This is news only to those who like to continuously say that Bush is lying to the American people:
President Bush said Wednesday there was no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 — disputing an idea held by many Americans.
“There’s no question that Saddam Hussein had al-Qaida ties,” the president said. But he also said, “We have no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with the Sept. 11” attacks.
The president’s comment was in line with a statement Tuesday by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who said he not seen any evidence that Saddam was involved in the attacks.
In one week, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Rice have all stated the same exact thing they have stated for the past two years- there is no evidence that Hussein had anything to do with 9/11, but we do know that he was connected to Al Qaeda and had ties with numerous other terrorist groups. I am sure someone out there is going to be misguided enough to claim that this is yet another Bush lie, or that he is just ‘coming clean’ from his previous lies (apparently mentioning Al Qaeda, 9/11, and Osama all in one speech qualifies as a ‘lie’ nowadays).
Once again, whether you agree with their assessment or not, the administration believes the action in Iraq was an integral part of the wear on terror, not a distraction. I am inclined to agree, and I am glad we have ended the regime and are taking care of the hornet’s nest. Still a long row to hoe, though.
Tman
Herein lies the kicker.
To make the statement that Saddam Hussein PLANNED 9/11 is to be without any credible evidence.
To make the statement Saddam Hussein was HEAVILY involved with terrorist groups from the Middle East, including Al-qaeda, does not have to be made without evidence.
Has anyone discredited Sabah Khodada yet? If not, his stories about who and what they were training at Salman Pak still bear witness to some serious connections.
(for those who haven’t read-
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/gunning/interviews/khodada.html )
Then we have Judge Merrit, from Tennessee, with this from Iraq-
http://tennessean.com/nation-world/archives/03/06/34908297.shtml?Element_ID=34908297
Was there a substantial motive for Saddam to be directly involved with 9/11? Probably not, but he had plenty of motives to be involved with anti-US terrorist operations, seeing as how we effectively denied him from eradicating the Kurds.
I think you have your head in the sand if you think Saddam had nothing to do with anti-US Middle Eastern Muslim terrorists who were and are planning to attack America.
Tim
btw- some other folks are not as sceptical as me-
http://www.freedomstavern.com/Saddam911link.htm
Kimmitt
Er, Cheney was pretty clear on Meet the Press that Iraq and Al Qaeda were linked and he made some pregnant references to 9/11. link
John Cole
Kimmitt- What part of this exchange is confusing people on the left:
MR. RUSSERT: The Washington Post asked the American people about Saddam Hussein, and this is what they said: 69 percent said he was involved in the September 11 attacks. Are you surprised by that?
VICE PRES. CHENEY: No. I think it
HH
We’ve seen a pattern of deception alright… a pattern of deceptively misquoting and taking out of context Bush admin. officials, over and over again.
Andrew Lazarus
GWB and Rumsfeld had belated honesty attacks, but not Cheney. What exactly does he mean, “We just don’t know” about Saddam and 9/11? At what point does absence of any evidence, not in Iraq, not in the nationalities of the hijackers, not anywhere reach the point where we know, and the answer is negative. And he trots out the so-called Prague meeting, at which time our own FBI is certain Mohammed Atta was in Florida.
I mean, if someone said “Did the Republican Party shoot down Paul Wellstone’s plane?” and I replied, “Well, we just don’t know.” you’d think I was a liar, a conspiracy theorist and/or nuts. Wouldn’t you? What’s your epistemology here guys??
[Josh Marshall, hardly a leftist, on Cheney]
David Perron
I heard an interview with Madeleine Albright on NPR this morning. In it, she managed to attempt to invalidate the invasion of Iraq (something to the effect of “not why, but why NOW?”) while propping up Clinton’s decision to cruise-missile a pharmaceutical factory (why THEN? why not give inspections a chance?). She then said (this is what got me) something to this effect: “We thought they were manufacturing VX.” Well. Sounds as if they proceeded with an act of war based on shaky intelligence.
cameron
“I mean, if someone said “Did the Republican Party shoot down Paul Wellstone’s plane?” and I replied, “Well, we just don’t know.” you’d think I was a liar, a conspiracy theorist and/or nuts. Wouldn’t you? What’s your epistemology here guys??”
“Well, we just don’t know.”
That would be the abridged version, if we are comparing it to the Cheney answer.
The complete answer would go along the lines of,
“Well Tim, we know that the republicans don’t like the democrats and the republicans have people in the defense industry where there is access to surface to air missles.
We know that republican strategists were meeting on how to remove Mr. Welstone from power. Did they have anything to do with shooting down Paul Wellstones plane? We just don’t know”
Andrew Lazarus
I applaud “Cameron” for his improvement on my argument.
I haven’t investigated the facts of the David Corn and The Nation thread, but it’s clear that Cheney is guilty of what you accuse Corn. By juxtaposition and careful choice of words, statements that are true in isolation imply or suggest something clearly false. (Or did the GOP shoot down Wellstone’s plane?)
timod420
Ok guys, you go from what should be a no brainer, whether or not Saddam was collaborating with Islamofascist terrorist froups to attack the US and its interests, to accusing the entire GOP of shooting down Wellstones plane.
Show me cent one of physical evidence connecting a single senator with Wellstones death, boom- you’ve got an argument.
I posted multiple links highlighting links between the two. Nothing to say about Khodada’s interview? I have yet to see it discredited. I am still waiting for Judge Merrit to come out with more information from his visit. This story is far from over.
Tim
ps- here’s a postcard from Iraq for you-
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/photos/3rd-infantry-saddam-911.jpg
Tim
Andrew Lazarus
Timod, I appreciate the fact you are arguing in a way that makes sense: basically that there WAS a connection between Saddam, 9/11, and Al Qaeda. (Now, of course, Saddam has sent out an SOS to every anti-American group on the planet.) So as far as epistemology goes, we’re in agreement.
A Google search didn’t turn up a “refutation” per se of Khodama, *but it didn’t turn up a shred of corroboraion either*. In other words, we HAVEN’T FOUND the airplane terrorist training camp, and we don’t seem to have found ANYONE ELSE who was involved there. What’s more, Khodama appears (from Google) to be affiliated with Ahmed Chalabi, and his group is known to have fed misinformation to US Intel that we now know was false. For instance, Chalabi associates gave very specific locations of WMD that didn’t pan out (including that notorious NY Times piece of an alleged scientist gesturing at points in the sand; no traces of WMD there). I imagine Chalabi was behind that Rumsfeld mistake when Rummy said we knew where the WMD are between Baghdad and Tikrit. These errors were embarrassing enough that Chalabi’s welcome in DC is rescinded.
So on balance, I’d say Khodama needs major shoring up to be taken as credible. But I have to say, it’s a legitimate form of argument, and if you can find any post-invasion corroboration, I’d like to see it.
More Cheney errors or reliance on obsolete, refuted “intel” here.
talbert
talk about lying. why is it that no one is talking about the fact that Bush stated that they actually found WMD? everyone likes to keep bringing up the fact that clinton lied about keeping his pants on, but everyone let this statement go.