It was all Bush's fault, of course and the entire administration knew ahead of time that there were no WMDs, according to this line of thinking. Granted, the buck does stop with the president and if any claims were incorrect he bears the ultimate responsibility for that error. But, shouldn't he ALSO get the credit if it were proven that he was right by all known information at the time?
Not according to ABC, apparently. Only Tenet gets credit for not presenting lies in a recent interview with Charles Gibson. The President is mysteriously not part of the discussion.
Starting their report reiterating that the WMD claims were untrue, ABC gives Tenet the chance to say how he "regrets" the Powell incident.
Former CIA director George Tenet told Charles Gibson he feels "great regret" when he looks back at the photos of Colin Powell at the United Nations, which were taken as the former secretary of state made the case for an Iraq invasion in 2003 and claimed Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
...Powell's Feb. 6, 2003, U.N. speech, which led to the Iraq invasion, was based on what turned out to be false information from a fraudulent source regarding the existence of WMDs in Saddam Hussein's arsenal.
Of course, we all know that the WMD claim was NOT the sole reason given by the Bush administration as the reason to oust Saddam, but, hey, who needs truth when you've got what you think is a "good story"?
But, later they revisit the "Bush lied" scenario with Tenet.
...Tenet refutes accusations that he knew the data was false.
"That's just repugnant to me, I would never let the secretary of state … someone who I was very close to, who represented the United States of America, in front of the eyes of the world, go out there and make a false statement. Never," Tenet said.
..."It's really serious for someone to say the director and the deputy director, essentially, cooked the books to go make the case for war and didn't tell the secretary of state. There's no way on this God's green Earth that that would ever happen, none."
Well, there you have it. The Bush administration did not "lie" about Saddam's WMDs. They acted on intelligence that may have been faulty, yes, but they did not act on "lies".
As Tenet says, "We wrote what we believed, we stayed true to it."
But, as ABC gives Tenet the room to tell his story, the focus is on Tenet and not on the Administration like it was during the many "Bush lied" stories. And that is because they wish to present Tenet as the "honest" guy who was ignored by the President.... even though he wasn't.
[b]So, on one hand "Bush lied" about WMDs, yet on the other Tenet acted on the best known info available at the time.[/b[
Well, it seems to make perfect sense that if Tenet was acting on information that they were all sure was quite correct at the time, then Bush did not "lie" when using that very same information.
Right?
Tell it to ABC.
It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.George S. Patton
posted on May 2, 2007 07:17:42 PM new 10 Appalling Lies We Were Told About Iraq
By Christopher Scheer, AlterNet June 27, 2003
What follows are just the most outrageous and significant of the dozens of outright lies uttered by Bush and his top officials over the past year in what amounts to a systematic campaign to scare the bejeezus out of everybody:
LIE #1: "The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program ... Iraq has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment need for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons." – President Bush, Oct. 7, 2002, in Cincinnati.
FACT: This story, leaked to and breathlessly reported by Judith Miller in the New York Times, has turned out to be complete baloney. Department of Energy officials, who monitor nuclear plants, say the tubes could not be used for enriching uranium. One intelligence analyst, who was part of the tubes investigation, angrily told The New Republic that, "You had senior American officials like Condoleezza Rice saying the only use of this aluminum really is uranium centrifuges. She said that on television. And that's just a lie."
LIE #2: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." – President Bush, Jan.28, 2003, in the State of the Union address.
FACT: This whopper was based on a document that the White House already knew to be a forgery thanks to the CIA. Sold to Italian intelligence by some hustler, the document carried the signature of an official who had been out of office for 10 years and referenced a constitution that was no longer in effect. The ex-ambassador who the CIA sent to check out the story is pissed: "They knew the Niger story was a flat-out lie," he told the New Republic, anonymously. "They [the White House] were unpersuasive about aluminum tubes and added this to make their case more strongly."
LIE #3: "We believe [Saddam] has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons." – Vice President Cheney on March 16, 2003 on "Meet the Press."
FACT: There was and is absolutely zero basis for this statement. CIA reports up through 2002 showed no evidence of an Iraqi nuclear weapons program.
LIE #4: "[The CIA possesses] solid reporting of senior-level contacts between Iraq and al-Qaeda going back a decade." – CIA Director George Tenet in a written statement released Oct. 7, 2002 and echoed in that evening's speech by President Bush.
FACT: Intelligence agencies knew of tentative contacts between Saddam and al-Qaeda in the early '90s, but found no proof of a continuing relationship. In other words, by tweaking language, Tenet and Bush spun the intelligence180 degrees to say exactly the opposite of what it suggested.
LIE #5: "We've learned that Iraq has trained al-Qaeda members in bomb-making and poisons and deadly gases ... Alliance with terrorists could allow the Iraqi regime to attack America without leaving any fingerprints." – President Bush, Oct. 7.
FACT: No evidence of this has ever been leaked or produced. Colin Powell told the U.N. this alleged training took place in a camp in northern Iraq. To his great embarrassment, the area he indicated was later revealed to be outside Iraq's control and patrolled by Allied war planes.
LIE #6: "We have also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad areas. We are concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles] for missions targeting the United States." – President Bush, Oct. 7.
FACT: Said drones can't fly more than 300 miles, and Iraq is 6000 miles from the U.S. coastline. Furthermore, Iraq's drone-building program wasn't much more advanced than your average model plane enthusiast. And isn't a "manned aerial vehicle" just a scary way to say "plane"?
LIE #7: "We have seen intelligence over many months that they have chemical and biological weapons, and that they have dispersed them and that they're weaponized and that, in one case at least, the command and control arrangements have been established." – President Bush, Feb. 8, 2003, in a national radio address.
FACT: Despite a massive nationwide search by U.S. and British forces, there are no signs, traces or examples of chemical weapons being deployed in the field, or anywhere else during the war.
LIE #8: "Our conservative estimate is that Iraq today has a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agent. That is enough to fill 16,000 battlefield rockets." – Secretary of State Colin Powell, Feb. 5 2003, in remarks to the UN Security Council.
FACT: Putting aside the glaring fact that not one drop of this massive stockpile has been found, as previously reported on AlterNet our own intelligence reports show that these stocks – if they existed – were well past their use-by date and therefore useless as weapon fodder.
LIE #9: "We know where [Iraq's WMD] are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south, and north somewhat." – Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, March 30, 2003, in statements to the press.
FACT: Needless to say, no such weapons were found, not to the east, west, south or north, somewhat or otherwise.
LIE #10: "Yes, we found a biological laboratory in Iraq which the UN prohibited." – President Bush in remarks in Poland, published internationally June 1, 2003.
FACT: This was reference to the discovery of two modified truck trailers that the CIA claimed were are potential mobile biological weapons lab. But British and American experts – including the State Department's intelligence wing in a report released this week – have since declared this to be untrue. According to the British, and much to Prime Minister Tony Blair's embarrassment, the trailers are actually exactly what Iraq said they were, facilities to fill weather balloons, sold to them by the British themselves.
So, months after the war, we are once again where we started -- with plenty of rhetoric and absolutely no proof of this "grave danger" for which O.J. Smith died. The Bush administration is now scrambling to place the blame for its lies on faulty intelligence, when in fact the intelligence was fine; it was their abuse of it that was "faulty."
Rather than apologize for leading us to a preemptive war based on impossibly faulty or shamelessly distorted "intelligence" or offering his resignation, our sly madman in the White House is starting to sound more like that other O.J. Like the man who cheerfully played golf while promising to pursue "the real killers," Bush is now vowing to search for "the true extent of Saddam Hussein's weapons programs, no matter how long it takes."
On the terrible day of the 9/11 attacks, five hours after a hijacked plane slammed into the Pentagon, retired Gen. Wesley Clark received a strange call from someone (he didn't name names) representing the White House position: "I was on CNN, and I got a call at my home saying, 'You got to say this is connected. This is state-sponsored terrorism. This has to be connected to Saddam Hussein,'" Clark told Meet the Press anchor Tim Russert. "I said, 'But -- I'm willing to say it, but what's your evidence?' And I never got any evidence.'"
While way too many liberals here have no clue as to what are actual FACTS vs the garbage some other liberal made up.....they'll buy ANYTHING - any LIE - as long as it's negative against this administration, and especially this President.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"If a Nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be... if we are to guard against ignorance and remain free, it is the responsibility of every American to be informed." --
Thomas Jefferson
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"While the democratic party complains about everything THIS President does to protect our Nation": "What would a Democrat president have done at that point?"
"Apparently, the answer is: Sit back and wait for the next terrorist attack."
Ann Coulter
[ edited by Linda_K on May 2, 2007 10:16 PM ]
posted on May 2, 2007 10:39:10 PM new
"More Than Enough Evidence"
(Weekly Standard) (5/2) -
George Tenet's just released book, At the Center of the Storm, has created quite a stir. Over the past few days, a myriad of news accounts have referenced various snippets of the former director of Central Intelligence's self-serving collection of remembrances.
But here is something you probably have not heard or read about Tenet's book: it confirms that there was a relationship between Saddam's Iraq and al Qaeda.
And, according to Tenet, "there was more than enough evidence to give us real concern" about it too.
"While the democratic party complains about everything THIS President does to protect our Nation": "What would a Democrat president have done at that point?"
"Apparently, the answer is: Sit back and wait for the next terrorist attack."
Ann Coulter
[ edited by Linda_K on May 2, 2007 10:46 PM ]
But just TRY and find a Bush basher who has EVER held saddam to any resolution the U.N. said he needed to account for. MASSIVE amounts of wmd WERE unaccounted for. Still are.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"While the democratic party complains about everything THIS President does to protect our Nation": "What would a Democrat president have done at that point?"
"Apparently, the answer is: Sit back and wait for the next terrorist attack."
Ann Coulter
[ edited by Linda_K on May 2, 2007 11:16 PM ]
posted on May 2, 2007 11:22:46 PM new
Linda_K, your liberal blogger's link about wmd being found has reports from Fox News, World Nut Daily, Hot Air and the Mooney Times and other links that go back to reports by them.
Didn't Bush and Rumsfeld admit to everyone that none were found? Have your news sources contacted your president to let him know that they found them now and where are they keeping them?
posted on May 2, 2007 11:32:50 PM new
Looks like Bush has big plans for the whole area with those mammoth bases and embassy being built over there, costing billions.
What's in it for the 'coalition of the willing' - or what's left of them?
What about the Iraqis? Will Bush be waving at them from the gates of the palace/embassy? Does he have a throne inside?
posted on May 3, 2007 04:22:22 AM new
Yes, bushit wants this war to go on forever and it's obvious since NOW that he's FLIP FLOPPED and doesn't believe in timelines anymore.
He doesn't give a damn about Americans dying as long as the bushit agenda is pushed.
The bushit administration is well on it's way to war with Iran, Syria....it will be endless unless this administration is stopped.
Our military will be so stretched if this continues.....leaving America , the U.S., vulnerable.
Think about that...is THAT the real plan ??????
[ edited by mingotree on May 3, 2007 04:27 AM ]
Linda, the quotes that I posted were reported by reliable press and on television. Many here who are well informed know that they are authentic. These were quotes from such identifiable sources as the State of the Union address, speeches by George Bush, a radio address by George Bush and in the case of Powell from the UN Security Council.
Your link to fact check is NOT relevant to any of the remarks quoted in my post. It's just another desperate and pitiful effort by you to debunk anything that illustrates the awful TRUTH about the failure of an administration that you have so blindly followed.
The few people in this country who still believe that WMD were found are unfortunately ignorant and uninformed. Apparently you are among that group.
Right...It's disturbing that here we find people so uninformed and so brainwashed that we have to revisit the topic of WMD's before we can discuss the topic of this thread "WMD Hunt Ends, Bush's Spin Goes On."
When no weapons of mass destruction surfaced in Iraq, President Bush insisted that all those WMD claims before the war were the result of faulty intelligence. But a former top CIA official, Tyler Drumheller — a 26-year veteran of the agency — has decided to do something CIA officials at his level almost never do: Speak out.
He tells correspondent Ed Bradley the real failure was not in the intelligence community but in the White House. He says he saw how the Bush administration, time and again, welcomed intelligence that fit the president's determination to go to war and turned a blind eye to intelligence that did not.
...the rest of the story is in the above link.
Absolute faith has been shown, consistently, to breed intolerance. And intolerance, history teaches us, again and again, begets violence.
---------------------------------- The duty of a patriot in this time and place is to ask questions, to demand answers, to understand where our nation is headed and why. If the answers you get do not suit you, or if they frighten you, or if they anger you, it is your duty as a patriot to dissent. Freedom does not begin with blind acceptance and with a flag. Freedom begins when you say 'No.'
posted on May 3, 2007 08:04:50 AM newYet all the demo saw all the info that was given to Pres Bush & ALL agreed on the Iraqi plan.
Here’s the full, unedited passage of Durbin’s April 25, 2007 Senate-floor remarks.
First, the administration told us that Saddam Hussein and Iraq had weapons of mass destruction which could be used--chemical and biological weapons--in a terrorist mode to kill innocent people in the Middle East and around the world.
Second, we were told they were developing nuclear weapons in Iraq, nuclear weapons that could destabilize the Middle East and even attack America. The leaders in this administration were giving speeches about mushroom clouds from these nuclear weapons.
Then we were told that Saddam Hussein had some connection to the al-Qaida terrorists who caused the 9/11 tragedy in America.
Then we were told that this madman, this dictator, was so ruthless that he even killed and gassed his own innocent civilians, his own people in Kurdish regions.
The Senate came to debate this, listening to the speeches by President Bush, Vice President Cheney, Secretary Rumsfeld, Secretary Colin Powell, and Condoleezza Rice, and the debate engaged. At the time of this debate, I was a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee. I would read the headlines in the paper in the morning and watch the television newscasts and shake my head because, you see, just a few hundred feet away from here in a closed room, carefully guarded, the Intelligence Committee was meeting on a daily basis for top-secret briefings about the information we were receiving, and the information we had in the Intelligence Committee was not the same information being given to the American people. I couldn't believe it. Members of this administration were in active, heated debate over whether aluminum tubes really meant that the Iraqis were developing nuclear weapons. Some in the administration were saying, of course, not, it is not the same kind of aluminum tube; at the same time, members of the administration were telling the American people to be fearful of mushroom-shaped clouds.
I was angry about it. Frankly, I couldn't do much about it because, in the Intelligence Committee, we are sworn to secrecy. We can't walk outside the door and say the statement made yesterday by the White House is in direct contradiction to classified information that is being given to this Congress. We can't do that. We couldn't make those statements. So in my frustration, I sat on the floor of the Senate and listened to this heated debate about invading Iraq thinking the American people are being misled , they are not being told the truth. That is why I joined 22 of my colleagues in voting no. I didn't believe at the time that the American people knew the real facts.
So what happened? We invaded, turned loose hundreds, if not thousands of people scouring Iraq for these weapons of mass destruction and never found one of them. We looked for nuclear weapons. There was no evidence whatsoever. We went into our intelligence files and said: OK, Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida--let's get this linkage put together once and for all. There was no evidence at all of a linkage.
Absolute faith has been shown, consistently, to breed intolerance. And intolerance, history teaches us, again and again, begets violence.
---------------------------------- The duty of a patriot in this time and place is to ask questions, to demand answers, to understand where our nation is headed and why. If the answers you get do not suit you, or if they frighten you, or if they anger you, it is your duty as a patriot to dissent. Freedom does not begin with blind acceptance and with a flag. Freedom begins when you say 'No.'
yep, the radicals show us they STILL will live in total denial.
tsk tsk tsk
Now factcheck.org isn't even proof that they choose to use arguments they've used since before we invaded Iraq as their positions now.
Doesn't matter they've been proven false, over and over again.
Nothing factual matters to them.
And the biggest problem I see as to the reason why that is, is do to the way things stated are WORDED.
Like in the other thread where ld insists that Cheney lied about AQ being in Iraq before we invaded.
They don't READ what is stated correctly. So they get ALL confused. They LIVE in a state of denial and confusion....and NO amount of explaning it will EVER clear anything up for them.
=====
And yes helen, your BLOGGER has all those facts vs lies reversed. As the factcheck.org democrat ad analysis points out.
Those LIES were DECEPTIVE then...and they still are. Your blogger is just using the same liberal distortions now as the dem party was back then.
tsk tsk tsk
"Linda, the quotes that I posted were reported by reliable press and on television."
LOL.....taken totally out of CONTEXT, as you well know, and with a liberal, anti-war, anti-administration BIAS.
That totally DISTORTS what was ACTUALLY stated.
=====
"Didn't Bush and Rumsfeld admit to everyone that none were found? Have your news sources contacted your president to let him know that they found them now and where are they keeping them?"
Proof positive that the problem lies in how they mis-comprehend what has ACTUALLY been stated.
No, kiara, they did not admit that. They stated no MASSIVE amounts were found...not that NONE were ever found.
Read the military sites like I've suggested over and over again to those of you who can't comprehend the written word, and you will READ the statements from our military on what they've found.
I'll believe their statements over ANY liberal ignorant blogger helen uses to rehash your 'they lied' distortions.
And try and explain just why the anti-war liberals argued that the womd THAT WAS FOUND....had deteriorated IF NONE were ever found. LOL LOL LOL
They argued it wasn't STILL a threat....while others very much disagreed.
Guess they were arguing their position on that for NO REASON....since according to the unimformed libs...there were NONE.
==============
"While the democratic party complains about everything THIS President does to protect our Nation": "What would a Democrat president have done at that point?"
"Apparently, the answer is: Sit back and wait for the next terrorist attack."
Ann Coulter
[ edited by Linda_K on May 3, 2007 09:59 AM ]
posted on May 3, 2007 10:25:30 AM new Linda, you would not recognize a fact even if it hit you upside the head and knocked you out.
You do not deal in credible facts but rather spins and twists offered as talking points to gullible people such as yourself by an administration floundering on a flimsy base of lies and deceit. If answering questions would clarify your points, you would jump at the chance to do so. The fact that you do not answer questions reveals the fact that you simply don't have an answer.
AGAIN, The fact check report that you referenced concerns other quotes taken out of out of context and then manipulated. More than likely those quotes were composed and presented to fact check as a right wing ruse so that people like you could try to use it.
The quotes that I listed are CORRECT and can be verified from sources such as as the State of the Union address, speeches by George Bush, a radio address by George Bush and in the case of Powell from the UN Security Council.
It must be embarrassing to have to defend such an indefensible administration.
posted on May 3, 2007 10:31:39 AM new
Embarrassing for me???
ROLOL
Not in the least, helen.
I know and can read what the UN and most intelligence agencies said BEFORE we invaded.
And those reports are exactly what led the LIBERALS and DEMOCRATS to vote to GO TO WAR in Iraq.
Your leaders weren't 'lied' to. They received the SAME intelligence reports everyone else did....during THIS admin. and during the last one too.
Your shame, imo, should be that you and others support and DEFEND saddam's side of the issue.
You always have and I have no doubt you always will.
I'll take Ameican's SIDE....and the side the world stated AGAINST saddam believing the TONS of reports the UN and the inspectors made about what WOMD was still accounted for in Iraq.
posted on May 3, 2007 10:48:13 AM new
And for anyone who actually is stupid enough to believe the lies and distortions that helen's blogger has made......
inform yourself. Do your own research on each and EVERY falsehood he has made....and helen believe.
For example I did a google search on his/helen's supposed lie #2.
THEN you can find the truth of the situtation....not the liberal distortions.
NO ONE has to take my word that helen rarely knows what she's talking about.......find out for yourselves.
=============
While radical's like helen want to PRETEND all this CRAP about this admin. lying to us....and will use bloggers opinions as HER supporting evidence....lol lol lol....
it's NOT about Bush. It's about AMERICA vs our enemies. And it's SAD that helen continues to ALWAYS take the side of our enemies.
Here is what our intelligence agencies were telling us about her supposed #2 lie. Which WASN'T
AND each and everyone of HER bloggers posted distortions can ALSO be proven to show he and helen have NO CLUE as to what they're talking about.
Their personal HATRED for this President blinds them to accepting the FACTS of most any situation.
=========
Bush's "16 Words" on Iraq & Uranium:
He May Have Been Wrong But He Wasn't Lying
July 26, 2004
Updated: August 23, 2004
IN PART
Two intelligence investigations show Bush had plenty of reason to believe what he said in his 2003 State of the Union Address.
Summary
The famous "16 words" in President Bush's Jan. 28, 2003 State of the Union address turn out to have a basis in fact after all, according to two recently released investigations in the US and Britain.
Bush said then, "The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa ."
Some of his critics called that a lie, but the new evidence shows Bush had reason to say what he did.
A British intelligence review released July 14 calls Bush's 16 words "well founded."
A separate report by the US Senate Intelligence Committee said July 7 that the US also had similar information from "a number of intelligence reports," a fact that was classified at the time Bush spoke.
Ironically, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who later called Bush's 16 words a "lie", supplied information that the Central Intelligence Agency took as confirmation that Iraq may indeed have been seeking uranium from Niger.
Both the US and British investigations make clear that some forged Italian documents, exposed as fakes soon after Bush spoke, were not the basis for the British intelligence Bush cited, or the CIA's conclusion that Iraq was trying to get uranium.
None of the new information suggests Iraq ever nailed down a deal to buy uranium, and the Senate report makes clear that US intelligence analysts have come to doubt whether Iraq was even trying to buy the stuff.
In fact, both the White House and the CIA long ago conceded that the 16 words shouldn't have been part of Bush's speech.
But what he said - that Iraq sought uranium - is just what both British and US intelligence were telling him at the time. So Bush may indeed have been misinformed, but that's not the same as lying.
Analysis
The "16 words" in Bush's State of the Union Address on Jan. 28, 2003 have been offered as evidence that the President led the US into war using false information intentionally.
The new reports show Bush accurately stated what British intelligence was saying, and that CIA analysts believed the same thing.
[ edited by Linda_K on May 3, 2007 11:05 AM ]
posted on May 3, 2007 11:55:17 AM new
We were told one of the main reasons for going to war in Iraq was because of the threat of weapons of mass destruction.
Then Bush said, "We have not found stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction"
"Iraq did not have the weapons that our intelligence believed were there."
Linda_K insists:
And as to the LIE about NO wmd being found.....
our troops DID find a lot of them.
The troops found weapons of mass destruction? So now Bush must have lied when he said they didn't find any? Why hasn't he reported that they did find them after all?
This from ANOTHER uninformed poster who chose to believe what BLOGGERS say...rather than to actually READ the FACTS.
But...then she even makes it MORE funny by challenging anyone who uses an op-ed piece, etc. themselves.
I call that a hypocrite....FULL of double standards as to what's allowed from one side and not the other, obviously.
Then kiara, who NEVER answers questions put to her....has some MORE stupid questions.
She would NEVER answer that since the clinton admin, the UN, the Bush 1 admin and many world leaders ALSO said their intelligence stated saddam had womd......WHERE the womd went?
Did it suddenly disappear? Did saddam move it somewhere, bury it in the sand like he did those HUGE planes....so many questions that she and her ilk will NEVER address.
But they love to use their bloggers who haven't a CLUE as to what they're talking about AS THEIR PROOF of everything. LOL
No wonder they're SO VERY misinformed.
It's sad really....too many ignorant people taking saddam's side against America.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"While the democratic party complains about everything THIS President does to protect our Nation": "What would a Democrat president have done at that point?"
"Apparently, the answer is: Sit back and wait for the next terrorist attack."
Ann Coulter
[ edited by Linda_K on May 3, 2007 12:29 PM ]
My information is not based on information from a "blog" Linda.
AlterNet is an award winning progressive news magazine. As evidence of its substantial reach and success, AlterNet has won two Webby Awards for Best Web Magazine and several Independent Press Awards for online political coverage. AlterNet was also named one of NPR's five "Winners on the Internet."
"AlterNet is an award-winning news magazine and online community that creates original journalism and amplifies the best of dozens of other independent media sources. AlterNet's aim is to inspire citizen action and advocacy on the environment, human rights and civil liberties, social justice, media, and health care issues. Our editorial mix underscores a commitment to fairness, equity and global stewardship, and making connections across generational, ethnic and issue lines. AlterNet serves as a reliable filter, keeping hundreds of thousands of people well-informed and engaged, helping them cope with a culture of information overload and resist the constant commercial media onslaught. Our aim is to stimulate, motivate, and engage."
posted on May 3, 2007 12:24:56 PM new
The UN on it's own site.....has posted the HUGE amount of weapons saddam NEVER accounted to the world for. NEVER.
But that won't stop saddam's supporters from arguing differently. LOL
Even their OWN leader said: over and over again
"Transcript: President Clinton explains Iraq strike
CLINTON: Good evening.
Earlier today, I ordered America's armed forces to strike military and security targets in Iraq.
They are joined by British forces. Their mission is to attack Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and its military capacity to threaten its neighbors.
Their purpose is to protect the national interest of the United States, and indeed the interests of people throughout the Middle East and around the world.
Saddam Hussein must not be allowed to threaten his neighbors or the world with nuclear arms, poison gas or biological weapons.
=========
Now maybe just ONE of all these MISINFORMED anti-war, Bush bashing liberals can PROVE to us just WHERE saddams weapons actually went.
LOL
Nope, they can't....that's why they have to stick to this constant badgering of 'he lied' 'he lied' 'he lied'.
Because they can't explain SO many things themselves.....[b]can't OFFER ANY PROOF - any of these weapons saddam DID have - of where they went.
posted on May 3, 2007 12:32:19 PM new
Good Grief! What a pile of BS.
If you were sincere, I would ask you to tell us how you believe that we support Saddam Hussein. But we all know that you can't do that so we will have to chalk that statement up as another lie by Linda_K.
posted on May 3, 2007 12:33:23 PM new
No weapons of mass destruction were ever found. Only you and your rag sheets claim they were, Linda_K. You are trying to use the troops to back your lies by claiming they found them. How despicable and anti-American can you get?
Are YOU a Bunghole?