AP Insults Readers MERGED w/ Half of US is Brainless

[red states rule]

The liberal media does it again. If you believe Saddam had WMD's you arr stupid according to the AP

Don'y you love it when the liberal media actually tells us what they really think?

http://newsbusters.org/node/6805
AP Scolds Stupid Americans For Still Believing Saddam Had WMD
Posted by Noel Sheppard on August 7, 2006 - 09:45.
It’s one thing when an obviously deluded shill suggests that Americans are stupid because they disagree with him as reported by NewsBusters Saturday. However, it is quite another thing when the largest wire service in the country does it.

Yet, that’s exactly what transpired when the Associated Press published a report Sunday evening entitled “Half of U.S. Still Believes Iraq Had WMD”: “Half of America apparently still thinks so, a new poll finds, and experts see a raft of reasons why: a drumbeat of voices from talk radio to die-hard bloggers to the Oval Office, a surprise headline here or there, a rallying around a partisan flag, and a growing need for people, in their own minds, to justify the war in Iraq.”

Much like CNN’s Jack Cafferty the day before, AP didn’t offer the possibility that many of these believers feel Saddam moved his weapons to Syria or elsewhere before the invasion began. Such was certainly not on the mind of AP writer Charles J. Hanley, who, instead, wanted to make the case that Americans are just deluding themselves: “People tend to become ‘independent of reality’ in these circumstances, says opinion analyst Steven Kull.”

Fascinating. So, 50 percent of the country is “independent of reality.” Isn’t that a marvelous thing for America’s largest wire service to report? But that was just the beginning:

"I'm flabbergasted," said Michael Massing, a media critic whose writings dissected the largely unquestioning U.S. news reporting on the Bush administration's shaky WMD claims in 2002-03.

"This finding just has to cause despair among those of us who hope for an informed public able to draw reasonable conclusions based on evidence," Massing said.

What is causing this delusion? Well, as you would imagine, Republicans were the primary culprit:

Timing may explain some of the poll result. Two weeks before the survey, two Republican lawmakers, Pennsylvania's Sen. Rick Santorum (news, bio, voting record) and Michigan's Rep. Peter Hoekstra (news, bio, voting record), released an intelligence report in Washington saying 500 chemical munitions had been collected in Iraq since the 2003 invasion.

"I think the Harris Poll was measuring people's surprise at hearing this after being told for so long there were no WMD in the country," said Hoekstra spokesman Jamal Ware.

Next up to blame for America’s stupidity…Fox News:

“Our top story tonight, the nation abuzz today ..." was how Fox News led its report on the old, stray shells. Talk-radio hosts and their callers seized on it. Feedback to blogs grew intense. "Americans are waking up from a distorted reality," read one posting.

Of course, the majority of the deluded are – drum roll, please – Republicans: “'For some it almost becomes independent of reality and becomes very partisan.’ The WMD believers are heavily Republican, polls show.”

Because they watch…Fox News:

"It is easy to see what is accepted as truth rapidly morph from one representation to another," he said in an e-mail. "It would be a shame if one effect of the power of the Internet was to undermine any commonly agreed set of facts."

The creative "morphing" goes on.

As Israeli troops and Hezbollah guerrillas battled in Lebanon on July 21, a Fox News segment suggested, with no evidence, yet another destination for the supposed doomsday arms.

"ARE SADDAM HUSSEIN'S WMDS NOW IN HEZBOLLAH'S HANDS?" asked the headline, lingering for long minutes on TV screens in a million American homes.

So let’s get this straight: Early Sunday morning, a major wire service admitted that one of its photographers intentionally doctored a photograph to make the devastation in Beirut, Lebanon, look worse than it is (as reported by NewsBuster Tom Blumer); hours later, another major wire service said that most of us are stupid.

Does anyone see a connection?

 

[Annie]

One of the documents recently translated from those found in Iraq:


http://www.floppingaces.net/category/saddam-documents/

pics and images of documents at site:

An interesting document was translated recently from a Iraqi opposition agent in Syria. It was written on Mar 14th, 2003 (arabic calender Mohorram 10) one week before our invasion and it details the fact that many many Iraqi trucks entered Syria and that the information he received was they were full of Iraqi WMD's:

Click to enlarge the translated letter. Here is the original in arabic:

The city where these trucks were unloaded is Dayr az Zawr which is along the Euphrates:

A small city with a population a little over 100,000 which appears perfect to hide these weapons.

This may not be the smoking gun but as in a criminal trial you could say that a preponderance of the evidence points to it's legitimacy.

Word of these documents hit the blogosphere yesterday and guess what? Not one MSM outfit has reported on it.

Surprised?

UPDATE

This ties in neatly with the report of Russians convoying out of Iraq into Syria:

National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, in Moscow to discuss the war in Iraq, met with Russian officials Monday to allay concerns following a Sunday attack on a Russian diplomatic convoy as it attempted to leave the war zone.

The convoy of 25 diplomats, including Russia's ambassador to Iraq, Vladimir Titorenko, was hit by ground fire near a western Baghdad suburb Sunday. Five diplomats were reported wounded, some seriously, Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko said on Russian television.

[…]News reports said the vehicles, some with visible bullet holes, arrived safely in Syria on Monday, but had left at least one wounded official behind in an Iraqi hospital.

"I saw six cars with Iraqi diplomatic number plates including the (Russian) ambassador's car," a Reuters cameraman reported from the Tanf border crossing in Syria. "He was driving his car which had two bullet holes in it, one in the glass and one on the driver's side. The other cars also had bullet holes."

UPDATE II

Debka, the site that has a somewhat negative reputation for being the enquirer of the intelligence community obviously got this one right when it reported on Feb 14th, 2003:

"In the last two weeks, our military sources discovered that Iraq staged a major removal of its forbidden weapons systems, sending them overland by truck to Lebanon via Syria."

 

[Gunny]

Goes to show you who is really stupid. Who gassed the Kurds? Who gassed Iranians during the Iran-Iraq War?

Must've been the Easter Bunny.

 

[DFresh]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060806/ap_on_re_us/iraq_believing_wmd :tdown2:

 

[Semper Fi]

Goes to show you who is really stupid. Who gassed the Kurds? Who gassed Iranians during the Iran-Iraq War?

Must've been the Easter Bunny.

That's the thing. The left is shown rock-hard evidence of WMDs, and I still have yet to hear anything refuting it, or even acknowledging it.

 

[Annie]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060806/ap_on_re_us/iraq_believing_wmd :tdown2:

I have to agree, that some still question that they were there and moved, is pitiful

 

[Gunny]

That's the thing. The left is shown rock-hard evidence of WMDs, and I still have yet to hear anything refuting it, or even acknowledging it.

You must have just missed the "That was then, this now" argument; whereby, actual proven possession and accountability is refuted by the fact that the left thinks enough time has elapsed since actual use to cast doubt.

 

[manu1959]

The UN had a definition in the Iraqi resolutions of what constitutues a WMD.

Anyone know what it said?

Anyone know if they found anything that matched the definition?

all facts are available on the UN website....all written by UN inspectors.

 

[Gunny]

The UN had a definition in the Iraqi resolutions of what constitutues a WMD.

Anyone know what it said?

Anyone know if they found anything that matched the definition?

all facts are available on the UN website....all written by UN inspectors.

Actually I don't. The military definition of WMDs is any nuclear, biological and/or nuclear weapon.

The current lefty definition has devolved from that to an ICMB carrying a nuclear warhead capable of hitting the continental US.

 

[Dr Grump]

Goes to show you who is really stupid. Who gassed the Kurds? Who gassed Iranians during the Iran-Iraq War?

Must've been the Easter Bunny.

Nobody is saying Sadman NEVER had WMDs, just whether he had them pre invasion....

 

[Gunny]

Nobody is saying Sadman NEVER had WMDs, just whether he had them pre invasion....

Thanks for providing a reference for my response to semper fi.

How many tons exactly of chemical and bio weapons was it Saddam could not account for?

Monday Morning quarterbacking is dishonest. Most of the world, to include the left, believed he possessed the weapons and in the absence of evidence otherwise (destruction or sales reports or producing said material) rightly so.

Being of suspicious mind about everything else, don't you find it curious that absolutely NOTHING has been turned up except some old stuff Saddam probably forgot about? This from a madman known to possess and used WMDs in the past? Absolutely no evidence smacks of cleanup to me.

Isn't like he didn't have time to move the stuff either. While the US sat there telegraphing their intent while building up an invasion force, Saddam had enough time to send lock, stock and barrel to a PO Box in Hobokken.

 

[Dr Grump]

How many tons exactly of chemical and bio weapons was it Saddam could not account for?

Monday Morning quarterbacking is dishonest. Most of the world, to include the left, believed he possessed the weapons and in the absence of evidence otherwise (destruction or sales reports or producing said material) rightly so.

Being of suspicious mind about everything else, don't you find it curious that absolutely NOTHING has been turned up except some old stuff Saddam probably forgot about? This from a madman known to possess and used WMDs in the past? Absolutely no evidence smacks of cleanup to me.

Isn't like he didn't have time to move the stuff either. While the US sat there telegraphing their intent while building up an invasion force, Saddam had enough time to send lock, stock and barrel to a PO Box in Hobokken.

And therein lies the rub. Not all people believed he had WMDs. Some believed the intel, some didn't. But, even if he did, were they a threat to the US? Was he onselling them? If he had them, and he was desperate, why didn't he use them during the invasion. And I was not that suspicious that nothing turned up after listening to Blix and Ritter.

 

[Gunny]

And therein lies the rub. Not all people believed he had WMDs. Some believed the intel, some didn't. But, even if he did, were they a threat to the US? Was he onselling them? If he had them, and he was desperate, why didn't he use them during the invasion. And I was not that suspicious that nothing turned up after listening to Blix and Ritter.

Most people believed he had WMDs.

Why is it you left-wingers have to wait until a gun is aimed at your head to recognize a threat? Same crap is being replayed with Iran.

I cannot explain Saddam's nonsensical reasoning. I can't even explain why he wasn't smart enough to just play ball with the UN until the heat was off and he could go back to business as usual.

And if he didn't have any WMDs, why'd he get his nation invaded and himself deposed by acting as if he did?

Listening to UN officials convinced you? What a mark.

 

[Semper Fi]

Nobody is saying Sadman NEVER had WMDs, just whether he had them pre invasion....

So he had them when? Post-invasion? If Saddam had them then and used them then, why would he stop possessing?

 

[T-Bor]

No - what I really like is when you tell us what YOU think. Please keep it coming cause its REALLY damn funny.

The liberal media does it again. If you believe Saddam had WMD's you arr stupid according to the AP

Don'y you love it when the liberal media actually tells us what they really think?

 

[T-Bor]

Gunny you use that worn out excuse way too much. If we really cared about Human rights atrocities we would have been in Africa with our troops before we went to Iraq. So dont give me this we care about what happened to the kurds crap. If we really cared about mass killings all of our troops would be in Africa at this very momment. So please...enough.

Goes to show you who is really stupid. Who gassed the Kurds? Who gassed Iranians during the Iran-Iraq War?

Must've been the Easter Bunny.

 

[Semper Fi]

Gunny you use that worn out excuse way too much. If we really cared about Human rights atrocities we would have been in Africa with our troops before we went to Iraq. So dont give me this we care about what happened to the kurds crap. If we really cared about mass killings all of our troops would be in Africa at this very momment. So please...enough.

That's really not the point. The point is that Saddam used gas in the previously mentioned accounts, period.

Aside from that, I think you have a lot of courage for calling what happened to the kurds 'crap.' But really, that's not what this board is about. So please...enough.

 

[Gunny]

Gunny you use that worn out excuse way too much. If we really cared about Human rights atrocities we would have been in Africa with our troops before we went to Iraq. So dont give me this we care about what happened to the kurds crap. If we really cared about mass killings all of our troops would be in Africa at this very momment. So please...enough.

What's this "we" shit, boot?

Perhaps had you been around enough, you would already know I am one of the staunchest advocates of military intervention in the Sudan.

And we were in Africa due to human rights attrocities ... or have you forgotten how quickly Clinton had us turn tail and run?

And before you choose to chastise me for something you don't know a damned thing about, you give just about everything you have that isn't glued to your uniform to some of those Africans EVERY time you go there before you presume yourself my fucking equal on this topic.

 

[LuvRPgrl]

Can anyone inform me of what RWA got banned for? I enjoyed reading most of his posts, even when we disagreed.

Oddly enough, some more strong evidence Saddam had the weapons was his top general stated emphatically that he watched them being shipped into Syria. That was some time ago, and now, I saw him again on the news and he is still making the same statement. If anyone would know, he would.
And let us not forget, as the liberals so conviently try to do, Saddam was required by the resolution that ended the war with Kuwait, and was instrumental in stopping the US from ousting sadam then and there, saddam was REQUIRED to show proof of the destrucion of the WMD's, which he couldnt do and never did. Lack of proof was a legitimate reason on its own, to oust him.

 

[LuvRPgrl]

Gunny you use that worn out excuse way too much. If we really cared about Human rights atrocities we would have been in Africa with our troops before we went to Iraq. So dont give me this we care about what happened to the kurds crap. If we really cared about mass killings all of our troops would be in Africa at this very momment. So please...enough.

Hey, I LOVE your rep points! How did you manage to pull that off?
Well, your statement above argues not against the war, but where the war was taken to. You forget, the war isnt about human rights atrocities only, its about US national Security. Saddam was a threat to us, Africa isnt.
Besides, like Gunny pointed out, he NEVER said we went into Iraq because of human rights violations, he was merely pointing out that Saddam had to have had WMD's because he used them on the Kurds.
But very typical of Liberals distorting what a conservative says. Oppps, or is it progessives now? They are even ashamed of their title. But playing word games is nothing new to them.