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Subscribe to RSSWhen President George W. Bush made the decision to invade Iraq, there was no way to know the lasting ramifications of his choice. But a decade later, it's clear that the conflict not only transformed his own political party, but all of American politics.
Republicans found their edge on national security matters eroded, laying the groundwork for President Barack Obama’s ascension to the White House. The Iraq War, which was waged for nearly nine years, changed Washington by empowering the Democrats to take on the role of the party of counter-terrorism and defense.
On the night of March 17, 2003, in a nationally televised speech, Bush said he was giving Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and his sons 48 hours to leave their country or else face an American invasion.
ARCHIVE FOOTAGE: In a televised statement to the nation, President George W. Bush announces "early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq."
Saddam had “harbored terrorists, including operatives of al Qaeda,” Bush said. “The danger is clear: using chemical, biological or, one day, nuclear weapons, obtained with the help of Iraq, the terrorists could fulfill their stated ambitions and kill thousands or hundreds of thousands of innocent people in our country, or any other.”
To the Iraqi people, Bush pledged, “The day of your liberation is near.”
Two nights later Bush was back on the air at 10:16 p.m., telling the American people that the invasion had begun. But he warned that the campaign “on the harsh terrain” of Iraq “could be longer and more difficult than some predict. And helping Iraqis achieve a united, stable and free country will require our sustained commitment.”
Ten years later, Bush’s warning has a haunting resonance for Americans, perhaps especially for those in his own party.
Preemptive invasions and wars of national liberation have gone out of favor with Americans, including many members of Bush’s party. Some of the disenchantment is due to the cost of Iraq operations which, as of Jan. 2012, the Congressional Budget Office estimated to be $767 billion.
Edge over Democrats destroyed
A new generation of House Republicans, many of them elected after Bush left office in 2009, has voted for spending cuts – even in the face of warnings that they will hurt Pentagon operations. The post-Bush Republicans put debt reduction ahead of overseas engagement.
They’re wary of any “sustained commitment” of the kind that Bush called for in 2003. Some, led by Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, are fearful of the concentration of power in the presidency that the Iraq War and the war against al Qaeda have brought about.
In the 2004 campaign, Bush conflated the danger of Saddam Hussein with the danger of terrorist attacks on the United States. Exit poll data from the 2004 election showed that more than seven out of 10 voters were worried that there would be another major terrorist attack in the United States. Of that group, Bush won 53 percent, while Democratic opponent John Kerry won 46 percent.
The Daily Rundown's Chuck Todd takes a "deep dive," look at money spent on the Iraq war over the last ten years. The Washington Post's Rajiv Chandrasekaran joins.
Fifty-five percent of voters in 2004 considered the war in Iraq to be part of the war on terrorism, and of that group, four out five voted for Bush.
Bush had an 18-point advantage over Kerry on the question of whom voters trusted to deal with terrorism.
By 2006, the cost of the Iraq insurgency had destroyed whatever illusion of post-9/11 Republican electoral ascendancy there may have been. Conservative columnist Ramesh Ponnuru said last week at a debate at the American Enterprise Institute on the future of the Republican Party, “You could make the argument that the beginning of the end of Republican dominance in Washington was the Iraq War, at least a stage of the Iraq War, 2005-2006.”
The outcome of the 2006 midterm elections was a disaster for Bush’s party, as Republicans lost 30 seats in the House and six in the Senate, losing control of both chambers.
The exit polls from the 2008 and 2012 elections showed how thoroughly the Iraq War had destroyed the GOP edge over the Democrats on national security and foreign policy.
In 2008, more than three out of five voters disapproved of the Iraq War. Although 2008 Republican candidate Sen. John McCain was critical of Bush’s conduct of the war and especially of Bush’s defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, McCain was identified with the war and was the foremost proponent of the Iraq troop surge in 2006. His Democratic opponent, Barack Obama, won 76 percent of those who disapproved of the Iraq War.
In the 2012 exit poll, of the relatively small group of the voters – only 5 percent – who chose foreign policy as the most important issue facing the country, 56 percent voted for Obama and only 33 percent for Republican Mitt Romney.
When asked who they’d trust to handle an international crisis, 42 percent said Obama, 36 chose Romney and 13 percent said both.
By losing the 2008 and 2012 elections, Republicans in effect handed responsibility for national security to a Democratic president for eight years, giving Obama the chance to show that a Democratic commander-in-chief can be just as or even more assertive than Bush was in using drones to kill suspected terrorists. Having Obama in charge means that it’s now a Democratic president who invokes the White House's inherent constitutional authority to wage war, with minimal consultation from Congress. Whether Democratic presidential contenders in 2016 will continue this robust assertion of presidential war-making power is unclear.
Ron Edmonds / AP file photo
President Bush holds a press conference in the Rose Garden with members of his Cabinet. From left to right, Acting Director of the Central Intelligence Agency John E. McLaughlin, Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge, Secretary of State Colin Powell, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, Attorney General John Ashcroft, and FBI Director Robert Mueller Monday, Aug. 2, 2004, in Washington.
'War weariness'
In the wake of the GOP defeats in 2008 and 2012, the party is defined at least partly by Rand Paul, whose father Ron was one of only six Republican House members to vote against the Oct. 10, 2002 authorization to use military force against Iraq.
Former Bush administration official Peter Wehner, who described himself as part of the internationalist wing of the Republican Party, said at the AEI debate last week that there is a concern in his wing of the GOP about “a kind of war weariness because of Iraq and Afghanistan … and I think Rand Paul tapped into it in a very creative and politically intelligent manner” with his filibuster against the possibility of Obama using drones to kill American citizens who may be terror suspects in the United States.
Paul also rails against U.S. aid to Egypt, where anti-American protests have taken place.
Wehner said he disagrees with Paul’s foreign policy views, but predicted a spirited intra-party debate over U.S. role in the world. “It may up being an acrimonious one because I think there are a lot people – including sort of traditional conservatives and a lot of people on talk radio – who had been strong supporters of President Bush and the Iraq war and the effort in Afghanistan – who spoke quite favorably about Rand Paul. I think that symbolized a kind of shift in thinking.”
Joining that debate the morning after Paul’s filibuster was McCain. Paul’s speculation about Obama using drones in the United States had “done a disservice to a lot of Americans by making them believe that somehow they are in danger from their government,” McCain said. “They are not. But we are in danger from a dedicated, longstanding, easily replaceable leadership enemy that is hell-bent on our destruction….”
Sen. Marco Rubio draws applause from a crowd Thursday at the annual CPAC event.
Last week at the Conservative Political Action Conference, potential 2016 Republican presidential contender Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida warned that Americans “need to engage in the world…. We can't be involved in every armed conflict. But we also can't be retreating from the world….”
A divided party might have a hard time winning the next election. But divided as Republicans are now, so Democrats were at the height of the Bush era, and yet they won the 2008 election.
The weekend before American troops invaded Iraq, Kerry, then a contender for the 2004 Democratic nomination, faced a heckling reception from some of the activists at the California Democratic Party’s convention in Sacramento as he tried to minimize the importance of his vote for the resolution authorizing Bush to attack Iraq.
“It’s disappointing to me that he gave President Bush preemptive war power without really having it be an issue,” said one of the Democrats heckling Kerry, Tim Steed, who was then 22 and chairman of the Orange County Young Democrats, who supported Kerry’s rival Howard Dean. Iraq “is a very divisive issue for our party and that is a shame,” Steed said.
This story was originally published on Tue Mar 19, 2013 3:43 AM EDT
Leave a Comment:
The problem has been the Libs concentrating on the WMD...
Ignoring the other reason that would have also led to WAR:
1. Saddam paying successful terrorist bombers & their families $10k to $25k+USD...
2. Saddam orchestrating an ASSASSINATION attempt on former POTUS Bush...
3. The use of chemical/nerve agents on the Iranians, Kurds and his own citizens...
Was there miss-information about the Intel??? Sure was, but hind-sight is always 20/20...
It all depends on your definition of WMD. IMO - Nerve agents/mustard gas and the ability to disperse them meet the definition. Their use KILLED - Hundreds of thousands...
Hey AC You still belive that stuff. I think the people were just fed that crap. The people in the war machine made money. That's the reason we went there.
ac, Where is the proof that Saddam paid terrorists.
If he tried to assassinate GHWB, he was obviously inept
The chemical weapons he used on Kurds was supplied by American chemical companies, and delivered by Donald Rumsfeld.
If the attempt on Bush was the reason, how much money and how many lives, both Iraqi and American were wasted for a personal vendetta.
Much of the "intel" used to justify the invasion was debunked BEFORE the invasion, The famous aluminum tubes were too long and the wall thickness was too thick to be used for centrifuges. The uranium sale from Niger was a hoax. The informant was a drunk and was known to give faulty information in the past, plus, any shipment of anything that large would have been as visible as the Thanksgiving Parade.
Another question ac. If Saddam paid successful bombers, how was that payment made? Did he put a check in the boots they blew themselves out of? Also, Kurds were Iraqis. They lived in the northern provinces.
1. Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has raised the amount offered to relatives of suicide bombers from $10,000 per family to $25,000, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Wednesday.
Since Iraq upped its payments last month, 12 suicide bombers have successfully struck inside Israel, including one man who killed 25 Israelis, many of them elderly, as they sat down to a meal at a hotel to celebrate the Jewish holiday of Passover. The families of three suicide bombers said they have recently received payments of $25,000...
see article - .cbsnews.com/2100-202_162-505316.html
2. U.S. Navy ships launched 23 Tomahawk missiles against the headquarters of the Iraqi Intelligence Service yesterday in what President Clinton said was a "firm and commensurate" response to Iraq's plan to assassinate former president George Bush in mid-April.
Clinton said he ordered the attack after receiving "compelling evidence" from U.S. intelligence officials that Bush had been the target of an assassination plot and that the plot was "directed and pursued by the Iraqi Intelligence Service."
see article - .washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/longterm/iraq/timeline/062793.htm
3. 30 Jun 2009 - The Dutch Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the war crimes conviction of a businessman for selling chemicals to Saddam Hussein that his regime in Iraq turned into poison gas and unleashed on Kurds and Iranians.
... In May 2007 a Hague appeals court upheld Van Anraat's 2005 conviction for complicity in war crimes and increased his sentence from 15 to 17 years. ... Presiding Judge Leo van Dorst said that from the mid-1980s Van Anraat was Iraq's sole supplier of a chemical called TDG, or thiodiglycol, for its mustard gas production program...
see article - .freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2282724/posts
3. Saddam was convicted and hanged for his ordering the chemical attacks on the Kurds & Iran...
Donald Rumsfeld is the Secretary of Defense? I thought that cock sucker was long gone. Twilight Zone, I guess.
What a crock on WMD. Still riding that horse until it drops...
Hey AC Saddom is dead how could he raise the price. Rumesfeld said that Wensday, he should go to. He should go anyway.
Now that's an interesting take.
And here I thought the problem was all the American dead bodies coming back from overseas having died in a war the drunken little bush lied us into.
But no, that's not the problem. The problem is the nonexistent WMD.
lol, there will always be some desperate "dead enders" (to use the GOP term) who will cling to justifying the iraqi invasion, no matter what.
Common sense would have shown that there was no need to invade iraq, Sadly common sense was in short supply right after 9/11, and the GOP was able to exploit the nation's emotions.
but desperate fools like AC have lost the war to justify iraq, even if they keep posting odds and ends of nonsense.
Saddam also decided to use the new Euro in its international oil transactions in 2000, an election year, challenging the status of the mighty dollar. Both Bush and Cheney were from the Big Oil.
AC... Those dogs don't hunt.
Those "reasons" were years old.
This was simply a war of choice. To deny that is to deny history, facts and reality.
What is pathetic is that nbc couldn't find anything else to write an article about than something that happened a decade ago. The Iraqi war is one of the reasons I didn't vote for bush the second time, so it isn't like I supported it. But holy @!$%#, nbc is really digging for @!$%# to bitch about the right now.
Maybe an article about bill maher bitching about his taxes would've been better :)
So, by this logic, we should have attacked North Korea long ago. They don't just have mustard gas, they have a nuke, they threaten America with it every day, and are starving their own people. Perhaps if we hadn't wasted time in Iraq we would have the resources to take on North Korea, an actual threat to the U.S.
What I love to hear is how the Iraqi people are so much better off now...this is usually spoken by the same people who would throw a brick into a window if it was owned by an Iraqi in America. It's entertaining to hear the same people who would deny the American people jobs or a living wage or the most basic of necessities talk about how glad they are the Iraqi people are so much better off now.
The Iraq war was petty and imperialistic. Any attempt to make it into a noble cause is ridiculous and insulting to those who died so Exxon could make a killing.
to use the dems tactics about blaming bush for everything they also voted on. What about viet nam lets see who started that? Wasn't it lbj that made it possible to take money to the caymans and other places and not tax it until it came back to the U.S. You dems are so led that you don't even check on the facts before you open your mouths and blindly follow. Hey all you dems vote for sorteo and he will make you rich ha ha
AC, George the Second was fixated on Saddam before he ever came to office. During the campaign he discussed the fact that Saddam had ordered a "hit" on his dad, George the First.
When 9/11 happened Bush used that as an opportunity to even the score. It has been proven over and over again that Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld cooked the books, they cherry-picked the intelligence they received so that Bush could invade Iraq and kill Saddam. None of that is political rhetoric. None of that is slanted or in any way colored to make it worse than it actually was. Multiple former cabinet members have written about Bush's fixation on Saddam and his obsession with blaming him for at least a small portion of responsibility for 9/11.
History has shown each and every reason and excuse for the war was WRONG. Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11. Saddam had no WMD's. He had destroyed them years earlier and dismantled the equipment to manufacture them. Saddam made a pretense of still having the weapons so he could maintain his "balance of terror" in the middle east as a deterrent to Iran.
The Gulf War nearly bankrupted this nation. It resulted in the deaths and maiming of over 30,000 Americans and over 200,000 Iraqis, most of whom were civilians.
It was Bush's obsession with Saddam and the NEO-CON dream of "nation building" that resulted in this tragic war and the blame rests firmly on the GOP's shoulders, as it should. The second Iraq War was responsible for most of the trillions of dollars in debt the GOP is now so concerned about and it led directly to the destabilization of the Middle East.
Those are the historical facts and Bush II and the NEO-CON GOP deserve the blame. Why do you think Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld pretty much disappeared from public life after Obama was elected. Why do you think they avoid traveling outside the US? Because they committed "crimes against humanity" for which they fear prosecution in the world court.
Wear their shame. If you are a Republican, you earned it.
Afghanistan was another GOP mistake. Neither the English or the Russians were able to subdue the Afgans. They both tried for decades. We should have learned that historical lesson and handled the search and elimination of Bin Ladin as a covert operation, not a land war in Asia. It was a covert, surgical strike that eventually got Bin Ladin and that's what the operation should have been all along.
Hmmmm, and as proof you offer this:
Since Iraq upped its payments last month, 12 suicide bombers have successfully struck inside Israel, including one man who killed 25 Israelis, many of them elderly, as they sat down to a meal at a hotel to celebrate the Jewish holiday of Passover.
Oddly enough, the justification for the Iraqi War was attacks on American soil! Fact of the matter is, that was false! Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with the World Trade Center attacks. Nor did his payments to suicide bombers entice any of those who did attack the US.
“Today, a newly-classified report from the Pentagon's inspector general gives more ammunition to those who believe that the administration either deceived itself, the country, or both, into thinking that al Qaeda had close ties with Saddam Hussein.
“… The I.G.'s report says interrogations of Saddam Hussein and two aides, along with captured Iraqi documents, confirm what the intelligence community believed prior to hostilities, that the Iraqi regime was not directly cooperating with al Qaeda.”
And there you put your finger right on the nose... "They tried to kill ma daddy!"
We do NOT elect presidents to wage personal vendettas. If Bush wanted a grudge war then HE should have financed it. Even more importantly, he should have fought in it, not sent thousands of others to fight and die for his personal vendetta.
You are joking, right? That all happened from 1987 to 1990, years before the Iraq War. In fact, much of Bush's justification for the Iraq War involved Hussein's refusal to allow UN inspectors to verify that he no longer had those chemical weapons. According to Bush that meant he did have them, he was continuing to manufacture them and he was planning on using them. Therefore, we had to stop him. When we marched in and searched the country, all we found were isolated, rotting, useless stockpiles that dated from that 1990 timeframe.
Sorry, dude, lies... all lies!
Why isn't Bush in jail? and Cheney and Rumsfeldt? They lied about their "evidence" and TENS OF THOUSANDS lost their lives. It's no different than when Hitler made up a story as an excuse to invade Poland....he and Bush are both war criminals.
And morons like AC are first to chime in on this board that it was the "libs" fault. The stupid can't admit when they are wrong and they always dig their heels in deeper. That's why you end up with a party lead by Rash Limpbaugh, Sarah Palin (really?), Donald Trump who just keep stay out of their own way.
Pride is one of the seven deadly sins, and it's tearing this country apart.
Marco Rubio of Florida warned that Americans “need to engage in the world…. We can't be involved in every armed conflict. But we also can't be retreating from the world….”
what Marco really wanted to say was "We can't be involved in every armed conflict...only those that make me and my political backers money....cause i deserve :) it "
Excuse me Rubio....yes I think its about time we took care of our home now...let the world deal with their own crap...that will NEVER happen you know why ... like the roman empire we need our hands in every single cookie jar
Hole,
That is the question of the century so far. Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Rice should all be up on charges in the world court for crimes against humanity. Sadly, I have to admit that Colin Powell should probably be charged as an accessory. I like Powell, but he was too much of a team player when he should have just quit in protest. It will never happen, and mores the pity.
dam:
"White guilt"? Surely you jest. Is there nothing 'color blind' in your agenda? I've read his biographies and his autobiography - the pages are all white, and the ink is all black - just like the biographies/autobiography of everyone else. There is guilt at play here, certainly.
Dam,
Powell did TRY to ameliorate the situation while still trying to be a good soldier and a team player.
The speech the Bush White House wanted him to give at the United Nations was rejected by Powell and only given after a great deal of re-writing and parsing of words. Since leaving the Bush White House Powell has been outspoken on the subject.
Would I have rather he said "no" and resigned? Sure. But it wasn't HIS plan. He wasn't the architect of the failed "Nation Building" scheme. He was only a reluctant cog in that grand plan and for that I would only charge him as an accessory.
Lean back in my barcolounger and eat another cheese burger????
Wrong call, Cowboy. I am a state-certified Civil Rights investigator with nearly 20 years of experience. I investigate complaints of discrimination on the basis of race, gender, age, national origin or religious belief. I am as color-blind as they come. No "white guilt" here.
Likewise, I don't own a barcolounger.
But you got me on the Cheeseburgers. I love 'em.
not just the LIBS. Cheny and crew basically chose to lie to us and it cost us a trillion dollars, over 5,000 dead and a generation of disabled vets. MISSION APPOMPLISHED!
dam:
Threats are for kids.
You folks cut AC some slack. He's the only sumbich on the Right that hasn't changed his story at least five times. Even Bush-Cheney went from WMD to imminent threat to disregard for UN resolutions to liberation to democracy ~ and so on. AC only has to defend one lie ~ BushCo kept inventing them but according to them, they never made a mistake.
Sniffling glue will not cure your social ills. Just thought you should know.
Seems to me that was Bush/Cheneys problem. How did it all of a sudden become that of the Liberals? Are you really as ****** as you appear?
TO: AC Robertson-2414093 who wrote:
Why shouldn't we concentrate on WMDs, that's the LIE we were told by George "Curveball" Bush and Condolezza "Mushroom Cloud" Rice! WMDs were the whole entire premise for going to war, to prevent a nuclear attack on the United States!
If that's true, then where's the body of the "assassin"?
George H.W. Bush being a former president has a security detail provided by and paid for by the American People.
By the way, we don't take the entire world to war based on a failed attempt to "orchestrate" an assassination on anyone, even a former president.
So you'd ask us to believe yet another bold lie, that someone attempted to assassinate a former president and then got away scott-clean with no evidence of who the assassin was, but somehow Republicans "assume" it was all orchestrated by Saddam who never stepped foot out of Iraq?
No thanks, we've heard enough lies related to Iraq, and not enough truth about the oil and those "spoils of war" that we've yet to see.
TO: AlexM-2364525 who wrote:
We Americans call that "American History" and just like all of the rest of our American History and our former presidents, this will be talked about from now until more than 100 years from now, just like we still talk about Custer's last stand.
American Girl,
I don't recall the reasons including a nuclear attack. The reasons in the U.S. Congress Iraq War Resolution included the following:
As usual, your liberal hysteria allows you to extrapolate. Also, regarding your comment on presidential protection, Obama just assigned himself lifetime secret service protection as well, paid for by the American People. So what was your point of blurting out in bold print that President GHW Bush has protection paid for by the American People?
...and 10 years later you are still a Bush Apologist.
KC, you don't "recall it" because it was never mentioned on Duck Dynasty. You have to actually be aware of what's going on around you to have caught it.
This Country really got screwed over by the Bush family !!!
Personally I wonder if Bush's call to war wasn't simply his attempt to look "presidential". He knew he had to do something and attacking 2 countries while going on an anti-terrorism p.r. rampage seemed to fill the bill. What I still question though is his refusal to meet with the 9/11 commission alone (he insisted on being accompanied by Cheney) and his administrations assertion that the money trail (leading to those who paid for the 9/11 attack) was irrelevant. Why did the GOP give him a pass on these issues?
No duh!
There is no honor in fighting a war for profit, which is what Iraq was. It benefited the very few at the expense of the many. Typical Republican plan: Filled with greed and certain failure.
We now have Republicans to thank for the strengthening and empowerment of Iran.
Way to go DUBYA and OLD MAN POTTER, and every single freaking idiot who voted for those goons!
This is why the republicans are destined for failure. After all we know, there are still so many TeaPartyers like AC that try to tell us that the debacle in Iraq was the right thing to do. Just one of so many lies that TeaPartying republicans tell us while looking us straight in the eye, expecting us to believe. This is why there is no point in reasoning with them- if they can't acknowledge that the war in Iraq was- at best- a mistake, a fact that every at least halfway reasonable person knows, than there is no point in talking to them. Our only hope is that the GOP keeps putting goofballs like the Pauls, Bachman, Palin and Santorum out front so americans vote their party into oblivion.
I'm assuming that you Libs have forgotten about the 'Gulf Of Tonken' - LIE that cost the USA 50+THOUSAND troop lives...
I'm assuming that you Libs forgot about the funding of the radical Muslims by Carter - $2+TrillionUSD...
I'm assuming you Libs forgot about POTUS Clinton's bombing of Baghdad in 1998 and his JUSTIFICATION. Or Chinagate..
I'm assuming you Libs have forgotten the non-stop 'Death Threats' against Goerge Bush...
When you Libs can support these actions by YOUR POTUS and Democrat supporters, then we can defend George Bush...
There was not only no reason to do it, there was a big reason to NOT do it: Iraq kept a lid on Iran.
That's what comes of electing an alcoholic moron because "he seems like he'd be a fun guy to party with."
Are we having fun yet?
Georgie Dubya Bush(wanker), Dick (CHa-ching) Cheney, and Donald Dumbsfeld cost thousand of lives and bankrupted America for their personal greed and glory.
May every one of them rot in HELL...
To perpetrate a fraud, knowing beforehand that if you are caught you can always blame "human error" to escape responsibility or to point to those who were defrauded as just as responsible because the didn't offer enough resistance are the tools of a political party whose lost it's reliance on relevancy & honesty in the pursuit of power & money .
And they beg us to like them !!
this story is pointless...the GOP is done. most other news sites are discussing the end of the GOP. They cannot attract the younger generation therefore their future is in serious doubt. The GOP is so old and uncool that younger voters are turned off by them. Its time for the GOP to go everyone knows it... they won't admit it but deep down they know the grand OLD party is over; well when I say party picture mormons at grandma's "just turned 80" soiree.
The young that the GOP attracts are the skin heads, the racists, and the paranoid. Of course the children of the upper 1% income bracket who are the future leaders of the GOP are definitely attracted.
Iraq today is one of fastest growing economy in the world, a fledgling democracy with both promises and perils.
and the left attracts all the unemployeed and non-productive members of society.
Some can even speak English...
Oh, bullcrap! Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, The State of Iraq:
The Malikioun: Similar to the Saddamists or Sadamiyyoun who had helped to consolidate Saddam’s power, Rayburn suggested that there is now a rise of the Malikioun, officials who enable the consolidation of Maliki’s power while neutralizing the checks and balances of the constitution. This group is mostly composed of Maliki’s family, close friends, and advisers; they have no real ideology and seek only to strengthen Maliki’s power and undermine the power of his political opponents Iyad Allawi and Muqtada al-Sadr. Rayburn expressed a fear that this group’s actions would eventually push the nation into civil war.
Chrip1 I hope you are not right because if there is only one party now then Obama the socialist has won and we are headed for the dictorship he wants. If there is one party then all the ideas are one sided and even in the one party you have no say when your rights are taken way, you blindly follow the leader like sheep.
downsouth:
What transparent nonsense. 'Socialist', 'dictatorship'. Bull. What will you say when the 2014 and 2016 elections roll around? If you must see 'sheep', check your mirrors.
We need at least two political parties with credible platforms and leadership. Notice the word "credible". Professing respect for individual rights while lobbying and legislating for organ control isn't what I'd consider"credible". Apparently, there are an awful lot of voters that have noticed the same, shall we say, "inconsistencies" in the Republican Party.
Entertaining a desperate choir with sophomoric one-liners isn't the quality of leadership I expect or would tolerate in this nation.
VikVega- I often wondered if Bush could speak english as well. He certainly had problems with it.
AC
1.We were BUDDIES with Sadam for a very long time. We stopped being buddies with him when he decided to no longer be our middle eastern bitch
2.Sorry but if your POTUS assassination attempts come with the territory. You don't INVADE a Fing country over that.
3.Vietnam, we used Agent Orange, we SOLD him weapons while he was in power, the middle east in general has been a non stop human rights violation for the past 2000 years.
Their was no miss information, Bush LIED, that's it, him and his master Dick wanted to go out as war heroes.
The only reason LIBS bring up WMD is because that was the whole Fing reason Bush used to INVADE a country which posed no military threat to us and was known to be against Osama because he thought they would try to destabilize Iraq.
AC has no clue. Fox news is his source.
AC is just a troll. No one can be that stupid and know how to work a computer.
Domewars- Good post. If the GOP really believes these TWO wars are so justified isn't it odd that Bush was absent from both the last election and CPAC. Bill Clinton is all over the place and Bush, the GOP embarrasment, is toxic. The GOP will never live him down but maybe, if they can even stay afloat, they'll be a lot more cautious about war talk. Or will they?
No comment. George W. Bush was the most corrupt, incompetent President this country has ever had. The facts are clear. The 1% saw more wealth gain in his term than any other time in history. The GOP only caters to the wealthy. Reagan was the last true republican.
Obama has INCREASED his net Worth by 10X to almost $10+Million USD...
Eight of the Richest people in Gongress are DEMOCRATS...
Obama is a one percenter who hob nobs with only the rich and famous, yet his sheeple give him a pass.
Hypocrites.
yes "W" was a horrible president, yet we still suffer with the lack of a true leader like we had in Reagan and Clinton. All politicians lie to advance their agenda, to think that they don't is just naive. Democrats and Republicans voted in favor of that unnecessary war, and we morn for the loss of our brave young men and women who lost their lives there. msnbc is just doing what they do best stirring up their base. Perhaps trying to soften the blow when content of Hilary's hacked emails over Benghazi start leaking out today ...
Those begging for "leadership" do not recognise it. Their definition won't jibe with the dictionary's definition.
ac:
"Eight of the Richest people in Gongress (sic) are DEMOCRATS..."
That tells us absolutely nothing, actually. Eleven of the tallest people in the US live in Idaho. Where do the other 300 million tallest people live?
Critical thinking seems to be more exclusive by the day.
TO: AC Robertson-2414093 who wrote:
In "Gongress"? Lol
If that's true, at least they didn't have to lie to the world and take the United States to war based on lies.
VikVega- If you weren't so owned by the GOP b.s. about liberal anti-wealth-divide-this-nation crap you would understand that nobody is against hard working people becoming successful. All we've been saying is that revenue needs to increase to pre-tax cut levels. That's not war on the rich but rather the recognition that tax cuts are a lousy way to pay for wars and we've been damaged as a result. Stop listening to the people who are really trying to divide the country.
Democrat Quotes on Iraq Weapons of Mass Destruction
"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line."
--President Bill Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998
"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program."
--President Bill Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998
"Iraq is a long way from [here], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face."
--Madeline Albright, Feb 18, 1998
"He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983."
--Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb, 18, 1998
"[W]e urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs."
Letter to President Clinton, signed by:
-- Democratic Senators Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, John Kerry, and others, Oct. 9, 1998
"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process."
-Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998
"Hussein has ... chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies."
-- Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999
"There is no doubt that ... Saddam Hussein has reinvigorated his weapons programs. Reports indicate that biological, chemical and nuclear programs continue at a pace and may be back to pre-Gulf War status. In addition, Saddam continues to redefine delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of a licit missile program to develop longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies."
Letter to President Bush, Signed by:
-- Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), and others, Dec 5, 2001
"We begin with the common belief that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and stability of the region. He has ignored the mandate of the United Nations and is building weapons of mass destruction and th! e means of delivering them."
-- Sen. Carl Levin (D, MI), Sept. 19, 2002
"We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country."
-- Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002
"Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power."
-- Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002
"We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction."
-- Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002
"The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capabilities. Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons..."
-- Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 2002
"I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force -- if necessary -- to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security."
-- Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9, 2002
"There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years ... We also should remember we have always underestimated the progress Saddam has made in development of weapons of mass destruction."
-- Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D, WV), Oct 10, 2002
"He has systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years, every significant UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and destroy his chemical and biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to do"
-- Rep. Henry Waxman (D, CA), Oct. 10, 2002
"In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members ... It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons."
-- Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), Oct 10, 2002
"We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has, and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for the production and storage of weapons of mass destruction."
-- Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), Dec. 8, 2002
"Without question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime ... He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation ... And now he is miscalculating America's response to his continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction ... So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real..."
-- Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Jan. 23. 2003
You and your damn facts. Where's that Cu#$%T Wasserman to shot holes in your research?
@ VikVega. How long did it take you to come up with all that info, or do you have that info stored in your head. No pun intended here. I couldn't even type that much.
Where's the Fanatical Left (who have co-opted the Democratic party)? Silence is a sign of heads exploding or they are preparing the obfuscation they are well known to use. The Democrat party of JFK is dead and now controlled by the Fanatical left loons.
If you think our president, who hired John Huntsman as an ambasador to China, is controlled by the far left, then you must be a john bircher and can be easily ignored. Thanks for showing your true colors.
What, no quotes from Senator Paul Wellstone, who spoke out against the proposed Iraq invasion so frequently that VP Dick Cheney delivered a veiled threat for Wellstone to stop? But Wellstone, the "Senate's conscious" continued to speak out, resulting in his improving poll numbers against Cheney's hand-picked Republican opponent Norm Coleman. Amazingly Wellstone died one day before his name would have remained on the ballot, in a still-unexplained plane crash that killed both Wellstone and his wife and daughter. Google "Wellstone plane crash" and see all the unanswered questions about this death.
lol, those quotes are from some site somewhere - they show up as a cut-and-paste often.
the OBVIOUS point here is that the dems ACTIONS showed how they would deal with iraq (NO invasion). You can find a zillion quotes from both parties if you look around. Speeches mean nothing..ACTIONS show your intent.
Only the GOP was stupid enough to order the invasion itself.
vermontgay
so being from another site makes them lies or what? They are infact true and your not believing they're true shows your blindly following the party that will sooner or later bankrupt the U.S.A. Just because you dim dems make fun of facts does not change the fact they are true. What you should be asking yourself is why do I just join the herd of sheeple that blindly follow dumb asses when I'm smart enough to check facts.when people such as yourself figure out both parties are at fault for the condition of america you will be enlightened. You dems check and see how your pollys made their money and then say oops I was misled
Isn't it the Rethuglican party who said they wouldn't let facts stand in their way? A joke is what your party has become, and why they cannot co-exsist with anyone but themselves. Soon to be gone altogether.
okie...no when you accept info as written in stone without doing the due diligence...ANYONE can have a website (without a driver's license-oh, no!)
Love it StateRunMedia. The GOP couldn't win the last election because Romney/Ryan were forced to be far-right to appeal to the GOP base. Now you accuse Democrats of the same thing. Right out of the playbook. In what way have the Democrats been taken over by the far-left? Be specific.
Btw, when Mitch McConnell said the GOP's main priority was to unseat Obama, what was your reaction? Did that really seem like a party looking out for the country?
You know what I really find incredulous? Nobody seems to remember or acknowledge that Saddam DID have a WMD program, DID use one of them against the Kurds, DID start 2 wars and DID torture and kill hundreds of thousands of his own people!! All this always seems to be about is a "hate George Bush and the Republican Party" argument. Does a "civilized" society allow another Hitler or Pol Pot to commit genocide and just sit back and do nothing because it's not "politically correct" to intervene? Doesn't anyone ever learn from history?
If you think that's the reason we went to war your very naive. We went to war over oil and ego.
This is a noble argument to make but where do you draw the line? There have been dozens of rulers that act this way... are we going into each of those countries and clean things up? No one has the the stomach to go into Africa and take out those crackpot dictators (because they don't have oil). Is that enough of a reason to ruin thousands of lives and wreck our economy? In for a penny, in for a pound... if your going to use this argument you better be prepared to overthrow every idiot out there.
yankee: yes, saddam was an evil, murderous dictator. But you seem to be arguing that the only two choices are "no intervention" and "full scale invasion", and that's a false choice.
@yankeeclipper: Whatever Saddam did during his dictatorial reign, has been acknowledged and dealt with. And despite it, you cannot then conclude that it was for the US to invade Iraq. All the bogus stuff that was presented to the UN by Powell, was just that, bogus. And as one poster decided to present here, on the matter of "democrat quotes", yeah, they did say those things, but they did not then go to war did they? Saddam was a brutal dictator, but he was not supportive of the al Qaida. He viewed them as threats to his reign. He knew they were Islamic fundamentalist terrorists, and that if anything, Saddam was definitely not one they would support. Bush/Cheney lied, distorted, and ignored facts that would not support their claims. The dems voted support of the authorization, they did not actually vote to go to war, that was the when Bush/Cheney took that vote, and did so without any other involvement except from the paranoid right wing.
@ yankeeclipper, a civilized country doesn't actively support or put dictators like the following, all of which now have or had CIA and other US government assistance:
Fidel Castro, Idi Amin, Saddam Hussein, Pervez Musharraf, Augusto Pinochet, Hosni Mubarak, Paul Biya (Cameroon), Shah Reza Pahlavi, Gurbanguly Berdymuhammedov (Turkmenistan), Teodoro Obiang Nguema (Equatorial Guinea), Idriss Deby (Chad), Islam Karimov (Uzbekistan), Meles Zenawi (Ethiopia) and King Abdullah Bin Abdul-Aziz of Saudi Arabia (who G.W Bush kisses full on the mouth).
Despite their penchant for brutality and lack of democratic philosophy, they either had oil or resources desperately wanted by US industry or they were the faction opposed to communist politicians.
This country has long created the monsters, and reaped the industrial benefits of waging war against those we coddled and placed in power.
dancer
no we did not go to war then but they did vote to go to war later so whats your point
Yankee Clipper-nobody denies that Hussein was an evil man. But why are we forgetting that intelligence people like Clarke and others, who were in the middle of the situation, avered that after 9/11, Rumsfeld, Bush, et al, openly asked if they could somehow use this as justification to invade Iraq. This was HW's staff's second act! And while Cheney directly linked Sadaam to 9/11, W was a lot more coy in his run-up to the war. Every day, he used that fear to stoke the flames. He kept mentioning 9/11, then shifted gears immediately to Iraq. In one of his debates vs. Kerry, he even said when asked about why he invaded Iraq, "we were attacked", to which Kerry needed to remind him who we were attacked by. There was never any doubt in my mind that he and Cheney would start this war, regardless. And too many dems were complicit, but this was clearly HIS war. Sorry it bothers some people that this rather dark chapter in our history is being reported on, but it is a truly significant piece of history. And Iran is probably a bigger threat now due to the fact that we helped create a more Shiite-friendly Iraq. Don't get me wrong, I actually thnk the Johnson-lead insurgence into Vietnam was a more egregious American-created tragedy. But Iraq is right up there, too.
Wow yankee that was quite a delayed sense of outrage you had over Saddam using checmicals. Since that happened in 80's, it took you what, 15-20 years to muster up all that outrage. LMAO You are THE very kind of dimwit that has no clue that the teapublicans count on. You are quite the sucker.
Funny -- I don't blame the GOP. I blame the United States Government. Oh, this is MSNBC.
And so many here are let by their noses.
the GOP CIC ordered the invasion.
I'm not a fan of either party, but on this issue, it is clear that if kerry had been president, we would never have invaded.
Both parties... Funny, it was GW's administration who were the architects of that obscenity.
Uh VermontGuy... Iraq was invaded in 2003... I believe if W hadn't been selected then Al Gore would have been president. But we still wouldn't have invaded Iraq...
Even if McCain had been elected I doubt we would have gone to war.
The GOP suffers from a very common ailment called stupidity. On occasion the Donkey party suffers from the same disease, but lately they've learned how to manage it better. They must have a better health care plan.
Considering that GWB & Co. planned, supported and orchestrated the events of 9/11 it's only right that their party suffer the consequences of systematic high treason. They should all be waterboarded vigorously and handed over to the Taliban.
You don't think Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld had the brains to plan it and carry it out? There is no amount of evil that Cheney would not do for profit.
GWB was never anything more than a simpering buffoon, a weak puppet for the evil genius behind the scenes.
Mjolnir-no proof to back that up whatsoever. As critical as I've been of the Bush administration, can't go there. Don't believe any sitting president could be that evil.
I agree Stageleft. Still I have to wonder why Bush needed to be with Cheney to face the 9/11 commission and why he wouldn't allow any recordings of that meeting. Also, why did his administration assert that the money trail which would have led to the financiers of 9/11 was irrelevent? Seems like it would have been the priority.
Standingwave: I think it was tantamount to a situation wherein a boss has to join a green employee on a conference call with his client, to make sure no grenades are lobbed (figuratively speaking!) into the client's office. Bush was simply inept, and he was not running the show. It's the same reason that his handlers never allowed him too much face time with the press. As for the money trail, I often question that myself. I think it could have lead to a major embarrasment for his administration, vis a vis the people Bush in particular had relationships with. I really don't think there was any intent.
Bush lowered taxes and the wealthy saw THEIR WEALTH increase exponentially over the last ten years AT THE EXPENSE of our national debt. Now the GOP wants to cut social security and medicare so they don't have to pay off the debt they racked up with two wars and the tax cut.
The only people not learning from history are living in red states believing the right-wing propaganda.
if these stupid republicans and conservatives listen to those who predicted the war would be a disaster, we would be in a much better position today, the lack of judgement on the right is unbelievable but then again most of them believe the earth is 6000 years old
It is downright embarrassing that we STILL have people that try and defend the Iraq war....I understand why people in power might do it....that is a pretty big admission to say an entire war was fought under false pretenses. However, the general public has all the information we need now......I don't think it is any surprise that the people still trumpeting this nonsense are the same ones trumpeting our bombing of Iran.
Nice to know the party of stupid isn't going to change until it dies an ignominious death. RIP GOP
There is more to the war than the effects on the GOP. 10 years later the killing of Saddam Hussein is not enough 'success' to counterpart the lives lost, the speculations given to the public, or the money spent. "Whatever the benefits of the war, skeptics argue, they are too meager to justify the costs: more than 150,000 Iraqis and 4,488 American service members killed, and an estimated cost of nearly $1 trillion"
#GlhD1HjulWGIljSp.99
There is more to the war than the effects on the GOP. 10 years later the killing of Saddam Hussein is not enough 'success' to counterpart the lives lost, the speculations given to the public, or the money spent. "Whatever the benefits of the war, skeptics argue, they are too meager to justify the costs: more than 150,000 Iraqis and 4,488 American service members killed, and an estimated cost of nearly $1 trillion" says "the Iraq War Ten Years Later" on Project Syndicate copy this link -- bit.ly/XYKyXg
A war that liberals voted for also, dumbass. Also tell it to all the men and women from here that fought there and know they were doing the right thing.
VLGil... Yes they did.
After they were lied to...
vlgil:
You must have missed the recent polls of Iraq war veterans.
So Damyou, in other words you want the US to go to war everywhere and every time a crime is committed by a government?
Iraq war taught us tough lessons, the world should be much better off without Fox News, the Zionist War Sellers, lying to us and send our kids into wars.
And don't forget about those libs that voted for the war. Fox news had nothing to do with it Einstein, and btw, why didn't your President on his first day back in 08 bring them all home then? Why are they not all home now??? Oh, I forgot, your liberal news outlets don't know cause they don't want to say a bad thing about the pos in the oval office.
VLGil, we have no boots on the ground in Iraq.
Please read something...
Chip,
You believe that? Did you ever serve or deploy in support of a war effort in the past 20 years?
Rob, not in the past 20 years, no... (40+ yrs)
We will always have intelligence on the ground in that country as we do in every country. Particualry where there is risk/threat.
Our withdrawal IS complete.
thanks W !
Two episodes define the republican chickenhawks and war...
Chris Mathews did a college tour at the height of the war.At Michigan he asked a group of students how many supported the war and every young republ;ican hand went up...then he asked how many wanted to participate in the war they supported and their were dislocated elboes from the young tough republicans getting their hands down.
My neighbor is a fire breathing kill them all conservatives except he hid his kid in the basement so the kid wouldn't join the effort...he bribed that kid with more goodies to keep him home instead of serving his country...the neighbor still puts his flag out each morning though...
That is why there needs to be a draft. If everyone had skin in the game then maybe we wouldn't be so quick to fight useless wars.
If you're not fighting to keep it, believe me, someone will fight you and take it.
Ronald Reagan once said, "Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same."
"The men of Normandy had faith that what they were doing was right, faith that they fought for all humanity, faith that a just God would grant them mercy on this beachhead or the next. It was the deep knowledge — and pray God we have not lost it — that there is a profound moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest."
Viki-please don't confuse Normandy with...Iraq.
Regan was also a horrible president who during his second term was SENILE NOTHING HE SAID or did matters because he was senile.
vik:
Do we know the difference between 'liberation' and 'conquest'?
Tiffany, are you 8 yrs old? Your opinion sounds extremely child-like.
Reagan's legacy is that of one of the best presidents ever.
I bet senile ol' Ronnie understood the importance of a .(period).
SDN, every historian states that we "liberated" Iraq, no matter what Rachel Maddow tells you...
stageleft, if there's nothing to worry about, why is your messiah increasing our missle defense along the Alaskan and california borders?
Just because you dream about a world full of rainbows and unicorns doesn't mean Iran, China and North Korea share your dreams....
Wake up. The real world is calling....
Viki-it is so typical of ignoramus's like you to think that all democrats consider Obama their "messiah". I never, ever considered any elected official to be any better than someone voted into office. And me, and people like me, aren't dreaming about "rainbows and unicorns". We are well aware of the dangers of the modern world. It's just that we are not guided by the fearmongering tactics of despicable b!stA$ds like Cheney, Rumsfeld, Bolton, et.al, and the many "valiant" conservatives that so gladly send other people's children into battle for false causes, and avoid service for everything from a boil on the ass (Rush) to "I didn't want to be up to my a$! in rice patties" (Bolton) to getting 5 deferments (Cheney) to going AWOL from the F'ing national guard (Bush). And in many case (Cheney) for personal gain. You are twisting Reagan's words for your own benefit. Once again, how can you not see the difference between Normandy and the war in Iraq? Or is it just more convenient for you to label people who disagree with you, or assume you know what they're about. On that score, it may interest you to know that I voted for Reagan. Show your ignorance much?
Not a bad idea to ask what the Iraqi's consider our presence in their nation.
Any claim to know what "every historian" believes, is, by definition, patently false. If you must post, at least arm yourself with a credible pretext.
Despite the justification that democrats voted for the war (which they did) there were still a lot of us who did not buy this when it was being sold. The IAEA did not support the theory that Iraq had WMD. The chemical weapon attacks on the Kurds happened decades earlier and those weapons were supplied by the west. Iraq had no part in the attacks of 9/11. All of this was already known before we went to war. Democrats displayed a complete lack of political courage when they voted in support of the war to protect their seats in the next election.
We had successfully contained Saddam Hussien for over a decade with the no-fly zones without loss of American lives in combat. That decade gave the Kurds the time and safety to establish an autonomous region of northern Iraq and the ability to defend themselves against Saddam. Saddam was losing power and his reach diminishing. Iraq continued to be a brake on Iran.
Now, without and enemy on their western border, Iran has gained much more power and influence in the region. Iraq will not align with the west politically. All those oil revenues will not be used to reimburse us for the billions we poured into that country and OBL's plan to destroy the west economically is close. All this and thousands of dead and maimed for no justifiable reason except hubris, machismo, and vendetta.
Well said Anita.
The GOP neocons may have created the lies, but there was little courage demonstrated by the Democrats or the Media when it came to Iraq resolution.
The CIA didn't support it either.
Cheney, Bush, Rumsfeld and the rest of the Neocons should have faced either war crimes charges or charges for treason for leading and lying us into the Iraq war.
These @!$%#s completely turned their back on Afghanistan to focus their attention on a neocon holy war in Iraq.
This led to thousands of deaths to brave soldiers, and trillions of dollars in US treasure, and the Democracy they planned for in Iraq is nothing more than an Iranian puppet state.
If that's what it took to get you to go even stupider than you already were, it worked.
The Mistake I believe President Bush made was believing the information given to him by two groups of People, Bill Clinton and his Staff, and the Clinton appointed Staff in the Department of Defense which Bush chose to keep instead up dumping, which he should have from day one...One of which who I feel got his Reward for setting up President Bush with his recent appointment to the CIA....Remember President Bush had to rely on what the outgoing Demoncrats and the Media as well as Demoncrat appointed Intelligence Heads provided him with. I also am enjoying a good laugh over how the butt kissing Media covered yellow backed Kerry's involvement and remember the House and Senate were controlled by Demoncrats at the time of President Bush's decisions and they were all supportive of President Bush..But like most cowards, er, Demoncrats they jump ship like the Rats they are...With this story, I believe MSN is trying to steal way Forbes Magazines determination that MSNBC is the worst and most biased Media outlet in the Country...Read that story a little while go over on a more Creditable news outlet from Europe.
Wow,eddie you sound just like the rest of the Rethuglican party and their twisted logic. Can't handle the blame for something that is Shrub's fault. You and I both know your party is doomed. The only difference is with my eyes open it's as clear as day. While you prefer to shut your eyes to what is going on around you.
eddie, that quite the rationalization you've spun there...
Unbelievable... (and it is, of course)
rich/chip:
The desperate, boorish rationale continues unabated. Fortunately, more and more Americans are abandoning an intellectually indefensible mindset. "Yeah, but" flies well in some circles, but that circle is, mercifully, shrinking.
Yes, demo's voted for the Iraq war, driven by self-interest and no doubt a spasm of poorly considered 'patriotism'. No, President Obama isn't perfect, but in comparison to an unrepentant 'venture capitalist', the choice was clear (assuming you realize what it is that venture capitalists do).
The Republican meeting this past week was an incredibly foolish venture for the party. Trotting out an embarrassing burlesque of certified losers ultimately, and oh-so predictably, illustrated to the public the purposes and policies of the party loyalists - whatever that might have been.
SDN, precisely...
And to "paraphrase" Rumsfeld, you go with the "burlesque of certified losers" that you have...
chip:
You or I could go to the mall and randomly select 10 people that are intellectually, rationally and spiritually superior to the Republican 'stars' such as Palin, Coulter, Trump.
You're right, you do what you can with what you have - some have a great deal more than others, and the differences are becoming more apparent daily.
Eddie..
Hogwash... Both the house and Senate were controlled by republicans that licked "W"'s boots every chance they got... the Iraq war was a republican thing plain and simple!
Apparently, some liberals on here believe that Dems didnt vote for the war. Well, they DID and in large numbers.
How were they "fooled" into a war full through lies and deceit? Cause, we all know the Dems would have NEVER voted for the war had the intelligence not been faulty or had they not been deceived by the nasty ol' GOP.
Yet, while I watched CNN and observed Colin Powell holding up cheap CGI pictures of where they "suspected" WMD's were...I was blown away that people were actually buying this garbage. I remember thinking this was like a cheap Power Point presentation I used to get during annual military training.
Is your blind loyalty THAT deep?
I think everyone was fooled by Cheney's war efforts, even after giving his presentation explaining the likelihood of Iraq having WMDs Colin Powell walked into the office of aide Larry Wilkinson on March 19 and said, "wouldn't it be something if we invade and never find WMD?"
Even he was not convinced apparently and could foresee the ramifications of starting a war under false pretenses.
The Cost, 5,000 American Lives, 33,000 seriously wounded, $3 Trillion of spending, 100 to 300,000 Iraqis killed or wounded.
This was not a liberal of conservative thing, this was Cheney in Bush's ear and haliburton made a ton of money off of that war. Lets see, who had stock in Haliburton? Hummmmm..
Rob, they all voted on the information (read BS) presented. And I agree, it was the saddest presentaiton repleat with the phoney vial. Laughable...
The whole "patriotic" junk was in full bloom after 9/11. That had a tremendous influence on the thinking process and the risk of self-destruction if you bucked the President.
And my wife and I had the same reaction that you did...
But the fact remains it was a lie and if the evidence had been that "strong" our "coalition" would have been more complete.
Yellow cake, WMDs, centrifigugal tubes, etc... All blown early on...
I don't see why the Republicans are still dealing with the ramifications of the Iraq War. Or wait, maybe the 5,000 American lives lost, 33,000 seriously wounded, estimated between 100,000 and 300,000 Iraqi people killed and wounded at a cost of, and Mr. Ryan and the Tea Party will love this one, almost $3 TRILLION Dollars, that war was estimated to cost $5,000.00 per second. That translated is $3 Trillion of the $16 Trillion of our "spending problem!"
One word .....CHENEY....the puppet master for bush.........Does any one think who ran the white house....Bush couldnt put a whole sentence together!
If nothing else, this has taught us the face of evil in our own country. Let's learn never to put these bastards in power again. Goodbye GOP.