The California Yankee is a touch upset:
Lies, Misrepresentations and More Left-Wing Extremist Propaganda By California Yankee
To paraphrase President Reagan, there they go again.
Associated Press writer, Douglas Daniel has written an article promoting more lies, misrepresentations, and left-wing extremist propaganda trying to revive the loony left’s thoroughly debunked fiction that we were “misled” into war in Iraq by “false statements” and “lies.”
On Yahoo the Douglas article is titled “Study: False statements preceded war.” But CBS News, the ever accurate former employer of Dan Rather, originally carried the article under the headline “Study: 2 Years Of Lies Led To Iraq War. That was too much even for the President Bush hating propagandists at CBS, who toned it down to “Study: ‘False Pretenses’ Led U.S. To War.”
You see- it is the media’s fault for reporting on the studies! As to the actual studies, well, he doesn’t even address them. I am willing to wager a good chunk of change he hasn’t even read them (I know I have not). Instead, he attacks the press for not citing facts he finds comfortable. Why, MR. EVIL AP WRITER, why did you not discuss the Robb-Silberman Commission On The Intelligence Capabilities? HRMM? HRMM? LEFT-WING BIAS! And on an on the whinge goes.
At any rate, what exactly did the studies find?
The study counted 935 false statements in the two-year period. It found that in speeches, briefings, interviews and other venues, Bush and administration officials stated unequivocally on at least 532 occasions that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or was trying to produce or obtain them or had links to al-Qaida or both.
“It is now beyond dispute that Iraq did not possess any weapons of mass destruction or have meaningful ties to al-Qaida,” according to Charles Lewis and Mark Reading-Smith of the Fund for Independence in Journalism staff members, writing an overview of the study. “In short, the Bush administration led the nation to war on the basis of erroneous information that it methodically propagated and that culminated in military action against Iraq on March 19, 2003.”
Named in the study along with Bush were top officials of the administration during the period studied: Vice President Dick Cheney, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Colin Powell, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and White House press secretaries Ari Fleischer and Scott McClellan.
Bush led with 259 false statements, 231 about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and 28 about Iraq’s links to al-Qaida, the study found. That was second only to Powell’s 244 false statements about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and 10 about Iraq and al-Qaida.
The center said the study was based on a database created with public statements over the two years beginning on Sept. 11, 2001, and information from more than 25 government reports, books, articles, speeches and interviews.
“The cumulative effect of these false statements — amplified by thousands of news stories and broadcasts — was massive, with the media coverage creating an almost impenetrable din for several critical months in the run-up to war,” the study concluded.
Yeah. That is why he didn’t address the studies. Anyone with half a brain would not find that even remotely controversial. Hell, perhaps we can ask Mr. Yankee to point us to all those WMD we found. Or maybe he can discuss the Office of Special Plans a bit. Or maybe not, as they have already had a pretty bad week at Red State, what with Fred dropping out of the race and all.
BTW- Why is it that everyone with the word “Yankee” in their pen names turn out to be a total wanker?
*** Update ***
Captain Ed finds the real villain- GEORGE SOROS!
4tehlulz
True, but at least give this one credit, he’s not sucking off
traitorsConfederates.Bombadil
It’s the true curse of the Bambino.
Svensker
First off, everyone knows that Saddam moved all the weapons to Syria before the war. Why would he moved weapons away from a war zone before a war? Obvious — spite. Then, if Syria gets attacked, they will move the weapons to someplace else Islamofascistic, probably Iran. Second, as proved by Santorum and Hoekstra, WMD were found in the Iraqi desert. Like you forgot or something? Why don’t you move to France and eat cheese!!!!?
And of course Pres. Bush had to have the OSP. The CIA and the State Dept. had been overrun (and still are!!!) with liberal traitors who would bend the facts to their liberal traitor agenda.
It is amazing to me that so many liberals refuse to see the truth. No wonder you guys love socialism and jihadis!!!!! Take off that burqa, John, and fact facts!!!!!!!!
ed
It would be nice for someone (other than me–hey, I’m busy!) to make a list of statements by Saddam Hussein about Iraq’s WMD or WMD Programs or ties to Al Quaeda over the same time period. I wonder who has the better percentage of truthful statements?
[Important note: I’ve always thought that Saddam Husssein to be a bad guy. Really bad. Ultra mega bad. Even when Don Rumsfeld and April Glaspie thought different.]
zmulls
A Yankee wanker would more accurately be a “yanker”
wilson
That’s why I’m a Mets fan.
John S.
Donald Rumsfeld didn’t know. He thought they were somewhere north, south, east and west of Tikrit.
A Different Matt
This is a pointless study. Anyone who isn’t thoroughly convinced of Bush’s nature/agenda isn’t going to be convinced by some independent journalistic study 5 years after the fact.
Nice work, press. Bunch of fucking tools they are.
Punchy
Ladies and gents, I give you A-Rod.
TR
How dare these people hold the administration accountable for its words.
It’s not like they were lying about something important, like a blowjob.
Zifnab
Dude. Whatever. In ten years these guys will be crowing about how we went into Iraq, killed Saddam, found the Ponies, defeated the terrorists, and were just about to bring Democracy to the entire Middle East when Democrats snatched control of power and ruined everything. This is just going to be Vietnam redux, with conservative “thinkers” claiming we totally could have won if we’d just stayed in a couple more years and blaming the dirty liberal hippie bloggers for the vicious STAB IN THE BACK that brought down the US freedom spreading force.
Why anyone should give a fuck when some wanker goes off about how everyone is lying but the Bush Administration, I’ll never know. Fuck him. If he wants to live with his head up his ass, who am I to stop him?
Davis X. Machina
They’re not lies, they serve a higher truth.
Merely comporting with external reality is an outdated, bourgeois, definition of ‘truth’.
The various Bush administration statements, because they advance the Party in its role as vanguard of the Glorious Revolution, possess revolutionary truth, which soars above the dialectally opposed ‘truth’ and ‘falsity’ of the dead past.
All correctly oriented cadres know that.
kindness
Good post. It is Confederate Yankee, not California Yankee. We out here in CA have enough issues to have him as an albatross draped around our necks. No thanks to that please.
It’s curious that there are even posters here that will wail and howl that it’s “liberals” who are America’s true traitors. Maybe they’re the same folks giving Doughboy Pantload’s awful book glowing reviews over at Amazon.
Craig
Beyond the whole lies versus inaccurate information discussion that this topic brings up, is the fact that apparently this “independant” study is from an organization heavily funded by George Soros.
Say what you will, but if a study come out from a “independant” journalistic organization about the Clintons and catalouged their “lies” (regardless of how purposely deceitful they were), and this organization was substancially funded by Rupert Murdoch, the left blogosphere would be rampant with quite reasonable claims of partisan gamesmanship.
It’s just another day in the life of ugly partisan politicals as mirrored by a hypocritical blogosphere by EVERYONE involved!! Wake up people! If you limit yourself to reading information that is only comfortable for a specific ideology (no matter who), you are always going to see only part of the picture.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
I know this is technically a fallacy, but why are we listening to these pepsi stained dimwits?
They need charity to keep running. That means their ideas aren’t widely received.
Somehow, this is you high-school AV Club all over again, with a shiny exterior. And instead of talking about how they’d bang the hot Star Trek chick, they’re making shit up about how the world ought to work.
When are you guys (I’m pointing at Sully) going to learn to ignore the people that are fuck-ups, instead of mocking them and giving them oxygen?
calipygian
Confederate Wanker is just pissed that the South has failed to rise again for the 138th consecutive year.
If only we had hanged Robert E Lee and Jeff Davis after the war as traitors and let the crows pick out their eyes, we wouldn’t have these problems with the South refusing to be patriotic and love America.
Paul L.
I do not remember. Was there a study by two nonprofit journalism organizations on the lies that Bill Clinton used to start his illegal war in Kosovo?
such as Mass graves with 100,000 dead.
IanY77
Fair point, Craig.
The problem I have with these tools yelling “SOROS!!” at every possible opportunity are the same people that breathlessly accepted every piece of Richard Mellon Scaife misinformation. Watching the cognitive dissonance at work is stunning.
Hart Williams
Well, it ain’t just RedState. The entire “blueblood” Red Blogosmear™ is on it like white on rice, and — Mirabile dictu! — they all have EXACTLY the same take on it. George SOROS is somehow behind it, and, therefore ALL the facts MUST have been manufactured! etc. etc. Even “Captain” Special Ed has dropped his normally “thoughtful” pose and is screeching like a newly-minted cuckold.
Which seems dumb. After all: Bush put the horns on ’em. We didn’t.
Jay
Lets not forget that a lot of people made false statements about WMD in Iraq not just the people in GWBs Admin. Here is a small sampling of them:
“Iraq made commitments after the Gulf War to completely dismantle all weapons of mass destruction, and unfortunately, Iraq has not lived up to its agreement.” — Barbara Boxer, November 8, 2002
“The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retained some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capability. Intelligence reports also indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons, but has not yet achieved nuclear capability.” — Robert Byrd, October 2002
“There’s no question that Saddam Hussein is a threat… Yes, he has chemical and biological weapons. He’s had those for a long time. But the United States right now is on a very much different defensive posture than we were before September 11th of 2001… He is, as far as we know, actively pursuing nuclear capabilities, though he doesn’t have nuclear warheads yet. If he were to acquire nuclear weapons, I think our friends in the region would face greatly increased risks as would we.” — Wesley Clark on September 26, 2002
“In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including Al Qaeda members, though there is apparently no evidence of his involvement in the terrible events of September 11, 2001. It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons. Should he succeed in that endeavor, he could alter the political and security landscape of the Middle East, which as we know all too well affects American security.” — Hillary Clinton, October 10, 2002
“I am absolutely convinced that there are weapons…I saw evidence back in 1998 when we would see the inspectors being barred from gaining entry into a warehouse for three hours with trucks rolling up and then moving those trucks out.” — Clinton’s Secretary of Defense William Cohen in April of 2003
“Iraq is not the only nation in the world to possess weapons of mass destruction, but it is the only nation with a leader who has used them against his own people.” — Tom Daschle in 1998
“Saddam Hussein’s regime represents a grave threat to America and our allies, including our vital ally, Israel. For more than two decades, Saddam Hussein has sought weapons of mass destruction through every available means. We know that he has chemical and biological weapons. He has already used them against his neighbors and his own people, and is trying to build more. We know that he is doing everything he can to build nuclear weapons, and we know that each day he gets closer to achieving that goal.” — John Edwards, Oct 10, 2002
“The debate over Iraq is not about politics. It is about national security. It should be clear that our national security requires Congress to send a clear message to Iraq and the world: America is united in its determination to eliminate forever the threat of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.” — John Edwards, Oct 10, 2002
“I share the administration’s goals in dealing with Iraq and its weapons of mass destruction.” — Dick Gephardt in September of 2002
“Iraq does pose a serious threat to the stability of the Persian Gulf and we should organize an international coalition to eliminate his access to weapons of mass destruction. Iraq’s search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to completely deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power.” — Al Gore, 2002
“We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has, and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for the production and storage of weapons of mass destruction.” — Bob Graham, December 2002
“Saddam Hussein is not the only deranged dictator who is willing to deprive his people in order to acquire weapons of mass destruction.” — Jim Jeffords, October 8, 2002
“We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction.” — Ted Kennedy, September 27, 2002
“There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein’s regime is a serious danger, that he is a tyrant, and that his pursuit of lethal weapons of mass destruction cannot be tolerated. He must be disarmed.” — Ted Kennedy, Sept 27, 2002
“I will be voting to give the president of the United States the authority to use force – if necessary – to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security.” — John F. Kerry, Oct 2002
“The threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real, but as I said, it is not new. It has been with us since the end of that war, and particularly in the last 4 years we know after Operation Desert Fox failed to force him to re accept them, that he has continued to build those weapons. He has had a free hand for 4 years to reconstitute these weapons, allowing the world, during the interval, to lose the focus we had on weapons of mass destruction and the issue of proliferation.” — John Kerry, October 9, 2002
“We begin with the common belief that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and stability of the region. He has ignored the mandates of the United Nations and is building weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them.” — Carl Levin, Sept 19, 2002
“Saddam’s existing biological and chemical weapons capabilities pose a very real threat to America, now. Saddam has used chemical weapons before, both against Iraq’s enemies and against his own people. He is working to develop delivery systems like missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles that could bring these deadly weapons against U.S. forces and U.S. facilities in the Middle East.” — Jay Rockefeller, Oct 10, 2002
“This is a guy who is an extreme danger to the world, and this is a guy who is in every way possible seeking weapons of mass destruction.” Senator Joe Biden (D-DE) August 4, 2002
“[M]y own personal view is, I think Saddam has chemical and biological weapons, and I expect that he is trying to develop a nuclear weapon. So at some point, we might have to act precipitously.”
Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) > August 25, 2002
“It is Hussein’s vigorous pursuit of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons, and his present and future potential support for terrorist acts and organizations that make him a danger to the people of the united states.”
Senatorc Chuck Schumer (D-NY) > October 10, 2002
Iraq is a long way from (here), but what happens there matters a great deal here, for the risk that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest national security threat we face — and it is a threat against which we must and will stand firm.” Madeline Albright – February 18, 2002
4tehlulz
tl;dr The fact of the matter is that the Bush administration ordered the invasion of Iraq and used lies to justify it. GTFO
Craig
You’re right Ian, the cognitive dissonance works on everyone who allows it to affect them in sorting out what they choose to believe (basically all of us to some degree).
Hart, the point is that a news story that reports retread information from a organization that claims “independence”, but whose partisan funding is omitted in the story, should be called out for sloppy and suspiciously tainted journalism, no matter what agenda is promoted. Not blindly embraced, due to its message.
Dug Jay
As noted, an organization funded by known left-wing political activists puts up a website with shopworn quotes taken mostly out of context and misrepresented — and this somehow qualifies as news? Well, as the NYT put it: “There is no startling new information [in the Report], because all the documents have been published previously.”
Well, it was good enough to bring out some of the blogosphere’s crazy old aunts in the attic, such as Cole, to try to make something out of nothing. They fell for it just like their ideological predecessors fell for other kinds of nonsense way back in the 1920’s and 1930’s.
UnkyT
Yes, we all know that the spineless piece of shit dems were totally complicit in this mess. The difference is the left at least tries to hold them accountable (somewhat, at least) for their fuck up where as the right denies there was a fuck up to begin with.
This obviously is generalizing a little seeing as there are some (Hillary) who are not willing to acknowledge their bullshit.
Also, in my opinion, many of the people on that list were just repeating whatever bullshit they could because it was politically popular. Reminds me of the movie Billy Madison, when Billy convinces everyone in the class that peeing their pants is cool, so everyone pees their pants. The dems are that class of kids.
4tehlulz
There also that minor “Bush is the Commander-in-Chief” thing to consider.
Jake
You know what needs to be studied? I’ll tell ya. Someone needs to find out how these fucksticks can live in a state of perpetual vein popping outrage without blowing every blood vessel in their brains …
Oh yeah.
Never mind.
I wonder what they’d do without Soros? He allows them to indulge in their Ach! Der Juden Kontrol teh Media fantasies without mentioning the fact that he’s Jewish.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
Well, more honestly, they too got suckered by false information that confirmed their small-minded little conspiracy, and ran with it.
You want a better target, so look at Michael Ledeen, that fucking proto-fascist. Somewhere there was a Vanity Fair article that slogged through the shit and found the source of dishonesty to be from an Italian right-wing semi-conspiracy to get intervention in the Mideast.
Bush just was too happy to go along for the right
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
Well, yes, but you can put lipstick on that pig, but it’s still going to feel like you’re kissing bacon.
Now, if you excuse me, I have a … um … date with a good woman. yes. “woman”.
Dug Jay
Sure you do….a real woman….or is it one made out of plastic?
John Cole
The study didn’t bring me out of the attic- the reaction from you and Red State and others brought me out of the attic… to laugh at you.
Who cares about the study? It is hardly breathtaking new evidence, and everyone knows the Bush administration was full of shit with their statements. Again, where are those WMD?
What is funny and fresh and exciting is watching the fringe freak out about the study. Now that is good stuff, and I bet worth everyone of Soro’s dollars.
Hart Williams
Yo, Craig.
Do you KNOW who the Center for Public Integrity is?
Sorry, I had hoped that the idiotic slur that “Hitler said 2+2=4” wouldn’t carry any weight, other than as a purposeful attempt to muddy the waters. (So, therefore 2+2 DOESN’T equal 4? It’s a classical fallacy. And a tired one at that.)
The “Soros” meme is as tired as it is cliché. And the only traction it’s ever had has been in Twenty-Five Percenter ranks.
Besides, how come all the Righie blogs had the same meme “defense” up within an hour or so of one another? Don’t they think for themselves?
Whoops. Sorry. Just answered my own question.
Jay
They have? How have they done so?
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
methinks he didn’t get my albeit miserable joke.
then again, I don’t think he got the message that wars under incorrect pretenses are especially taxing on this country and merit historical examination to prevent future occurrences.
But no! If preznit says it, it’s automatically holy gospel. Onward to Iran!
TenguPhule
Shorter Dug Jay: Forget about the lies we told before, they’re old. Just think happy thoughts about flying ponies in Iraq.
The Grand Panjandrum
Is the group actually funded by Soros? I couldn’t find any documentation to support the claim. Does anyone know where to find that information?
And with all the wingnut claims of BDS shouldn’t they be called on their … SDS (Soros Derangement Syndrome)? Oh no! Proof that Conservative Communist’s exist! (Don’t forget where you first read about this absolute, undeniable proof of its existence!)
The Grand Panjandrum
Never mind. I found it.
Jody
*cough* Lieberman *cough*…
UnkyT
From what I have seen the left is pretty pushy about getting their politicians to acknowledge that they made a huge mistake. I am not saying that they have been successful, as Hillary to this day will not say she made a mistake or was complicit in any way (It was all GWB’s fault I made those statements), and a lot of the left hates that about her. The left looks at those statements and asks ‘what do have to say for yourselves’ whereas the right looks at the ones Bush and Comp. said and find nothing wrong with it.
Craig
That’s right, John. Who cares about the study. Apparently a flawed news story by AP, covering essentially a partisan press release as as something it is not, is good enough to post just for the reaction it will generate. No point in conceding the legitimacy of that journalistic point. It ruins the fun. That is what the ENTIRE political-oriented part of the blogosphere has come to.
Partisan hacks of ALL STRIPES promoting some stories, avoiding others, while spinning all of them to placate the suckling masses who want confirmation of their point of view. You can see it on websites of any ideology when the blogger dares to write something that appears to concede a point to the “enemy”. The comments become filled with indignation and accusations of the blogger drinking the other side’s kool-aide.
More and more the blogosphere seems representative of a noble idea wasted.
rob
What I don’t understand is why Captain Ed is quoted like he is some sort of center right guy. I don’t mean this as a slam against John; He is quoted by TMV, Donklephant and other center blogs.
I just don’t see it. He believes all the same things as RedState, he just USUALLY doesn’t say them quite as confrontationally.
Ninerdave
Is it too much to wish for that someday the wingnuts will wake up and realize they and the policies they support have driven our country into the ground? Retorical question.
It takes too much effort and integrity to look at the facts, realize you’ve been duped and man up and admit it.
Just as Paul L.’s post above shows, when in doubt yell about Clinton, and with Hillary looking like the nominee, that won’t change (of course it wouldn’t change no matter what Dem makes it into office).
Here’s a question that I’ve never had the answer too. What is at the root of the liberals are evil incarnate thinking. Why is everything liberal or that has the appearance of being liberal, or hell just randomly labeled liberal: world destroying bad?
John Cole
A.) Do you have any analysis of the actual study itself? Have you read the study? How is what is said in the study inaccurately portrayed in the media? Until you can answer yes, yes, and then provide some reason on how the study portrayal is flawed, please STFU with “ZOMG EVERYONE BUT PURE ME IS A PARTISAN HACK AND WHAT HAS BECOME OF THE NOBLE BLOGOSPHERE!!oneeleven!!
B.) What is important about this reaction is WHAT they freak out about. Double Gitmo- they are cool with that. Mitt Romney a pathological liar- cool with that too. Iraq a quagmire that is going to cost hundreds of billions annually for who knows how long- cool with that. And on and on and on. But, if the press does a bland write-up of some trivial study, and the freak-out factor hits maximum power in an instant. OMG GEORGE SOROS! OMG MEDIA BIAS!
Seriously, the last god damned thing I need today in the mood I am in is catcalls from concern trolls worried about the independence and integrity of the blogosphere.
Dug Jay
In the words of a commenter over at
CaliforniaConfederate Yankee, it would appear that the “Head Moonbat” is having a bad day.Bubblegum Tate
How do you guys know Soros is having a bad day?
Craig
My, you are in a mood! I don’t recall claiming myself as some pure blogger. I don’t even have my own blog. I try to read blog sites from a range of opinions and ideologies. This is just a trend I’ve seen across the board (perhaps my use of the words “entire” and “of all stripes” was too nuanced for you?).
As a human, I’m not exempted from carrying some preferred opinions of my own. Part of my bigger-picture point is that the hypocracy that you note in part B of your response is not the property of any classification of bloggers. It can be seen on collection sites such as memeoradeum whenever a significant news story breaks that casts one group (left or right for simplistic purposes) in a negative light. Who is linking far more often to that story?
It’s a higher arcing idea far beyond the daily battles of who wins the political points of the day.
4tehlulz
Villager detected.
Wilfred
Redstate is a vegetable sanctuary, a place where the rights and feelings of the brain-dead are respected above all else, like, well…
935 is impressive, but what I want to know is how many lies have been told since the invasion.
Tim F.
Way to dispel that troll label, Dug. It’s hard to imagine why any those crazy Jew Nazi lefties wouldn’t such a carefully crafted argument seriously.
Jay
I think it had as much to do with antisemitism on the far left as it did with the war. For some the war was the excuse to go after a Jew.
Davis X. Machina
Is it too much to wish for that someday the wingnuts will wake up and realize they and the policies they support have driven our country into the ground?
Faulty predicate — you said ‘our’ country. It’s their country, or it’s no country at all.
4tehlulz
Are you allowed to play with sharp objects?
Dug Jay
And I see that the “Assistant Head Moonbat” is his usual incoherent self….
Zifnab
ZOMG! Why does everyone hate the Jews when they lie us into wars on false premises? Can’t you see the double standard? No one is mad at Bush or Cheney or Rumsfeld or Doug Feith or Judy Miller or the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board or the thousands of yes-men and partisan flunkies who propagated the myth of WMDs for political gain. JUST Joe Lieberman. Because he’s Jewish.
First come the verbal condemnations for lying. Then the gas chambers. It’s Germany circa 1933 all over again.
Tim F.
That has to be one of the most fucking retarded statements that I have ever read. Honestly, other than the cheap efforts to conflate neoconservative criticism with Jew-hating I can’t come up with a single reason how anybody could make a good-faith argument that comes within ten miles of that conclusion. Dazzle me with your logic, Jay.
Hart Williams
Craig, it seems, is a troll.
It is essentially irrefutable that the Bushies “fixed the facts to fit their policy,” to drum up support for invading Iraq.
Now, faced with a study (that they clearly haven’t had time to read) delineating just how widespread and coordinated the campaign to get us INTO Iraq was, the “Dan Rather”/”Swiftboat” technique shows up — including agents provocateurs like “Craig.”
That technique that we recall from the shifting of attention from Bush’s AWOL Air Guard “service” to a never completely debunked document that wasn’t particularly material to the report on 60 Minutes II.
That effectively ended the career of Dan Rather.
And the technique used to pretend that John Kerry hadn’t actually served in Vietnam, or was cutting himself shaving and then putting in for purple hearts. Remember?
Now, faced with the potential of a real groundswell for *justified* impeachment investigations, the Rightie Blogosmear™ and said agents provocateurs are running around screaming “SOROS! SOROS!” to deflect attention.
(Er, and what’s so bad about George Soros? He hasn’t killed anybody.)
The Center for Public Integrity has won more journalism awards than you can shake a stick at, including, last year, the Online News Association’s Online Journalism Awards’ “Overall Excellence” award.
Most of the judges that jury for ONA are from the same national media outlets that the Pulitzer judges are drawn from, BTW.
[“The judges for the 2007 awards were:
http://journalist.org/awards/archives/000773.php
Lane Beauchamp. Managing Editor CBS Television Stations Digital Media
Suki Dardarian, Managing Editor, News Coverage and Enterprise, The Seattle Times
Jeff Dionise, Design Director, USAToday
Rich Jaroslovsky, Executive Editor, government and economy, Bloomberg News
Sandeep Junnarkar, Associate Professor. The CUNY Graduate School of Journalism
Logan Molen, Vice president / Interactive Media, The Bakersfield Californian
Kim Moy, Managing Editor, Broadband at Yahoo!
Jill Hunter Pellettieri, Slate Magazine
Laura Sellers, Online Director, East Oregonian Publishing Co.
Jonathan Weber, Founder and Editor in Chief, New West”]
All of which means that someone screaming about a report that they haven’t read, from a highly credible news organization has almost undoubtedly got an ulterior motive in going to a site ideologically at odds with their position to smear the integrity of the report’s authors.
Sounds like a troll to me.
Tim F.
Hahaha, of course. Crazy – John. Nazi:
Jews: The evil tentacles of George Soros. Using his insidious globe-spanning financier connections to promote leftist revolution no doubt.
You’re throwing perfect strikes of bad-faith trollery, Dug boy. And it looks like you’re not alone.
Bombadil
Please excuse the interrruption.
To all who are confusing Confederate Yankee with California Yankee, the article at RedState that John linked to was, in fact, written by “California Yankee”.
We now return to our regular troll baiting session.
Tony J
You can always judge the accuracy of a report like this by watching the reaction of the wingnutoshpere. If they scream like stuck pigs and wail about bias, it’s accurate.
Glances back at the troll/spoof postings here.
Yeah, it’s accurate.
Grand Moff Texan
As to the actual studies, well, he doesn’t even address them.
Can’t afford to. But, it’s his blog, and he can suck if he wants to.
.
Tony J
Fixed because it’s more accurate this way.
Dug Jay
As far as I know, it is correct that George Soros has not killed anybody. He is, however, a felon, convicted of insider trading several years ago.
Additionally, he has also bankrolled groups involved in the manipulation of elections, an activity that has increased since his money came into the picture. Two groups — Americans Coming Together and the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now — were sanctioned recently by the Federal Election Commission for fraud.
Soros pledged $10 million to ACT, which has since been fined $775,000 for illegally funneling $70 million set aside for voter registrations to Democratic candidates.
He also gave at least $150,000 to ACORN, the left-wing group that has been accused of voter fraud in over a dozen different states since 2004 and was convicted of falsifying signatures in a voter registration drive last July, drawing a fine of $25,000 in Washington state.
Grand Moff Texan
I think it had as much to do with antisemitism on the far left . . .
Where “antisemitism” = “failure to support rightwing politics in Israel.”
Yeah, those hateful lefties (not to mention all those American Jews on the left). The nerve of those people.
.
liberal
Craig wrote,
Ultimately, what really matters—to anyone with Enlightenment values, anyway—is the truth.
While partisan reports should initially be held suspect, attacking a claim based merely on its provenance is a form of the ad hominem fallacy.
(Not even mentioning the point that it’s hardly proven that the original report is “partisan.”)
As long as we’re on this topic, IIRC polls have shown that on topics like “did Saddam Hussein have WMD?” and “was Iraq connected to the 9-11 attacks?” right-wingers are, on average, more ignorant than others.
Rick Taylor
I’m amazed this is still a point of contention. We were all there when the administration said quite clearly and repeatedly, Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, we know it, we know where the weapons of mass destruction are; we went to war on that basis. And no less than the Republican David Kay, tasked by the administration to find the weapons, said in no uncertain terms they weren’t there. The reason some of my friends supported the invasion was they reasoned the administration wouldn’t dare say what they were saying if they didn’t have conclusive proof. I imagine conservatives at the time wouldn’t have derided anyone who questioned the existence of Iraq’s WMD’s of necessarily accusing the administration of lying (perhaps someone has quotes?)
They were lying when they said they had proof Iraq had weapons of mass destruction; they were doing it because they wanted to go to war so badly. This isn’t a contentious incendiary charge, this is just what happened, as anyone who lived through it could see. And any dirty smelly hippy who lived through the Gulf of Tonkin resolution wouldn’t have been the least bit surprised.
Jay
I am not alone in how I feel and what I saw:
“I came to believe that we liberals couldn’t possibly be so intolerant and hateful, because our ideology was famous for ACLU-type commitments to free speech, dissent and, especially, tolerance for those who differed with us. Now in the closing days of the Lieberman primary campaign, I have reluctantly concluded that I was wrong.” – Lanny Davis
The Other Andrew
I don’t know whether Craig is a troll or not, but equivocation is a very real weapon for the right, whether we’re talking about politicians or Fighting Keyboarders. Once caught doing something illegal/unethical/self-serving, they say something like “The problem is that all politicians/bloggers are (insert negative quality here)!”, to attempt to distract people and spread the guilt around.
Well, no, the actual problem is that (by and large) conservatives are (insert negative quality here), and the liberals aren’t doing anything about it. If the left were just as bad, things would be much closer, ironically.
4tehlulz
That doesn’t mean shit. You telling me that the 40% of CT Jews that voted for Lamont were self-hating?
Grand Moff Texan
Two groups — Americans Coming Together and the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now — were sanctioned recently by the Federal Election Commission for fraud.
…
He also gave at least $150,000 to ACORN
Must be cutting and pasting: he cited ACORN twice as if it were two different things.
As for ACT, the FEC didn’t call it “fraud” at any point. Apparently, they didn’t use the proper percentage allocations.
.
Tsulagi
You know, I was going to read that thing, but after about 5/6 paragraphs of nothing but air in which he was masturbating himself, obviously there was no point. Didn’t care to see his climax.
But took a quick glance at the comments. Air Dittoes were in attendance. Even the comical Moe. As always a little challenged, so I’ll help him out with his comment…
Don’t know, but I’d guess Moe is a Mitty backer. Would fit.
BTW, not to make you any crankier, but you got an apostrophe at the end of your first link address messing it up. Wouldn’t want anyone like Dug Jay to miss the opportunity of a CY facial.
Fe E
I was gonna say somethin’, but John has beaten me to the punch. His is better material too.
Rick Taylor
This is still one of the things I just don’t get. Some of my friends believed the administration, because they reasoned if the administration said Saddam was a threat harboring WMDusing it as the causus belli for war, it had to be true; the alternative was virtually unthinkable. Even John Dean said in a lecture he thought Saddam must have them, because he couldn’t imagine an administration distorting what we knew to go to war to that degree, if only because the consequences for them would be so grave.
And yet there were no consequences. Bush won the election in 2004. I still don’t get that. He persuades the country to go to war by saying we know Saddam is concealing weapons of mass destruction that are a threat to us, we invade, it turns out to be completely false, and as a result we’re in an open ended occupation with no end in sight. And yet the majority of those who voted said we’d like four more years of that, please. I still don’t understand how that was possible.
Bubblegum Tate
There’s your problem. “Enlightenment values” are for godless liberal atheist bloodsuckers who hate AMerica, freedom, babies, puppies, apple pie, and freedom puppies. True conservatives–the real 28 percenters–stand against “Enlightenment values” because they distracted us from the Godly values we’re supposed to be following.
(I’m only exaggerating a little bit above. Sad, isn’t it?)
Svensker
Citing Lanny Davis in defense of a charge of anti-semitism against Lieberman’s opponents is like citing Mussolini in defense of a charge of anti-Germanism against Hitler’s opponents. Davis and Lieberman are fellow travelers in the war-hawk “liberal” movement and are both scum sucking sewer dwellers. (Other than that, they’re really nice guys…)
Tim F.
Yes, and creationism has plurality support in America. I was also there and quite involved at the time. With all due respect for Mr. Davis I both observed no antisemitism in the anti-Lieberman campaign (as a Jew I would have noticed) and a tendency by Lieberman and his supporters to label any and all criticism as bigoted attacks on his religion and/or race. The tendency was so flagrantly dishonest as to be almost Republican (see Rachel Paulouse, neocons, et cetera ad nauseum).
As I said in my first comment, Lieberman’s pathological habit of mixing criticism with race hate identifies him as a neocon just as clearly as does his foreign policy. That might help you to understand why Democratic voters lost patience with him.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
I do hate those damned goofy lookin’ French Poodles.
Jen
Posted before, sorry, but with a title like “wingnuts unhinged”, it bears repeating.
RedState called Fred a “warrior-chieftain.”
(I find it interesting that terrorists and Fred Thompson sharing the afterlife has been stipulated to.)
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
To kindly rebuff you, there are a bunch of Jews who can’t tell the difference between the State Dept. of Modern Israel and their own religion, so you’ll have to pull out a bit better credentials to hammer that point home. The Neocons have let that particular piece of credit rot in the sun.
No, that pathological habit just identifies him as pathological. No fair lumping all the race-baiters with the Neocons. Liberals get their fair share too.
Jay
I am a Jew too and I saw what Lanny Davis saw. I read it in the far left blogs. I saw it in 2004 too.
Shygetz
“I can’t believe that you bastards would dare hold my longtime close personal friend Joe Lieberman accountable for his words and actions.”–shorter Lanny Davis
Lanny Davis is a longtime friend of Lieberman. Lanny Davis wrote that piece in the closing days of the primary where Lieberman was getting his ass handed to him by Lamont. Lanny Davis was trying to play the anti-Semite card, relying on anonymous comments from various blogs to substantiate that Lieberman was losing due to anti-Semitism. Lanny Davis had a real, material reason to engage in such dishonest hackery–he was trying to swing a last minute primary victory for his friend and candidate.
What’s your excuse, Jay?
The Other Steve
Damn that George Soros for supporting American Values!
Shygetz
Hating Jews = Anti-Semitism
Hating A Jew != Anti-Semitism
Lee
What was the over/under for the first post of ‘B-B-B-But clinton!’
14 seems pretty quick.
Blue Neponset
Someone mentioned John Dean above. Here is an excerpt from an article he wrote in June 2003. link
The whole article is a good read. There has been so much water under the Iraqi War bridge that it is easy to forget how much Bush lied to us.
Blue Neponset
The link worked in the preview. Here it is again.
link
Tim F.
If you’re laying out a case for horrible leftie antisemitism and the worst that you can come up with is some unnamed blogs then you have bubkis. Any moron can start a blog. Name your blogs. You can even surprise me for once and cite something more meaningful than an obscure anonymous commenter at Daily Kos.
4tehlulz
The amusing thing about Jay is that he’ll talk about some hateful comments on blogs and ignore the avalanche of responses that, in sum, tell the anti-Semite to go fuck himself.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
The point is, it exists!
And the head
[______Insert Demon Here ______]is far away in another country! Don’t bother looking it up, nobody knows this stuff but us! And it’s an empty desert! You’ll just get lost! The only thing you can do about it is approve use of defense forces to go over there and make it stop existing!!Tony J
Yeah, but that’s the cheap thrill trolls get off on.
“I can say whatever the hell I like and when I ignore them, that just makes them madder!”
The slightly tacky cheeto-crumbs are flying all over the place right now.
Jay
What Lanny wrote came out on election day. If it was planned to be used as you say it would have come out at least a day earlier.
The antisemitism on the left is there. Denying it won’t make it go away. Most stuff isn’t as blatant as this:
“I think we need to be very suspicious of any kind of partnerships between the Jews at that kind of level because we know that their interest primarily has to do with, you know, money and these kinds of things.” -Lee Alcorn
But it is there.
Tim (the other one)
“RedState called Fred a “warrior-chieftain.” ”
I’m getting a boner !!
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
Find someone that is in an actual position of power when he makes those remarks, and we’ll give you credit. But if he gets dropped on his ass when he does that, it kind of refutes your argument.
Punchy
Rush has a new girlfriend. 31 y.o….He’s nearly 60. Yeah, THAT’LL work out. But from that link, this:
You lawyers….what the fuck does that bolded part mean? Is that a nice way of saying “divorced”?
caustics
That looked a bit spoofy to me, but I must admit the SchadenFred has been particularly tasty there.
Jay
I find it amusing to see Lanny Davis being depicted as a politic hack not to be trusted here.
Tim Kos is filled with the crap. Here a link to another group blog that is an example of it.
http://www.myleftwing.com/showDiary.do;jsessionid=D1B4E2D09A6B62670C31AACDE991F75E?diaryId=20242
4tehlulz follow the above link there is some people telling them to ‘fuck themselves’ but not as many as you think or would like.
I know how you folks here hate RedState.com and how you think all the antisemitism comes from the right, so can any of you point out the antisemitism at RedState?
Any way I need to get a lot of work done today. I’ll look back here tomorrow for your replies.
Have a good day and try not to be such haters… :)
Tim (the other one)
“I’ll look back here tomorrow for your replies.”
You just know he’s looking back here every 5 minutes or so…
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
shorter Jay: The whole thing is complicated and hard to make sense of, so why don’t we just say I’m right and give me a gold star?
Jen
As far as I know from my legal miseducation, there is no point of family law called being “legally freed”. I’m guessing it means divorced.
Doesn’t Rush have an anti-McCain thing? Maybe her dad will smack him down. I mean, if your daughter dating a 60 year old drug addict windbag weren’t enough, that is.
Tim F.
Jay, if the best you can find is commenters at a couple of blogs (diaries on a scoop site are glorified comments) then you have proved the opposite of your point. The diaries at Maryscott’s site couldn’t even win plurality support from the site members who bothered to read them and comment, and Maryscott’s is one of the most extreme leftist partisan blogs in existence.
I know that you wanted to link to antisemitism at Kos, which unlike Maryscott’s site actually matters. So why didn’t you do that? The answer couldn’t possibly have to do with the Kossacks treating antisemites like trolls. That would contradict your point that the site is “rife” with antisemitism, wouldn’t it? You’re better off making a general reference to the site and hoping that nobody calls you on your dishonest bullshit.
Jay
One more thing. If you go to most peace rally you will see stuff like this from the people on the far left.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
/sigh
shorter Jay:
The whole thing is complicated and hard to make sense ofthere are some psycho bastards who erratically claim they’re on your side, so why don’t we just say I’m right and give me a gold star?4tehlulz
Jay fails as usual. Protip: Citing someone that got banned by Kos is going to hurt your credibility.
Maryscott O’Connor is the blog version of Ward Churchill — An unknown that the media and the right pull out to smear the entire liberal blogosphere.
Tim F.
Jay, your nutpicking keeps getting less credible. No doubt you’re aware that I can cherry pick images or sound clips of supporters of whatever given cause saying some incredibly bigoted and/or moronic shit. Gen. Jerry Boykin’s tirades linking neocon foreign policy with religious domination of subhuman muslims is a particular favorite of mine. Did I just prove that every cause on Earth, including Joe Lieberman’s precious neoconservatism, is “rife” with bigoted haters? Please, Jay, you tell me.
Jen
You’re right, I can’t count the number of times I’ve seen a “Nazi Kike” sign at a peace rally. SUCH a cliche! What’s a kike again, that’s one of those slang words from my granddad’s generation — Italian, is that right? Oh, Jew, thanks Wikipedia.
Sheesh.
Zifnab
So give Jay some credit. He’s managed to point out that some people disapproved of a single post on a mildly popular blog in the corner of the blog-o-sphere. But not enough people to satisfy him. Ergo, the entire leftist movement is anti-Semitic.
Wow. Epic. As a commie-leftist-Osama-kissing-Saddam-loving-Jew, I guess I’m just a giant turd on a stick for my disdain of Old Joementum.
See, what you don’t seem to get, Jay, is that you reach the heights of ridiculousness when you start flinging out race-baiting ploys on a board inhabited by the same people you are trying to “defend”.
Perhaps next week you can head down to the NAACP and call them anti-Black. Or swing by your local YMCA and demand that they stop hating Jesus. Pound some pavement in downtown Boston, protesting Massachusetts and its longstanding intolerance of Catholics.
“OMFG! Liberals want another holocaust!” is going to get you nothing but flame bait around here. Maybe you’ll have better luck elsewhere.
Ed Drone
“28-percenter” is a shorter way of saying “some of the people all of the time.”
An acronym might be better –> SOTPAOTT doesn’t roll off the tongue, though. Maybe SOPAOT? SOPATT?
Who knows? I just like to call ’em “some of the people all of the time,” just like Lincoln did.
Works for me.
And the right calling liberals ‘anti-Semites’ when the earlier rightists (McCarthy & Co.) called us ‘communist Jewish fifth-columnists’ shows how the right has progressed. No longer anti-Semitic themselves (yeah, right!), they call the historically Jewish-backed liberal causes ‘anti-Semites.’ You can’t win with bigots, you know?
Ed
Jay
I never said that or even implied that. You would think if you had a valid point you wouldn’t have to lie.
Punchy
Mary Scott OConner got banned from DKos? When did this happen? And why? Sorry to be so out-of-the-loop.
Bruce Moomaw
On the subject of Jay’s lengthy parade of equally false statements by Democratic liberals about Saddam’s supposed ownership of WMDs, let’s keep three rather elementary (and constantly mentioned) things in mind, hm?
(1) Just about everyone DID honestly think that Saddam had chemical and biological weapons (the former, by the way, being barely more dangerous than conventional chemical explosives, although they’re certainly more efficient at exterminating whole villages full of civilians while Defense Secretary Rumsfeld looks the other way).
(2) The scandal was over the Administration’s deliberate exaggeration of the evidence that Saddam had a NUCLEAR weapons program going, which would have been infinitely more dangerous even than biological weaponry. And all those Democrats fell hook, line, and sinker for the Administration’s deliberate distortions of that, for the simple reason that (like me) they found it impossible to believe that sensible people — notably including one Colin Powell — would tell deliberate lies about something so crucial to the country’s national survival. (Of course, all of them [again like me] underestimated the absolute confidence of the Neocons that all the US would have to do was wave its Hogwarts wand and Iraq would instantly and cheaply be transformed into a peaceful pro-American democracy, which we could then use as a military base to perform the same near-bloodless, super-cheap magic on Iran and Syria — a belief which the Neocons naturally assumed would justify all their little white lies about Saddam’s supposed Bomb factory.)
(3) Note that virtually all those Democrats did think that the UN inspectors should be allowed to finish their job of, you know, INSPECTING before we invaded the place — and they were already well on their way to proving that Saddam had no significant Bomb program, and that his biological and ehcmical weapons stocks were considerably smaller than we had thought. Bush and Tony Blair (who fully shared his idiotic optimism about the powers of Neocon magic — hell, J.K. Rowling came from HIS country) got caught in that leaked tape recording (whose accuracy the British Foreign Office has never challenged) a few weeks before the invasion sweating bullets that the inspectors might NOT turn up anything that could be used as an excuse for their wonderful new Transformative War for Moslem Democracy, and Bush actually talked about trying to trump up grounds to start the invasion (while Blair remained silent and noncommittal). After all, such lies are always justified in a cause that’s sure to be just and successful, as LBJ and his cabinet would also have assured you at the time of the Gulf of Tonkin incident.
Jen
I have a very important announcement. If you were not so fortunate as me, and missed the Ron Paul blimp, please be on the lookout for this.
I have no idea how this thing turns a corner.
Face
General Petraeus says that a lot, too.
Jen
If I’m not mistaken, Petraeus actually put the kibosh on anyone saying that again. Seems like I heard that, and that should be all the documentation I need.
If the interactive Friedman Unit timeline posted this morning (very, very good), had included a supplemental “corner-turning” interactive model, we could maybe see exactly how many 360 degree rotations have been completed to date.
jvill
In the president’s defense, no one told him Iraq was a whole country. He just thought we were gonna bomb those loud, Jew neighbors of his up in Kennebunk. The bastards went to Harvard.
caustics
Said by a guy who copied and pasted a bunch of stuff from Right Wing News then called it a day. Oh wait….
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
True. But he exaggerated instead.
Didn’t you say you were leaving and planning to come back tomorrow? By all means, don’t wait up for us.
Darkness
Shorter Jay: “Bu-bu-but if you don’t love Lieberman even though he politically backstabs his old party at every chance he gets, then you’re a Jew hater.”
Oh come on. Lieberman makes a special point of making a show out of railroading his friends. He’s a piece of work, all right, but he could be a Martian for all I care. But if he were and and his supporters started going around whining all the time that everyone hates him because he’s a Martian who loves the Martian colonies above all else even though he lives on Earth, I’ll tell you that many will get pretty damn sick of hearing it and that could MAKE it true, funny enough.
What he is is a loser who’s gone back on every campaign promise he made to get re-elected. Which is utter disrespect for his constituency. He got wealthy FROM his position, rather than working for a living like his previous opponent, and the only reason he ran as an independent was the screw his district for one more round for his own sake because his ego couldn’t take it. The man doesn’t give a crap about anyone but himself and he stays in the spotlight turning the screw on everyone he thinks did him wrong.
Who’d he endorse for president again? I rest my case.
Rick Taylor
Thanks, Blue Neponset, I was looking for that link.
And yet he was re-elected. I guess things have changed since Johnson was President.
Ray Robison
A new book shows Saddam did support al Qaeda and the Taliban:
‘Both In One Trench: Saddam’s Secret Terror Documents’
http://www.bothinonetrench.com
Justin
Guys, before getting into pointless and beside the point discussions about how everyone agreed upon mistaken beliefs back then, read the report.
The report juxtaposes public statements made by Bush Administration officials at the time with what the intelligence agencies published at the time.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
Let’s pick up on just one point from this blowhard:
Oh really?
“DAVID FROST: The French Foreign Secretary, Dominique De Villepin, won unprecedented applause at the United Nations last month for an impassioned speech against war on Iraq, or immediate war on Iraq.
France is convinced it speaks for the majority of the international community, certainly for the individuals in it if not all the governments. But how far will it go in defiance of the United States? ”
And the money shot from that speech:
“So let us allow the United Nations inspectors the time they need for their mission to succeed. But let us together be vigilant and ask Mr. Blix and Mr. ElBaradei to report regularly to the Council. France, for its part, proposes another meeting on March 14 at ministerial level to assess the situation. We will then be able to judge the progress that has been made and what remains to be done.
Given this context, the use of force is not justified at this time.”
Chuck Butcher
How about this one, Jay, I don’t give a rat’s ass about Jews, one way or the other. Israel is pretty close to as much to blame for its problems as the Palestinians. Joe Lieberman is a piece of crap as a Democrat. You, Jay, are an asshole, being a Jew is beside the point. Assholes come in a lot of stripes and Jews are not exempt. Watching the Israeli lobby run politics in this country is offensive, and I really don’t care that they are Jewish, they are a foreign government with their own agenda and it is not our security that is their agenda and it should be our’s.
If there is something really interesting about the BushCo lies study, it might have to do with whether there are spikes and when those spikes occurred. (yes and you can guess when) As for Soros, is the information verifiable? If so, what’s the bitch? That it was published? Cry me a river liars. As for EVERYBODY buying into the BushCo lies, I created a lot of trouble for myself by not buying in…
D-Chance.
But you’re willing to buy the study anyway? A couple of minutes on Google and you could have gone to the two groups’ websites. No, don’t see “Soros” anywhere, but there are full lists of the founder, board, and contributors to the groups. All you have to do is a bit of research or, in some cases, simple name recognition to realize that the so-called study is hardly “non-partisan”.
Basically, you bought into a propaganda machine slam piece. We know you were a blind and gullible Republican… looks like you became a Democrat, but still remain blind and gullible.
Aaron
dug Jay refers to the report as: “quotes taken mostly out of context and misrepresented”
Out of context?? Out of context???
Could you explain what the correct context was of this statement: national radio address on September 28, 2002, President Bush flatly asserted: “The Iraqi regime possesses biological and chemical weapons, is rebuilding the facilities to make more and, according to the British government, could launch a biological or chemical attack in as little as 45 minutes after the order is given. The regime has long-standing and continuing ties to terrorist groups, and there are al Qaeda terrorists inside Iraq. This regime is seeking a nuclear bomb, and with fissile material could build one within a year.”
Neo
Funny how they missed this one …
Clinton to Saddam: You cannot defy the will of the world