Muslims

Defense Secretary Rumsfeld on September 27 stated that the administration had several "bullet-proof" sentences in intelligence reports about ties between Iraq under Saddam and al Qaeda. "We have what we consider to be very reliable reporting of senior-level contacts going back a decade," Rumsfeld said.
 
CIA
NSA
DIA
and others

Have all said there was NO evidence of operational cooperation between AQ and Saddam.


These are Flat out facts people.

Please I beg of you we need to make our decisions for our country on Facts or we will make very bad decisions.
 
"Some men eventually stumble over the truth but they usually pick themselves and walk on as if nothing ever happened."
-Winston Churchill
 
CIA
NSA
DIA
and others

Have all said there was NO evidence of operational cooperation between AQ and Saddam.


These are Flat out facts people.

Please I beg of you we need to make our decisions for our country on Facts or we will make very bad decisions.


and why would there be? the overriding goal of Al Qaeda is the overthrow of secular nation states in the middle east. Why would Saddam cooperate in any way with them when their strategic mission was the dissolution of his empire?

and especially...why would he EVER give them any of the stockpiles of WMD's (which he didn't really actually have)????

if you are awakened at night by a motorcycle gang on your front porch who are asking you for your firearms so that they could go down the street and terrorize and rob your neighbors, will you willingly hand over those weapons, even if the gang promised not to come back and use them against you? no matter how much you disliked your neighbors??
 
The evidence is just mountain high.

This admin cherry picked intell against the intell workers wishes (note some quit and told the coutry right after Bush attacked Iraq).

He then told even the congress these lies.

It was planned from day one to misinform the people to the facts.

No matter how much reality hurts you need to accept the facts.

It will hurt more in the end to continue to believe lies and continue to make Bad decisions based on false information.

Because Truth Matters!
 
We can hope that they are thinking about it and will realise that Facts are our ONLY hope in this country and once we abandon facts that we are lost.

I think I have seen some very bright and capable people in this crowd that are completely capable of doing so.

A change of opinion is always honorable if based on the facts.
 
We can hope that they are thinking about it and will realise that Facts are our ONLY hope in this country and once we abandon facts that we are lost.

I think I have seen some very bright and capable people in this crowd that are completely capable of doing so.

A change of opinion is always honorable if based on the facts.

I agree. Good Luck!

Care
 
"Some men eventually stumble over the truth but they usually pick themselves and walk on as if nothing ever happened."
-Winston Churchill


I ripped this quote from another posters signature , I love it !
 

Bingo what? I have never implied otherwise, thankyouverymuch.

Saddam had ties to terrorist organizations. That is fact. Which ones and how deeply involved are unknowns.

While there is evidence that suggests Saddam had communications with al Qaeda, there is no evidence to support anything more than that.

Neither of those facts support Saddam being involved with 9/11, nor anyone claiming he was. The implied relationship between Saddam and AQ was to claim he was supporting terrorists, during the buildup to the invasion of Iraq, not to claim Saddam had anything to do with 9/11.

So, once again, in 31 pages, NO ACTUAL FACT has been presented to suport the allegation that Bush/his administration said Saddam was involved with 9/11.
 
Rsr/Alucard

Your weekly Standard article has been PROVEN not to be true!!!!



But Cheney CONTINUED to pass along this FALSE information, a form of mind control...to brainwash people in to believing that this connection existed....and still exists after it was PROVEN not to be true.

This is a TACTIC that is utilized quite well, by this administration....to mislead people...imo.... and shows AGAIN the way this administration utilizes propaganda tactics to brainwash our citizens....imho.... As they did with Iraq's imminent threat to us.... watch out for it rsr!

Care

It doesn't require brainwashing to come to the common sense conclusion that Saddam Hussein and OBL could have had a dialogue concerning a common enemy.

I think the key word here is that ir is highly unlikely, and no evidence has been found to support and operational connection between the two.

However, your allegation that Cheney lied is also unsupported.
 
I'm LMAO now. Seems everyone's done a 180 the second rsr says AQ and Saddam were connected.

We can conclude that Saddam and AQ were not connected, a fact that has been pretty-much a given since Sep 01, and NO ONE is buying THAT.

BUT you WILL buy that 70% of the American people believe Saddam was involved in 9/11 even though OBL claimed the credit for it shortly after 9/11, and no connection between Saddam and OBL/AQ existed.

And this is ALL due to being brainwashed by Bush.

:cuckoo:
 
I'm LMAO now. Seems everyone's done a 180 the second rsr says AQ and Saddam were connected.

We can conclude that Saddam and AQ were not connected, a fact that has been pretty-much a given since Sep 01, and NO ONE is buying THAT.

BUT you WILL buy that 70% of the American people believe Saddam was involved in 9/11 even though OBL claimed the credit for it shortly after 9/11, and no connection between Saddam and OBL/AQ existed.

And this is ALL due to being brainwashed by Bush.

:cuckoo:

gunny...as a thinking reasoning intelligent American adult/veteran, I share your dismay that Americans could have been so easily misled. But the fact is: they were. the fact is that 70 % of Americans believed - in the early months of 2003 - that Saddam was connected to 9/11.

And if you accept that, you can easily understand why a significant majority of Americans supported the invasion of Iraq.

I will tell you...if I believed, in the spring of 2003 - like 70% of Americans believed, that Saddam had had anything to do with 9/11, I wouldn't have cared about his weapons of mass destruction..... I would have said, "let's go kill the bastard".

Is it any wonder that Americans supported the war against Iraq in the spring of 2003?
 
Bush and team did some misleading and our Press failed miserably at THEIR job which is to question what is said and to give people all sides.

They didnt they got lazy (or worse) and left the misleading lies on the table for the American people to trust.

There is lots of blame to go arround ,I just hope we all learned the lessons.
 
gunny...as a thinking reasoning intelligent American adult/veteran, I share your dismay that Americans could have been so easily misled. But the fact is: they were. the fact is that 70 % of Americans believed - in the early months of 2003 - that Saddam was connected to 9/11.

And if you accept that, you can easily understand why a significant majority of Americans supported the invasion of Iraq.

I will tell you...if I believed, in the spring of 2003 - like 70% of Americans believed, that Saddam had had anything to do with 9/11, I wouldn't have cared about his weapons of mass destruction..... I would have said, "let's go kill the bastard".

Is it any wonder that Americans supported the war against Iraq in the spring of 2003?

only partisan hacks would believe people would be brainwashed by the planned and repeated, misleading statements..... ;) j/k u
 
gunny...as a thinking reasoning intelligent American adult/veteran, I share your dismay that Americans could have been so easily misled. But the fact is: they were. the fact is that 70 % of Americans believed - in the early months of 2003 - that Saddam was connected to 9/11.

And if you accept that, you can easily understand why a significant majority of Americans supported the invasion of Iraq.

I will tell you...if I believed, in the spring of 2003 - like 70% of Americans believed, that Saddam had had anything to do with 9/11, I wouldn't have cared about his weapons of mass destruction..... I would have said, "let's go kill the bastard".

Is it any wonder that Americans supported the war against Iraq in the spring of 2003?

Sorry. I ain't buying it. I don't know ANYONE that believe Saddam was part of 9/11 past 9/12. I haven't heard it on the news, nor read it in the paper or on the net.

Which all goes back to the poll. I don't accept polls as fact to begin with. Who was asked? What question was asked, verbatim? How many people were asked to come up with this "70%"?

I don't believe that many Americans are THAT dumb. To believe that, one has to ignore obvious, published all over the media facts. Saddam and AQ were behind 9/11, he took credit for it removing ANY doubt, and we invaded Afghanistan and ousted the Taliban for refusing to hand him over. THAT info was EVERYWHERE.

Now you're going to say 70% of American people ignored those facts and accepted a CONTRADICTORY set of facts to justify invading Iraq? Barring anyone else, I would have noticed that.

So we're going to have to agree to disagree because I'm tired of pointing out the facts don't support the allegation. They didn't the first time, the last time, nor any time in between.

On a personal side, I'm glad I didn't look at Clinton the way you liberals/Democrats have treated Bush, and I can only hope I give the next Democrat president, whenever that may be more benefit of the doubt; especially, when the facts don't support he accusations.

I'll be interested in 2008, if a Democrat is elected President, to see if you hold your own under the same scrutiny. So far, since Nov 06, you haven't where Congress is concerned.
 
here is an article with in depth analysis regarding the public misperceptions that you can get to from the link:

http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/p...security_bt/102.php?nid=&id=&pnt=102&lb=brusc

Misperceptions, the Media and the Iraq War
Study Finds Widespread Misperceptions on Iraq
Highly Related to Support for War


Full Report

A new study based on a series of seven US polls conducted from January through September of this year reveals that before and after the Iraq war, a majority of Americans have had significant misperceptions and these are highly related to support for the war in Iraq.

The polling, conducted by the Program on International Policy (PIPA) at the University of Maryland and Knowledge Networks, also reveals that the frequency of these misperceptions varies significantly according to individuals’ primary source of news. Those who primarily watch Fox News are significantly more likely to have misperceptions, while those who primarily listen to NPR or watch PBS are significantly less likely.

An in-depth analysis of a series of polls conducted June through September found 48% incorrectly believed that evidence of links between Iraq and al Qaeda have been found, 22% that weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq, and 25% that world public opinion favored the US going to war with Iraq. Overall 60% had at least one of these three misperceptions.

Such misperceptions are highly related to support for the war. Among those with none of the misperceptions listed above, only 23% support the war. Among those with one of these misperceptions, 53% support the war, rising to 78% for those who have two of the misperceptions, and to 86% for those with all 3 misperceptions. Steven Kull, director of PIPA, comments, “While we cannot assert that these misperceptions created the support for going to war with Iraq, it does appear likely that support for the war would be substantially lower if fewer members of the public had these misperceptions.”

The frequency of Americans’ misperceptions varies significantly depending on their source of news. The percentage of respondents who had one or more of the three misperceptions listed above is shown below.

Variations in misperceptions according to news source cannot simply be explained as a result of differences in the demographics of each audience, because these variations can also be found when comparing the rate of misperceptions within demographic subgroups of each audience.

Another key perception—one that US intelligence agencies regard as unfounded—is that Iraq was directly involved in September 11. Before the war approximately one in five believed this and 13% even said they believed that they had seen conclusive evidence of it. Polled June through September, the percentage saying that Iraq was directly involved in 9/11 continued to be in the 20-25% range, while another 33-36% said they believed that Iraq gave al-Qaeda substantial support. [Note: An August Washington Post poll found that 69% thought it was at least “somewhat likely” that Saddam Hussein was personally involved in 9/11—a different question than the PIPA/KN question that asked respondents to come to a conclusion.]

In the run-up to the war misperceptions were also highly related to support for going to war. In February, among those who believed that Iraq was directly involved in September 11, 58% said they would agree with the President’s decision to go to war without UN approval. Among those who believed that Iraq had given al Qaeda substantial support, but was not involved in September 11, approval dropped to 37%. Among those who believed that a few al Qaeda individuals had contact with Iraqi officials 32% were supportive, while among those who believed that there was no connection at all just 25% felt that way. Polled during the war, among those who incorrectly believed that world public opinion favored going to the war, 81% agreed with the President’s decision to do so, while among those who knew that the world public opinion was opposed only 28% agreed.

While it would seem that misperceptions are derived from a failure to pay attention to the news, in fact, overall, those who pay greater attention to the news are no less likely to have misperceptions. Among those who primarily watch Fox, those who pay more attention are more likely to have misperceptions. Only those who mostly get their news from print media have fewer misperceptions as they pay more attention.

The level of misperceptions varies according to Americans’ political positions. Supporters of President Bush and Republicans are more likely to have misperceptions. However, misperceptions do not appear to only be the result of bias, because a significant number of people who do not have such political positions also have misperceptions.

For the entire study of seven polls the total sample was 9,611 respondents, and for the in-depth analysis for the polls conducted June through September the sample was 3,334 respondents. The polls were fielded by Knowledge Networks using its nationwide panel, which is randomly selected from the entire adult population and subsequently provided Internet access. For more information about this methodology, go to www.knowledgenetworks.com/ganp. Funding for this research was provided by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and the Ford Foundation.

this is a part from the full report:


Misperceptions, The Media and The Iraq War October 2, 2003
INTRODUCTION
From January through September 2003, PIPA/Knowledge Networks conducted seven different polls that dealt with the conflict with Iraq. Among other things, PIPA/KN probed respondents for key perceptions and beliefs as well for their attitudes on what US policy should be. In the course of doing this, it was discovered that a substantial portion of the public had a number of misperceptions that were demonstrably false, or were at odds with the dominant view in the intelligence community.

In the January poll it was discovered that a majority believed that Iraq played an important role in 9/11 and that a minority even expressed the belief that they had seen “conclusive evidence” of such involvement. The US intelligence community has said that there is not evidence to support the view that Iraq was directly involved in September 11 and there has clearly never been any observable “conclusive evidence.”

In February, by providing more fine-grained response options it became clearer that only about one in five Americans believed that Iraq was directly involved in 9/11, but that a majority did believe that Iraq had given substantial support to al-Qaeda—both propositions unsupported by the US intelligence community. Other polls found even higher numbers responding positively to the idea that Iraq was involved in September 11 or had some type of close involvement with al-Qaeda. These perceptions of Iraq’s involvement with al-Qaeda and 9/11 persisted largely unchanged in numerous PIPA/KN polls through September 2003, despite continued disconfirmation by the intelligence community.

More striking, in PIPA/KN polls conducted after the war--in May, July, and August-September--approximately half of the respondents expressed the belief that the US has actually found evidence in Iraq that Saddam was working closely with al-Qaeda. While administration figures have talked about a purported meeting in Prague between an al-Qaeda member and an Iraqi official, this does not constitute evidence that Saddam was working closely with al-Qaeda and, in any case, this purported meeting had been discredited
by the US intelligence community during the period of these polls.

One of the most striking developments in the postwar period was that once US forces arrived in Iraq, they failed to find the weapons of mass destruction that had been a major rationale for going to war with Iraq. Nonetheless, in PIPA/KN polls conducted May through September, a substantial minority of the public said they believed that weapons of mass destruction had been found. A substantial minority even believed that Iraq had used weapons of mass destruction in the war. Polls from other organizations repeated these questions and got similar results.

In polls conducted throughout the world before and during the war, a very clear majority of world public opinion opposed the US going to war with Iraq without UN approval (see page 8 for details). However, PIPA/KN found in polls conducted during and after the war that only a minority of Americans were aware of this. A significant minority even believed that a majority of people in the world favored the US going to war with Iraq. Other perceptions of European public opinion and Islamic public opinion also contradicted numerous polls.

These striking findings raised numerous questions:

• How widespread are these misperceptions? Are they clustered in a constant minority or does a majority have at least one key misperception?

continued:

http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/p...security_bt/102.php?nid=&id=&pnt=102&lb=brusc

PROGRAM ON INTERNATIONAL POLICY ATTITUDES / KNOWLEDGE NETWORKS
 
This is 6/04


Last week the bipartisan commission investigating the 9/11 attacks said it did not find credible evidence of a "collaborative relationship" between Saddam’s regime and the Al Qaeda terror network. The poll finds that twice as many Americans believe that there was a partnership between Iraq and Al Qaeda when Saddam was in power than that there was no working relationship (56 percent and 28 percent).

"It is notable that while many critics have seen the 9/11 commission reports as hurting the administration, they may actually have helped with the voters," comments Gorman. "The commission is saying something that a majority of Americans don't believe, while the president has been given the platform to repeat his belief in something they do believe. Right or wrong, he's preaching to the choir."

There is a huge partisan divide on this issue, with 73 percent of Republicans believing there was a partnership between Iraq and Al Qaeda, compared to 38 percent of Democrats and 58 percent of independents.

A strong majority thinks it is likely that Saddam had prior knowledge of the September 11 attacks. Last week the bipartisan commission investigating the 9/11 attacks said it did not find credible evidence of a "collaborative relationship" between Saddam’s regime and the Al Qaeda terror network. The poll finds that twice as many Americans believe that there was a partnership between Iraq and Al Qaeda when Saddam was in power than that there was no working relationship (56 percent and 28 percent).

"It is notable that while many critics have seen the 9/11 commission reports as hurting the administration, they may actually have helped with the voters," comments Gorman. "The commission is saying something that a majority of Americans don't believe, while the president has been given the platform to repeat his belief in something they do believe. Right or wrong, he's preaching to the choir."

There is a huge partisan divide on this issue, with
73 percent of Republicans believing there was a partnership between Iraq and Al Qaeda,
compared to 38 percent of Democrats and 58 percent of independents.

A strong majority thinks it is likely that Saddam had prior knowledge of the September 11 attacks. Over two-thirds of Americans (68 percent) think it is "very" or "somewhat" likely Saddam knew about the attacks, while 23 percent think it is "not very" or "not at all" likely the former Iraqi leader knew about the plans.
 

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