What Democrats Had To Say About Iraq, Short attention spans are convenient...

[HondaMan]

[from the Glenn Beck website - sources listed there]

"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line."
- President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998

"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program."
- President Bill Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998

"We must stop Saddam from ever again jeopardizing the stability and security of his neighbors with weapons of mass destruction."
- Madeline Albright, Feb 1, 1998

"He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983."
- Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb, 18, 1998

"[W]e urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs."
- (D) Senators Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, John Kerry, others, Oct. 9, 1998 (letter to President Clinton)

"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process."
- Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998

"Hussein has ... chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies."
- Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999

"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 mandate of the United Nations and is building weapons of mass destruction and th! e means of delivering them."
- Sen. Carl Levin (D, MI), Sept. 19, 2002

"We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country."
- Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002

"Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power."
- Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002

"We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction."
- Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002

"The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains 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 capabilities. Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons..."
- Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 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."
- Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9, 2002

"There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years ... We also should remember we have always underestimated the progress Saddam has made in development of weapons of mass destruction."
- Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D, WV), Oct 10, 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 ... 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."
- Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), Oct 10, 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."
- Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), Dec. 8, 2002

"Without question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime ... He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation ... And now he is miscalculating America's response to his continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction ... So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real..."
- Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Jan. 23. 2003

[larchmont]

Again, IMO none of that is highly relevant. A little relevant, but not highly.

When you're in the driver seat, you're the one who's responsible for maneuvering the car right. Not the passengers, and not the person who might have driven the car yesterday or 6 years ago. What they might have said about driving the car 6 years ago is one thing, and how they drove the car 6 years ago is important. But none of that has much to do with how other drivers drove the car later on, or how the current driver is doing.

The only thing that's highly relevant is, HOW EACH DRIVER DRIVES THE CAR.

And Bush drove the car lousy. He didn't watch out for what he should have watched out for, the things he looked at were things that weren't reliable -- and yes, it's the driver's job to know what to watch for, isn't it? Just because you have a guy in the back seat saying, "Hey, there's a boogeyman behind us going 100 mph," that's not a reason for the driver to start recklessly going 120, is it? He has to know the reliability of the source and he has to use his own correct judgment.

Larchmont, who likes this analogy quite a bit. :D

[pocketkiller]

Did you vote for Hilary Clinton larch?

[larchmont]

Did you vote for Hilary Clinton larch?
Of course I voted for Hillary. Why do you ask?

[HondaMan]

Of course I voted for Hillary. Why do you ask?

LOL, that explains a lot! :rotz:

[larchmont]

LOL, that explains a lot! :rotz:
Like what? :D

Larchmont, who finds "Like what?" to be one of the most useful phrases in the English language.
(That, and "Huh huh.")

[Ferg]

I don't really see the point in all those quotes, to be honest. Congress voted overwhelmingly to give the President authority to go into Iraq -- Repubs and Dems. Many people thought they had WMD's, based on what could be considered one of the worst intelligence debacles the world has ever known.

The problem was, Iraq really did not have any WMD's, and had no way of delivering any potential WMD's as the intelligence said they did.

Many high ranking officials (Generals, Colonels, etc) said that going into Iraq would be a bad idea because we do not have a military designed to occupy a country. Turns out they were correct. Oh, and BTW one of those people who disagreed with the invasion was Colin Powell, until he got slapped around by the administration and told to step in line.

If anyone really believes that the United States is safer now that we have invaded and occupied a middle-Eastern country, then I have a few bridges to sell to you.

[pocketkiller]

The problem was, Iraq really did not have any WMD's, and had no way of delivering any potential WMD's as the intelligence said they did.

Wow so you disagree with Kerry?

[pocketkiller]

Of course I voted for Hillary. Why do you ask?

so I can laugh my ass off
hahahaha larch wants a "girlie-man" for his president

[Ferg]

The problem was, Iraq really did not have any WMD's, and had no way of delivering any potential WMD's as the intelligence said they did.

Wow so you disagree with Kerry?

That isn't abundantly clear?

It would be hard to agree with something someone said in the past that has since been proven to be false, regardless of their qualifications or stature at the time.

[pocketkiller]

That isn't abundantly clear?

It would be hard to agree with something someone said in the past that has since been proven to be false, regardless of their qualifications or stature at the time.

Then please tell me how it was proven to be false? Perhaps you should share this inside information.

[HondaMan]

I don't really see the point in all those quotes, to be honest. Congress voted overwhelmingly to give the President authority to go into Iraq -- Repubs and Dems. Many people thought they had WMD's, based on what could be considered one of the worst intelligence debacles the world has ever known.

The problem was, Iraq really did not have any WMD's, and had no way of delivering any potential WMD's as the intelligence said they did.

Many high ranking officials (Generals, Colonels, etc) said that going into Iraq would be a bad idea because we do not have a military designed to occupy a country. Turns out they were correct. Oh, and BTW one of those people who disagreed with the invasion was Colin Powell, until he got slapped around by the administration and told to step in line.

If anyone really believes that the United States is safer now that we have invaded and occupied a middle-Eastern country, then I have a few bridges to sell to you.

http://www.protestwarrior.com/nimages/signs/pw_sign_26.gif

[Ferg]

Then please tell me how it was proven to be false? Perhaps you should share this inside information.

It's not exactly inside information, although I do appreciate that you think I'm either a) lying or b) making this all up. It was all over the news in the last couple weeks.

Please refer to the following thread started by Joker, and the link he included to a BBC article. Do a search -- it was pretty big news.

Joker's thread (http://www.tsxclub.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2489)

I'm betting this report is more accurate than the fools jumping up and down screaming "Yes they did!! Yes they did!!" without a shred of proof.

Ferg

[pocketkiller]

That says nothing about not having WMD. You call that proof?

[larchmont]

That says nothing about not having WMD. You call that proof?
WRONG QUESTION!

BTW that's a time-honored rhetorical technique, used everywhere from courtrooms to political forums to spousal disputes to everything else too.

When all else fails, try to ask the wrong question.


So, lemme get this straight. If you want to kick a country's ass for having WMD's, at the expense of billions of dollars and hundreds or thousands of our people's lives, not to mention many thousands of THEIR people's lives (in case you care about that), it's enough for you that we CAN'T prove that they DON'T have them?????? :donno:

[Ferg]

That says nothing about not having WMD. You call that proof?


Most of the key judgements about Iraq's WMD programmes "were either overstated or were not supported by the raw intelligence reporting," said the committee's chairman, Republican Senator Pat Roberts.

What else do you want? Here is a Republican Senator saying, in effect, we were dead wrong. I'm not sure how else to say this...maybe I need to use hand puppets.

Why do people so stubbornly refuse to admit the facts as they stare them in the face?

If Dubya had any balls at all -- and I'm not convinced the pair he has aren't borrowed from Cheney or Rummy -- he would simply stand up and say something like "Look, our intelligence failed us, and we made decisions that we thought were right at the time, but our assumptions were wrong. Nonetheless, we removed a brutal dictator, and we intend to get out of Iraq in X months."

[larchmont]

I agree totally with Ferg's post -- in the sense that what he is saying is what's significant on the subject.

But it doesn't address PK's question about "proving" that they didn't have WMD's.
In this extremely limited sense, PK is right. We haven't proved it.

Trouble is, such a thing can NEVER be proved. Not anywhere, not for any country.
If PK (or anybody) disagrees, please tell us, even theoretically, how such a thing could ever be proved.
It couldn't be.

But the main thing wrong with insisting we haven't "proved" it is that it implies you believe we should invade countries that we think have WMD's, just because we haven't proved that they don't.

Which would be a very strange standard.

[Ferg]

Larch, you're right -- in this case, it's impossible to "prove the negative". A simple litmus test here would be to simply reverse the situation. Instead of trying to do the impossible -- prove that they didn't have WMD's -- just do the opposite....prove that they did.

As Lewis Black said, "all I needed was picture of a nuke strapped to the back of a camel." :D

However.....all of this, in my opinion, is just window dressing detracting your attention from the fact there's a giant hole in the glass pane. The issue of WMD's was a conveniently galvanizing topic that resonated with people after 9/11, and something that all the sheeple could agree on (in fact, Rumsfeld has said almost those exact words, but it seems that Democrats are not the only ones with short attention spans). Larch and Bob like to talk about "the calculus" of a situation. How about the government's calculus that they used to sell this war to 80% of the country:

WMD's = bad. Hussein = bad. Therefore, WMD's = Hussein.

I maintain that WMD's were not even the real reason why we went into Iraq to begin with. So, to the administration, it's only slightly inconvenient that none were found. I mean, it's not like we can just get up and leave Iraq simply because we haven't found anything.

[pocketkiller]

once again larch swings and misses the point.
I only asked the question because Ferg stated that there were no WMD. Of course no one can be sure either way, except the 5,000 dead Kurds who were gased to death. HMMM where did THOSE WMD go? Wait a minute, he just used it all up on those Kurds right?

[larchmont]

once again larch swings and misses the point.....
Fortunately PK is not a professional umpire. :D

[Ferg]

That's almost ancient history in terms of chemical weapons. They have a constrained shelf life. Chemical weapons that were good 30 years ago would be next to worthless today. Of course he had chemical weapons then. Hell, we probably sold them to him. That argument bears very little relevance on our course of action today.

The point is...did he have enough WMD's in March of 2003 to justify the billions of dollars spent and the nine hundred soldiers lost ?? Even our own people are saying that we greatly overestimated what they had.

[party chicken]

As in the eye of an foreigner, I think the best thing about american politics is there are ALWAYS someone try to speak out the truth loud. It is hard to politically justify an invasion just because that SOME people FEEL that there MIGHT be a POSSIBILITY that Iraq WOULD be able to have the ABILITY to produce WMD and COULD use it against others. It is great that many americans will argue the reason although it is economically justified.

More knowledge should not bring less sense. :jester:

[pocketkiller]

Then why were there 17 UN resolutions passed telling saddam to disarm? Disarm what exactly?

[larchmont]

If you could give the dates of those resolutions, we can start looking at how relevant this is.

[pocketkiller]

Would you like the resolution number too larch? I'm not gonna try to convince you. Its like a sane man trying to reason with insanity.

[larchmont]

Would you like the resolution number too larch? I'm not gonna try to convince you. Its like a sane man trying to reason with insanity.
Well, unlike you, I'm not going to get personal.

(I think I just did.) :D

Let's see if I can make this simple.
Even simple enough for.....(oops, I said I wasn't gonna do that). :nono:

Most if not all of those resolutions were a long time ago.
The war wouldn't have been justified on the basis of what was believed to be true "a long time ago," but on what was contemporaneous (good word).

So, in order to see whether those resolutions are relevant to the invasion, we have to look at whether they had anything to do with the recent period.

Then there would also be additional things to look at, such as whether they contained findings that were sufficient to justify an invasion.

Larchmont, who is completely secure that none of this is insane.

[HondaMan]

Larchmont, who is completely secure that none of this is insane.

LOL, so you do recognize it is insane. Maybe you should run the UN and get their resolutions in order? :donno:

[party chicken]

LOL, so you do recognize it is insane. Maybe you should run the UN and get their resolutions in order? :donno:

sorry... so I was wrong. There was proof that Iraq has WMD. Everybody agrees and UN issue the resolution... bbbbb5 (who cares if there is a real proof...)

It is a happy ending for the whole arguement. Anyway, I am not happy to see the gas price reach $2 level, although atlanta has the lowest gas price in the whole country. :p

[larchmont]

LOL, so you do recognize it is insane.....
:donno: :donno: :donno: :donno:

:donno: Hey, HondaMan, go back and re-read the sentence! :donno:

[HondaMan]

sorry... so I was wrong. There was proof that Iraq has WMD. Everybody agrees and UN issue the resolution... bbbbb5 (who cares if there is a real proof...)

It is a happy ending for the whole arguement. Anyway, I am not happy to see the gas price reach $2 level, although atlanta has the lowest gas price in the whole country. :p

Yeah, cheap gas here is nice...I'm glad I don't live on the west coast anymore. :)

It sucks supply and demand for oil is driving the price up...darn Chinese & OPEC! ;) hehe

[larchmont]

......When you're in the driver seat, you're the one who's responsible for maneuvering the car right.....
And Bush drove the car lousy. He didn't watch out for what he should have watched out for, the things he looked at were things that weren't reliable -- and yes, it's the driver's job to know what to watch for, isn't it? Just because you have a guy in the back seat saying, "Hey, there's a boogeyman behind us going 100 mph," that's not a reason for the driver to start recklessly going 120, is it? He has to know the reliability of the source and he has to use his own correct judgment.

Larchmont, who likes this analogy quite a bit. :D
Reluctant though I am to quote myself...... :D

Yesterday, the guy who was our head arms inspector in Iraq, David Kay, testified to Congress and said this:

"Every president who has been successful, at least that I know of, in the history of this republic, has developed both informal and formal means of getting checks on whether people who tell him things are in fact telling him the whole truth."


Which sounds like basically the same thing.


When you're driving, you want to listen to the warnings that other people might give you -- but you're the one who's ultimately responsible, right?
And you take it upon yourself to make the right decisions, right?
It's so obvious that we hardly ever think about it.
If you make a dumb move, it's no excuse that somebody in the back seat yelled "Fire!"

It's beyond me that not everybody holds the President of the U.S. to the same standard.

But I sure as hell do.