Say Anything Blog

Rob
howard dean is a fine representative of the far left dimmycrats! Leave him alone!
If he wants to put out the message that the dimmycratic party thinks the people are too stupid to understand what’s going on, let him. It goes with the continued spinfeeding of the news the msm is practicing. That’s not working for them and we are seeing the results. I like howard right where he’s at!

Once again, jadegoldwhatever, you prove yourself to be an ass! Do you work in the msm? You sound like it. Keep underestimating the American people. While I believe in keeping things as simple as possible, Dean is implying an inability for people to understand the issues. They understood enough of the boy kerry to send him packing! The msm and the left are losing the ability to spoon feed what they think we should know. It’s driving them crazy!

maxx:  The fact is it is impossible to underestimate the American people. 

Karl Rove has been highly successful at it.  After all, 45% of Americans went to the polls in 2004 believing Saddam Hussein was involved with 9/11.

Rob averages 1 or 2 posts a week on this site that makes some claim Iraq has/had/moved WMDs.

On another post, Rob has suggested states should be allowed to have segregation if they so desire.

Dean is exactly right.

The sad truth is most Americans are incapable of understanding complex issues and the fact such issues often require complex solutions.

It’s much easier to think in terms of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ and to pretend all issues fit neatly on one side or the other.

Saddam supported terrorism. that we know to be true. The training camps have been documented. One with a plane for practicing highjackings.Nidal and al zarquari were in iraq prior to the war! Did saddam have first hand knowledge of or actively participate in 9-11? I doubt it. He did rejoice in it, though! We know he had WMD, we know he used it! If he got rid of them why did he feel the need to bribe inspectors and if he had nothing to hide why did he obstruct the inspectors. How would he benefit from destroying them and then not proving to the world he had done so?
I don’t recall the segregation issue you mention so I’ll refrain form discussing it.

[...] nius that is called Rove.  Let it Bleed has more thoughts (and a great blog tag line), and Say Anything makes this observation:  One sure way to remain the minority party [...]

Maxx: You’re Karl Rove’s bread and butter: the folks who can’t and won’t look at facts.

State your facts, asshole! I’m tired of your rhetoric!

Maxx: WHAT FACTS?

Just what Rove counts on. Folk who don’t want to know the facts.

Maxx: Reread what I wrote.  I didn’t say Saddam and links to terrorism.  I wrote Saddam and 9/11.

The fact you’re still trying to prove a link between Saddam and terrorism when the 9/11 Commission and CIA have both stated there wasn’t such a link speaks volumes as to the problem of the uneducated voter.

jadegoldwhatever: His support and funding of terrorism is proven. His dealings with osama’s thugs have been shown to at least be possible especially in light of al zarquai being there prior to the war. The man was a scumbag and now he is in prison awaiting trial by the people he terrorized. You reread what I wrote and come accross with intelligient answers regarding WMD

Actually, jadegoldwhatever, I’ve been a democrat most of my life. Today I am just me.
WHAT FACTS?

Simply because there are people out there who you believe are wrong, JG, does not make them stupid.

Can you not even conceed that there is a reasonable argument to be made that Saddam did in fact have WMDs and we either haven’t found them or they were in fact moved, without necessecerily subscribing to the theory?

Or are you too blindly partisan to even think about anything other than BUSH LIED!!!!

Jadegold:

“It’s much easier to think in terms of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ and to pretend all issues fit neatly on one side or the other.”

The entire notion that it’s somehow “easier” to think in terms of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ is blatant nonsense. In fact, I find it much easier to come up with this extenuating circumstance and that possible exception to the rule.  What you’re advocating is actually the EASIEST way to think.  It is NOT “easy” to finally grow up enough to realize that there ARE evil people in the world who will stab you in the back no matter how “nice” and rational you are towards them.  That is the HARD view to accept, the view that requires growing up.  The fact that YOU find it so hard to accept should prove that.

And NO ONE ‘pretends’ that all issues are on one side or the other.  To claim that anyone DOES think this way on every issue is hogwash, to put it in ‘family forum’ language.  That is pure political hackery.

“The fact is it is impossible to underestimate the American people.”

Then why do liberals do exactly that routinely?  This is precisely the reason they keep losing elections.  You don’t win elections in this country by insulting more than half the people.

“Karl Rove has been highly successful at it. After all, 45% of Americans went to the polls in 2004 believing Saddam Hussein was involved with 9/11.”

Guess what?  Some of us STILL think Saddam was involved with 9/11.  SOME of us actually REMEMBER the reports that certain funds the 19 highjackers--yes, most of whom were Saudis-- had available were never successfully tracked down, and that Muhammed Atta was seen meeting with IRAQI OFFICIALS in Europe on numerous occasions.  What was he getting in the envelopes he was being passed?  Money, maybe?  Bulgarian intelligence seemed to believe that to be the case.

Are you actually dumb enough to believe that Iraqi officials were meeting a member of Al Qaida and Saddam didn’t know about it??? Saddam was a run-amuck CONTROL freak, fer cryin’ out loud!!!

Do I think Saddam was sitting at the planning table when 9/11 was originally dreamt up?  Hell, no!  Do I think Saddam had something to do with financing it?  Absolutely!!!

To think that Saddam had something to do with 9/11 does not, in any way, imply that he was central to the plot.  Nor is this a “dumb” idea.  I think he had a role like that of the auto mechanic who knowingly rigs a bank robber’s car for a rapid take-off because he’s, say, ticked off at the police for some reason.

Rob averages 1 or 2 posts a week on this site that makes some claim Iraq has/had/moved WMDs.

Uh huh.  And I very clearly remember Colin Powell at the UN showing satellite photos of a fleet of trucks moving from a known WMD site to Syria just before the invasion.

So what the hell was Saddam so anxious to move from a known WMD site, and why did it take so many trucks? 

Jadegold… YOU explain what Saddam hid in Syria.  We all saw the satellite photos of the trucks moving.  Can YOU come up with an alternate scenario that explains a fleet of trucks moving from a known WMD site to Syria?  I can’t wait to read THAT one!

Mamapj:  Basically, your screed can be boiled down to ‘I don’t care what the facts are’.

Yes, there are evil people in the world.  But the fact is we’re happy to do business with them and ignore their evildoings if it’s convenient for us.

Pakistan?  Why, we couldn’t be bigger allies and buddies with them.  Yet, they sold nuclear technology and material to everyone and anyone.  And their intelligence services are practically branch offices of Al Qaeda.

Why, just this morning we learned No. Korea sold uranium hexafluoride to Pakistan--who, in turn, sold it to Libya.

As for Colin Powell’s UN presentation--here’s a fact-check:

http://editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1971092

Excerpt:

ALUMINUM TUBES: Powell said “most United States experts” believed aluminum tubes sought by Iraq were intended for use as centrifuge cylinders for enriching uranium for nuclear bombs.
Energy Department experts and Powell’s own State Department intelligence bureau had already dissented from this CIA view… No centrifuge program has been reported found.

REVIVED NUCLEAR PROGRAM: “We have no indication that Saddam Hussein has ever abandoned his nuclear weapons program,” Powell said.

On July 24, Foreign Minister Ana Palacio of Spain, a U.S. ally on Iraq, said there was “no evidence, no proof” of a nuclear bomb program before the war. No such evidence has been reported found since the invasion.

DECONTAMINATION VEHICLES: At two sites, Powell said trucks were “decontamination vehicles” associated with chemical weapons.

Nothing has been reported found since… Norwegian inspector Jorn Siljeholm told AP on March 19 that “decontamination vehicles” U.N. teams were led to by U.S. information invariably turned out to be water or fire trucks.

BIOWEAPONS TRAILERS: Powell said defectors had told of “biological weapons factories” on trucks and in train cars. He displayed artists’ conceptions of such vehicles.

After the invasion, U.S. authorities said they found two such truck trailers in Iraq, and the CIA said it concluded they were part of a bioweapons production line. But no trace of biological agents was found on them, Iraqis said the equipment made hydrogen for weather balloons, and State Department intelligence balked at the CIA’s conclusion.

DESERT WEAPONS: According to Powell, unidentified sources said the Iraqis dispersed rocket launchers and warheads holding biological weapons to the western desert, hiding them in palm groves and moving them every one to four weeks.

Nothing has been reported found, after months of searching by U.S. and Australian troops in the nearly empty desert.

ANTHRAX: Powell noted Iraq had declared it produced 8,500 liters of the biological agent anthrax before 1991. None has been “verifiably accounted for,” he said.

No anthrax has been reported found, post-invasion. The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), in a confidential report last September (five months before the Powell speech) said that although it believed Iraq had biological weapons it didn’t know their nature, amounts, or condition.

UNMANNED AIRCRAFT: Powell showed video of an Iraqi F-1 Mirage jet spraying “simulated anthrax.” He said four such spray tanks were unaccounted for, and Iraq was building small unmanned aircraft “well suited for dispensing chemical and biological weapons.”

According to U.N. inspectors’ reports, the video predated the 1991 Gulf War, when the Mirage was said to have been destroyed, and three of the four spray tanks were destroyed in the 1990s. No small drones or other planes with chemical-biological capability have been reported found in Iraq since the invasion.

FOUR TONS OF VX: Powell said Iraq produced four tons of the nerve agent VX.

Powell didn’t note that most of that was destroyed in the 1990s under U.N. supervision. No VX has been reported found since the invasion. Experts at Britain’s Internatonal Institute of Strategic Studies said any pre-1991 VX most likely would have degraded anyway.

Uhmmm hmmm… a commission that had at least two people who SHOULD have recused themselves from the proceedings (given that one of them was the author of the “wall” that kept the CIA and FBI from talking to each other, and probably the REAL reason “no one connected the dots”, and the other a supporter of that cracked viewpoint) came up with the idea, re: Atta meeting an Iraqi official in Prague (Czech Republic, not Bulgaria as I previously stated):

“We do not believe that such a meeting occurred,� the report said.

Woohoo!  BIG surprise!!!  A virulently anti-Bush committee disclaimed the intelligence from the Czech Republic!  That was all they had to do to make this “all Bush’s fault”!!!  They HAD to disclaim it, and have never given a really GOOD reason for disclaiming it!  And that’s one of the biggest problems with the 9/11 Commission Report!

As for the CIA report, they said “There’s no conclusive evidence the Saddam Hussein regime had harbored Zarqawi,� NOT that there was no connection between al Qaida and Saddam.

And “no conclusive evidence” means that there’s no way to prove it in a court of law, not that it didn’t happen .

There’s no “conclusive evidence” that the human race is intelligent, and a lot of evidence that argues against it.  But I think that viewpoint is wrong .

BTW, Mamapj, it appears Colin Powell is backing away from his UN presentation as fast as possible:

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/04/03/powell.iraq/index.html

WASHINGTON (CNN)—U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said his pre-war testimony to the U.N. Security Council about Iraq’s alleged mobile, biological weapons labs was based on information that appears not to be “solid.”

Maxx: Watch your mouth.  I might take offense.

Here’s where the CIA said no Saddam/Zarqawi link

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6189795/

You have to realize Zarqawi operated in a part of Iraq not controlled by Saddam; it was actually under our control.

Now, here’s a link where the 9/11 Commission said no Saddam/9/11 involvement:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5223932/

jadegoldwhatever: your links are to msnbc. I’ll look at them when my stomach is strong enough. I find it interesting you site the CIA. I guess when it convenient to ya,huh? Zarqawi recieved medical treatment in bahgdad! Probably had lunch with nidal. I have agreed with you that saddam had no direct connection to 9-11 that can be proven. you have yet to return to my questions re: WMD, which by the way, you brought up in the 1st place!
Take offense ashole! free country and all!

There were plenty of GOPers on the 9/11 Commission. Remember, this Commission was chaired by a GOPer and the whole commission was selected by…..{{{drumroll}}}….AWOL Georgie.

Additionally, if members of the 9/11 Commission disagreed with others–they were free to say that.

The Commission was co-chaired by a Democrat. Also, there were give Democrats and five Republicans on the commission. The report was unanimously accepted among the Commission members.

From the report’s preface:

We present the narrative of this report and the recommendations
that flow from it to the President of the United States, the United States
Congress, and the American people for their consideration. Ten
Commissioners—five Republicans and five Democrats chosen by elected
leaders from our nation’s capital at a time of great partisan division—have
come together to present this report without dissent.

This has absolutely NOTHING to do with SATELLITE PHOTOGRAPHS of a whole frikkin’ FLEET of semis moving from a known WMD site to Syria.

And where are these photos?  Powell certainly didn’t mention this in his lies to the UN on 5 Feb.

Mamapj:

There were plenty of GOPers on the 9/11 Commission.  Remember, this Commission was chaired by a GOPer and the whole commission was selected by.....{{{drumroll}}}....AWOL Georgie.

Additionally, if members of the 9/11 Commission disagreed with others--they were free to say that.

JG: BTW, Mamapj, it appears Colin Powell is backing away from his UN presentation as fast as possible:

WASHINGTON (CNN) — U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said his pre-war testimony to the U.N. Security Council about Iraq’s alleged mobile, biological weapons labs was based on information that appears not to be “solid.�

Psssst!  Guess what?  I’ve already HEARD about the RV’s that were set up as labs.

This has absolutely NOTHING to do with SATELLITE PHOTOGRAPHS of a whole frikkin’ FLEET of semis moving from a known WMD site to Syria. 

EXPLAIN the satellite photos.  WHAT WERE THEY MOVING TO SYRIA, and WHY DID IT TAKE AN ENTIRE FLEET OF SEMIs????

Mamapj:

http://msnbc.msn.com/Default.aspx?id=3741646&p1=0

Dec. 17 - A widely publicized Iraqi document that purports to show that September 11 hijacker Mohammed Atta visited Baghdad in the summer of 2001 is probably a fabrication that is contradicted by U.S. law-enforcement records showing Atta was staying at cheap motels and apartments in the United States when the trip presumably would have taken place, according to U.S. law enforcement officials and FBI documents.

Jadegold: Keep your head in the sand.  The rest of us are not.

Atta Trained in Iraq/UK Telegraph

Also from Newsweek:

“Contacted by Newsweek, The Sunday Telegraph’s Con Coughlin acknowledged that he could not prove the authenticity of the document. He said that while he got the memo about Mohammed Atta and Baghdad from a ‘senior’ member of the Iraqi Governing Council who insisted it was ‘genuine,’ he and his newspaper had ‘no way of verifying it.’”

jadegoldwhatever
Still waiting for you to respond to why saddam acted like he did if he had no wmd.His only incentive to get rid of them was to get the sanctions dropped. He could have done that by not obstructing the inspections if he had nothing to hide!
Stuff don’t add up!

I don’t believe the word of a “thug” has much value and I would consider any person lending credence to it a fool.
saddam was cooperative with the un?
You must mean the supplying of whiskey and women, not to mention the money!
I’m not sure I’d be quoting alot of people from the inspectors ranks. I’d wait and see how things shake out.

Your crack about wasted lives I should ignore… but I won’t!
When I see the pictures of purple fingers and read the stories of the soldiers who are there I know this was the right thing to do.
I am reassured when I see 100s of thousands of people in the streets of Beruit chanting for freedom and rights! Egypt and Saudi Arabia making small but positive moves towards democracy gives me more to feel good about.
Don’t make light of the sacrifice of these brave people! Voice your opinion but don’t make light of the sacrifice of these brave people!
You’ve made other comments along these lines that show you to be chickenshit candy-ass. That’s fine, I have and would again defend your right to do so! Don’t make light of the sacrifice of these brave people! FYTE

Maxx: Try and remember that Saddam did issue the famous 12000 page report stating he had no WMD.

On that basis, Saddam was more honest than Colin Powell’s 5 Feb UN liefest.

Additionally, at the time we invaded--the UN inspectors did say Saddam was being cooperative.  They weren’t finding anything.

Look, Saddam was a thug. He also didn’t control 2/3 of his own country.  His military had been hammered in the first Gulf War to about 20% of what it was prior to 1991.  Bluster is about all he had.

But bluster isn’t a good enough excuse to waste American lives based on lies.

About 1600 Americans have died in war based on lies.  Another 25,000 have been wounded.

We can’t change the fact the war was based on lies.

But, now, the objectives have changed; first, it was to bring democracy to the ME.  Well, it now seems all we’re going to do is create another religious state that’s not too fond of the US.

jadegoldwhatever
Inflating KIA and WIA figures doesn’t make your arguement stronger, it just makes you more of a candy ass!
I’m tired of you!
I’m tired of your bullshit!
you win!
have a night, asshole!

Wether or not the elected gov’t of Iraq is ‘fond’ of the US is beside the point.  As Bush has said from the beginning, free nations do not attack one another.  If the Iraqi people are free, and other nations in the region become more free as a result (as we are currently witnessing), we have less to worry about from that side of the world.

The US is, as Bush says, “chaning the face of the middle east”

"Maxx: Try and remember that Saddam did issue the famous 12000 page report stating he had no WMD.

On that basis, Saddam was more honest than Colin Powell’s 5 Feb UN liefest.

Additionally, at the time we invaded–the UN inspectors did say Saddam was being cooperative. They weren’t finding anything.”

WRONG!
The inspectors weren’t in Iraq to “find anything”. Iraq was required to provide evidence of WMD destruction.

http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/SC7asdelivered.htm
SECURITY COUNCIL 7 MARCH 2003
Oral introduction of the 12th quarterly report of UNMOVIC
Executive Chairman Dr. Hans Blix

Iraq, with a highly developed administrative system, should be able to provide more documentary evidence about its proscribed weapons programmes.  Only a few new such documents have come to light so far and been handed over since we began inspections.  It was a disappointment that Iraq’s Declaration of 7 December did not bring new documentary evidence.

The provision of names prompts two reflections:
The first is that with such detailed information existing regarding those who took part in the unilateral destruction, surely there must also remain records regarding the quantities and other data concerning the various items destroyed.
The second reflection is that with relevant witnesses available it becomes even more important to be able to conduct interviews in modes and locations, which allow us to be confident that the testimony is given without outside influence.  While the Iraqi side seems to have encouraged interviewees not to request the presence of Iraqi officials (so-called minders) or the taping of the interviews, conditions ensuring the absence of undue influences are difficult to attain inside Iraq.

What are we to make of these activities?  One can hardly avoid the impression that, after a period of somewhat reluctant cooperation, there has been an acceleration of initiatives from the Iraqi side since the end of January.

Against this background, the question is now asked whether Iraq has cooperated “immediately, unconditionally and actively” with UNMOVIC, as required under paragraph 9 of resolution 1441 (2002).  The answers can be seen from the factual descriptions I have provided.  However, if more direct answers are desired, I would say the following:

The Iraqi side has tried on occasion to attach conditions, as it did regarding helicopters and U-2 planes.
It is obvious that, while the numerous initiatives, which are now taken by the Iraqi side with a view to resolving some long-standing open disarmament issues, can be seen as “active”, or even “proactive”, these initiatives 3-4 months into the new resolution cannot be said to constitute “immediate” cooperation.  Nor do they necessarily cover all areas of relevance.