So says Senator Pat Roberts of Kansas, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Spin this............

"..... in an hourlong interview on Wednesday morning in his office, Mr. Roberts said he was "not too sure" that the administration would have invaded if it had known how flimsy the intelligence was on Iraq and illicit weapons. Instead, the senator said, Mr. Bush might well have advocated efforts to maintain sanctions against Iraq and to continue to try to unearth the truth through the work of United Nations inspectors. "I don't think the president would have said that military action is justified right now," Mr. Roberts said. If the administration had been given "accurate intelligence," he said, Mr. Bush "might have said, 'Saddam's a bad guy, and we've got to continue with the no-fly zones and with inspections.' "

<a href='http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/15/politics/15inte.html?ei=5006&en=10673daba09bff35&ex=1090555200&partner=ALTAVISTA1&pagewanted=print&position=' target='_blank'>NY Times</a>

Trooper Wrote:So says Senator Pat Roberts of Kansas,&nbsp; the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Spin this............

"..... in an hourlong interview on Wednesday morning in his office, Mr. Roberts said he was "not too sure" that the administration would have invaded if it had known how flimsy the intelligence was on Iraq and illicit weapons. Instead, the senator said, Mr. Bush might well have advocated efforts to maintain sanctions against Iraq and to continue to try to unearth the truth through the work of United Nations inspectors. "I don't think the president would have said that military action is justified right now," Mr. Roberts said. If the administration had been given "accurate intelligence," he said, Mr. Bush "might have said, 'Saddam's a bad guy, and we've got to continue with the no-fly zones and with inspections.' "

<a href='http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/15/politics/15inte.html?ei=5006&en=10673daba09bff35&ex=1090555200&partner=ALTAVISTA1&pagewanted=print&position=' target='_blank'>NY Times</a>

No spin necessary.

Maybe I'm just reading it wrong, but to me that says that Bush wasn't a war-hungry cowboy who wanted to blow something up just for the hell of it.

Sorta contradicts the wackos...

Lethemeul Wrote:

Trooper Wrote:So says Senator Pat Roberts of Kansas,  the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Spin this............

"..... in an hourlong interview on Wednesday morning in his office, Mr. Roberts said he was "not too sure" that the administration would have invaded if it had known how flimsy the intelligence was on Iraq and illicit weapons. Instead, the senator said, Mr. Bush might well have advocated efforts to maintain sanctions against Iraq and to continue to try to unearth the truth through the work of United Nations inspectors. "I don't think the president would have said that military action is justified right now," Mr. Roberts said. If the administration had been given "accurate intelligence," he said, Mr. Bush "might have said, 'Saddam's a bad guy, and we've got to continue with the no-fly zones and with inspections.' "

<a href='http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/15/politics/15inte.html?ei=5006&en=10673daba09bff35&ex=1090555200&partner=ALTAVISTA1&pagewanted=print&position=' target='_blank'>NY Times</a>

No spin necessary.

Maybe I'm just reading it wrong, but to me that says that Bush wasn't a war-hungry cowboy who wanted to blow something up just for the hell of it.

Sorta contradicts the wackos...

Yeah, that's what I was thinking too. All that it says is that Bush was given weak intelligence in which he wasn't aware of its weaknesses. No need to spin. He did what a clear minded person with their country's best interests in mind would do. I did notice that the article had a NY Times tag to it too.

Touchdown Rrrrrooockets! Wrote:Yeah, that's what I was thinking too.&nbsp; All that it says is that Bush was given weak intelligence in which he wasn't aware of its weaknesses.&nbsp; No need to spin.&nbsp; He did what a clear minded person with their country's best interests in mind would do.&nbsp; I did notice that the article had a NY Times tag to it too.

George W. Bush created the whole issue of Iraq in his head, with the help of those crazy people he keeps around him.

I firmly believe that.

I also firmly believe our intelligence services were filtering their intelligence in a way that gave George W. Bush and the crazy people around him exactly what they wanted to hear. They were looking for evidence that Iraq Needed To Be Invaded, and "intelligence" services gave them what they wanted to hear. Contrary evidence, ambigious evidence -- and it was out there -- just wasn't emphasized.

Finally, I believe that even if everything Bush claimed was true about Iraq was true, that it was still wrong to invade.

Iraq never attacked us. Iraq never threatened to attack us. We had no evidence that Iraq was secretly planning to do so. We had no evidence that they were secretly planning to do so through intermediaries.

Also, much of the evidence that supposedly suggested ties to al Qaeda or an intent to build WMDs was just way too ambiguious. I'm a thirtysomething with absolutely no foreign policy experience and no personal friends in Washington, and even I could see the ambiguity of it all sitting right here in Columbus, Ohio.

But, look, if Roberts is right and it was a mistake to invade -- then why doesn't Bush just come out and admit it?

Because he's a ****ing idiot who has never had a firm grip on reality. That's why. He appears to truly believe what he is saying, that this war was still the Right Thing To Do.

We need to get rid of this guy. America is less safe as long as he is president.

So let me get this straight...

1. Bush has crazy idea about Iraq (not that Iraq ever earned what people thought about them) They were just a peace-loving nation that got caught up in some crazy circumstances :rolleyes:
2. Bad intelligence overstated Iraq's capabilities (a fact that Iraq was apparently unwilling to clarify in that they continued to railroad inspection efforts that IRAQ agreed to...UN resolutions mind you that everyone seems to want to ignore).
3. Bush acted on bad intelligence coupled with Iraq's unwillingness to cooperate as they had agreed to but is a moron because he reached that conclusion...makes sense to me :rolleyes:

What I find amusing is folks who are saying that we should allow the UN to monitor and certify our election are mostly the same folks who apparently don't believe that anyone should have enforced those UN resolutions and agreements (i.e. you should just wait until countries comply on their own or they invade a neighbor or someone else with the weapons they agreed not to have, whichever comes first). Whatever fits, I guess.

jjburtzel Wrote:What I find amusing is folks who are saying that we should allow the UN to monitor and certify our election are mostly the same folks who apparently don't believe that anyone should have enforced those UN resolutions and agreements (i.e. you should just wait until countries comply on their own or they invade a neighbor or someone else with the weapons they agreed not to have, whichever comes first). Whatever fits, I guess.

:eek: :eek: :eek: :eek: :eek:

No truer words could be said about the UN/Elections situation.

Is it not up to the U.N. to enforce U.N. resolutions?

Trooper Wrote:Is it not up to the U.N. to enforce U.N. resolutions?

It's certainly not up to us to decide which resolutions to enforce and when we want to do it.

It most certainly is our responsibility, especially when you come to understand the simple fact that without the United States and its military, the U.N. is nothing more than a think tank with no capability of execution.

Looking at British intelligence (which they've never backed down from) and the Senate Intelligence report, we know now for a fact that Hussein was trying to negotiate yellowcake from Niger - so much for Democrat Hero and Kerry campaign adviser Joe Wilson (notice how all these media outlets so eager to jump on Iraq as a "mistake" now conveniently ignore the fact that one of their primary sources of information is a flat out liar).

We also know Zarqawi was in Iraq PRIOR TO the Iraq invasion.

We know that Iraq envoys had contact with Al Qaida operatives during the 90s (and for those of you who wish to espouse the "Hussein and Bin Laden hated each other ergo they wouldn't have worked together" tripe, please explain Mussolini-Hitler and the USA-Soviet alliances during WWII).

We know Hussein, for some inexplicable reason if you buy the "no WMD" theory, refused to cooperate with the UN inspections - in essence, if you believe Saddam had no WMD, you also believe that he sabotaged his own regime for absolutely no reason.

We also know that the members of the Senate Intelligence Committee were all folks that had access to the SAME INTELLIGENCE that George Bush had, and guys like Rockefeller parrotted the Administration position, or better yet gave PRO-INVASION speeches before the President did. Now those same people try to distance themselves from the decisions they made by pointing fingers at Bush.

In the meantime, the Administration correctly stands by their positions rather than tuck tail and run for political purposes. What would the moral of our military personnel be like if the Commander-In-Chief told them the invasion and occupation was a mistake?

It WASN'T a mistake. George W. Bush made a decisive play that he felt would make us safer in the long run, politics be damned. He's made the decisions that others would shy away from. And for those of you supporting Kerry, who has now decided to flop his war position for political purposes, I'd make this simple statement: If he's not willing to make the tough choices and see them through regardless of setbacks and the volatility of public sentiment, then he has no business holding the position of Commander in Chief. Period.

Trooper Wrote:Is it not up to the U.N. to enforce U.N. resolutions?

You're not getting it. He's saying that the UN doesn't have the capacity to enforce it's own resolutions, what makes them qualified to monitor the free-est country on Earth's elections? Hell, MANY of the countries IN the UN are some of the worst human right's violators on Earth. We chastise them, the UN promotes them. The UN is worthless. You've heard the old saying, "clean up your own front porch before you start criticizing someone else's". The problem in Florida is indicative of what the Democratic party is all about these days......things don't go your way, blame someone else.

Thanks for the backup RebelKev...that's exactly what I'm saying. Democrats get into this circular discussion about the UN...dems/libs want us to allow the UN to sanction our elections yet everyone is upset over the fact that essentially we invaded Iraq based on UN resolutions (though dems/libs never bring that up) and information presented by the CIA. If the UN didn't really want to hold Iraq to the post-Desert Storm UN resolutions, then why even bother putting the words on paper? And if you don't believe that the resolution to allow inspections meant anything and didn't warrent any enforcement, then why should I believe any election certified by that body?

And oh...why would we enforce UN resolutions? Because who has to cleanup the mess if they don't enforce their UN resolutions? The same folks who are in Iraq right now.

And let me add that I am not a big believer in the UN for many reasons (including those pointed out by RebelKev and BearcatCarl), however, those who do believe in it seem to want to ignore that the US was enforcing a UN resolution and, ironically, hate us for it. It just goes to show you, regardless of what we do we will almost certainly be the most hated country in the world. If we had left it alone and Iraq started feeling frisky again and invading neighbors everyone would have said, "Why didn't the US take a stronger stance against Iraq? They should have removed Hussein during Desert Storm...this is all their fault...blah, blah, blah."

Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

jj and rebel...it never ceases to amaze me how Dems scream for a "true international coalition" - meaning France and Germany- while failing to realize that the government of France has NEVER been our friend.

Even more amazing that libs would want the friendship of a French Govt. that has always favored lining their own pockets over humanitarian efforts...see the Sudan for current events. How many times has France turned their backs on ethnic cleansing and mass murder simply because they were doing under the table business with the government of that country?

I can think of 2 in the past 2 years alone.

Wake up, people.

BearcatCarl Wrote:How many times has France turned their backs on ethnic cleansing and mass murder simply because they were doing under the table business with the government of that country?&nbsp;

I can think of 2 in the past 2 years alone.

Wake up, people.

Sudan is exactly the kind of tragedy that the international community needs to come up with a much improved model to deal with. But they're poor, so it's hard to get our attention. Nigeria, with all that oil, grabs U.S. attention much more easily. Meanwhile, news comes out this week that the growing safe havens of choice for Islamist radicals are in Africa. No doubt our own neglect plays a role in that. If we were a little more principaled and not so driven by our immediate capitalist interests, maybe we could stop being our own worst enemy.

As for France's failures that you cite, they really aren't much different than U.S. positions towards the current government in Pakistan, Saddam when he was going up against Iran, or much of the rest of our Mideast policy.

You may be right, Socko, but there's a danger in spreading ourselves too thin if we try to deal with everything at once. I'd almost think it's better to concentrate on one area at a time, and hope to get some residual effect from it. I'm not saying Iraq was the best priority target, but we've had the residual effect of Libya dismantling their arsenal after they saw Iraq laid to waste.

Afghanistan was our 1st operation, and I realize we're still there doing work (very effective work, I might add) but if we were to throw Iran, the Saudis, Africa, and every other Jacka$$ area doing dirty work in there, we'd be way too thin.

From that standpoint, I certainly understand that military might alone isn't going to get it done, but I can't believe we wouldn't give Iran some serious pause if we threatened an Iraq like military move that way. Besides, Kerry's idea of building internation coalitions sounds like appeasement to me.

I think if Kerry gets elected, terrorists will breathe a huge sigh of relief knowing the U.N. will be at the fore once again.

Always room for disagreement, though, and you make good points. No easy solutions, that's for sure.

Schadenfreude Wrote:

Touchdown Rrrrrooockets! Wrote:Yeah, that's what I was thinking too.  All that it says is that Bush was given weak intelligence in which he wasn't aware of its weaknesses.  No need to spin.  He did what a clear minded person with their country's best interests in mind would do.  I did notice that the article had a NY Times tag to it too.

George W. Bush created the whole issue of Iraq in his head, with the help of those crazy people he keeps around him.

I firmly believe that.

I also firmly believe our intelligence services were filtering their intelligence in a way that gave George W. Bush and the crazy people around him exactly what they wanted to hear. They were looking for evidence that Iraq Needed To Be Invaded, and "intelligence" services gave them what they wanted to hear. Contrary evidence, ambigious evidence -- and it was out there -- just wasn't emphasized.

Finally, I believe that even if everything Bush claimed was true about Iraq was true, that it was still wrong to invade.

Iraq never attacked us. Iraq never threatened to attack us. We had no evidence that Iraq was secretly planning to do so. We had no evidence that they were secretly planning to do so through intermediaries.

Also, much of the evidence that supposedly suggested ties to al Qaeda or an intent to build WMDs was just way too ambiguious. I'm a thirtysomething with absolutely no foreign policy experience and no personal friends in Washington, and even I could see the ambiguity of it all sitting right here in Columbus, Ohio.

But, look, if Roberts is right and it was a mistake to invade -- then why doesn't Bush just come out and admit it?

Because he's a ****ing idiot who has never had a firm grip on reality. That's why. He appears to truly believe what he is saying, that this war was still the Right Thing To Do.

We need to get rid of this guy. America is less safe as long as he is president.

:roflol: :roflol: :roflol:

The black helicopters never stop!!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!! :eek:

Actually, I think there quite a bit of validity to Schad's post. Although I doubt any president, D or R, would open up and admit that an invasion and occuption was all an "oops". Especially a sitting president during an election year, not to mention troops' morale in mind.

Bush probably knows that if Iraq never happened, he'd be sitting comfortably with a 10-15 percentage point lead over Kerry in the polls right now, instead of the current neck-and-neck (and if the budget were still nearly balanced, it'd basically be over already). It would seem that this notion alone would give him second thoughts about the whole adventure.

BearcatCarl Wrote:You may be right, Socko, but there's a danger in spreading ourselves too thin if we try to deal with everything at once. I'd almost think it's better to concentrate on one area at a time, and hope to get some residual effect from it. I'm not saying Iraq was the best priority target, but we've had the residual effect of Libya dismantling their arsenal after they saw Iraq laid to waste.

Afghanistan was our 1st operation, and I realize we're still there doing work (very effective work, I might add) but if we were to throw Iran, the Saudis, Africa, and every other Jacka$$ area doing dirty work in there, we'd be way too thin.

From that standpoint, I certainly understand that military might alone isn't going to get it done, but I can't believe we wouldn't give Iran some serious pause if we threatened an Iraq like military move that way. Besides, Kerry's idea of building internation coalitions sounds like appeasement to me.

I think if Kerry gets elected, terrorists will breathe a huge sigh of relief knowing the U.N. will be at the fore once again.

Always room for disagreement, though, and you make good points. No easy solutions, that's for sure.

We did something the USSR, AKA Russia, couldn't do......we invaded Afghanistan in the hopes of doing what we wanted. What's the difference? We came with a message of peace, which is what we wanted. Right now, they have their own government, free of torture, murder, etc. They are independent and have their own government that actually CARES about the people. It IS a good thing. Of course, you guys just watch. SOME Liberal will come on here saying it's a bad thing to FREE people from a regime like that....like Iraq, masked with Bush did it for oil from one of those other 'Stans. Funny, people can talk all the shiznit they want in this country; they live in freedom. I want, just for once, some of the liberals in this country to visit a totalitarian state. Let's see how they like it. It's ALWAYS easy to spout idiotic beliefs behind the comfort that the US Military has provided.....which they ALSO talk shiznit about.

Actually, Rebel, quite a few libs (Michael Moore, Rob Reiner, Jack Nicholson, and the ilk) visit Cuba quite a bit...normally Castro wines and dines them in "Potemkin" Villages - which suits these guys fine, since they're used to being on movie sets. He shows them his "wonderful" film program, and sells them on the notion of great health care and education. Remember, Moore is the guy who said (paraphrasing)"all Elian Gonzalez has to worry about in Cuba is a world class education and free health care". (sorry my web link not working for some reason) <a href='http://www.cubasolidarity.net/mmoore.html' target='_blank'>http://www.cubasolidarity.net/mmoore.html</a>


I'm not sure if even the most ardent liberals that use this forum would buy into Moore/Castro's rubbish concerning their educational and health care systems...but if anyone wishes a debate on this, I'm more than willing. It doesn't take much time in research to obliterate Moore's ridiculous assertions, or at very least add the part of Cuba's educational and health care "successes" that Moore so conveniently leaves out.

I will include this one little juicy tidbit, though: During the U.S. occupation of Cuba (around the turn of last century), the Cuban literacy rate went from nearly 0 to 71% within 30 years.

But libs continually look to Cuba as the bellwether example that their ideas (and ideals) can succeed. I say remember the wisdom of Ross Perot and apply it here: Taking Cuba and comparing it to the United States is like taking the way mom and pop do business at their little store and extrapolating that into running Wal Mart.

Sorry, did I go off on a tangent there? What were we talking about????

I often wonder why Michael Moore and his ilk don't sidestep the US and just move to Canada (or Cuba, if totalitarianism is really their fetish*). Now, I know the knee-jerk reaction to this will be that I'm engaging in "love it or leave it" jingoism. But what's so ridiculous about this question? If you hate snow with a passion and live in Buffalo, would the suggestion of moving a few states to the south be sane and reasonable?

First, I'd do the same thing if the situations were reversed and I looked at Canada's governing model in a much more favorable view than the U.S. model. Of course, I only live 20 minutes from Canada, so moving to Windsor, or going the extra few hours to Toronto, would be an attractive option since everyone I know would still be so close. This workers paradise wouldn't be too radical of a move for those living in the Pacific Northwest, the big Rustbelt cities, and New England (all areas with a comparatively high amount of people who prefer more federal statism than what is normally offered in the U.S.). I'll even give credit to Johnny Depp who left the U.S. to go live in France**. He walked the walk.

If Moore is this aggravated by American-style capitalism, wouldn't it make sense to simply take residence in a country more suitable to his wants? My advice to Moore would be to sell his million-dollar lakehome in Michigan and his million-dollar apartment in Manhattan, and look north of the border. In fact, he could buy a modest $125,000 home in Ottawa and give the rest of his loot to charity and the poor (Ha. Like he'd ever do that).

Free (sic) health care, more lavish social programs, Supersized taxes, stricter gun control, anti-Iraq War... what more could he possibly want? It's only a stone's throw away from where he lives now, and they speak English to boot. Easy as pie.


* - I think the reason Hollywood elites 'admire' Castro is that he shares the same unquenching hunger for power/control as many in the movie studios do. They may not torture dissidents, but Hollywood actors are obsessed with being on top, their name in the spotlight, placed on a pedestal, and worshipped by millions. As does Castro.

** - Although I'm betting the reason Depp moved to France was not so much to leave the awful free-market America, but to live with his hot French actress girlfriend, who didn't want to leave France. Depp currently lives in a multi-million dollar home in the south of France near Nice.