Why does the Right have such a hard-on for blaming Clinton?

[Crown]

Wrong. If you seek a separate resolution explicitly authorizing the use of force, and it fails, then the more recent resolution's failure to pass takes precedence over the older one, and makes the previous one irrelevant for the purposes of authorizing the use of force. While France would doubtless have become a target because of their veto, the war with Iraq would still have been explicitly illegal, as opposed to being legally justifiable under 1441.

I don't know where you got your legal degree Ossus, but ask for a refund.

If they take a new resolution and it fails, resolution 1441 (which specifies the sanctions, weapons inspectors and 'serious consquences') is the status quo! It does not go poof into thin air. Until such time as the UN organisations appointed by the SC report that resolution 1441 has been fully met. Or a new resolution is passed by the SC specifying that resolution 1441 is null and void for any other resolution they wish, resolution 1441 is A.O.K!

Unless you wish to seriously argue that a French veto would not only mean no new resolution explicitly authorising invasion, but also an end to sanctions, weapons inspectors and the oil for food program?

(Think carefully as to what the French position was for the reason of the veto threa, Hint :: Inspections are working, and we want them to continue to work)

[Elfdart]

Bush and his stooges certainly DID know there were no WMD stockpiles in Iraq. May 2001, Secretary of State Powell was in Cairo and said that not only did Iraq no longer have any WMDs, but that Saddam Hussein wasn't even a conventional threat to the region. This address was recorded on Egyptian TV and shown repeatedly.

[Crown]

Bush and his stooges certainly DID know there were no WMD stockpiles in Iraq. May 2001, Secretary of State Powell was in Cairo and said that not only did Iraq no longer have any WMDs, but that Saddam Hussein wasn't even a conventional threat to the region. This address was recorded on Egyptian TV and shown repeatedly.

Ossus and I are arguing over another kettle of fish (go back to page 2 for the primer, my first post) entirely.

EDIT :: And Yes, I have seen the speach you mentioned.

[Patrick Degan]

I said prove that Bush lied - that he knew Saddam had no WMDs, but stated that he did, and used this as a casus belli.

Bush has already proven it for me: the repetition of the Niger Yellowcake Myth after it had been demonstrated to be baseless and the repetition of the Aluminium Tubes Myth after it had been demonstrated to be baseless —both intentionally part of his 2003 State of the Union address.

And the interesting thing is that you demand proof beyond any reasonable doubt about Clinton's lies, but you are entirely ready to condemn Bush even though all reasonable doubt has not been eliminated.

Wrong again. The issue as far as Clinton is concerned is whether or not he actually committed a crime or whether he engaged in legalistic hairsplitting. The issue as far as Bush is concerned is whether he outright lied about the Great Iraqi Threat to the U.S. or whether he simply is too stupid to see to it that the things he's saying have a grain of fact behind them.

And you are hugely mistaken about belief in Iraqi WMD requiring "reasonable doubt" —the evidence for them simply has not been demonstrated to exist. It is up to those making the positive assertions that they must exist to actually demonstrate that they do.

[Perinquus]

I said prove that Bush lied - that he knew Saddam had no WMDs, but stated that he did, and used this as a casus belli.

Bush has already proven it for me: the repetition of the Niger Yellowcake Myth after it had been demonstrated to be baseless and the repetition of the Aluminium Tubes Myth after it had been demonstrated to be baseless —both intentionally part of his 2003 State of the Union address

It had not been demonstrated to be baseless, it had been revealed as doubtful. Do you understand the difference between baseless - as in known to be false - and doubtful? One indicates certainty, the other does not. As I said, it is quite possible that Bush lied, but it is also plausible that Bush had convinced himself that Saddam really did have weapons, and simply thought that he had done a good enough job hiding them that we had no hard evidence of it, and that he also thought that we would find such evidence once we overran Iraq and had access to Iraqi documents, scientists, military personnel, etc. You have not eliminated this possibility, and until you do, you have not proven that he lied. I don't care if he has proven it "for you". Try again.

And the interesting thing is that you demand proof beyond any reasonable doubt about Clinton's lies, but you are entirely ready to condemn Bush even though all reasonable doubt has not been eliminated.

Wrong again. The issue as far as Clinton is concerned is whether or not he actually committed a crime or whether he engaged in legalistic hairsplitting. The issue as far as Bush is concerned is whether he outright lied about the Great Iraqi Threat to the U.S. or whether he simply is too stupid to see to it that the things he's saying have a grain of fact behind them.

And you are hugely mistaken about belief in Iraqi WMD requiring "reasonable doubt" —the evidence for them simply has not been demonstrated to exist. It is up to those making the positive assertions that they must exist to actually demonstrate that they do.

As I recall, the burden had been placed on Saddam, by the UN, to comply with the UN resolution, and be fully cooperative, and provide complete evidence that he had disposed of all his WMDs.

[BoredShirtless]

It had not been demonstrated to be baseless, it had been revealed as doubtful. Do you understand the difference between baseless - as in known to be false - and doubtful? One indicates certainty, the other does not.

Wrong. The fact the Niger documents were signed and dated by a man who had been out of office for many years was discovered and known before the 2003 State of the Union address. This fact is good enough to prove the documents were FORGERIES.

No room for doubt; 100% baseless.

[Perinquus]

It had not been demonstrated to be baseless, it had been revealed as doubtful. Do you understand the difference between baseless - as in known to be false - and doubtful? One indicates certainty, the other does not.

Wrong. The fact the Niger documents were signed and dated by a man who had been out of office for many years was discovered and known before the 2003 State of the Union address. This fact is good enough to prove the documents were FORGERIES.

No room for doubt; 100% baseless.

Then it's awfully funny that no such language was ever used by CIA or any other intel source that evaluated the documents. The language that was used indicates that it was doubtful, not that it was known to be false. And if the forgeries really were as obvious and clumsy as that why did no one say so?

[Vympel]

Then it's awfully funny that no such language was ever used by CIA or any other intel source that evaluated the documents. The language that was used indicates that it was doubtful, not that it was known to be false. And if the forgeries really were as obvious and clumsy as that why did no one say so?

They *did*. The moment the IAEA saw them, they said they were "obvious forgeries." Of course, Cheney got up and said "well, they're wrong".

[Patrick Degan]

I said prove that Bush lied - that he knew Saddam had no WMDs, but stated that he did, and used this as a casus belli.

Bush has already proven it for me: the repetition of the Niger Yellowcake Myth after it had been demonstrated to be baseless and the repetition of the Aluminium Tubes Myth after it had been demonstrated to be baseless —both intentionally part of his 2003 State of the Union address

It had not been demonstrated to be baseless, it had been revealed as doubtful.

Wrong again. The very evidence of the tubes themselves disproved the claim in regards to those and the documentation supporting the Niger Yellowcake Myths were revealed to be forgeries. You're demonstrating Axis Kast-level stupidity again.

Do you understand the difference between baseless - as in known to be false - and doubtful? One indicates certainty, the other does not. As I said, it is quite possible that Bush lied, but it is also plausible that Bush had convinced himself that Saddam really did have weapons, and simply thought that he had done a good enough job hiding them that we had no hard evidence of it, and that he also thought that we would find such evidence once we overran Iraq and had access to Iraqi documents, scientists, military personnel, etc. You have not eliminated this possibility, and until you do, you have not proven that he lied. I don't care if he has proven it "for you". Try again.

I don't have to "try again", numbskull —history has made that demonstration for me. And your Appeal to Ignorance does not alter that fact one jot. Until evidence is actually revealed to the contrary, the default assumption is that the WMDs don't exist.

And the interesting thing is that you demand proof beyond any reasonable doubt about Clinton's lies, but you are entirely ready to condemn Bush even though all reasonable doubt has not been eliminated.

Wrong again. The issue as far as Clinton is concerned is whether or not he actually committed a crime or whether he engaged in legalistic hairsplitting. The issue as far as Bush is concerned is whether he outright lied about the Great Iraqi Threat to the U.S. or whether he simply is too stupid to see to it that the things he's saying have a grain of fact behind them.

And you are hugely mistaken about belief in Iraqi WMD requiring "reasonable doubt" —the evidence for them simply has not been demonstrated to exist. It is up to those making the positive assertions that they must exist to actually demonstrate that they do.

As I recall, the burden had been placed on Saddam, by the UN, to comply with the UN resolution, and be fully cooperative, and provide complete evidence that he had disposed of all his WMDs.

It is utterly immaterial whether or not the UN or the current White House engaged in a huge Burden of Proof Fallacy. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

[BoredShirtless]

Then it's awfully funny that no such language was ever used by CIA or any other intel source that evaluated the documents. The language that was used indicates that it was doubtful, not that it was known to be false. And if the forgeries really were as obvious and clumsy as that why did no one say so?

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml%3Fi= ... er20030708

[Perinquus]

Then it's awfully funny that no such language was ever used by CIA or any other intel source that evaluated the documents. The language that was used indicates that it was doubtful, not that it was known to be false. And if the forgeries really were as obvious and clumsy as that why did no one say so?

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml%3Fi= ... er20030708

This is the testimony of one person who is hardly unbiased:

He was an outspoken opponent of U.S. military intervention in Iraq.

He's an "adjunct scholar" at the Middle East Institute — which advocates for Saudi interests. The March 1, 2002 issue of the Saudi government-weekly Ain-Al Yaqeen lists the MEI as an "Islamic research institutes supported by the Kingdom."

He's a vehement opponent of the Bush administration which, he wrote in the March 3, 2003 edition of the left-wing Nation magazine, has "imperial ambitions." Under President Bush, he added, the world worries that "America has entered one of it periods of historical madness."

He also wrote that "neoconservatives" have "a stranglehold on the foreign policy of the Republican Party." He said that "the new imperialists will not rest until governments that ape our world view are implanted throughout the region, a breathtakingly ambitious undertaking, smacking of hubris in the extreme."

He was recently the keynote speaker for the Education for Peace in Iraq Center, a far-left group that opposed not only the U.S. military intervention in Iraq but also the sanctions — and even the no-fly zones that protected hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Kurds and Shias from being slaughtered by Saddam.

And consider this: Prior to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Wilson did believe that Saddam had biological weapons of mass destruction. But he raised that possibility only to argue against toppling Saddam, warning ABC's Dave Marash that if American troops were sent into Iraq, Saddam might "use a biological weapon in a battle that we might have. For example, if we're taking Baghdad or we're trying to take, in ground-to-ground, hand-to-hand combat." He added that Saddam also might attempt to take revenge by unleashing "some sort of a biological assault on an American city, not unlike the anthrax, attacks that we had last year."

And at the time he made that report, even he refrained from using language that would indicate certain knowledge, but kept it limited to expressions merely of doubtfulness:

Wilson says he spent eight days in Niger "drinking sweet mint tea and meeting with dozens of people" — hardly what a competent spy, detective, or even reporter would call an in-depth investigation. Nevertheless, let's give Wilson the benefit of the doubt and stipulate that he was correct when he reported back to the CIA that he believed it was "highly doubtful that any such transaction ever took place. "

And Wilson may not have been in a position to evaluate the accuracy of the report on which Bush based his statement anyway:

For the record, here's what President Bush actually said in his SOTU: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

Precisely which part of that statement isn't true? The British government did say that it believed Saddam had sought African uranium. Is it possible that the British government was mistaken? Sure. Is it possible that Her Majesty's government came by that belief based on an erroneous American intelligence report about a transaction between Iraq and Niger? Yes — but British Prime Minister Tony Blair and members of his Cabinet say that's not what happened.

They say, according to Britain's liberal Guardian newspaper, that their claim was based on "extra material, separate and independent from that of the US."

[Perinquus]

Damn this lack of an edit feature. Forgot the link to the article those quotes came from.

Scandal!

[Perinquus]

Bush has already proven it for me: the repetition of the Niger Yellowcake Myth after it had been demonstrated to be baseless and the repetition of the Aluminium Tubes Myth after it had been demonstrated to be baseless —both intentionally part of his 2003 State of the Union address

It had not been demonstrated to be baseless, it had been revealed as doubtful.

Wrong again. The very evidence of the tubes themselves disproved the claim in regards to those and the documentation supporting the Niger Yellowcake Myths were revealed to be forgeries. You're demonstrating Axis Kast-level stupidity again.

Then it should be easy for you to answer the question. Why wasn't anyone telling the president this at the time? If these were known to be such clear forgeries at the time, why is that nowhere in all the quotes you posted before does anyone indicate that they knew so at the time? All the quotes you produced have people saying how doubtful, dubious, or shaky the info was, and how it was merely "single source" intel. Where is the quote of someone telling Bush: "we can't rely on this report sir, we've discovered it's a forgery and therefore certainly false." If they knew at the time that this material was forged, why be so obviouly less than forthright in saying so?

Do you understand the difference between baseless - as in known to be false - and doubtful? One indicates certainty, the other does not. As I said, it is quite possible that Bush lied, but it is also plausible that Bush had convinced himself that Saddam really did have weapons, and simply thought that he had done a good enough job hiding them that we had no hard evidence of it, and that he also thought that we would find such evidence once we overran Iraq and had access to Iraqi documents, scientists, military personnel, etc. You have not eliminated this possibility, and until you do, you have not proven that he lied. I don't care if he has proven it "for you". Try again.

I don't have to "try again", numbskull —history has made that demonstration for me. And your Appeal to Ignorance does not alter that fact one jot. Until evidence is actually revealed to the contrary, the default assumption is that the WMDs don't exist.

History has made no such thing. You are assuming that everything that is known now was also known prior to the 2003 SOTU speech. Again, numbskull, you have not demonstrated that it was.

It is utterly immaterial whether or not the UN or the current White House engaged in a huge Burden of Proof Fallacy. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

It is not immaterial. U.S. relations with Iraq were not a debate society. We were perfectly capable of telling him: "you've revealed yourself to be an unscrupulous and untrustworthy aggressor. We will now deal with you as such. If you want to restore your status, it is now up to you to demonstrate your good intent by being fully cooperative and providing full and complete disclosure of your WMD program and your efforts to fulfill your obligation to dismantle it. Failure to be cooperative in this fashion will be taken as evidence of bad faith." And that, in fact, is basically what the relevant U.N resolutions did say, divested of their diplomatic language.

[SirNitram]

It had not been demonstrated to be baseless, it had been revealed as doubtful.

Wrong again. The very evidence of the tubes themselves disproved the claim in regards to those and the documentation supporting the Niger Yellowcake Myths were revealed to be forgeries. You're demonstrating Axis Kast-level stupidity again.

Then it should be easy for you to answer the question. Why wasn't anyone telling the president this at the time? If these were known to be such clear forgeries at the time, why is that nowhere in all the quotes you posted before does anyone indicate that they knew so at the time? All the quotes you produced have people saying how doubtful, dubious, or shaky the info was, and how it was merely "single source" intel. Where is the quote of someone telling Bush: "we can't rely on this report sir, we've discovered it's a forgery and therefore certainly false." If they knew at the time that this material was forged, why be so obviouly less than forthright in saying so?

This will shock you, but no one here has a little microphone in on the President's briefings. Of course, you will now promptly appeal to ignorance to claim we can't know the President knew..

[Perinquus]

This will shock you, but no one here has a little microphone in on the President's briefings. Of course, you will now promptly appeal to ignorance to claim we can't know the President knew..

And this will shock you, but as the person making the claim that the president knew, it is up to you to back it up. It is up to you to support your assertion, and that includes demonstrating how alternative explanations of the facts we have are not viable.

As I said earlier, the Clinton defenders here are ready to demand proof beyond any reasonable doubt , and in its absence, are equally ready to state categorically that he did not lie while he was under oath. However, when it comes to the question of whether or not Bush lied, an equally stringent requirement of proof beyond any reasonable doubt is conspicuously lacking. A plausible alternative explanation for the facts we have exists, and it has not been eliminated. This leaves some reasonable doubt. But I guess that only matters when it's not a politician whose ideology you approve of.

[SirNitram]

This will shock you, but no one here has a little microphone in on the President's briefings. Of course, you will now promptly appeal to ignorance to claim we can't know the President knew..

And this will shock you, but as the person making the claim that the president knew, it is up to you to back it up. It is up to you to support your assertion, and that includes demonstrating how alternative explanations of the facts we have are not viable.

As I said earlier, the Clinton defenders here are ready to demand proof beyond any reasonable doubt , and in its absence, are equally ready to state categorically that he did not lie while he was under oath. However, when it comes to the question of whether or not Bush lied, an equally stringent requirement of proof beyond any reasonable doubt is conspicuously lacking. A plausible alternative explanation for the facts we have exists, and it has not been eliminated. This leaves some reasonable doubt. But I guess that only matters when it's not a politician whose ideology you approve of.

You are a quick little monkey to shove words into someone else's mouth, aren't you? Nevertheless, you present an interesting concept. Perhaps the entire Bush administration is merely so staggering moronic, so unbeleivably, inconceivably dumb, so completely unprofessional and out to lunch, that they can't actually get the data to those who need to see it. That's a fascinating concept. And you support an administration which is so pathetic it can't circulate a memo? Because that is what you are suggesting happened.

[Perinquus]

This will shock you, but no one here has a little microphone in on the President's briefings. Of course, you will now promptly appeal to ignorance to claim we can't know the President knew..

And this will shock you, but as the person making the claim that the president knew, it is up to you to back it up. It is up to you to support your assertion, and that includes demonstrating how alternative explanations of the facts we have are not viable.

As I said earlier, the Clinton defenders here are ready to demand proof beyond any reasonable doubt , and in its absence, are equally ready to state categorically that he did not lie while he was under oath. However, when it comes to the question of whether or not Bush lied, an equally stringent requirement of proof beyond any reasonable doubt is conspicuously lacking. A plausible alternative explanation for the facts we have exists, and it has not been eliminated. This leaves some reasonable doubt. But I guess that only matters when it's not a politician whose ideology you approve of.

You are a quick little monkey to shove words into someone else's mouth, aren't you? Nevertheless, you present an interesting concept. Perhaps the entire Bush administration is merely so staggering moronic, so unbeleivably, inconceivably dumb, so completely unprofessional and out to lunch, that they can't actually get the data to those who need to see it. That's a fascinating concept. And you support an administration which is so pathetic it can't circulate a memo? Because that is what you are suggesting happened.

Now whose putting words into someone else's mouth? You are a hypocritical little rodent to leap to the same tactic you are so quick to condemn in others, aren't you?

[SirNitram]

Now whose putting words into someone else's mouth? You are a hypocritical little rodent to leap to the same tactic you are so quick to condemn in others, aren't you?

Not quite. You see, you are the one suggesting vital information did not get to the needed places in the Bush Administration. You are the one suggesting a complete failure there. Therefore, how can I be shoving words in your mouth to point that out? Oh yes, because it leads to conclusions you don't like.

[Perinquus]

Now whose putting words into someone else's mouth? You are a hypocritical little rodent to leap to the same tactic you are so quick to condemn in others, aren't you?

Not quite. You see, you are the one suggesting vital information did not get to the needed places in the Bush Administration. You are the one suggesting a complete failure there. Therefore, how can I be shoving words in your mouth to point that out? Oh yes, because it leads to conclusions you don't like.

You are shoving words in my mouth, because that's not what I said, and if you you would drop the belligerent mindset, and read my remarks honestly, you would no doubt realize this. You are allowing your political ideology, and your hatred of my more conservative political views to cause you to impute to me the worst possible motives. So you distort my argument.

I am not suggesting that this "vital information" that was in the hands of the intelligence agencies somehow never reached the president. I am suggesting that this information was not in the hands of the intelligence agencies in the first place - at least not at that time. Why? Because if these things had been known at CIA and elsewhere at that time, why is it that no one can be found who said so at the time? Joseph C. Wilson, for example, is now saying that he knew then. But in the first place, when you look at his quotes from the time period in question, he does not express any certainty about the matter, and in the second place, he is an avowed bitter opponent of Bush, and may have an axe to grind. If this information was in the hands of CIA personnel or administration officials at the time, why is it that no one ever says unequivocally that this is bad info based on obviously forged documents? The most they say is that it was doubtful.

This is what I was saying, and it's different from the argument you are attributing to me, so you are shoving words in my mouth.

[SirNitram]

Now whose putting words into someone else's mouth? You are a hypocritical little rodent to leap to the same tactic you are so quick to condemn in others, aren't you?

Not quite. You see, you are the one suggesting vital information did not get to the needed places in the Bush Administration. You are the one suggesting a complete failure there. Therefore, how can I be shoving words in your mouth to point that out? Oh yes, because it leads to conclusions you don't like.

You are shoving words in my mouth, because that's not what I said, and if you you would drop the belligerent mindset, and read my remarks honestly, you would no doubt realize this. You are allowing your political ideology, and your hatred of my more conservative political views to cause you to impute to me the worst possible motives. So you distort my argument.

Now you're pretending to be psychic. Which is really quite amusing. By the way, it's not belligerance, it's contempt.

I am not suggesting that this "vital information" that was in the hands of the intelligence agencies somehow never reached the president. I am suggesting that this information was not in the hands of the intelligence agencies in the first place - at least not at that time. Why? Because if these things had been known at CIA and elsewhere at that time, why is it that no one can be found who said so at the time? Joseph C. Wilson, for example, is now saying that he knew then. But in the first place, when you look at his quotes from the time period in question, he does not express any certainty about the matter, and in the second place, he is an avowed bitter opponent of Bush, and may have an axe to grind. If this information was in the hands of CIA personnel or administration officials at the time, why is it that no one ever says unequivocally that this is bad info based on obviously forged documents? The most they say is that it was doubtful.

Wait, wait, wait. And you're claiming you're not suggesting incompetence instead of ill intent? So the Bush administration goes ahead on doubtful intel that no one was sure on, and this is somehow a good thing? How is this anything but incompetence, precisely?

This is what I was saying, and it's different from the argument you are attributing to me, so you are shoving words in my mouth.

I'm really wondering about you. You're suggesting that they went ahead on intel they at very least knew was shoddy, and you're not suggesting they acted incompetently?

The knots you twist yourself in to get out of admitting Bush has lied and will lie and is probably lying currently are really getting insane. He's a politician. Welcome to reality. They lie. Get over your goddamn self.

[Perinquus]

Now you're pretending to be psychic. Which is really quite amusing. By the way, it's not belligerance, it's contempt.

I see. So I have to be a psychic huh? I have to be psychic to discern that when you refer to me as a "monkey" in a debate over the actions of a conservative politician whom you clearly despise, that you are allowing your political views and your own now admitted contempt of my more conservative political views to color your reactions to my remarks?

I don't have to be psychic to pick up on the blindingly obvious.

I am not suggesting that this "vital information" that was in the hands of the intelligence agencies somehow never reached the president. I am suggesting that this information was not in the hands of the intelligence agencies in the first place - at least not at that time. Why? Because if these things had been known at CIA and elsewhere at that time, why is it that no one can be found who said so at the time? Joseph C. Wilson, for example, is now saying that he knew then. But in the first place, when you look at his quotes from the time period in question, he does not express any certainty about the matter, and in the second place, he is an avowed bitter opponent of Bush, and may have an axe to grind. If this information was in the hands of CIA personnel or administration officials at the time, why is it that no one ever says unequivocally that this is bad info based on obviously forged documents? The most they say is that it was doubtful.

Wait, wait, wait. And you're claiming you're not suggesting incompetence instead of ill intent? So the Bush administration goes ahead on doubtful intel that no one was sure on, and this is somehow a good thing? How is this anything but incompetence, precisely?

Nice bait and switch there. You put words in my mouth, and characterized me as advocating the position that the administration is staffed by such dunderheads that they couldn't manage to pass vital information up the chain. Now that I point out clearly that was not my poistion, rather than admit that you erected a strawman, you switch to a different definition of incompetence.

As I said, Bush seems to have apparently believed that Saddam really had WMDs. And before you crow about what an idiot he was to believe that based on such shaky evidence, I should point out that just about everybody else seems to have thought so at the time as well. You can check here for a list of prominent politicians, many of whom had access to high level intelligence, who never doubted Saddam had WMDs and was seeking to devolop more:

Weapons of Mass Destruction

And note this list includes plenty of people from the democratic party and the political left.

So Bush decided the threat was serious enough to be worth going to war over. And if he'd found WMDs people would be praising him for his decisive action. But he didn't so people are either accusing him of lying, or of being an incompetent, or of being a trigger happy cowboy.

This is what I was saying, and it's different from the argument you are attributing to me, so you are shoving words in my mouth.

I'm really wondering about you. You're suggesting that they went ahead on intel they at very least knew was shoddy, and you're not suggesting they acted incompetently?

The knots you twist yourself in to get out of admitting Bush has lied and will lie and is probably lying currently are really getting insane. He's a politician. Welcome to reality. They lie. Get over your goddamn self.

Gee, no shit, politicians lie. I never would have thought that!

But the fact that politicians in general are known to lie occasionally does not constitute proof that this particular statement by Bush is a lie. So all this smug posturing and all the smarmy little comments you want to make don't change the fact that as the person making the assertion that the president lied, it's up to you to prove it, and you haven't done it. The best you can do is show evidence that he may have.

[BoredShirtless]

Then it's awfully funny that no such language was ever used by CIA or any other intel source that evaluated the documents. The language that was used indicates that it was doubtful, not that it was known to be false. And if the forgeries really were as obvious and clumsy as that why did no one say so?

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml%3Fi= ... er20030708

This is the testimony of one person who is hardly unbiased:

He was an outspoken opponent of U.S. military intervention in Iraq.

He's an "adjunct scholar" at the Middle East Institute — which advocates for Saudi interests. The March 1, 2002 issue of the Saudi government-weekly Ain-Al Yaqeen lists the MEI as an "Islamic research institutes supported by the Kingdom."

He's a vehement opponent of the Bush administration which, he wrote in the March 3, 2003 edition of the left-wing Nation magazine, has "imperial ambitions." Under President Bush, he added, the world worries that "America has entered one of it periods of historical madness."

He also wrote that "neoconservatives" have "a stranglehold on the foreign policy of the Republican Party." He said that "the new imperialists will not rest until governments that ape our world view are implanted throughout the region, a breathtakingly ambitious undertaking, smacking of hubris in the extreme."

He was recently the keynote speaker for the Education for Peace in Iraq Center, a far-left group that opposed not only the U.S. military intervention in Iraq but also the sanctions — and even the no-fly zones that protected hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Kurds and Shias from being slaughtered by Saddam.

And consider this: Prior to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Wilson did believe that Saddam had biological weapons of mass destruction. But he raised that possibility only to argue against toppling Saddam, warning ABC's Dave Marash that if American troops were sent into Iraq, Saddam might "use a biological weapon in a battle that we might have. For example, if we're taking Baghdad or we're trying to take, in ground-to-ground, hand-to-hand combat." He added that Saddam also might attempt to take revenge by unleashing "some sort of a biological assault on an American city, not unlike the anthrax, attacks that we had last year."

Your red herrings don't change the fact he helped unearth, that the documents were signed and dated by a man who wasn't even in office at the date of the signature.

And at the time he made that report, even he refrained from using language that would indicate certain knowledge, but kept it limited to expressions merely of doubtfulness:

Wilson says he spent eight days in Niger "drinking sweet mint tea and meeting with dozens of people" — hardly what a competent spy, detective, or even reporter would call an in-depth investigation. Nevertheless, let's give Wilson the benefit of the doubt and stipulate that he was correct when he reported back to the CIA that he believed it was "highly doubtful that any such transaction ever took place. "

Wilson was a diplomat. Diplomats usually hit people with information using a feather, not a sledgehammer. They rarely use decisive language and tend to brouch senstive subjects very carefully in order to allow the suckers in this case [the British] either wiggle room or to save some face. Or both.

And Wilson may not have been in a position to evaluate the accuracy of the report on which Bush based his statement anyway:

For the record, here's what President Bush actually said in his SOTU: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

Precisely which part of that statement isn't true? The British government did say that it believed Saddam had sought African uranium. Is it possible that the British government was mistaken? Sure. Is it possible that Her Majesty's government came by that belief based on an erroneous American intelligence report about a transaction between Iraq and Niger? Yes — but British Prime Minister Tony Blair and members of his Cabinet say that's not what happened.

They say, according to Britain's liberal Guardian newspaper, that their claim was based on "extra material, separate and independent from that of the US."

You do know what a lie is, don't you? When you know beforehand that information is false, but present it anyway as being true [regardless of who discovered it], you are DECEIVING. The dictionary:

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=lie

Second definition.

[Vympel]

Precisely which part of that statement isn't true? The British government did say that it believed Saddam had sought African uranium. Is it possible that the British government was mistaken? Sure. Is it possible that Her Majesty's government came by that belief based on an erroneous American intelligence report about a transaction between Iraq and Niger? Yes ? but British Prime Minister Tony Blair and members of his Cabinet say that's not what happened.

Not this tired old piece of bullshit apologia again. "We stand by our claim that Iraq sought uranium yellowcake from Africa, but no, this forged report has nothing to do with it. Oh, you want to know what does have to do with it? Well ... erm ... that's ... uhm ... a secret! Yeah! That's the ticket! What? You want to know how come we were prepared to provide this forged, embarassing report to the IAEA, but we're not prepared to provide any better evidence of our allegation? Because erm ... oh look, a cloud that looks like an elephant!"

*runs away*

Who gives a fuck what Blair and his Cabinet said. These are the same bunch of clowns who passed off a plagiarised, edited version of a decade old term paper from a university as the latest intelligence from Iraq.

[Stofsk]

Who gives a fuck what Blair and his Cabinet said. These are the same bunch of clowns who passed off a plagiarised, edited version of a decade old term paper from a university as the latest intelligence from Iraq.

What happened with that, anyway? Blair is still in office, so whatever happened couldn't have been too severe.

[Vympel]

What happened with that, anyway? Blair is still in office, so whatever happened couldn't have been too severe.

In any sane universe, he would've been kicked out. Alas, we live in Bizarro World.