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>>>Americans were in full support of the war,<<<
Americans were in full support (roughly 75%) of the war once it started. Prior to the war, less than 50% of Americans supported a pre-emptive strike without UN approval which is exactly what we ended up doing anyway. No matter since the first bomb dropped fixed the poll numbers.
>>>It was the sales job of the century"....<<<
That reporter can't be serious. How can a sales job using forged documents, bogus IAEA reports and extortion of CIA officials to promote a war be praised for its salesmanship? Moreover, less than 50% of Americans bought the sales job pre-attack, and 70-80% of the outside industrialized world never bought it pre or post-attack. As war promotions go, it was probably the lousiest sales job of the century and it's coming home to roost now.
Bush crashes Segway on test ride. Thought that was almost impossible to do after watching all the reporters step right up on it and zip along without incidence. More could be said but I will leave it at that...
http://us.news1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/p/rids/20030612/i/1055454096.3154296905.jpg
White House In Denial
June 13, 2003
White House in Denial
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
Let me give the White House a hand.
Condoleezza Rice was asked on "Meet the Press" on Sunday about a column of mine from May 6 regarding President Bush's reliance on forged documents to claim that Iraq had sought uranium in Africa. That was not just a case of hyping intelligence, but of asserting something that had already been flatly discredited by an envoy investigating at the behest of the office of Vice President Dick Cheney.
Ms. Rice acknowledged that the president's information turned out to be "not credible," but insisted that the White House hadn't realized this until after Mr. Bush had cited it in his State of the Union address.
And now an administration official tells The Washington Post that Mr. Cheney's office first learned of its role in the episode by reading that column of mine. Hmm. I have an offer for Mr. Cheney: I'll tell you everything I know about your activities, if you'll tell me all you know.
To help out Ms. Rice and Mr. Cheney, let me offer some more detail about the uranium saga. Piecing the story together from two people directly involved and three others who were briefed on it, the tale begins at the end of 2001, when third-rate forged documents turned up in West Africa purporting to show the sale by Niger to Iraq of tons of "yellowcake" uranium.
Italy's intelligence service obtained the documents and shared them with British spooks, who passed them on to Washington. Mr. Cheney's office got wind of this and asked the C.I.A. to investigate.
The agency chose a former ambassador to Africa to undertake the mission, and that person flew to Niamey, Niger, in the last week of February 2002. This envoy spent one week in Niger, staying at the Sofitel and discussing his findings with the U.S. ambassador to Niger, and then flew back to Washington via Paris.
Immediately upon his return, in early March 2002, this senior envoy briefed the C.I.A. and State Department and reported that the documents were bogus, for two main reasons. First, the documents seemed phony on their face — for example, the Niger minister of energy and mines who had signed them had left that position years earlier. Second, an examination of Niger's uranium industry showed that an international consortium controls the yellowcake closely, so the Niger government does not have any yellowcake to sell.
Officials now claim that the C.I.A. inexplicably did not report back to the White House with this envoy's findings and reasoning, or with an assessment of its own that the information was false. I hear something different. My understanding is that while Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet may not have told Mr. Bush that the Niger documents were forged, lower C.I.A. officials did tell both the vice president's office and National Security Council staff members. Moreover, I hear from another source that the C.I.A.'s operations side and its counterterrorism center undertook their own investigations of the documents, poking around in Italy and Africa, and also concluded that they were false — a judgment that filtered to the top of the C.I.A.
Meanwhile, the State Department's intelligence arm, the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, independently came to the exact same conclusion about those documents, according to Greg Thielmann, a former official there. Mr. Thielmann said he was "quite confident" that the conclusion had been passed up to the top of the State Department.
"It was well known throughout the intelligence community that it was a forgery," said Melvin Goodman, a former C.I.A. analyst who is now at the Center for International Policy.
Still, Mr. Tenet and the intelligence agencies were under intense pressure to come up with evidence against Iraq. Ambiguities were lost, and doubters were discouraged from speaking up.
"It was a foregone conclusion that every photo of a trailer truck would be a `mobile bioweapons lab' and every tanker truck would be `filled with weaponized anthrax,' " a former military intelligence officer said. "None of the analysts in military uniform had the option to debate the vice president, secretary of defense and the secretary of state."
I don't believe that the president deliberately lied to the public in an attempt to scare Americans into supporting his war. But it does look as if ideologues in the administration deceived themselves about Iraq's nuclear programs — and then deceived the American public as well.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/13/opinion/13KRIS.html?pagewanted=print&position=
>>>>The diplomat went to Niger in February 2002 and spoke with officials, who denied having uranium dealings with Iraq. The information was shared with British officials, and was reported widely within the US government...<<<
But somehow none of the people involved in putting together a state of the union speech focusing on rationales for war with Iraq knew? Am I a Bush basher if I'm skeptical of this?
I flipped on Chris Matthew's Hardball for the first time in months tonight. Chris' guest list for the evening:
Orrin Hatch discussing abortion. Rick Santorum discussing abortion. Peggy Noonan on why she switched from Democrat to Republican followed by Bob Barr who I'm not sure what he talked about. Later on MSNBC, Chris "proud to be a redneck" Scarborough has a full hour to himself to trash gun control and anything else that might contribute to a civilized society. I'd say the liberal media is getting completely out of hand.
>>>Sorry you feel that way Seabass,most intelligent people can carry on a dialogue with others even if they disagree, no problem.<<<
Has nothing to do with disagreement. I'm just tired of your inconsistencies and your tendency to answer difficult questions with another question. That's all.
>>>are they forced to prayer or do they go on their own free will with the given right to worship?<<<
1. Officially, nobody is forced. However, with John "Patriot Act" Ashcroft's overall disposition in mind, would it be a stretch to say that there must be considerable pressure to attend?
2. Your own original claim (with which I agree) was: " Politics belongs in Washington, ones faith at their house of worship". If that's how you feel, then why do you defend Ashcroft's White House worship sessions even if participation is officially voluntary?
3. This is my last response to you. Your message is incoherent at best, disingenuous at worst.
>>>You just don't get it my dear. Politics belongs in Washington, ones faith at their house of worship. Can you grasp that ideal, someone by the name of Jefferson first wrote about it.<<<<
Seems the Bush administration has that concept a bit confused, but I'm sure that's "different"?
Ashcroft Holds Prayer Meetings at White House
Source: The Washington Post
May 14, 2001
WASHINGTON, DC -- The Bible study begins each day at 8 a.m. sharp, with Attorney General John D. Ashcroft presiding, The Washington Post reported.
According to the Post, a group of employees gathers at the Main Justice building in Washington, either in his personal office or a conference room, to study Scripture and join Ashcroft in prayer.
Ashcroft held similar meetings each morning as a United States senator from Missouri and sees the devotionals as a personal matter that has no bearing on his job as attorney general, according to aides.
Spokeswoman Mindy Tucker said Ashcroft wants to "continue to exercise his constitutional right to express his religious faith."
Any employee is welcome, but not required, to attend, his aides said.
But within the massive Justice Department, with about 135,000 employees worldwide, some who do not share Ashcroft's Pentecostal Christian beliefs are discomfited by the daily prayer sessions -- particularly because they are conducted by the nation's chief law enforcement officer, entrusted with enforcing a Constitution that calls for the separation of church and state.
"The purpose of the Department of Justice is to do the business of the government, not to establish a religion," said a Justice attorney, who like other critics was unwilling to be identified by name. "It strikes me and a lot of others as offensive, disrespectful and unconstitutional. . . . It at least blurs the line, and it probably crosses it."
Several aides said many of Ashcroft's top staffers -- including the chief of staff, the deputy chief of staff and the communications director -- have never attended the devotional meetings, nor have they been pressured to do so.
They say that the sessions are open to all Justice employees, Christians or otherwise, and that one of the regular participants is an Orthodox Jew.
The federal government's "Guidelines on Religious Exercise and Religious Expression in the Federal Workplace," issued in 1997 after bipartisan negotiations, say supervisors and department heads must be especially careful with religious activities or statements.
Ashcroft, who is the son and grandson of Assemblies of God ministers, considered a run for the presidency with support from leading Christian conservatives, and has regularly cited God and Scripture in speeches and policy statements. In 1998, Ashcroft said at a Christian Coalition event that "a robed elite have taken the wall of separation designed to protect the church and they have made it a wall of religious oppression."
The next year, he told Bob Jones University graduates that America was founded on religious principles, and "we have no king but Jesus." That statement became the subject of some controversy at his confirmation hearings.
Under Ashcroft, the Justice Department issued new style guidelines for correspondence carrying Ashcroft's signature. They forbid, among other things, the use of "pride," which the Bible calls a sin, and the phrase "no higher calling than public service."
"He's running the department like a church, complete with rituals and forbidden words," said Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. "That is deeply troubling."
Ashcroft refers to his daily devotionals as RAMP meetings -- Read, Argue, Memorize and Pray.
Ashcroft hands each participant a devotional book from a stack he has used for years, Tucker said. The book highlights a Bible verse or passage for each date of the year, and the group spends the first minutes discussing its meaning, according to a participant.
The group then moves on to a memorization, with the goal of committing to memory a psalm or Bible story through repeated readings.
The session ends with a prayer, often including a reference to a relative or acquaintance who is ill or in need.
Many members of Congress and their employees participate in Bible studies, prayer meetings and other religious gatherings. A Christian magazine, Charisma, recently estimated that about 30 Bible study and prayer groups regularly meet on Capitol Hill.
Laura W. Murphy, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Washington office, said Ashcroft is at least violating the spirit of the federal rules on workplace prayer.
"Ashcroft has a right to pray in office, but he does not have a right to implicitly or explicitly force others into praying with him," she said.
"Ashcroft is the chief defender of the nation's civil liberties. He can't pretend to be just another citizen leading prayers," she added.
A career Justice lawyer agrees, calling the devotionals "totally outrageous."
"It feels extremely exclusive, that if you don't participate in that kind of religion, that your career could be affected by it," the attorney said. "If I had some political aspirations and wanted to work for the front office and didn't have the same religious feelings as he does, my non-participation could adversely affect me."
Now More Than Ever: Help The ACLU Turn Back Assaults on Our Freedoms!
© American Civil Liberties Union
125 Broad Street, 18th Floor, New York, NY 10004
http://www.aclu.org/ReligiousLiberty/ReligiousLiberty.cfm?ID=7039&c=37
>>>Could we compare the Average American to an Average Ostrich, sticking his or her Average Head in the sand?
I think we could...<<<<
I think something like that is going on which is why I agree with you that all the questions surrounding the war should not be abandoned. The public may say they don't care now, but I like to think that most Americans are still decent, honest people, and decent honest people don't approve of being tricked into war which may well be the case. We still have troops on the ground in Iraq, making any war related (or Bush related) poll politically useless as they are still tainted by mandatory patriotism. Given time, even Bush will be judged on his merits instead of on Karl Rove's talking points.
>>>Americans like a good picture. And one photograph of an Iraqi child kissing a U.S. soldier is more powerful than two months of debate on the floor of Congress."<<<
Translation: "We here at the republican party recognize that the average American is easily manipulated and we have made a science out of exploiting it". Didn't somebody post a story here about retired Hollywood producers working with the Bush WH?
Who would have guessed? Republicans refuse investigation of WMD intelligence. Just like we didn't need any investigation of 9/11. All we need under GW Bush is lots of faith and patriotism, closed door hearings and positively no dissent or bothersome questions.
GOP Rejects WMD Probe
WASHINGTON, June 11, 2003
Majority Republicans ignored Democratic calls for a full – and public – congressional investigation into the handling of intelligence on Iraq's weapons programs. Instead, lawmakers will hold routine oversight hearings behind closed doors.
"We're going to complete a very thorough review of all the documentation," Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts said Wednesday.
Leading Senate Democrats have called for a more thorough investigation in light of doubts raised about some of the intelligence and the failure so far to find weapons of mass destruction. They want to know whether intelligence on weapons programs was inaccurate or manipulated to make the case for war.
There was new ammunition for critics Wednesday, reports CBS News Chief White House Correspondent John Roberts. In an interview with Britain's Guardian newspaper, the U.N.'s chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix, railed against "bastards" who tried to undermine him.
Blix said some U.S. officials waged a "smear campaign" to discredit him, since no banned weapons have been found in Iraq. And he said the Bush administration "leaned" on his team in the days before launching the war in Iraq.
"There are bastards who spread things around, of course, who planted nasty things in the media. Not that I cared very much," said Blix.
Sensing that the Pentagon's hunt for weapons is going nowhere, the White House said Wednesday it was hiring former weapons inspector David Kay as a special advisor to the new search team.
At the same time, Republicans dismissed as "pure politics" charges the administration "hyped" the intelligence on Iraqi weapons.
Roberts, R-Kan., said some of the Democratic criticism of the handling of the intelligence has "been simply politics and for political gain."
"I will not allow the committee to be politicized or to be used as an unwitting tool for any political strategist," Roberts said.
But Democrats, who claim the White House is pressuring the committee chairs to "put out the fire" on the weapons issue argue that what's at stake is U.S. credibility in the world.
"We have to be able to rely on our own intelligence," said Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., ranking member of the Armed Services Committee. "The world has to be able to rely on our word," Levin said.
The political stakes of any investigation could be high before next year's election if President Bush's primary reason for going to war continues to be called into question. Roberts and other GOP senators said the White House did not attempt to influence their decisions on an investigation.
In fact, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer, traveling with Mr. Bush for a presidential speech in Chicago, said the administration "welcomes the review."
"We always work together with Congress on dealing with the threat of Iraqi possession of WMD," he said. "And we'll continue to work with Congress on the facts that led previous administrations, Democrats and Republicans alike, to know he (Saddam) had WMD."
"This is an important part of Congress' oversight and we welcome it," Fleischer said.
Roberts said his committee will evaluate prewar intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and its connection to terrorist groups. It will examine whether the findings were reasonable and accurate. The CIA has begun submitting details of the intelligence that supported administration claims on Iraq's weapons programs.
Roberts said closed-door hearings will begin next week and "when the committee deems it appropriate, we will make whatever public statements that are necessary." The Senate Armed Services Committee has already begun closed-door hearings on the intelligence issue.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/05/31/iraq/main556375.shtml
>>>just my opinion, yayaa should be ignored ..only then will it go away<<<
I agree. A complete waste of time and bandwidth.
>>>>Ergo, When does your space ship fpr Mars depart! LOL<<<<
Pretty lame response to a legitimate question. Are you concerned about human rights in general or only where George Bush says it matters? In case you haven't noticed, this newfound concern for human rights among republicans just happened to coincide with the failure to find 500 tons of nerve gas and Saddam Hussein's nuclear arsenal. Just so you know where the cynicism originates...
>>>>This has to be the most complacent market in history,<<<<
Warnings from MOT, NOK & TXN, accounting probes at IBM and FRE - all within a week and a market that's more overbought than at the peak of the bubble SHRUGS. Unreal...
http://stockcharts.com/def/servlet/SC.web?c=$BPSPX,uu[w,a]mjclyyay[pf][vc60][iut!Ui!La!Lb!Lm!Lk]&...
Pinter blasts 'Nazi America' and 'deluded idiot' Blair
Angelique Chrisafis and Imogen Tilden
Wednesday June 11, 2003
The Guardian
The playwright Harold Pinter last night likened George W Bush's administration to Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany, saying the US was charging towards world domination while the American public and Britain's "mass-murdering" prime minister sat back and watched.
Pinter, 72, was at the National Theatre in London to read from War, a new collection of his anti-war poetry that had been published in the press in response to events in Iraq.
In conversation on stage with Michael Billington, the Guardian's theatre critic, Pinter said the US government was the most dangerous power that had ever existed.
The American detention centre in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where al-Qaida and Taliban suspects were being held, was a concentration camp.
The US population had to accept responsibility for allowing an unelected president to take power and the British were exhausted from protesting and being ignored by Tony Blair, a "deluded idiot" Pinter hoped would resign.
After a big operation for cancer, Pinter returned to public life last year to speak out against American belligerence. He called it a return from a "personal nightmare" to an "infinitely more pervasive public nightmare".
The playwright said: "The US is really beyond reason now. It is beyond our imagining to know what they are going to do next and what they are prepared to do. There is only one comparison: Nazi Germany.
"Nazi Germany wanted total domination of Europe and they nearly did it. The US wants total domination of the world and is about to consolidate that.
"In a policy document, the US has used the term 'full-spectrum domination', that means control of land, sea, air and space, and that is exactly what's intended and what the US wants to fulfil. They are quite blatant about it."
Pinter blamed "millions of totally deluded American people" for not staging a mass revolt.
He said that because of propaganda and control of the media, millions of Americans believed that every word Mr Bush said was "accurate and moral".
The US population could not be let off scot-free for putting the country under the control of an "illegally elected president - in other words, a fake".
He asked: "What objections have there been in the US to Guantanamo Bay? At this very moment there are 700 people chained, padlocked, handcuffed, hooded and treated like animals. It is actually a concentration camp.
"I haven't heard anything about the US population saying: 'We can't do this, we are Americans.' Nobody gives a damn. And nor does Tony Blair." Pinter added: "Blair sees himself as a representative of moral rectitude. He is actually a mass murderer. But we forget that - we are as much victims of delusions as Americans are."
In a British society where people were increasingly encouraged not to use their brains, the only way to protest was by "thought, intelligence and solidarity".
· Michael Billington was last night voted theatre critic of the year in a survey of theatregoers for the website whatsonstage.com.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2003
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,975048,00.html
yayaa.....>>>>Are you not proud of what our country has accomplished or would you prefer to allow a tyrant to spread hatered and death.<<<<
The pride, what's left of it, is wearing thin as the real possibility of intentional deception grows by the day. A war worth fighting and a war worth sacrificing American lives over should easily stand the test of the truthful reason for fighting it. Instead, the case for war was made with cheap forgeries, outright misrepresentation of facts and borderline extortion tactics by the White House as reported by CIA officials. I don't know that this country has a history of taking pride in such behavior by our leaders so why start now?
"It would make no sense to suppose that a neutral or non-governmental entity would go to the trouble and expense of falsifying documentation and then convincing "a number of states" to deliver that evidence to the I.A.E.A. Quite clearly, the more one thinks about this intrigue, the more obvious it becomes that someone was responsible for a deliberate intelligence disinformation campaign targeting the United Nations with an aim toward padding the evidence supporting an American-British invasion of Iraq. That is a world-class criminal act, a felony of historic proportions, by any definition."
http://www.counterpunch.org/close03102003.html
yayaa.....this was your original challenge:
>>>I think you do an injustice to political adversaries of Pres. Bush when you bring into question his truthfulness. No leaders I have ever read have questioned this. If you can show me evidence of his willful deception I'll send you the address of the DNC.<<<<
I responded with three references to what many call willful deception and some call outright lies by Bush and you got busy tapdancing. I know you're a proud citizen and I know you're proud of Bush. Now, would you please follow up on the subject you yourself started? If the references provided don't describe willful deception on Bush's part, then what would you like to call it?
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0927-08.htm
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0314/schanberg.php
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fc%2Fa%2F2003%2F01%2F24%2FMN163516.DTL
yayaa....>>>International Atomic Reg Agency??? As bad as the U.N. imho.<<<
I take it that's your translation of the "International Atomic Energy Agency" which you also feel can't be trusted? Why then has the Bush administration referred to them repeatedly when presenting war related "evidence"? And what about pointing to amateurishly forged documents for another reason to go to war? That's ok too? Your posture is a familiar one from rightwing fantasyland - if it's critical of GW Bush, it can't be true.
Yohoo yayaa..!! Post # 19701 is just for you.....just what you asked for. You must have missed it...
>>>>I think you do an injustice to political adversaries of Pres. Bush when you bring into question his truthfulness. No leaders I have ever read have questioned this. If you can show me evidence of his willful deception I'll send you the address of the DNC.<<<<
I must have posted these links ten times over to Bush apologists like yourself. Each time they are conveniently ignored with silence or explained away as "innocent mistakes". President Bush in his state of the union address referred to documents long known to be forgeries as evidence of an active nuclear weapons program in Iraq. In another speech, once again a nuclear scare, he referred to an IAEA report that the agency itself says never existed. I'm both reasonable and fair, so please help me understand why this should not be considered deceptive:
"The International Atomic Energy Agency says that a report cited by President Bush as evidence that Iraq in 1998 was "six months away" from developing a nuclear weapon does not exist."
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0927-08.htm
"Bush used it as ammunition in his 2003 State of the Union speech on January 28. Powell did the same in his speech to the UN on February 5, seeking broader support for military action. There was only one problem with the documents. They were forgeries."
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0314/schanberg.php
"When President Bush traveled to the United Nations in September to make his case against Iraq, he brought along a rare piece of evidence for what he called Iraq's "continued appetite" for nuclear bombs. The finding: Iraq had tried to buy thousands of high-strength aluminum tubes, which Bush said were "used to enrich uranium for a nuclear weapon."........But according to government officials and weapons experts, the claim now appears to be seriously in doubt."
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fc%2Fa%2F2003%2F01%2F24%2FMN163516.DTL
Experts say mobile labs not likely weapons labs.
June 7, 2003
Some Analysts of Iraq Trailers Reject Germ Use
By JUDITH MILLER and WILLIAM J. BROAD
American and British intelligence analysts with direct access to the evidence are disputing claims that the mysterious trailers found in Iraq were for making deadly germs. In interviews over the last week, they said the mobile units were more likely intended for other purposes and charged that the evaluation process had been damaged by a rush to judgment.
"Everyone has wanted to find the 'smoking gun' so much that they may have wanted to have reached this conclusion," said one intelligence expert who has seen the trailers and, like some others, spoke on condition that he not be identified. He added, "I am very upset with the process."
The Bush administration has said the two trailers, which allied forces found in Iraq in April and May, are evidence that Saddam Hussein was hiding a program for biological warfare. In a white paper last week, it publicly detailed its case, even while conceding discrepancies in the evidence and a lack of hard proof.
Now, intelligence analysts stationed in the Middle East, as well as in the United States and Britain, are disclosing serious doubts about the administration's conclusions in what appears to be a bitter debate within the intelligence community. Skeptics said their initial judgments of a weapon application for the trailers had faltered as new evidence came to light.
Bill Harlow, a spokesman for the Central Intelligence Agency, said the dissenters "are entitled to their opinion, of course, but we stand behind the assertions in the white paper."
In all, at least three teams of Western experts have now examined the trailers and evidence from them. While the first two groups to see the trailers were largely convinced that the vehicles were intended for the purpose of making germ agents, the third group of more senior analysts divided sharply over the function of the trailers, with several members expressing strong skepticism, some of the dissenters said.
In effect, early conclusions by agents on the ground that the trailers were indeed mobile units to produce germs for weapons have since been challenged.
"I have no great confidence that it's a fermenter," a senior analyst with long experience in unconventional arms said of a tank for multiplying seed germs into lethal swarms. The government's public report, he added, "was a rushed job and looks political." This analyst had not seen the trailers himself, but reviewed evidence from them.
The skeptical experts said the mobile plants lacked gear for steam sterilization, normally a prerequisite for any kind of biological production, peaceful or otherwise. Its lack of availability between production runs would threaten to let in germ contaminants, resulting in failed weapons.
Second, if this shortcoming were somehow circumvented, each unit would still produce only a relatively small amount of germ-laden liquid, which would have to undergo further processing at some other factory unit to make it concentrated and prepare it for use as a weapon.
Finally, they said, the trailers have no easy way for technicians to remove germ fluids from the processing tank.
Senior intelligence officials in Washington rebutted the skeptics, saying, for instance, that the Iraqis might have obtained the needed steam for sterilization from a separate supply truck.
The skeptics noted further that the mobile plants had a means of easily extracting gas. Iraqi scientists have said the trailers were used to produce hydrogen for weather balloons. While the white paper dismisses that as a cover story, some analysts see the Iraqi explanation as potentially credible.
A senior administration official conceded that "some analysts give the hydrogen claim more credence." But he asserted that the majority still linked the Iraqi trailers to germ weapons.
The depth of dissent is hard to gauge. Even if it turns out to be a minority view, which seems likely, the skepticism is significant given the image of consensus that Washington has projected and the political reliance the administration has come to place on the mobile units. At the recent summit meeting with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, President Bush cited the trailers as evidence of illegal Iraqi arms.
Critics seem likely to cite the internal dispute as further reason for an independent evaluation of the Iraqi trailers. Since the war's end, the White House has come under heavy political pressure because American soldiers have found no unconventional arms, a main rationale for the invasion of Iraq.
Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, who also used Iraqi illicit weapons as a chief justification of the war, has been repeatedly attacked on this question in Parliament and outside it.
Experts described the debate as intense despite the American intelligence agencies' release last week of the nuanced, carefully qualified white paper concluding that the mobile units were most likely part of Iraq's biowarfare program. It was posted May 28 on the Internet at www.cia.gov.
"We are in full agreement on it," an official said of the Central Intelligence Agency and the Defense Intelligence Agency at a briefing on the white paper.
The six-page report, "Iraqi Mobile Biological Warfare Agent Production Plants," called discovery of the trailers "the strongest evidence to date that Iraq was hiding a biological warfare program."
A senior administration official said the White House had not put pressure on the intelligence community in any way on the content of its white paper, or on the timing of its release.
In interviews, the intelligence analysts disputing its conclusions focused on the lack of steam sterilization gear for the central processing tank, which the white paper calls a fermenter for germ multiplication.
In theory, the dissenting analysts added, the Iraqis could have sterilized the tank with harsh chemicals rather than steam. But they said that would require a heavy wash afterward with sterile water to remove any chemical residue - a feat judged difficult for a mobile unit presumably situated somewhere in the Iraqi desert.
William C. Patrick III, a senior official in the germ warfare program that Washington renounced in 1969, said the lack of steam sterilization had caused him to question the germ-plant theory that he had once tentatively endorsed. "That's a huge minus," he said. "I don't see how you can clean those tanks chemically."
Three senior intelligence officials in Washington, responding to the criticisms during a group interview on Tuesday, said the Iraqis could have used a separate mobile unit to supply steam to the trailer. Some Iraqi decontamination units, they said, have such steam generators.
The officials also said some types of chemical sterilization were feasible without drastic follow-up actions.
Finally, they proposed that the Iraqis might have engineered anthrax or other killer germs for immunity to antibiotics, and then riddled germ food in the trailers with such potent drugs. That, they said, would be a clever way to grow lethal bacteria and selectively decontaminate the equipment at the same time - though the officials conceded that they had no evidence the Iraqis had used such advanced techniques.
On the second issue, the officials disputed the claim that the mobile units could make only small amounts of germ-laden liquids. If the trailers brewed up germs in high concentrations, they said, every month one truck could make enough raw material to fill five R-400 bombs.
Finally, the officials countered the claim that the trailers had no easy way for technicians to drain germ concoctions from the processing tank. The fluids could go down a pipe at its bottom, they said. While the pipe is small in diameter - too small to work effectively, some analysts hold - the officials said high pressure from an air compressor on the trailer could force the tank to drain in 10 or 20 minutes.
A senior official said "we've considered these objections" and dismissed them as having no bearing on the overall conclusions of the white paper. He added that Iraq, which declared several classes of mobile vehicles to the United Nations, never said anything about hydrogen factories.
Some doubters noted that the intelligence community was still scrambling to analyze the trailers, suggesting that the white paper may have been premature. They said laboratories in the Middle East and the United States were now analyzing more than 100 samples from the trailers to verify the intelligence findings. Allied forces, they noted, have so far failed to find any of the envisioned support vehicles that the trailers would need to produce biological weapons.
One skeptic questioned the practicality of some of the conjectural steps the Iraqis are envisioned as having taken to adapt the trailers to the job of making deadly germs.
"It's not built and designed as a standard fermenter," he said of the central tank. "Certainly, if you modify it enough you could use it. But that's true of any tin can."
The reporting for this article was carried out by Judith Miller in Iraq and Kuwait and by William Broad in New York. Her agreement with the Pentagon, for an "embedded" assignment, allowed the military to review her copy to prevent breaches of troop protection and security. No changes were made in the review.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/07/international/worldspecial/07TRAI.html?th
Mlsoft...yes, the perjury case is closed but that's not what I referred to. Let me repeat:
"Lots of foolish and unfair republicans across the country per your definition as I still haven't seen concrete evidence of either mass murder, rape or fraud."
The accusations mentioned above were flying long before the grand jury hearing and the impeachment circus and still are for that matter. So I ask again: Were and are republicans accusing Clinton of mass murder, rape and fraud foolish and unfair?
>>>Is it logical or right for folks to be "outraged" over something that is merely "possible"???
Why don't they back their accusations up with concrete evidence before getting "outraged" - to do otherwise is both foolish and unfair to the accused.<<<
You mean like outraged republicans backed up all their accusations of Clinton with concrete evidence for 8 years? Lots of foolish and unfair republicans across the country per your definition as I still haven't seen concrete evidence of either mass murder, rape or fraud.
And naturally, Tom Delay is mentioned. If there's a bigger creep in Washington than this guy, I'd sure like to know who that would be. Whenever there's political extortion, corruption, unconscionable legislation or sleaze in general, Tom Delay is never far away. Enron's Clifford Baxter was found with a bullet in his head blocks from Tom Delay's Sugarland home just days prior to the Enron hearings. And he personally dispatched the gone squad that stormed the 2000 election Miami recount headquarters. More recently, he used Homeland Security personnel to settle the Texas dispute between GOP and democratic house members. A fine, fine man the republican party has elevated to one of Washington's top positions.
>>>Ridiculous, isn't it, and it's no wonder lying has become not only common place but expected.<<<
And tolerated by the public except of course if it's about sex. The British are revolting over the possibility that they were deceived into war. Here, under identical circumstances, Americans say - so what? What does complete indifference to lies about reasons for war say about the integrity of Americans, and do we really need to give the world more reasons to hate our guts?
"The war in Iraq has sent support for the United States to new lows in Muslim countries and significantly damaged the standing of the United Nations in those nations and elsewhere, according to a survey released Tuesday."
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/06/03/world/main556771.shtml
>>>Anyone remember the last time Bush held a press conference? Heaven forbid he should answer questions from reporters!<<<
The last one was about a month ago. Carefully scripted and by invitation only for reporters. In other words, reporters known to ask provocative questions not suitable for a good photo-op were not invited. How's that for a free country - the government decides who can report political news.
>>>In the meantime the 3rd axis if evil is coming into focus:<<<
Coming into focus? Poll after poll prior to the Iraq war showed the American people more concerned about North Korea than Iraq by an almost 2 to 1 margin. It's "coming into focus" now exactly as many predicted which is in the form of the next wave of terror that will keep voters in line right up to the 2004 election and distract from any Iraq "mistakes". If NK alone won't do it, Iran can always be added for amplification. Nothing new here whatsoever.
>>>The only way Bush will be hurt by this is if the Iraq situation turns dangerous for Americans<<<
It did the moment the war started. Muslims hate us with more intensity than ever, making terrorist the profession of choice for increasing numbers.
"Dislike of the United States has really deepened and spread throughout the Muslim world," said Andrew Kohut, director of the Pew Research Center that oversaw polling."
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/06/03/world/main556771.shtml
>>if Americans keep losing lives over there,<<<
They are.
>>>if order isn't restored,<<<
It isn't.
>>>if the Iraqis aren't properly "grateful" for our intervention,<<<
Many are not, which is why they keep killing our servicemen.
>>>and the mideast situation blows up.<<<
Three suicide bombings in three days recently, or was it four?
>>>And Bush claimed to be the guy who could work with people, the "compassionate" conservative who could bring people together,<<<
Has the country and the world ever been more divided than under Bush's watch? War and terror are the only things that bring Americans together these days - none of which reflects on Bush's ability to unite the way he promised during his campaign.
Even in the United States, Blair comes out ahead of Mr. Bush.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/06/03/world/main556771.shtml
>>>Yet, as of this writing, Bush has paid no price for his Iraq deceptions. Two-thirds of the public, according to polls, approve of how he handled the war.<<<
Is it possible that the common man has gotten so spooked over terrorism, all the government powers afforded by the patriot act, John Ashcroft and republican patriotism propaganda in general that many don't have the guts to answer candidly to questions about Bush when asked over the phone? I sure as heck don't sense a 66% approval rating of Bush when I'm out and about where people speak their mind.
>>>I believe this is the violation:
160 new centrifuges in Natanz in central Iran, part of a massive uranium enrichment plant due for completion in 2005; the plant will leave Iran capable of producing enough uranium for several nuclear bombs a year<<<
I guess it could be a violation as long as enriched uranium has one use only - nuclear weapons production. I think it has other legitimate applications but I'm not sure.
hap.....Last I heard, Iran is bound by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty which they signed (as opposed to Israel, India and Pakistan). Per the definition below, how is Iran in violation (so far)?
"Non-nuclear-weapon States Parties undertake not to acquire or produce nuclear weapons or nuclear explosive devices. They are required also to accept safeguards to detect diversions of nuclear materials from peaceful activities, such as power generation, to the production of nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices. This must be done in accordance with an individual safeguards agreement, concluded between each non-nuclear-weapon State Party and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Under these agreements, all nuclear materials in peaceful civil facilities under the jurisdiction of the state must be declared to the IAEA, whose inspectors have routine access to the facilities for periodic monitoring and inspections. If information from routine inspections is not sufficient to fulfill its responsibilities, the IAEA may consult with the state regarding special inspections within or outside declared facilities."
http://www.fas.org/nuke/control/npt/
>>>Last week Richard Perle was on PBS saying that the *real* reason for the Iraq war was so we could get our troops out of Saui Arabia. Huh?<<<
The arrogance of this administration just takes your breath away. Not even when dragging the country (and the world) into the most controversial conflict in recent history do they feel obligated to deliver a coherent message on their reasons and motives.
Paul Wolfowitz: Iraq was about oil
Is Karl Rove on vacation? Seems some of the WH clowns aren't getting their talking points as they should. One blooper after the next:
"...the deputy defence minister said: "Let's look at it simply. The most important difference between North Korea and Iraq is that economically, we just had no choice in Iraq. The country swims on a sea of oil."
Wolfowitz: Iraq war was about oil
George Wright
Wednesday June 4, 2003
The Guardian
Oil was the main reason for military action against Iraq, a leading White House hawk has claimed, confirming the worst fears of those opposed to the US-led war.
The US deputy defence secretary, Paul Wolfowitz - who has already undermined Tony Blair's position over weapons of mass destruction (WMD) by describing them as a "bureaucratic" excuse for war - has now gone further by claiming the real motive was that Iraq is "swimming" in oil.
The latest comments were made by Mr Wolfowitz in an address to delegates at an Asian security summit in Singapore at the weekend, and reported today by German newspapers Der Tagesspiegel and Die Welt.
Asked why a nuclear power such as North Korea was being treated differently from Iraq, where hardly any weapons of mass destruction had been found, the deputy defence minister said: "Let's look at it simply. The most important difference between North Korea and Iraq is that economically, we just had no choice in Iraq. The country swims on a sea of oil."
Mr Wolfowitz went on to tell journalists at the conference that the US was set on a path of negotiation to help defuse tensions between North Korea and its neighbours - in contrast to the more belligerent attitude the Bush administration displayed in its dealings with Iraq.
His latest comments follow his widely reported statement from an interview in Vanity Fair last month, in which he said that "for reasons that have a lot to do with the US government bureaucracy, we settled on the one issue that everyone could agree on: weapons of mass destruction."
Prior to that, his boss, defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld, had already undermined the British government's position by saying Saddam Hussein may have destroyed his banned weapons before the war.
Mr Wolfowitz's frank assessment of the importance of oil could not come at a worse time for the US and UK governments, which are both facing fierce criticism at home and abroad over allegations that they exaggerated the threat posed by Saddam Hussein in order to justify the war.
Amid growing calls from all parties for a public inquiry, the foreign affairs select committee announced last night it would investigate claims that the UK government misled the country over its evidence of Iraq's WMD.
The move is a major setback for Tony Blair, who had hoped to contain any inquiry within the intelligence and security committee, which meets in secret and reports to the prime minister.
In the US, the failure to find solid proof of chemical, biological and nuclear arms in Iraq has raised similar concerns over Mr Bush's justification for the war and prompted calls for congressional investigations.
Mr Wolfowitz is viewed as one of the most hawkish members of the Bush administration. The 57-year old expert in international relations was a strong advocate of military action against Afghanistan and Iraq.
Following the September 11 terror attacks on the World Trade Centre and Pentagon, Mr Wolfowitz pledged that the US would pursue terrorists and "end" states' harbouring or sponsoring of militants.
Prior to his appointment to the Bush cabinet in February 2001, Mr Wolfowitz was dean and professor of international relations at the Paul H Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), of the Johns Hopkins University.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2003
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,970331,00.html
>>>your insight into the minds of the administration to highlight the lying is needed for evil #2:<<<
One collection of lies at a time please. We haven't sorted out the "mistakes" made in building the case for war with Iraq yet so I have to assume you bring up North Korea now for one reason only: To distract.
Mlsoft. You are being very generous to both Bush & Blair with your excuses and explanations. Sure, those are possibilities, but should we not expect a bit more research, confirmation and accuracy when the leader of the world's only superpower makes his case for war in the most notorious powder keg of the world? I don't want to think about what this country would be going through right now had a democratic president presented bogus proof for a war that killed 170 servicemen (and counting).
>>>Do you really think Bush lied about WMD's?? That takes a bizarre leap of faith where logic is totally left behind.<<<
"The International Atomic Energy Agency says that a report cited by President Bush as evidence that Iraq in 1998 was "six months away" from developing a nuclear weapon does not exist."
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0927-08.htm
"Bush used it as ammunition in his 2003 State of the Union speech on January 28. Powell did the same in his speech to the UN on February 5, seeking broader support for military action. There was only one problem with the documents. They were forgeries."
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0314/schanberg.php
"When President Bush traveled to the United Nations in September to make his case against Iraq, he brought along a rare piece of evidence for what he called Iraq's "continued appetite" for nuclear bombs. The finding: Iraq had tried to buy thousands of high-strength aluminum tubes, which Bush said were "used to enrich uranium for a nuclear weapon."........But according to government officials and weapons experts, the claim now appears to be seriously in doubt."
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fc%2Fa%2F2003%2F01%2F24%2FMN163516.DTL
>>>"By both these standards, the current President Bush would have to be judged one of the more honest politicians of our time. He's untouched by scandal, and he keeps his promises. He said he'd cut taxes, and he did."<<<
Hard to take a cheerleading column like that seriously but I guess some people do. Of course he kept his promise to cut taxes. Did anyone say he didn't? That's not the lie. The lie was his assurances that the tax cut would benefit all Americans who paid taxes. And do I really need to post Bush's pre-war lies about WMD related proof again or quote (again) his claim to reporters that two rusty trucks were the WMD's they have been looking for? The fact that Bush remains "untouched by scandal" has nothing to do with honesty and integrity but has everything to do with a nation paralyzed by fear and a press whipped into submission by an administration who does not take kindly to "unpatriotic" reporters. I am 100% sure something will blow up in this president's face in dramatic fashion. I have no idea what it will be or how long it will take, but the company he keeps, the style he insists on and the policies he rams down our throats assures it. I'm patient and I don't mind waiting.
>>>They have lines for everything. They are brilliant at spin.<<<
I disagree. The spin is incredibly transparent for the most part. Cheap slogans and platitudes mixed with outright lies. What makes it work is a gullible, ignorant audience.
Paul Krugman turns up the heat:
"The public was told that Saddam posed an imminent threat. If that claim was fraudulent, the selling of the war is arguably the worst scandal in American political history — worse than Watergate, worse than Iran-contra. Indeed, the idea that we were deceived into war makes many commentators so uncomfortable that they refuse to admit the possibility."
June 3, 2003
Standard Operating Procedure
By PAUL KRUGMAN
The mystery of Iraq's missing weapons of mass destruction has become a lot less mysterious. Recent reports in major British newspapers and three major American news magazines, based on leaks from angry intelligence officials, back up the sources who told my colleague Nicholas Kristof that the Bush administration "grossly manipulated intelligence" about W.M.D.'s.
And anyone who talks about an "intelligence failure" is missing the point. The problem lay not with intelligence professionals, but with the Bush and Blair administrations. They wanted a war, so they demanded reports supporting their case, while dismissing contrary evidence.
In Britain, the news media have not been shy about drawing the obvious implications, and the outrage has not been limited to war opponents. The Times of London was ardently pro-war; nonetheless, it ran an analysis under the headline "Lie Another Day." The paper drew parallels between the selling of the war and other misleading claims: "The government is seen as having `spun' the threat from Saddam's weapons just as it spins everything else."
Yet few have made the same argument in this country, even though "spin" is far too mild a word for what the Bush administration does, all the time. Suggestions that the public was manipulated into supporting an Iraq war gain credibility from the fact that misrepresentation and deception are standard operating procedure for this administration, which — to an extent never before seen in U.S. history — systematically and brazenly distorts the facts.
Am I exaggerating? Even as George Bush stunned reporters by declaring that we have "found the weapons of mass destruction," the Republican National Committee declared that the latest tax cut benefits "everyone who pays taxes." That is simply a lie. You've heard about those eight million children denied any tax break by a last-minute switcheroo. In total, 50 million American households — including a majority of those with members over 65 — get nothing; another 20 million receive less than $100 each. And a great majority of those left behind do pay taxes.
And the bald-faced misrepresentation of an elitist tax cut offering little or nothing to most Americans is only the latest in a long string of blatant misstatements. Misleading the public has been a consistent strategy for the Bush team on issues ranging from tax policy and Social Security reform to energy and the environment. So why should we give the administration the benefit of the doubt on foreign policy?
It's long past time for this administration to be held accountable. Over the last two years we've become accustomed to the pattern. Each time the administration comes up with another whopper, partisan supporters — a group that includes a large segment of the news media — obediently insist that black is white and up is down. Meanwhile the "liberal" media report only that some people say that black is black and up is up. And some Democratic politicians offer the administration invaluable cover by making excuses and playing down the extent of the lies.
If this same lack of accountability extends to matters of war and peace, we're in very deep trouble. The British seem to understand this: Max Hastings, the veteran war correspondent — who supported Britain's participation in the war — writes that "the prime minister committed British troops and sacrificed British lives on the basis of a deceit, and it stinks."
It's no answer to say that Saddam was a murderous tyrant. I could point out that many of the neoconservatives who fomented this war were nonchalant, or worse, about mass murders by Central American death squads in the 1980's. But the important point is that this isn't about Saddam: it's about us. The public was told that Saddam posed an imminent threat. If that claim was fraudulent, the selling of the war is arguably the worst scandal in American political history — worse than Watergate, worse than Iran-contra. Indeed, the idea that we were deceived into war makes many commentators so uncomfortable that they refuse to admit the possibility.
But here's the thought that should make those commentators really uncomfortable. Suppose that this administration did con us into war. And suppose that it is not held accountable for its deceptions, so Mr. Bush can fight what Mr. Hastings calls a "khaki election" next year. In that case, our political system has become utterly, and perhaps irrevocably, corrupted.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/03/opinion/03KRUG.html