Why Not Build the Fence?

[EdwardBaiamonte]

why did we go to war with Iraq?

Because all the world's intelligence services said he had WMDs. It figures you didn't know that. It was in all the papers.

 

[Windship]

why did we go to war with Iraq?

Because all the world's intelligence services said he had WMDs. It figures you didn't know that. It was in all the papers.

Your a sheep and probably hopeless. People like you are the reason we have corporate in control. You believe whatever you hear as long as it's YOUR guy saying. You question nothing as long as YOUR guy says it. You have closed beliefs and are un reasonable.
but Ill copy and paste anyway but you wont believe it....




June 26, 2003 |





















"The Iraqi dictator must not be permitted to threaten America and the world with horrible poisons and diseases and gases and atomic weapons."
-- George Bush, Oct. 7, 2002, in a speech in Cincinnati.

There is a small somber box that appears in the New York Times every day. Titled simply "Killed in Iraq," it lists the names and military affiliations of those who most recently died on tour of duty. Wednesday's edition listed just one name: Orenthial J. Smith, age 21, of Allendale, South Carolina.

The young, late O.J. Smith was almost certainly named after the legendary running back, Orenthal J. Simpson, before that dashing American hero was charged for a double-murder. Now his namesake has died in far-off Mesopotamia in a noble mission to, as our president put it on March 19, "disarm Iraq, to free its people and to defend the world from grave danger."

Today, more than three months after Bush's stirring declaration of war and nearly two months since he declared victory, no chemical, biological or nuclear weapons have been found, nor any documentation of their existence, nor any sign they were deployed in the field.

The mainstream press, after an astonishing two years of cowardice, is belatedly drawing attention to the unconscionable level of administrative deception. They seem surprised to find that when it comes to Iraq, the Bush administration isn't prone to the occasional lie of expediency but, in fact, almost never told the truth.

What follows are just the most outrageous and significant of the dozens of outright lies uttered by Bush and his top officials over the past year in what amounts to a systematic campaign to scare the bejeezus out of everybody:

LIE #1: "The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program ... Iraq has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment needed for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons." -- President Bush, Oct. 7, 2002, in Cincinnati.

FACT: This story, leaked to and breathlessly reported by Judith Miller in the New York Times, has turned out to be complete baloney. Department of Energy officials, who monitor nuclear plants, say the tubes could not be used for enriching uranium. One intelligence analyst, who was part of the tubes investigation, angrily told The New Republic: "You had senior American officials like Condoleezza Rice saying the only use of this aluminum really is uranium centrifuges. She said that on television. And that's just a lie."

LIE #2: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." -- President Bush, Jan.28, 2003, in the State of the Union address.

FACT: This whopper was based on a document that the White House already knew to be a forgery thanks to the CIA. Sold to Italian intelligence by some hustler, the document carried the signature of an official who had been out of office for 10 years and referenced a constitution that was no longer in effect. The ex-ambassador who the CIA sent to check out the story is pissed: "They knew the Niger story was a flat-out lie," he told the New Republic, anonymously. "They [the White House] were unpersuasive about aluminum tubes and added this to make their case more strongly."

LIE #3: "We believe [Saddam] has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons." -- Vice President Cheney on March 16, 2003 on "Meet the Press."

FACT: There was and is absolutely zero basis for this statement. CIA reports up through 2002 showed no evidence of an Iraqi nuclear weapons program.

LIE #4: "[The CIA possesses] solid reporting of senior-level contacts between Iraq and al-Qaeda going back a decade." -- CIA Director George Tenet in a written statement released Oct. 7, 2002 and echoed in that evening's speech by President Bush.

FACT: Intelligence agencies knew of tentative contacts between Saddam and al-Qaeda in the early '90s, but found no proof of a continuing relationship. In other words, by tweaking language, Tenet and Bush spun the intelligence180 degrees to say exactly the opposite of what it suggested.

LIE #5: "We've learned that Iraq has trained al-Qaeda members in bomb-making and poisons and deadly gases ... Alliance with terrorists could allow the Iraqi regime to attack America without leaving any fingerprints." -- President Bush, Oct. 7 .

FACT: No evidence of this has ever been leaked or produced. Colin Powell told the U.N. this alleged training took place in a camp in northern Iraq. To his great embarrassment, the area he indicated was later revealed to be outside Iraq's control and patrolled by Allied war planes.

LIE #6: "We have also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad areas. We are concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles] for missions targeting the United States." -- President Bush, Oct. 7.

FACT: Said drones can't fly more than 300 miles, and Iraq is 6,000 miles from the U.S. coastline. Furthermore, Iraq's drone-building program wasn't much more advanced than your average model plane enthusiast. And isn't a "manned aerial vehicle" just a scary way to say "plane"?

LIE #7: "We have seen intelligence over many months that they have chemical and biological weapons, and that they have dispersed them and that they're weaponized and that, in one case at least, the command and control arrangements have been established." -- President Bush, Feb. 8, 2003, in a national radio address.

FACT: Despite a massive nationwide search by U.S. and British forces, there are no signs, traces or examples of chemical weapons being deployed in the field, or anywhere else during the war.

LIE #8: "Our conservative estimate is that Iraq today has a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agent. That is enough to fill 16,000 battlefield rockets." -- Secretary of State Colin Powell, Feb. 5 2003, in remarks to the UN Security Council.

FACT: Putting aside the glaring fact that not one drop of this massive stockpile has been found, as previously reported on AlterNet the United States' own intelligence reports show that these stocks -- if they existed -- were well past their use-by date and therefore useless as weapon fodder.

LIE #9: "We know where [Iraq's WMD] are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south, and north somewhat." -- Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, March 30, 2003, in statements to the press.

FACT: Needless to say, no such weapons were found, not to the east, west, south or north, somewhat or otherwise.

LIE #10: "Yes, we found a biological laboratory in Iraq which the UN prohibited." -- President Bush in remarks in Poland, published internationally June 1, 2003.

FACT: This was reference to the discovery of two modified truck trailers that the CIA claimed were potential mobile biological weapons lab. But British and American experts -- including the State Department's intelligence wing in a report released this week -- have since declared this to be untrue. According to the British, and much to Prime Minister Tony Blair's embarrassment, the trailers are actually exactly what Iraq said they were; facilities to fill weather balloons, sold to them by the British themselves.

So, months after the war, we are once again where we started -- with plenty of rhetoric and absolutely no proof of this "grave danger" for which O.J. Smith died. The Bush administration is now scrambling to place the blame for its lies on faulty intelligence, when in fact the intelligence was fine; it was their abuse of it that was "faulty."

Rather than apologize for leading us to a preemptive war based on impossibly faulty or shamelessly distorted "intelligence" or offering his resignation, our sly madman in the White House is starting to sound more like that other O.J. Like the man who cheerfully played golf while promising to pursue "the real killers," Bush is now vowing to search for "the true extent of Saddam Hussein's weapons programs, no matter how long it takes."

On the terrible day of the 9/11 attacks, five hours after a hijacked plane slammed into the Pentagon, retired Gen. Wesley Clark received a strange call from someone (he didn't name names) representing the White House position: "I was on CNN, and I got a call at my home saying, 'You got to say this is connected. This is state-sponsored terrorism. This has to be connected to Saddam Hussein,'" Clark told Meet the Press anchor Tim Russert. "I said, 'But -- I'm willing to say it, but what's your evidence?' And I never got any evidence.'"

And neither did we.
lieve it.

 

[Windship]

A look back at some of the predicted US outcomes for the Iraq war, and what happened.

By Dan Murphy, Staff writer December 22, 2011



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Maya Alleruzzo/AP
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Would the war be cheap and would Iraq pay for it?

The projections: Ahead of and shortly after the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, a number of officials, including former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his deputy Paul Wolfowitz suggested the war could be done on the cheap and that it would largely pay for itself. In October 2003, Rumsfeld told a press conference about President Bush's request for $21 billion for Iraq and Afghan reconstruction that "the $20 billion the president requested is not intended to cover all of Iraq's needs. The bulk of the funds for Iraq's reconstruction will come from Iraqis -- from oil revenues, recovered assets, international trade, direct foreign investment, as well as some contributions we've already received and hope to receive from the international community." In March 2003, Mr. Wolfowitz told Congress that "we're really dealing with a country that could finance its own reconstruction." In April 2003, the Pentagon said the war would cost about $2 billion a month, and in July of that year Rumsfeld increased that estimate to $4 billion.

What happened? The Iraq war cost about $800 billion, or about $7.6 billion a month. When long term benefits are paid out connected with the death and injury of US troops there, the number is expected to rise to about $1 trillion, or about $9.5 billion a month. About $60 billion was spent directly on Iraq reconstruction efforts.

Did Iraq have weapons of mass destruction?

The projections: Ahead of the war, then Secretary of State Colin Powell told the UN that the US was worried that Saddam Hussein's Iraq had vast chemical weapons stockpiles, including anthrax, and asserted that the country had mobile biological weapons laboratories. In August of 2002, Vice President Dick Cheney said: "There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, against us." President Bush said in March 2003 "intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised" and then Senator Hillary Clinton said that year: "Iraq ... remains in material and unacceptable breach of its international obligations by, among other things, continuing to possess and develop a significant chemical and biological weapons capability, actively seeking a nuclear weapons capability, and supporting and harboring terrorist organizations."

Recommended: In PicturesLeaving Iraq

What happened? The Iraq Survey Group was the US-led team dispatched to find Saddam's purported weapons of mass destruction after the US invasion, led by David Kay. The group found evidence of low level biological weapons research and Mr. Kay resigned in early 2004. In September of that year, the group issued the Duelfer Report on the findings of its 18 months search. It found that Saddam had ended nuclear weapons research in 1991, and that biological and chemical weapons research had ended in 1995, though it found that Saddam would have liked to obtain WMD's, were it possible.




Play

In Pictures|Leaving Iraq



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Photos of the Day| Photos of the day 02/08

Did Iraq become a democracy and did it transform the region?

The projections: Many in the Bush Administration, including the president, argued that the US would successfully bring democracy to Iraq and in the process, set off a cascade of democracy in the middle east. In a November 2003 speech marking the anniversary of the National Endowment for Democracy, a US government fund focused on international democracy promotion, President Bush said: This is a massive and difficult undertaking -- it is worth our effort, it is worth our sacrifice, because we know the stakes. The failure of Iraqi democracy would embolden terrorists around the world, increase dangers to the American people, and extinguish the hopes of millions in the region. Iraqi democracy will succeed -- and that success will send forth the news, from Damascus to Teheran -- that freedom can be the future of every nation. The establishment of a free Iraq at the heart of the Middle East will be a watershed event in the global democratic revolution.

What happened? Iraq today has certainly far more public consultation in its politics than it did under Saddam Hussein, and on the simple question of "is Iraq more democratic?" the answer is clearly "yes." Iraq's 2010 parliamentary election was largely fair, though voting broke down on sectarian lines (Shiite Arabs, Sunni Arabs, and Kurds). There are worrying signs that Iraq's majority Shiite Arabs, about 60 percent of the country, are forming the nucleus for a new authoritarianism under Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, and the country remains a far more violent place than it was before the 2003 invasion, though much safer than at the height of the sectarian civil war that claimed about 100,000 lives. The second projection of transforming the region did not come to pass, though boosters of the Iraq war insist that the Arab uprisings of 2011 were inspired by Iraq. Most Arabs were opposed to the US invasion, and watched the sectarian bloodletting in Iraq in its aftermath with horror.

Was Iraq a war for oil?

Prediction: It was common for anti-war critics on the far left in the US and Europe before and during the war, and among all sorts of folks in the Middle East, to say that the Iraq war was about stealing Iraq's oil. Former UK MP George Galloway led a protest shouting "no war for oil" in London in late 2002, and it was a common refrain from around the world.

What happened? The Iraq war was completely about oil. And it wasn't about oil at all. It was completely about oil in the sense that Iraq's vast reserves are what make Iraq important, both as a supplier to global oil markets and as a potential regional military and economic powerhouse. Had Saddam Hussein been a nasty dictator in some resource-starved land, the odds of the US taking much interest in invasion would have been close to zero. To top it off, southern Iraq lies in reach of the Straits of Hormuz, a major artery for international energy and thus Hussein could pose a threat to the health and economy of the US (as well as much of the rest of the world). But it wasn't about oil, at all, in the sense that US was somehow going to get its hands on the stuff like an extractive 19th century colonial empire. While the war was incredibly profitable for military suppliers like Halliburton and private armies like the since renamed Blackwater, US oil majors haven't punched above their weight in post-Saddam Iraq. Exxon has a major contract in the south, and US oil services companies are making a lot of money there. But so are Chinese and Russian oil companies. As one wag on twitter put it "this was the least successful war for oil in history."

Was Saddam Hussein involved in 9/11?

Prediction: It was commonly implied in the runup to the invasion and in the first few years of the war that Saddam Hussein was, somehow, a backer of Al Qaeda and perhaps involved in the 9/11 attacks on the US. In March 2003, President Bush wrote in a letter to the Speaker of the House that "I have... determined that the use of armed force against Iraq is consistent with the United States and other countries continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001." In September of 2004, a Washington Post poll found that 69 percent of Americans believed Saddam was involved in 9/11. Then Vice President Dick Cheney on Meet the Press, asked whether he thought that made sense, answered: "We don’t know. You and I talked about this two years ago. I can remember you asking me this question just a few days after the original attack. At the time I said no, we didn’t have any evidence of that. Subsequent to that, we’ve learned a couple of things. We learned more and more that there was a relationship between Iraq and al-Qaeda that stretched back through most of the decade of the ’90s, that it involved training, for example, on (biological and chemical weapons) that al-Qaeda sent personnel to Baghdad to get trained on the systems that are involved. The Iraqis providing bomb-making expertise and advice to the al-Qaeda organization." In 2004 Cheney told NPR that there was "overwhelming" evidence of ties between Al Qaeda and Saddam's Iraq.

The results? No links were even found between Saddam Hussein and the events of 9/11. On broader ties to Al Qaeda, the question is mixed. Evidence was found that indicated some high-level Al Qaeda operatives passed through Iraq in the 1990s and may have received some government assistance, or at least have been tolerated. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian militant who was the face of Al Qaeda in Iraq in the first few years of the war (before being killed in a US airstrike) was in Iraq before the war -- but working with Ansar al-Islam, in autonomous Kurdistan, an area that was protected from Saddam by a NATO no-fly zone. Al Qaeda and its jihadi fellow travelers flourished in Iraq after the invasion, both recruiting from among disaffected Iraqi Sunni Arabs and drawing in militants from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Libya and other regional countries. Saddam Hussein's regime was an avowedly secular one, and hostile to even peaceful Islamist groups during his reign.

 

[Windship]

I remember seeing on the news, they were reporting that the war was aver and on another channel they were reporting that the five American oil companies were on line in Iraq and pumping.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Dear, are you saying that all the world's intelligence services didn't say that he had WMDs and that all the leaders in both parties didn't vote for it? Or are you idiot lib saying you have perfect hindsight?

 

[Windship]

lol...cute, that "dear" thing.
I saw a lot of these lies before the traitors on both sides voted for it.
Im not a lib. There are very few libs still in office. There are mostly pseudo libs that say they are libs and then cater to corporate America. Like bill Clinton. I hate Obama and never voted for him....just in case that was your next waste of words.

 

[Windship]

I care about the truth and whats good for America as a whole. Does that make me an idiot?

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

I care about the truth and whats good for America as a whole. Does that make me an idiot?

you appear to be a deep lib commie. Ideally who would you want to be President. Thanks

 

[Toro]

I think we should build a fence with guard towers every mile, staffed by guards with orders to shoot to kill. But the guard towers would all look like the Statue of Liberty, with huge neon signs and the phrase "Bring me your huddled masses ..." etc., etc. in Spanish.

Because that's what America is all about!

 

[BillyP]

why did we go to war with Iraq?

Because all the world's intelligence services said he had WMDs. It figures you didn't know that. It was in all the papers.

No they didn't.
That was just an excuse to get their oil. Everyone knew they had no WMD.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

I think we should build a fence with guard towers every mile, staffed by guards with orders to shoot to kill. But the guard towers would all look like the Statue of Liberty, with huge neon signs and the phrase "Bring me your huddled masses ..." etc., etc. in Spanish.

Because that's what America is all about!

Except there are limits and always have been to how many we can absorb. And on top of that we are now $`17 trillion in debt.

 

[Crystalclear]

A fence to protect the border is a good idea to stop illegals entering the U.S.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

A fence to protect the border is a good idea to stop illegals entering the U.S.

for sure, but liberals won't allow it because doing so gets them votes and soothes their bleeding hearts.

 

[Windship]

A fence to protect the border is a good idea to stop illegals entering the U.S.

for sure, but liberals won't allow it because doing so gets them votes and soothes their bleeding hearts.

Ya see eddie, this is what I mean by ppl who blindly follow their boy no matter what. Isnt it true that the right are supposed to cater more to capitalism than to the working class? With their union breaking and opposal to a living wage and a ton of other crap too but give everything to the corporations? But who benefits the most from the illegals? Its business and corporations because of cheap labor and other bennies from cheap labor and you should know that. But you still stand there and say what you said. True, the left gets the votes(but how do illegals vote? Their illegal!)but the right.....the right gets the cheap labor and that spells profit and we know that the capitalists are rabid for profit no matter what. And the right has had their chance to do something while they were in office and what did they do?
NOTHING...THEY DID NOTHING.
THE RIGHT WAS IN OFFICE AND THEY DID NOTHING

Well...in all fairness they did do 1 thing. Reagan legalized 5 million of them and G W Bush voiced his opinion that he wanted them here frequently...remember now??
You believe that only the left benefits from illegals and you blame everything on the left. That's how I know that you and your ilk are brainwashed blindly following little babe's.