Pelosi calls out Bush on Timetable flip flop

link

The president said, in his comments, he did not believe in timelines, and he spoke out very forcefully against them. Yet in 1999, on June 5th, then-Governor Bush said, about President Clinton, “I think it’s important for the president to lay out a timetable as to how long they will be involved and when they would be withdrawn.” Despite his past statements, President Bush refuses to apply the same standard to his own activities. Standards — that’s the issue.

I disagree. The issue is double standards. That's what you get from people who want others to play by the rules and tell them the truth but think they don't have to.

Comments :

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.

You obviously do not understand

You see, what Republicans said during the Clinton Administration cannot be brought up and used against them today because Clinton was evil and got a blowjob, so therefore whatever they said at the time was necessary in order to rid the country of the horror of blue dresses with semen stains.

qui tacet consentire

…………

I suppose

you are right. It seems so obvious now that you explain it...

………… parent

I agree.

The issue is double standards.

This is absolutely correct.

That's what you get from people who want others to play by the rules and tell them the truth but think they don't have to.

And so is this. The Democrats are consistently applying one standard to themselves and another to everyone else. I of course don't subscribe to this philosophy which is why I assume that the Democrats are living by the Golden Rule ... in other words the way that they treat the Republicans is the way that they want to be treated themselves (in terms of the rhetorical devices that are employed as part of the public discourse).

So when you see something that I, as a Republican, say that appears to be a double standard it is not. I am merely applying the time honored Democrat tradition of triangulation. I stick my finger up in the air to see which way the Democrat windbags are "blowing" and then I simply follow their lead (in terms of rhetorical techniques, that is).

Bush is merely doing the same. When the Democrats were in power they apparently didn't want to set any timetables, so now that is the norm. By calling for them now THEY are the ones changing their tune. We merely want to play the game by the same rules which they applied to themselves.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

…………

There wasn't a need

for timetables as we were actually making progress. And at the time, about 11,000 American troops were in Bosnia and Kosovo working alongside about 55,000 soldiers from allied countries. If only!(link )

I agree that Bill Clinton triangulated too much. But there is where your point should end. Just because someone else did something wrong does not give another person, particularly another president, carte blanche to say one thing and do another.

Furthermore, we are not doing what is most popular and avoiding hard decisions, as John McCain would accuse us. We are doing the right thing here. Just ask a General who is willing to tell the truth. (link )

George Bush is a two-faced liar and blaming Bill Clinton for that is just unacceptable!

………… parent

This is a lie.

George Bush is a two-faced liar ...

Bush has not lied.

[Sorry, nothing personal, this is just my new standard reaction for the Bush Lied / Bush is a Liar crowd. It is sort of the equivalent of hitting "standard reply #3" on the tape recorder.]

I respectfully disagree with the remainder of your reply ... except for the "Clinton triangulated too much" part.

BTW, I am NOT blaming Clinton for Bush's decisions or political posturing ... I am merely pointing out that Clinton set the bar for what is now considered normal conduct.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Liar

is a pretty strong claim, I agree, and one that requires conclusive evidence.

Come, my friends. 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world -- Tennyson

………… parent

How about

this nugget of beauty?

Now, by the way, anytime you hear the United States government talking about wire tap, it requires—a wire tap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we’re talking about chasing down terrorists, we’re talking about getting a court order before we do so.

That was April, 2004 - before the news broke that the President had been authorizing wiretaps without court orders since 2001.

I think "liar" is a fairly accurate term, at least here.

Saint, n. A dead sinner revised and edited. - Ambrose Bierce

………… parent

The court order is required only for domestic

surveillance. These wiretaps all involve foreign surveillance and don't even apply to any calls which both originate and terminate wholly within the US ... which is what this comment was clearly based on.

You choose to focus on the domestic side of the call. I choose to focus on the foreign side of the call. Is there some reason to say that your perspective is "correct" and mine is not? I don't think so.

So, from my perspective, Bush has not lied. From yours, I can see why you might think so but you still can't make your claim without ignoring the true nature of the wiretaps allowed under the program.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

How are you reading this?

When we’re talking about chasing down terrorists, we’re talking about getting a court order before we do so.

That's pretty unequivocal there. No "domestic" versus "interational" involved, period. You're developing your own case for separating out types of wiretaps, but none of that is in the original quote.

He made a blanket statement: we do not wiretap without court orders. If you want to defend his right to wiretap foreign calls without, that's fine, but it's not what's at issue here.

Saint, n. A dead sinner revised and edited. - Ambrose Bierce

………… parent

Please point me to the full context for this quote

and the text thereof. I tend to agree with your point here, assuming that the quote is accurate and not taken out of context.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Here you go:

from the White House website: full text . The relevant portion's about halfway down, when he starts describing the difference between traditional wiretapping and "roving" wiretaps. He also talks about FISA (without mentioning it by name) by discussing the ability of the White House to order post-facto warrants for wiretaps.

Saint, n. A dead sinner revised and edited. - Ambrose Bierce

………… parent

Cleaning up loose ends...

OK, pico made a fair point . I will try to go through and respond to any dangling points on the "Bush Lied" meme. If I miss yours let me know and I will get back to it. This is my last round on this topic, though. You all can have the last word on your respective threads...

pico:

Here is a larger piece of his actual statement:

Secondly, there are such things as roving wiretaps. Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so. It's important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution.

But a roving wiretap means -- it was primarily used for drug lords. A guy, a pretty intelligence drug lord would have a phone, and in old days they could just get a tap on that phone. So guess what he'd do? He'd get him another phone, particularly with the advent of the cell phones. And so he'd start changing cell phones, which made it hard for our DEA types to listen, to run down these guys polluting our streets. And that changed, the law changed on -- roving wiretaps were available for chasing down drug lords. They weren't available for chasing down terrorists, see? And that didn't make any sense in the post-9/11 era. If we couldn't use a tool that we're using against mobsters on terrorists, something needed to happen.

The Patriot Act changed that. So with court order, law enforcement officials can now use what's called roving wiretaps, which will prevent a terrorist from switching cell phones in order to get a message out to one of his buddies.

From this it is evident that the term "roving wiretap" has a very specific legal meaning, and that such wiretaps were not available for use against potential terrorists ... only against drug lords for whatever reason. It is also evident that this was a common practice that was already in place well before 9/11 or the Patriot Act. The only thing that the Patriot Act did was alter the scope for where roving wiretaps are applicable.

As far as I can tell, and as the text of the speech makes clear, the use of these "roving wiretaps" still require a court order to apply. Bush has explicitly stated as such directly in the speech. Do you have any evidence that this specific type of wiretap has been used without a court order?

Given that the context of the quote you originally provided was referring specifically to "roving wiretaps" (as opposed to the so-called warrantless wiretaps within Bush's formerly secret program to listen to calls between the US and Foreign Countries made by individuals suspected of having ties to terrorist organizations), and given that we, presumably, ARE obtaining proper warrants in conjunction with these "roving wiretaps" Bush's comment within the speech that you highlighted is NOT a lie.

You do recognize that we are talking about two distinctly different types of wiretaps which are applied in distinctly different circumstances, correct?

One is these "roving wiretaps" which existed as a tool (apparently for the DEA) prior to either 9/11 or the GWOT. The other is the so called "warrantless wiretaps" which only apply to calls which either originate or terminate in a foreign country (created as part of Bush's secret program).

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Hmm...

I think you're making a much more creative reading than the text warrants. Let's take this passage again:

Secondly, there are such things as roving wiretaps. Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so.

It's clear from the context that when Bush says "any time you hear the US gov't talking about wiretaps", he's backing up to talk about all wiretaps, not only the roving ones. Keywords here are "by the way" and the lack of a qualifier in front of the second "wiretap".

I'll make up an example using the same sentence structure:

This class is going to discuss French literature. Now, by the way, any time you hear me talking about literature, I'm referring to poetry and prose.

What you're trying to argue - and what I find totally not believable - is that my second "literature" refers specifically to French literature. I cannot imagine a reasonable listener who would come away with that impression, and if any of my students did, they'd have a hard time coming out of that class with a passing grade.

So in order to believe your reading, we'd need all these criteria to be met:

1. The President really intended to refer only to roving wiretaps, but chose a very poor way of doing so;
2. The President's assurance that "nothing has changed" in terms of copyright law was intended only to refer to roving wiretaps (in which case he may still be lying by omission, since he had long since instituted changes for other wiretaps); and
3. Not one of the roving wiretaps between 2001 and 2004 were issued without a court order, which means that Bush's super-secret program was not using the type of wiretap that he defends as the most necessary in the war on terror.

I still call B.S. There's nothing either in your reading or in the larger argument that convinces me he was not intentionally misleading his listeners here.

Saint, n. A dead sinner revised and edited. - Ambrose Bierce

………… parent

You can believe what you want ...

I'll never be able to convince you either way. What is clear from the context, as you say, is that all three of the relevant paragraphs from start to finish are discussing NOTHING but roving wiretaps. They are mentioned in the opening sentence as well as the closing one, and several places in between.

What I find unbelievable is that you have to spin things to the point where he basically is jumping out of the middle of this text to suddenly be intending all wiretaps, not just the ones that every other piece of the text is discussing.

To be perfectly honest, what this sounds like to me is that he was actually trying to talk through this in his own words and was mangling them how he always does. Are you not the people who harp on and on about what an inarticulate boob he is? But now the finer points of his "grammatical sentence structure" are suddenly the key point of this discussion?

Keywords here are "by the way" and the lack of a qualifier in front of the second "wiretap".

Give me a break.

So in order to believe your reading, we'd need all these criteria to be met:

1. The President really intended to refer only to roving wiretaps, but chose a very poor way of doing so;
2. The President's assurance that "nothing has changed" in terms of copyright law was intended only to refer to roving wiretaps (in which case he may still be lying by omission, since he had long since instituted changes for other wiretaps); and
3. Not one of the roving wiretaps between 2001 and 2004 were issued without a court order, which means that Bush's super-secret program was not using the type of wiretap that he defends as the most necessary in the war on terror.

Counter points:

1) Consistent with your [the liberals] "he's an inarticulate boob" position.

2) In this entire section of the speech he was explaining what the provisions in the Patriot Act did, correct? What the Patriot Act actually authorized relative to other existing capabilities. Within that context, only the roving wiretaps apply, correct? I don't think that the Patriot Act actually says anything about his "secret programs" does it?

3) See number 2 above. Also, unless you can provide proof to the contrary, as far as we know they are, in fact, obtaining the required warrants for the roving wiretaps.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Now you're playing intentionally dumb.

You can dismiss what I say as nitpicking, but look at the example I gave above. There is no way that anyone with half a brain and no agenda wouldn't consider that segment a digression to qualify all wiretaps. And what's irking me is not only that you know this, but that you're pretending you don't, and throwing it back at me as if this were some creation of mine.

This section of his speech is an attempt to explain the difference between traditional and roving wiretaps. He's trying to assure the audience that roving wiretaps do not break from the law that governs all wiretaps, and he promises that nothing has changed in that respect.

Nothing I said implied he was an "inarticulate boob", but I guess you're having as much trouble reading my comments as you do the Presidents.

Saint, n. A dead sinner revised and edited. - Ambrose Bierce

………… parent

Ha!

Nothing I said implied he was an "inarticulate boob", but I guess you're having as much trouble reading my comments as you do the Presidents.

………… parent

Have you actually read your own reference?

Here, let me widen the scope even more and give you a play by play of the logical flow of the points being made:

Up to this point in the speech the President was basically thanking lots of people and talking about the issues with the Iraq war and Saddam.

At home, we've got a lot of work to do. We've got a lot of work to do. We're a freedom nation, we're a big nation, people come and go. And we needed to change the whole attitude about how we protect the homeland. We'll do everything we can to stay on the offensive. But just remember, we've got to be right 100 percent of the time; and the enemy has only got to be right once. And so we've got a tough job.

It means we've got to coordinate between the federal government and the state government and the local government like never before. We've got to share information on a real-time basis, so first responders and police chiefs can move as quickly as possible. We're going to talk about that communication today.

We created the Department of Homeland Security which would allow us to better coordinate between agencies. It's kind of -- what happens in bureaucracies is you get what they call stovepipes -- in other words, people don't talk to each other, they kind of stay in their own lane, and they don't share information across the lanes, and therefore, vital information may show up, but it's not widely disseminated so there's not real-time action on, say, a threat.

Part of the problem we face was that there was laws and bureaucratic mind-sets that prevented the sharing of information. And so, besides setting up the Homeland Security Department and beefing up our air travel security, and making sure that we now fingerprint at the borders and take those fingerprints, by the way, and compare to a master log of fingerprints of terrorists and known criminals, to make sure people coming into our country are the right people coming into our country. I mean, we do a lot of things. But we change law, as well, to allow the FBI and -- to be able to share information within the FBI.

Incredibly enough, because of -- which Larry and others will discuss -- see, I'm not a lawyer, so it's kind of hard for me to kind of get bogged down in the law. (Applause.) I'm not going to play like one, either. (Laughter.) The way I viewed it, if I can just put it in simple terms, is that one part of the FBI couldn't tell the other part of the FBI vital information because of law. And the CIA and the FBI couldn't talk. Now, these are people charged with gathering information about threats to the country; yet they couldn't share the information. And right after September the 11th, the Congress wisely acted, said, this doesn't make any sense. If we can't get people talking, how can we act? We're charged with the security of the country, first responders are charged with the security of the country, and if we can't share information between vital agencies, we're not going to be able to do our job. And they acted.

This section of the speech is talking about Gorelick wall between the FBI and the CIA, and how it prevented us from connecting the dots that needed to be connected.
This is making the case for the need to change the law via the Patriot Act.

So the first thing I want you to think about is, when you hear Patriot Act, is that we changed the law and the bureaucratic mind-set to allow for the sharing of information. It's vital. And others will describe what that means.

And here is the transition to talking about the Patriot Act and what the main items that it addressed are. This paragraph is discussing the the first point (keywords: "the first thing I want you to think about"). In case it escaped you the point was: one thing the Patriot Act did was break down the Gorelick wall.

Secondly, there are such things as roving wiretaps. Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so. It's important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution.

But a roving wiretap means -- it was primarily used for drug lords. A guy, a pretty intelligence drug lord would have a phone, and in old days they could just get a tap on that phone. So guess what he'd do? He'd get him another phone, particularly with the advent of the cell phones. And so he'd start changing cell phones, which made it hard for our DEA types to listen, to run down these guys polluting our streets. And that changed, the law changed on -- roving wiretaps were available for chasing down drug lords. They weren't available for chasing down terrorists, see? And that didn't make any sense in the post-9/11 era. If we couldn't use a tool that we're using against mobsters on terrorists, something needed to happen.

The Patriot Act changed that. So with court order, law enforcement officials can now use what's called roving wiretaps, which will prevent a terrorist from switching cell phones in order to get a message out to one of his buddies.

This section is talking about the second important point he wants to make (keywords: "Secondly, there are such things as roving wiretaps."). Surprisingly enough, the context of this section is talking about "roving wiretaps", what they are, why they are important, and that they still require warrants (keywords: "So with court order, law enforcement officials can now use what's called roving wiretaps").

Thirdly, to give you an example of what we're talking about, there's something called delayed notification warrants. Those are very important. I see some people, first responders nodding their heads about what they mean. These are a common tool used to catch mobsters. In other words, it allows people to collect data before everybody is aware of what's going on. It requires a court order. It requires protection under the law. We couldn't use these against terrorists, but we could use against gangs.

We had real problems chasing paper -- following paper trails of people. The law was just such that we could run down a problem for a crooked businessman; we couldn't use the same tools necessary to chase down a terrorist. That doesn't make any sense. And sometimes the use of paper trails and paper will lead local first responders and local officials to a potential terrorist. We're going to have every tool, is what I'm telling you, available for our people who I expect to do their job, and you expect to do their jobs.

We had tough penalties for drug traffickers; we didn't have as tough a penalty for terrorists. That didn't make any sense. The true threat to the 21st century is the fact somebody is trying to come back into our country and hurt us. And we ought to be able to at least send a signal through law that says we're going to treat you equally as tough as we do mobsters and drug lords.

This section is talking about the third important point he wants to make (keywords: "Thirdly, to give you an example of what we're talking about, there's something called delayed notification warrants."). Surprisingly enough, the context of this section is talking about "delayed notification warrants", what they are, why they are important, and the message we are sending by applying them in the GWOT.

There's other things we need to do. We need administrative subpoenas in the law. This was not a part of the recent Patriot Act. By the way, the reason I bring up the Patriot Act, it's set to expire next year. I'm starting a campaign to make it clear to members of Congress it shouldn't expire. It shouldn't expire, for the security of our country. (Applause.)

And then this is the paragraph where the talk transitions from "what we have already done" (via the Patriot Act) to "what still needs to be done" (in preparation for a call to action).

I don't know how much public speaking you have done, but speeches are typically organized around a logical flow which focuses on making very specific points.

As I said above, this section of the speech was clearly walking through the three main points he wanted to make about the Patriot Act:

  1. It tore down the wall between law enforcement agencies.
  2. It provides roving wiretaps which require warrants.
  3. It provides delayed notification warrants.

So, I will ask you again, if the three paragraphs which talk about roving wiretaps are clearly scoped within a section discussing the changes that the Patriot Act put into place (as the other surrounding sections do as well), why would he suddenly try to talk about wiretaps that applied to a program that he considered to be a national security secret?

You are just hearing what you want to hear because you want him to be a liar. I understand this. I don't particularly care or blame you for it. But this is an objective analysis of what he said in the context of the actual speech. And within this context, his statement was NOT a lie.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

I know this is pico's battle

but I just wanted to jump in here and say if you held Bush to the same standards as us here , then Bush should have said 'roving wiretaps' in that 'BTW' section that pico pointed out properly as a backtrack. Without that qualifier (according to you), he is discussing 'all wiretaps'.

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

This is (ever so barely) a fair point, Specter.

Feel free to jump in if you want. I am always happy to "correct" the record, although in the case you may wish that I hadn't. :-)

First, let's review the point that I believe you are trying to make. In this post I make the following statements:

Even in the context of your original comment the phrase "the rich" was clearly directed at "wealthy white people". This is clearly implied in your comment.

...

You didn't say "the racist rich" or "the rich who are racist", you just said "the rich" in a context where that clearly translated to "white". And I would have called you on these phrases as well, BTW, because no matter how you try to hide it or cover it up it is a bigoted comment.

So, what was "in the context of your original comment" referring to? Let's see.

pico wrote:

I may be wrong, but I always thought the opposition to and support for vouchers was always primarily a money issue. Basically (cue Norquist), the people paying the highest in taxes are also the least likely to be sending their children to public school, so in effect it's like paying for double the education costs of your own child. I know in New Orleans there's a strong level of racial animosity added to this, as well: the city public schools are predominantly black, with white private schools sprinkled throughout.* So it's not just that the wealthy are paying twice as much in education costs, but they're doing it to support people that, in the New Orleans case, they'd rather leave to their own devices. The city is not exactly ground zero for racial reconciliation anytime soon.

*(a quick pseudo-defense of some of them: private schools around the country sprung up in opposition to school desegregation, but the New Orleans situation is often the result of religious tradition - for example, my own school is well over a century old, so its founding wasn't tied to segregation issues or race. Its history since then has been, unfortunately.)

And Specter replied:

No, you are right. My education series was going to cover 1) Student's rights in the age of school shootings (done), 2) Standardized testing (doubt I will do this one now, as I addressed most of my points briefly below), and 3) the stratification of the educational system (still plan to complete).

You touch on an important point: the alternative education of the rich. The racial component is sad. Basically, the rich are saying they should be able to buy segregation. Sad.

I was originally going to simply highlight that in Bush's case he actually DID use the term "roving wiretaps", multiple times in fact, AND in the opening sentence of the three paragraphs from his speech that we are discussing. In your case you (personally) did NOT ever qualify your use of "the rich" even a single time.

Upon further review, however, I see that pico, much to his credit, did in fact provide clarification of his intended targets in the form of his footnote wherein he at least acknowledges that some of the people in the group encompassed by the term "the wealthy" have other good faith reasons for sending their kids to the privates schools other than "trying to buy segregation" as you later termed it. This is why I did not feel the need to jump on his comment like I did on yours.

I still maintain that within the context of your statement, the phrase "the rich" refers to the group "all wealthy people living in New Orleans who send their kids to private schools," but since pico did provide a qualification I can see how a reasonable person might assume that his qualification was also implied in your use of "the rich".

So, given this, I stand corrected and hereby retract the foul and evil epithets I hurled at you.

Now, let us review. You have claimed that in your use of "the rich" you were only referring to the racist ones in that group, not all of them. You have no specific defense of this within the text or your original comment, but I can see how you could find one indirectly through pico's text in the form of a footnote.

In Bush's case he clearly lead off the entire section (thus setting the scope of that discussion) by using the qualified term "roving wiretaps", and he re-iterated this term multiple times throughout the three paragraphs in question.

Of these two, I would argue that Bush clearly has the stronger case. Would you not agree?

Now, after having reviewed the original context of your comment and recognizing my error, I have in good faith admitted my error and retracted my admonition. Thus I am clearly and with out a doubt holding both you and George Bush to the same exact standard.

It occurs to me, however, that this now leaves you in a bit of a conundrum, or a pickle if you will.

If you accept the above logic which lets you off the hook for having made a bigoted comment, does it not also let Bush off the hook for having lied (in this specific case)? And given that I have so graciously admitted that I was wrong for having claimed your comment was bigoted would it not also be a reasonable gesture on your part to admit that Bush did not lie (in this specific instance)?

Hmmm. Decisions, decisions.

Either the reasoning above is correct (and therefore you did not make a bigoted comment and Bush did not lie, at least in this case), or that reasoning is incorrect (and therefore Bush [may have] actually still lied [by picos argument] but then my original argument about your [possibly] bigoted comment still applies).

:-)

So, Specter, which is it? Is Bush a liar (in this case) or was your comment bigoted?

[ Just for the record I don't really think that Specter is a bigot, even though I do believe that his original comment was careless and could be interpreted as such. My only purpose of one of raising awareness. ]

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

I do not buy the premise

I do not buy the premise that calling out segregationism is bigotry. You never answered how that one works.

Lastly, my comment was also more in context than Bush's as I explain here to show it follows a previous comment in a thread as you sometimes acknowledge and sometimes don't, while Bush's comment is clearly a backtrack as pico points out wonderfully through this example (which you still have not addressed):

This class is going to discuss French literature. Now, by the way, any time you hear me talking about literature, I'm referring to poetry and prose.

(edit): Before you answer this, see my comment below about 'Paradox and Values'.

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

Black is he black

I don't see color....... said Stephen Colbert.

………… parent

Raising awareness.

NOTE: Most of this commentary is explaining my previous position which I have now retracted. I offer it here merely as an explanation to help you understand my mindset at the time.

I do not buy the premise that calling out segregationism is bigotry. You never answered how that one works.

I guess that this depends on our respective definitions of bigotry. Webster will work fine for me in this discussion:

Main Entry: big·ot
Pronunciation: 'bi-g&t
Function: noun
Etymology: French, hypocrite, bigot
: a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices; especially : one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance

Based on the affirmative action training I have had over the past 20 years, a slightly different way of saying it is that bigotry is the act of applying a negative stereotype to all the members of a group, rather than solely to those individuals who exhibit it. Example: The black man that complains that we should not call him lazy just because he is black.

So the issues at play here are as follows:

1) Being racist is bad (i.e. negative).
2) Promoting segregation is racist.
3) Democrats promote the stereotype that Republicans are racists.
4) Democrats promote the stereotype that Republicans are mostly Rich White People.
5) Ergo, your statement is applying a negative stereotype to all of the members of a group (which is also aligned with a racial component).
6) Ergo, your statement is a valid example of a bigoted statement.

I think that if you examine all of the examples of where I complain about bigotry the logic will be similar to this.

I do speak out against bigotry. Here, I will do so now: "Bigotry in all of its forms is evil and should be abolished wherever it lives. We should denounce any and all that harbor such inclinations."

Feel free to quote me on that. :-)

So when I see your comment as being bigoted and I speak out against it, I am just walking the walk. I am against bigotry in all of its forms, not just the bigotry against the politically correct list of accepted groups.

For the most part, the politically correct groups have entire organizations to speak out for them. Because of this I don't spend much time chiming in because those groups are pretty well covered.

I spend my "walking the walk" time speaking out against the lesser known forms of bigotry such as the one I claim to have noticed here. As you say, you have likewise seen other examples from me.

I am most sensitive to bigotry against "moderately successful white males." I think we get a bad rep in society today and I speak out against it, but I don't necessarily limit myself to this group.

As you have noted, I will also tend to speak up for Christians, not because I am one but because I believe that they too are getting a bad rep in society today.

But I would also not be above defending those "left handed hermaphrodites with blond hair and six toes" out there if I thought they were being unfairly attacked/discriminated against.

From here we have:

I was speaking directly to this comment which was right above mine. It was not a blanket statement about all wealthy people, but, in the context of responding to pico's previous comment, it was a direct reference to a particular situation. Furthermore, in this context, it is only the rich who are putting their children in private schools due to racism, which is also heavily implied by the context. So rich racists in New Orleans who segregate their children are who I was discussing. Particular and specific. Not all.

I understand your analysis. Had it not been for pico's footnote, however, you would have no ground to stand on ... and I really doubt that the footnote was foremost in you mind when you made your comment. I believe that a more accurate characterization of the group you had in mind at the time you wrote the comment given this context was: "Rich White People in New Orleans that send their kids to private schools." Only you know for sure.

If not for his footnote my argument would still be 100% correct given the semantics of the English language and the most narrow interpretation that you could claim/support would be the one I present above which, in my estimation, would still be a bigoted comment because I am sure that there are at least SOME rich white people in New Orleans who send their kids to private schools for reasons other than racism.

I still maintain that to the casual reader the impression was clearly that you were saying the rich white people in New Orleans are racists, which is what I reacted to.

Either way it is moot. I have already acknowledged my error as stated above.

There is a lesson for all of us here. When I was being so hyper-critical of an innocent comment how did that make you feel? Did you feel that I was being unfair, ridiculous, unjust? Well that is how I feel about many of the talking points that come out of the Democrat leadership ... especially when they are playing the race card. Unfortunately comments like this one just play into that meme.

Trent Lott paid a pretty heavy price for comment related to segregation at an old man's birthday party, and I believe that his comment was just as innocent as yours was here. And I believe that the left was being every bit as hyper-critical in that case as I was here.

points out wonderfully through this example (which you still have not addressed):

This class is going to discuss French literature. Now, by the way, any time you hear me talking about literature, I'm referring to poetry and prose.

It is all well and good to sit here and play games with the sentence structure when you have all the time in the world to get everything just so. In Bush's case he was just talking. And was trying to connect with people by saying things more in his own style rather than reading every word off of a teleprompter.

When speaking we all make fits and stutters which come out as grammatical faux pas in the transcripts. I think that it is fundamentally unfair to scrutinize every last word out of a spoken speech, especially from a section where he had clearly lost his place and was still recovering his thoughts.

Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order.

This sentence, the very one that you are so concerned about, is clearly malformed. Keywords: "it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order".

When I read it this sounds to me like he was launching into his talking point about roving wiretaps and then something caused him to remember that he had a very important point to make here ... maybe he was remembering some coaching he had before the speech to remember to talk about how these wiretaps need warrants ... not to forget to mention the warrants.

So there he is, following the highlights on the teleprompter and putting things (somewhat) into his own words when he hits this point and the neurons fire and all of a sudden he begins to get distracted by remembering the coaching to remember the warrants. So things get jumbled in the process and for a sentence or two he forgets to qualify things with the word roving.

Can I prove this? Obviously not. Certain never to your collective satisfactions. So I didn't even try.

I stand by my analysis of the overall structure of the speech coupled with the observation that I seriously doubt that he ever meant to talk about the warrant, or lack thereof, in such a high profile speech for a program which was [at least once] considered to be a national secret. This latter point makes no sense at all IMHO.

Edit: Almost forgot ...

Let's consider the following statement now:

Secondly, there are such things as roving wiretaps. These wiretaps require a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so. It's important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution.

Before you go all ballistic, I KNOW he didn't actually say this. I merely changed the offending sentence to one that might have flowed more naturally when speaking but STILL LEFT THE UNQUALIFIED REFERENCE TO WIRETAPS. So, the question is, in this text what does the underlined word "wiretap" refer too? ALL wiretaps or just roving wiretaps?

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Paradox and Values

I've noticed something recently when you have been calling me bigoted for referring to groups as racists.

Let's go through a recap of the instances just so we are on the same page. These are only the instances I remember off the top of my head, so there could be more.

The first time you did this (not directly to me) was when you said people on this site (I don't exactly recall, but I think it was pico, missliberties, and CLC) were bashing Christianity because they were in favor of Happy Holidays (I was busy writing my own diary on the matter so I was not really involved in this discussion).

The second time that I recall is when I called out Schlafly who was invited by the college republicans to speak at a college, in which she said many sexist remarks. Purpleface added to this conversation by stating that there was a thread with multiple posters agreeing that women should not have the right to vote, to which I made a joke at Ender's definition of the GOP as the party of individuality and freedom.

The most recent is the discussion of private schools in which I said that it is sad that the rich can buy segregation in reference to what pico said as you point out above.

Ok, the first thing I want to point out is that it is mostly impossible to meet your standard of only calling the people directly related for the racism out rather than a larger group. For example, is it fair for me to say that whites in the South had slaves before the civil war? Or do I have to go find census reports to find the slave owners' exact names to meet your tough standards?

In the Schlafly scenario (or numerous Coulter examples), she was invited by the college republicans which is a group endorsed and sponsored by the larger republican party. As such, saying the GOP (joke as it was) endorsed her comments is not that big of a stretch (though I do not actually believe this is a GOP platform or anything). In these scenarios, I think a statement about a larger group is fair within the context.

Next, I wanted to discuss the use of paradox which I think you are often trying to point out without using that terminology. You basically say that I am being intolerant because I am not accepting of difference. You also say that I am applying my comments to a larger group than what is called for. The latter I try to answer above, but I will make an attempt to be as specific as possible within reason in the future (but please take context and threads into consideration in these discussions).

About the former (intolerant of the intolerant): this is indeed a logical paradox if taken to the extreme as pure tolerance accepts all difference. Paradoxes are always a double-sided coin though, two mutually true comments that do not coincide with each other. While I can clearly point out a racist's intolerance on one side of the coin, you can clearly point out my intolerance for the racist's intolerance on the other. Perfectly valid argument logically. It is a paradox admittedly. So what do we do from here?

Since we are social animals, we then return to the human realm and focus on values to overcome the paradox. What kind of world do we want to live in. A world that values merit and hard-work, or one that prefers established privilege over others because of racism? If you value the former, then you over-ride the logical paradox by using your value system to say we should give one side of the paradox coin more credence (the saying racism is bad and we will not tolerate it) than the other side (we should value and defend racism). We can remain static in the realm of language and logic while these problems persist or we can tackle the problems using the values we appreciate.

Let's try to avoid the nit-picky arguments about the logical consistency of 'intolerance' and focus on the real problems which we can determine by our values. So what is it? Are you with me in fighting the racist intolerance or are we going to play word games on this site all the time?

[Thanks for actually not thinking I'm a bigot. I don't actually think you defend bigots. I do think I should be more careful with my wording when discussing groups, but I think you should spend more time condemning the true bigots.]

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

Proof of Lying

When asked if Harriet miers was the best qualified candidate for the Supreme Court bush said:

"Yes," he answered. "Otherwise I wouldn't have put her on."

There is no stretch of imagination that a petty bureaucrat with no legal training would be the best qualified candidate for the SCOTUS.

The best thing about this example is even hard core right wingers have difficulty arguing against it.

I came. I saw. I posted.
Veni, Vidi, Bitchy.

………… parent

Not so.

Despite what you might think, the term "best qualified" is actually pretty sketchy. "Best qualified" along what dimension? There are many such dimensions to consider when contemplating some one's "qualifications" to be a judge on the Supreme (or any other) Court.

Weighing the relative merits of a person's qualifications amongst these varying dimensions comes down to a judgement call, which is all Bush did when he said what he did. At the time she was the best qualified person in his opinion, and as President it was his opinion that mattered in the nomination process.

You may not agree with his opinion, but luckily for the rest of us your agreement, or lack thereof, is not the deciding factor in determining whether someone "lied".

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Not *that* subjective.

There is no axis on which harriet Miers is the best qualified.

You may not agree with his opinion, but luckily for the rest of us your agreement, or lack thereof, is not the deciding factor in determining whether someone "lied".

A statement of opinion so divorced from verifiable reality is a lie. That or the speaker is insane.

I came. I saw. I posted.
Veni, Vidi, Bitchy.

………… parent

In your opinion ...

There is no axis on which harriet Miers is the best qualified.

but unfortunately for you, it was President Bush's opinion that mattered.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Actually...

...his opinion didn't matter since that comment was met by total derision even from Redstate. He blatantly lied and even his base told him to shove it.

And it was shoved. Notice that Mrs. meirs is not in fact a sitting Supreme Court Justice.

I came. I saw. I posted.
Veni, Vidi, Bitchy.

………… parent

Irrelevant to the point at hand.

Which is whether Bush lied (when he said she was the best qualified), which he didn't.

his opinion didn't matter since that comment was met by total derision even from Redstate. He blatantly lied and even his base told him to shove it.

And it was shoved. Notice that Mrs. meirs is not in fact a sitting Supreme Court Justice.

And his opinion DID matter because she actually WAS nominated which is all he gets to say about it. Her absence from sitting on the Supreme Court is not for lack of his nomination.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Question for you.

Let's, for the sake of this discussion, assume that Bush DID lie in the quote you provided above. This then raises the question of motive. What do you believe was Bush's motivation to lie under these circumstances? What would he hope to gain by nominating her?

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Gee, I wonder...

Harriet miers is a loyal Bushy (to use their term). What possible point could there have been to Bush trying to stack the highest court in the land with people who are intensely loyal to him?

That's a pretyy obvious self answering question you got right there.

I came. I saw. I posted.
Veni, Vidi, Bitchy.

………… parent

Not obvious at all.

But under this scenario where we are assuming that he actually DID lie (i.e. he knew she was not qualified), he would have known that she was lacking in qualifications and therefore would not ever actually make it onto the court. So your response doesn't make sense in this case, since he would have known she was a bust.

Given this, he must have had some other reason than actually expecting her to be confirmed.

Do you have anything else?

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Truth and lies

He would lie because it is politically disasterous to admit to nominating someone for SCOTUS even though there are other better qualified people. Particularly when you are sensitive the past accusations about all of your successes being based on who you know and who your family is.

Bush doesn't lie because he doesn't care what the truth is. Was HM the most qualified? Who cares, the most advantageous answer is 'yes' so that is the response. Truth or falsehood is never analyzed and is irrellevant.

Call it a truth or a lie as you choose, but there is certainly nothing resembling integrity in it.

………… parent

You make a level headed point.

And his response was most likely the knee jerk response that you articulate, but does that make it a lie? I think not. The only people who would try to interpret his comment as anything more than the standard knee jerk response are merely engaging in political spin (and that includes me).

But I can't resist this flippant response:

there is certainly nothing resembling integrity in it

I don't know. Isn't standing up for those you believe in something that resembles integrity? Having put her out there as a nominee, isn't standing by her and defending her something that resembles integrity?

What, in your mind, would a person of integrity do in these cases?

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

I understand

that what I consider a lie is not a lie to you, because, among others, we both live in alternate realities, but how do you explain something like this to a normal person (who lives in a reality where a lie is defined as: a : an assertion of something known or believed by the speaker to be untrue with intent to deceive b : an untrue or inaccurate statement that may or may not be believed true by the speaker)

"I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees. "
President Bush (09/01/05)

Sic semper tyrannis

………… parent

I begin by ...

who lives in a reality where a lie is defined as: a : an assertion of something known or believed by the speaker to be untrue with intent to deceive b : an untrue or inaccurate statement that may or may not be believed true by the speaker

Explaining to them that (a) constitutes the controlling definition of the term "lie" in these circumstances, whereas (b) does not. The manner in which the liberals are using the phrase "Bush Lied" is clearly intended to imply "intent to deceive", but we have no way of determining that Bush knew or believed what he was saying was untrue.

I understand that you probably pulled these from some dictionary definition someplace, however I would further argue that in common usage of the term "lie" that (b) is not even a valid definition. By this definition, any statement which is not 100% true and accurate constitutes a "lie".

Example:
Random Person: How do I get to 101 main street from here?
Me: Head north two blocks and turn right.

Now, if I gave my answer in all good faith and truthfully to the best of my knowledge yet it turns out they needed to turn left instead of right, have I "lied"? I say no.

If you prefer to say "yes" in this circumstance then you are removing from the equation my intent, for it matters not whether I intended to deceive.

I may have been confused as to which block we were on or I may simply have misspoke (i.e. I meant to say left but for whatever reason the word that came out of my mouth was right) or I may simply have been incorrect in my understanding of where 101 main street actually was. I don't believe that in common usage very many people would claim that I had "lied" under these scenarios.

If you accept (b) as being a valid definition of "lie" then it is a true statement that everyone posting on this site is also a "two face liar" because at some point in their lives they will have made and incorrect or inaccurate statement.

Do you all accept that you are a bunch of "two face liars" because of this? If you do then I guess that you are basically the same as President Bush in this respect.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Well,

I'm sorry, if in your alternate reality Webster is just some dictionary - in mine it's pretty authoritative. If you have a problem with this definition you should really take it up with them.

Repeating a statement that is not true is not lying? You might not have the intent to lie but you certainly didn't take diligent care to assure that your statement is 100% correct (as in "the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth - which in my opinion is quite an overkill - but completely unambiguous)

As to the last two paragraphs - it's irrelevant - we are discussing Bush - not ourselves, and, what is even more important, in the example quote i posted, preponderance of evidence shows that Bush intentionally made his "incorrect" statement.

Sic semper tyrannis

………… parent

You're clutching at straws.

Repeating a statement that is not true is not lying?

Who repeated what?

You might not have the intent to lie but you certainly didn't take diligent care to assure that your statement is 100% correct

Funny, I don't see anything about taking diligent care to assure 100% accuracy in your definition.

(as in "the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth - which in my opinion is quite an overkill - but completely unambiguous)

And when was anyone under oath in this context?

As to the last two paragraphs - it's irrelevant - we are discussing Bush - not ourselves, and, what is even more important

They are not only completely relevant, but the very core of this discussion. The point being contested is what it means for something to constitute a lie.

So, since you were not 100% accurate with that statement I guess you must be a liar.

in the example quote i posted, preponderance of evidence shows that Bush intentionally made his "incorrect" statement.

I must have missed that part. Where have you provided anything but you own interpretation of the circumstances, much less a demonstrable "preponderance of evidence" to support your here to fore unfounded assertion?

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Apparently you missed

the interview with Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) director Michael Brown on August 31, 2005 where he said:

Larry, let me tell you something I did. When I became the director of FEMA a couple of years ago, I decided it was time we did some really serious catastrophic disaster planning. So, the president gave me money through our budget to do that. And we went around the country to figure out what's the best model we can do for a catastrophic disaster in this country? And we picked New Orleans, Louisiana, being struck dead on by a cat five hurricane.

This did not happen in this event. But that cat 4 hurricane caused the same kind of damage that we anticipated. So we planned for it two years ago. Last year, we exercised it. And unfortunately this year, we're implementing it.

Hurricane Katrina's Aftermath

and a SPECIAL REPORT from THE TIMES-PICAYUNE

Levees, our best protection from flooding, may turn against us.

I think this sufficiently establishes that not only there were people who predicted the breach of the levees, which makes the statement false

And this doesn't really require any comment from me:

The [Senate Homeland Security] Committee released documents showing that the White House situation room received a report at 1:47 a.m. the day Katrina hit, predicting that Katrina would likely lead to severe flooding and/or levee breaching. A couple days later, the president said no one anticipated that the levees could breach.

Katrina: Who knew what when?

Sic semper tyrannis

………… parent

Video documentation

that Bush knew before the storm (shows Bush giving a thank you to Brownie and a meteorologist who directly discusses the levee breach before the storm hits).

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

checkmate

Pièce de résistance.
and
Coup de Grâce.

Sic semper tyrannis

………… parent

Safe to say

Bush lied.

Now official.

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

This video is crap.

You aren't seriously putting this over-editted video up as proof of anything, are you? woodsman has mounted a better case above than this.

My comments on the video:

1) No one in the video actually claims that the levees will actually be breached. One guy mentions it as a "possibility" and a "grave concern". Somehow I doubt that Bush watches this particular news guy, either, so the hyperbole about "were you listening" is completely over rated here. Do you know, for a fact, that Bush saw this guys forecast BEFORE the storm hit?

If not, then this proves nothing.

2) Everyone else in the video is talking about it being a big storm. I didn't hear any mentions of levee breaches in any of the other segments. Given the absence of any such direct discussion with Bush present, these segments are moot.

My more general comments:

3) Again, without giving me the full context of his statement I have no way of knowing whether you are twisting his meaning. For example, what was the intended universe of people he meant to encompass when he said "anybody". Anybody in the country? Anybody in the government? Anybody in the federal government? Any of his direct reports?

4) What was the context and which meaning of the term "anticipate" was he intending here?

Main Entry: an·tic·i·pate
Pronunciation: an-'ti-s&-"pAt
Function: verb
Inflected Form(s): -pat·ed; -pat·ing
Etymology: Latin anticipatus, past participle of anticipare, from ante- + -cipare (from capere to take) -- more at HEAVE
transitive verb
1 : to give advance thought, discussion, or treatment to
2 : to meet (an obligation) before a due date
3 : to foresee and deal with in advance : FORESTALL
4 : to use or expend in advance of actual possession
5 : to act before (another) often so as to check or counter
6 : to look forward to as certain : EXPECT

If, per chance, he meant meaning number 6 then I would argue that he was correct. If he was thinking of the FEMA guys and using meaning number 3, this too could be viewed not only as correct but as an admission of responsibility as well (i.e. for failing to do number 3).

So, come on guys, do you have any PROOF of which of these were running through his mind when he was making his statement? His state of mind and his intent to deceive are the primary elements of a lie.

Given that you think he is such a clear cut liar and all, you seem to be having a lot of trouble making a completely airtight case for that fact.

Personally, I think that you just hate him and are looking to read what you want to hear into whatever is convenient. Make a case to prove me wrong here.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Your standard of proof is

getting ridiculous. You're doing your best, "it depends on what the definition of 'is' is," but you are doing it poorly. In this context, 'anticipate' means 'to expect' and 'anybody' means the government (he is talking about the response of the government) as seen clearly by the interview shown here .

A better version of the video in which Bush is shown lying from his previous statement he made in the video above (the ABC interview) is here .

I know Bush was watching this 'particular news guy', because the whole presentation was done specifically for him through a conference call.

Here is further evidence that he was warned by this 'news guy' in advance (and if your last excuse is to blame the 'librul media' you will lose a lot of standing in my eyes--I will even start out with your favorite news source just in case):

FOX News : Video Footage Shows Bush, Chertoff Were Warned of Katrina's Potential Impact

BBC : Video showing President George W Bush being warned on the eve of Hurricane Katrina that New Orleans' flood defences could be overcome has emerged.

USA Today : Video shows Bush, Chertoff warned before Katrina

CBS : Tape: Bush, Chertoff Warned Before Katrina

MSNBC : ideo shows Bush got explicit Katrina warning
President, Chertoff were clearly told of storm’s dangers numerous times

CNN : Transcripts, tape show Bush, Brown warned on Katrina

ABC : Video shows Bush was warned about Katrina

Washington Post : White House Got Early Warning on Katrina

A sampling from this article:

In the 48 hours before Hurricane Katrina hit, the White House received detailed warnings about the storm's likely impact, including eerily prescient predictions of breached levees, massive flooding, and major losses of life and property, documents show.

A 41-page assessment by the Department of Homeland Security's National Infrastructure Simulation and Analysis Center (NISAC), was delivered by e-mail to the White House's "situation room," the nerve center where crises are handled, at 1:47 a.m. on Aug. 29, the day the storm hit, according to an e-mail cover sheet accompanying the document.

He had verbal and written warning.

In other words, Bush lied.

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

Seconded

NIce work, btw.

Fascinating the mindset of subtlety and denial suddenly discovered by the right.

The irony that they lambasted Kerry as too "nuanced", and now the right finds itself nuancing til the cows come home to make it seem like Bush never lied.

And....... drum roll..... please....... Bush is now using Kerry's definition of what like stability would look like in Iraq, an acceptable level of violence.

Yesterday:

"President Bush — without saying so explicitly — embraced Kerry’s definition of success against terrorism. “Success is a level of violence where the people feel comfortable about living their daily lives.”

Kerry was crucified for saying exactly that. That terrorism is not a matter of war but a matter for the law.

My new favorite is ...... Bush never linked Iraq and 9/11!

Rush Limbaugh's nuanced version to rescue Bush as a truth ranger, "Bush never said the government of Iraq attacked us on 9/11, only that there were links between Saddam Huessein and al_Queda. (another falsehood to cover a falsehood)

………… parent

More nuances ...

Fascinating the mindset of subtlety and denial suddenly discovered by the right.

Yet another example of us learning from the masters. What is your definition of "is"?

My new favorite is ...... Bush never linked Iraq and 9/11!

He didn't. I have repeatedly asked from direct references from the left for anyplace that Bush directly made the claim that Iraq attacked us on 9/11.

You come up short every single time. The best that you can come up with is exactly what we have been saying all along ... there were links (contacts) between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda ... and this was confirmed in the 9/11 Commission report. Those are the facts. Claiming more than that is a lie.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

and claiming less?

The Sept. 11 commission reported

that it has found no "collaborative relationship" between Iraq and al Qaeda (...)

(...)report of the commission's staff, based on its access to all relevant classified information, said that there had been contacts between Iraq and al Qaeda but no cooperation. (...) a senior FBI official and a senior CIA analyst concurred with the finding.

Al Qaeda-Hussein Link Is Dismissed

Sic semper tyrannis

………… parent

My comment was based on the following

excerpts from the 9/11 commission report :

Page 58:

Bin Ladin now had a vision of himself as head of an international jihad confederation. In Sudan, he established an “Islamic Army Shura” that was to serve as the coordinating body for the consortium of terrorist groups with which he was forging alliances. It was composed of his own al Qaeda Shura together with leaders or representatives of terrorist organizations that were still independent. In building this Islamic army, he enlisted groups from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, Oman, Algeria, Libya, Tunisia, Morocco, Somalia, and Eritrea. Al Qaeda also established cooperative but less formal relationships with other extremist groups from these same countries; from the African states of Chad, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, and Uganda; and from the Southeast Asian states of Burma,Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia. Bin Ladin maintained connections in the Bosnian conflict as well.37 The groundwork for a true global terrorist network was being laid.

Page 61:

Bin Ladin was also willing to explore possibilities for cooperation with Iraq, even though Iraq’s dictator, Saddam Hussein, had never had an Islamist agenda—save for his opportunistic pose as a defender of the faithful against “Crusaders” during the Gulf War of 1991. Moreover, Bin Ladin had in fact been sponsoring anti-Saddam Islamists in Iraqi Kurdistan, and sought to attract them into his Islamic army.53

To protect his own ties with Iraq, Turabi reportedly brokered an agreement that Bin Ladin would stop supporting activities against Saddam. Bin Ladin apparently honored this pledge, at least for a time, although he continued to aid a group of Islamist extremists operating in part of Iraq (Kurdistan) outside of Baghdad’s control. In the late 1990s, these extremist groups suffered major defeats by Kurdish forces. In 2001, with Bin Ladin’s help they re-formed into an organization called Ansar al Islam. There are indications that by then the Iraqi regime tolerated and may even have helped Ansar al Islam against the common Kurdish enemy.54

With the Sudanese regime acting as intermediary, Bin Ladin himself met with a senior Iraqi intelligence officer in Khartoum in late 1994 or early 1995. Bin Ladin is said to have asked for space to establish training camps, as well as assistance in procuring weapons, but there is no evidence that Iraq responded to this request.55 As described below, the ensuing years saw additional efforts to establish connections.

Page 66:

There is also evidence that around this time Bin Ladin sent out a number of feelers to the Iraqi regime, offering some cooperation. None are reported to have received a significant response. According to one report, Saddam Hussein’s efforts at this time to rebuild relations with the Saudis and other Middle Eastern regimes led him to stay clear of Bin Ladin.74

In mid-1998, the situation reversed; it was Iraq that reportedly took the initiative. In March 1998, after Bin Ladin’s public fatwa against the United States, two al Qaeda members reportedly went to Iraq to meet with Iraqi intelligence. In July, an Iraqi delegation traveled to Afghanistan to meet first with the Taliban and then with Bin Ladin. Sources reported that one, or perhaps both, of these meetings was apparently arranged through Bin Ladin’s Egyptian deputy, Zawahiri, who had ties of his own to the Iraqis. In 1998, Iraq was under intensifying U.S. pressure, which culminated in a series of large air attacks in December.75

Similar meetings between Iraqi officials and Bin Ladin or his aides may have occurred in 1999 during a period of some reported strains with the Taliban. According to the reporting, Iraqi officials offered Bin Ladin a safe haven in Iraq. Bin Ladin declined, apparently judging that his circumstances in Afghanistan remained more favorable than the Iraqi alternative. The reports describe friendly contacts and indicate some common themes in both sides’ hatred of the United States. But to date we have seen no evidence that these or the earlier contacts ever developed into a collaborative operational relationship. Nor have we seen evidence indicating that Iraq cooperated with al Qaeda in developing or carrying out any attacks against the United States.76

Page 125:

With UN sanctions set to come into effect in November, Clarke wrote Berger that “the Taliban appear to be up to something.”89 Mullah Omar had shuffled his “cabinet” and hinted at Bin Ladin’s possible departure. Clarke’s staff thought his most likely destination would be Somalia; Chechnya seemed less appealing with Russia on the offensive. Clarke commented that Iraq and Libya had previously discussed hosting Bin Ladin, though he and his staff had their doubts that Bin Ladin would trust secular Arab dictators such as Saddam Hussein or Muammar Qadhafi. Clarke also raised the “remote possibility” of Yemen, which offered vast uncontrolled spaces. In November, the CSG discussed whether the sanctions had rattled the Taliban, who seemed “to be looking for a face-saving way out of the Bin Ladin issue.”90

Page 128:

Though intelligence gave no clear indication of what might be afoot, some intelligence reports mentioned chemical weapons, pointing toward work at a camp in southern Afghanistan called Derunta.On November 4, 1998, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York unsealed its indictment of Bin Ladin, charging him with conspiracy to attack U.S. defense installations. The indictment also charged that al Qaeda had allied itself with Sudan, Iran, and Hezbollah. The original sealed indictment had added that al Qaeda had “reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al Qaeda would not work against that government and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al Qaeda would work cooperatively with the Government of Iraq.”109 This passage led Clarke, who for years had read intelligence reports on Iraqi-Sudanese cooperation on chemical weapons, to speculate to Berger that a large Iraqi presence at chemical facilities in Khartoum was “probably a direct result of the Iraq–Al Qida agreement.” Clarke added that VX precursor traces found near al Shifa were the “exact formula used by Iraq.”110 This language about al Qaeda’s “understanding” with Iraq had been dropped, however, when a superseding indictment was filed in November 1998.111

Page 134:

In February 1999, Allen proposed flying a U-2 mission over Afghanistan to build a baseline of intelligence outside the areas where the tribals had coverage. Clarke was nervous about such a mission because he continued to fear that Bin Ladin might leave for someplace less accessible. He wrote Deputy National Security Advisor Donald Kerrick that one reliable source reported Bin Ladin’s having met with Iraqi officials, who “may have offered him asylum.” Other intelligence sources said that some Taliban leaders, though not Mullah Omar, had urged Bin Ladin to go to Iraq. If Bin Ladin actually moved to Iraq, wrote Clarke, his network would be at Saddam Hussein’s service, and it would be “virtually impossible” to find him. Better to get Bin Ladin in Afghanistan, Clarke declared.134 Berger suggested sending one U-2 flight, but Clarke opposed even this. It would require Pakistani approval, he wrote; and “Pak[istan’s] intel[ligence service] is in bed with” Bin Ladin and would warn him that the United States was getting ready for a bombing campaign: “Armed with that knowledge, old wily Usama will likely boogie to Baghdad.”135 Though told also by Bruce Riedel of the NSC staff that Saddam Hussein wanted Bin Ladin in Baghdad, Berger conditionally authorized a single U-2 flight. Allen meanwhile had found other ways of getting the information he wanted. So the U-2 flight never occurred.136

So, while I agree that the evidence considered by the 9/11 commission does not demonstrate the existence of an operational collaborative relationship between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein (thus making the statement that you highlighted true) that does not negate the strong evidence of the following:

  1. Al Qaeda and Iraqi officials met on multiple occassions to discuss just such a relationship.
  2. Al Qaeda DID have a relationship with terrorist groups already inside Iraq.
  3. High ranking members of Al Qaeda DID have contacts within the Iraqi government and elsewhere within Iraq.
  4. High ranking members of OUR intelligence and defense communities who were familiar with these issues were clearly concerned that such a relationship looked increasingly likely.
  5. Of what we know of the contacts between al Qaeda and the Iraqi regime, it appears that the relations between the two were improving rather than deteriorating.

So, I stand by my statement above:

The best that you can come up with is exactly what we have been saying all along ... there were links (contacts) between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda ... and this was confirmed in the 9/11 Commission report. Those are the facts. Claiming more than that is a lie.

Note that I never claimed, nor has the President, the existence of an operational collaboration between the two much less that Saddam had an active role in 9/11. The fact remains that (a) the two were talking about forming a relationship, (b) both sides at one time or another initiated the contacts, (c) al Qaeda already had established relationships with terrorist organizations within Iraq, and (d) high ranking al Qaeda operatives had contacts within the Iraqi regime. To me, at least, that means "links".

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

I tire of this topic.

You may continue to believe what you want but I in no way concede this point or any of the others in these related threads. As far as I am concerned I have made my points and continuing will not change any minds here.

Moving forward I merely intend to call out the lies as I see them and let it go at that.

Moving on ...

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Bush lied

whether you concede it or not. But I'm tired of the subject too. :)

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

But you didn't even address mine!

I gave you the link and all. I feel stood-up! :)

Saint, n. A dead sinner revised and edited. - Ambrose Bierce

………… parent

woodsman, you get the gold star ...

Of all of the differing examples that people have raised I actually find this one to be the hardest to defend against. As Specter points out I have had to do a pretty good impression of Bill Clinton's "it depends on the definition of "is".

While I believe that I have found the requisite "wiggle room" in the definitions to have my claim stand up in a court of law, I have undoubtedly passed beyond the "red faced test" on this one.

Personally I believe that his Katrina comment was intended more as a CYA comment as opposed to a nefarious intent to deceive the American people in some way.

Never the less, the comment that you have brought forth appears to have been a tad shy of genuinely truthful and I hereby acknowledge that I can honestly see how a reasonable person might come to the conclusion that "Bush Lied" (in THIS very specific instance).

How's that for admitting defeat? :-)

And with that I am done with this "Bush Lied" meme other than to point out transgressions from the left with a simple "Bush did not lie" posting (on a case by case basis).

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Here's a good one

“Had I known that the enemy was going to use airplanes to strike America, to attack us. I would have used very resource, every asset, every power of this government to protect the American people.”

or how about this:

Anything we do ... to that end in this effort, any activity we conduct, is within the law. We do not torture.

or the Winnebagos of death:

We have found the mobile biological weapons labs that I could only show cartoons of that day. We now have them.

Sic semper tyrannis

………… parent

None of these are lies.

Neither of the first two is even a contender for being a lie because they are true.

The last is at least a contender, but unless Bush knew that what he was saying was untrue (we have no idea how the info about the so called labs was presented to him by his direct reports at the time). I choose to take him at his word that he genuinely thought that we had captured the biological labs but was merely mistaken about what they actually were.

You are free to disagree, and you obviously do, but your assertion of lying is just that, an assertion based on your opinion. I am merely voicing my own opinion to the contrary.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Your opinion

is so far outside of what even mainstream media reported as facts that I would have to call it extremely incredulous. If not based on blind faith in ze leader.

Sic semper tyrannis

………… parent

As has been demonstrated many times over the years.

The things that the mainstream media report as "facts", aren't necessarily facts.

On the first point:

“Had I known that the enemy was going to use airplanes to strike America, to attack us. I would have used very resource, every asset, every power of this government to protect the American people.”

what supposed mainstream media reported facts are you actually referring to here. We had no specific intelligence before 9/11 to suggest that there was a plan to fly airplanes into buildings, did we?

What possible "facts" could the media present that could "prove" what Bush would, or would not, have done if he had such intelligence?

On your second point:

Anything we do ... to that end in this effort, any activity we conduct, is within the law. We do not torture.

I simply don't agree that anything we have done constitutes torture. It is as simple as that. Have the mainstream media been reporting things that they want to call torture as fact, sure. But just because they make the claim and print their assigned label does not make it a fact, it is more like a lie because they are knowingly attempting to deceive the American people regarding the intent and/or severity of our interrogation methods.

Your last point I have already addressed.

Am I being incredulous here? Sure. Am I being extremely incredulous here? Not in my book given the lies and deceptions from the left wing which I see being foisted onto the American people on a daily basis. From my perspective I am merely being prudently cautious.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

You might have missed

even the tip of the iceberg - the August 6, 2001 memo entitled “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.” allegedly delivered to Bush personally and the briefer being dismissed with: "All right. You've covered your ass, now."

Obviously we define torture differently, I suppose, one man's torture could be another man's tropical paradise relaxation technique, and I give you that - in that alternate reality the "We do not torture." statement would be true.

Sic semper tyrannis

………… parent

As I recall ...

that memo was old news left over from the Clinton Administration who, BTW, did absolutely nothing with it ... several times, in fact, when they had the chance.

I also don't seem to recall anything in there saying anything about flying airplanes into buildings. It may have mentioned hijacking airplanes among other things, but no one envisioned what happened that day.

Obviously we define torture differently, I suppose, one man's torture could be another man's tropical paradise relaxation technique, and I give you that - in that alternate reality the "We do not torture." statement would be true.

You are correct, we do define it differently.

You may equate being made to listen to loud rock music or having a female interrogator brush up against you as being the moral equivalent of starving people to death, or performing medical experiments on them against their will, or using their skin to make lamp shades, or gassing them in fake showers, or killing their families in front of them, or dumping them alive into grinders designed to shred plastic ... but I do not.

Go tell your tale of torture to the holocaust survivors, or the families of the victims of the likes of Hitler, and Stalin, and Saddam Hussein. I suspect that they might feel that their plight was just a little bit worse than the prisoners at Gitmo who gain weight while they are there.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Nope

Sorry, but you are wrong, and Bush is still a liar (no hard feelings) :-)

The following is a transcript of the August 6, 2001, presidential daily briefing entitled Bin Laden determined to strike in US. Parts of the original document were not made public by the White House for security reasons.

Clandestine, foreign government, and media reports indicate bin Laden since 1997 has wanted to conduct terrorist attacks in the US. Bin Laden implied in U.S. television interviews in 1997 and 1998 that his followers would follow the example of World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef and "bring the fighting to America."

After U.S. missile strikes on his base in Afghanistan in 1998, bin Laden told followers he wanted to retaliate in Washington, according to a -- -- service.

An Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ) operative told - - service at the same time that bin Laden was planning to exploit the operative's access to the U.S. to mount a terrorist strike.

The millennium plotting in Canada in 1999 may have been part of bin Laden's first serious attempt to implement a terrorist strike in the U.S.

Convicted plotter Ahmed Ressam has told the FBI that he conceived the idea to attack Los Angeles International Airport himself, but that in ---, Laden lieutenant Abu Zubaydah encouraged him and helped facilitate the operation. Ressam also said that in 1998 Abu Zubaydah was planning his own U.S. attack.

Ressam says bin Laden was aware of the Los Angeles operation. Although Bin Laden has not succeeded, his attacks against the U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 demonstrate that he prepares operations years in advance and is not deterred by setbacks. Bin Laden associates surveyed our embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam as early as 1993, and some members of the Nairobi cell planning the bombings were arrested and deported in 1997.

Al Qaeda members -- including some who are U.S. citizens -- have resided in or traveled to the U.S. for years, and the group apparently maintains a support structure that could aid attacks.

Two al-Qaeda members found guilty in the conspiracy to bomb our embassies in East Africa were U.S. citizens, and a senior EIJ member lived in California in the mid-1990s.

A clandestine source said in 1998 that a bin Laden cell in New York was recruiting Muslim-American youth for attacks.

We have not been able to corroborate some of the more sensational threat reporting, such as that from a ---- service in 1998 saying that Bin Laden wanted to hijack a U.S. aircraft to gain the release of "Blind Sheikh" Omar Abdel Rahman and other U.S.-held extremists.

Nevertheless, FBI information since that time indicates patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York.

The FBI is conducting approximately 70 full-field investigations throughout the U.S. that it considers bin Laden-related. CIA and the FBI are investigating a call to our embassy in the UAE in May saying that a group or bin Laden supporters was in the U.S. planning attacks with explosives.

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

You are the one lying here.

(And I mean that is the best possible way, no hard feelings.) :-)

How do the highlighted portions of your quote differ substantively from what I said here:

I also don't seem to recall anything in there saying anything about flying airplanes into buildings. It may have mentioned hijacking airplanes among other things, but no one envisioned what happened that day.

Where in that transcript does it mention them flying airplanes into buildings? You have not contradicted anything I have said above, but rather have confirmed it.

I know that you WANT those highlighted words to mean that "it was obvious they were going to hijack airplanes and fly them into the World Trade Center", but they just don't and it is completely disingenuous of you to maintain that they do.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

What the heck do you

want a blue-print? He was warned that al-Qaeda was going to hijack a plane and they were scoping out New York buildings in the same sentence. It doesn't take a brain surgeon to connect the one dot.

I thought you said you were tired and done with this topic. Why don't you go back to the other thread and defend the Katrina lie, or did you just give up there because of the overwhelming evidence?

(no offense either ;-))

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

Look, I'll admit that I have to stretch things here

but certainly no further than the Democrats do (and most assuredly no further than Clinton ever did). So why do you seek to hold my feet to the fire of the alter of unforgiving truth when, in fact, most of the people on your side of the aisle were doing these very same things in defense of Mr. Clinton?

The name of the game when dealing with slimy ACLU lawyer types is semantic nuances. So, am I playing the semantic nuance game in some of these cases, sure. But as long as I have the wiggle room to do so I can legitimately claim that Bush did not lie (thank you Bill Clinton).

Because, after all and as you have pointed out, it depends on what the definition of "is" is.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Have you ever

heard me defend Clinton's lie? No. Clinton lied. See, it is liberating; try it.

Clinton had his faults, but trying to compare him (or his lies) to Bush (and his lies) is like comparing, well, a BJ to a failing war and a destroyed city.

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

Have you no dignity left sir....

...at long last?

So let me get this straight... you feel you can use every single dishonest type of argument or statement in debate here, just as long as some Democrat in the past has made a comparable dishonest argument or statement? And you can use these dishonest techniques even if the subject at hand has nothing to do with that Democrat?

If so, I can only conclude that you need to do so either because the facts are not on the side of your positions or you are a poor debater and can't assemble your facts into a coherent case for your positions without resorting to dishonest techniques.

 

 

………… parent

Dignity and honor?

Don't make me laugh. Those went out the window of political debate with the Clintons ...

I have plenty of dignity and honor, though, but it is reserved for those who demonstrate that they understand what those terms mean.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

So you show no dignity and honor...

...when you first encounter someone?  Odd, but I guess that's your prerogative.  I don't see what Specter has done to deserve such treatment, however.  Missliberties, maybe-- she's kind of hard on you sometimes ;-)

And so I suppose that that is the defense for the Republican Culture of Corruption also?  Duke Cunningham and Bob Ney had no reason to behave ethically because ehtics "went out the window" with Rostenkowski and Jim Wright... 

 

………… parent

This sounds a lot like

applying one standard to Republicans and a different one to the Democrats. This is the main point (that we are discussing), is it not?

Your comments (here) are merely a veiled attempt (whether conscious or not) to effectively chastise Republicans (and me personally) for showing no honor or dignity while ignoring the misdeeds of the Democrats.

I don't like this state of affairs but I have no way to control how the Democrats present themselves.

Also, let me make it clear that in my defense of "Bush has not lied" I view myself as arguing against Democratic talking points (primarily) as opposed to the specific individuals who may be the ones articulating them here. As such I mean no personal disrespect for Specter or anyone else (here) in this context.

On a separate note ...

This little sub-thread (where I admitted to having to stretch things a bit to make my case) is also interesting to me. I have been chastised here for being stubborn and not being realistic and not being willing to admit when I am wrong. Well, so here I give you all an inch and what is the response?

Attack me personally while completely ignoring the truth and the substance of the point that I was making (which is that I was acting no differently than the Democrats have been doing all along).

Rather than stepping back and saying, "You know, you have a point. The Democrats are being just as despicable as I think you are here. Maybe we should try to fix that. Maybe we should denounce this type of behavior on BOTH sides.", you instead pounce on my open admission and continue to chastise me to show some dignity while leaving the Democrats untouched.

So who is being intellectually honest here?

This is the very essence of the unlevel playing field that I refuse to accept. You expect the Republicans to play "fair" while continually overlooking the dirty methods of the Democrats. You can all say what you want, but I have seen people even here continuing to bolster those same Democratic points using the same methods that you are upset with me about. Case in point? Using half-truths to spin the meme "Bush lied."

The difference between us?

I am openly admitting what I am doing and why I am doing it (i.e. to raise your awareness about the dirty methods of the Democrats). You (collectively), however, appear to refuse to recognize the truth of my point because it doesn't fit with your own mental perspectives about your own honor and integrity.

Cognitive dissonance at work.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

the game

of playing the perpetual victim seems to be your forte.

Yes we know, politics is a contact sport and both sides don't play fair, but to constantly use this as an excuse seems like a weak argument at best.

From Bush's own mouth these words.......

"I don't think our troops ought to be used for what's called nation-building. . . .

Here is the source of the quote, from a conservative site.

At some point whether a democrats did something yesterday, or a hundred years ago, the Party of Personal Responsibility actually has to accept the consequences of their actions.

Bush said, "I don't think our troops out to be used for what's called nation building.....".

It was a campaign promise that Bush made by himself standing alone on a stage without any democrat behind him twisting his arm. It is a promise he has broken, all by himself.

The author of the cited article said he voted for Bush because of this promise.

One of the reasons I voted for him in 2000 was that he promised no nation building.

That particular voter was let down not because of what Bill Clinton or Nancy Pelosi said, he was let down because of what George W. Bush said with his own mouth.

So explain to me how your cognitive dissonance theory works in this case?

The cognitive dissonance I see, is that you constantly change the subject when its time to hold a Republican accountable for their own words, so the debate isn't about being a responsible adult, instead it's arguing the personality of the other side.......! It is NOT an argument of substance to blame Nancy Pelosi for what George Bush says.

………… parent

Your comments (here) are

Your comments (here) are merely a veiled attempt (whether conscious or not) to effectively chastise Republicans (and me personally) for showing no honor or dignity while ignoring the misdeeds of the Democrats.

How did I ignore misdeeds of Democrats? By admitting that Clinton lied? By voluntarily bringing Democrats that had ethics problems into the conversation?

Also, let me make it clear that in my defense of "Bush has not lied" I view myself as arguing against Democratic talking points (primarily) as opposed to the specific individuals who may be the ones articulating them here. As such I mean no personal disrespect for Specter or anyone else (here) in this context.

Is "Clinton lied" a Democratic talking point? Is bringing up Democrats with corruption issues a talking point?

I am openly admitting what I am doing and why I am doing it (i.e. to raise your awareness about the dirty methods of the Democrats). You (collectively), however, appear to refuse to recognize the truth of my point because it doesn't fit with your own mental perspectives about your own honor and integrity.

Raise awareness of what? That Clinton lied? Done. That some Democrats had some corruption problems prior to 1994? Done. That Bill Jefferson took a bribe? Done. Diane Feinstein? She had conflicts of interest, and resigned her chair. I haven't seen any evidence that she lied about anything. Bottom line, most of our eyes appear to be wide open about Democrats. For instance, check out what I wrote a couple months ago about Harry Reid regarding his failures on earmark reform :

****************

Senator Harry Reid is fast losing whatever credibility he had on earmark reform, as far as I'm concerned.

He seemed intent this afternoon to push through a far weaker earmark reform bill than the one that Nancy Pelosi got passed easily in the House. Worse, he's allowing Republicans, including Tom Coburn (R-OK) and Jim DeMint (R-SC), to score points by offering an amendment that would alter the Senate earmark rules so that they would match the House earmark rules.

Harry! WTF are you doing, making me side with Tom Coburn?? Ugh.

It's worth noting that Reid has recently come under fire for self-serving earmarks, and rightfully so, in my opinion:

[L]ast year's huge $286-billion federal transportation bill included a little-noticed slice of pork pushed by Reid that provided benefits not only for the casino town of Laughlin, Nev., but also, possibly, for the senator himself.

Reid called funding for construction of a bridge over the Colorado River, among other projects, "incredibly good news for Nevada" in a news release after passage of the 2005 transportation bill. He didn't mention, though, that just across the river in Arizona, he owns 160 acres of land several miles from proposed bridge sites and that the bridge could add value to his real estate investment.

Reid denies any personal financial interest in his efforts to secure $18 million for a new span connecting Laughlin with Bullhead City, Ariz.

http://www.latimes.com/...

And now today's Senate proceedings, where Reid struggled to come up with arguments against an amendment offered by a Republican. His arguments could be summarized as follows:

  1. Mitch McConnell and me TOILED AND SLAVED FOR WEEKS over this bill
  1. The House got earmark reform wrong

Don't fall for this. Earmark reform ain't universal healthcare... it's a pretty simple and straightforward issue. The House passed its earmark reform measure easily, with UNANIMOUS support of Democrats and a considerable number of Republicans on board. Harry Reid is trying to tell you that every single House Democrat got it wrong.

TPM Muckraker sums the situation up nicely:

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) offered an amendment today that mirrored the tougher legislation passed by House Democrats.

According to Craig Holman of Public Citizen, Reid's version, if it had been applied to earmarks as part of legislation passed last year, would have disclosed the sponsor of only approximately 500 earmarks. DeMint's amendment would have forced sponsors to be known of roughly 12,000.

"DeMint's version is considerably tougher," Holman told me, noting that both Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who co-sponsored the bill, are "on the appropriations committee and haven't really believed in strong earmark reform propoals in the first place."

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/...

Then, to make matters worse, Reid engaged in unusual stalling tactics to prevent a vote on the DeMint Amendment. Why?

"It's important that the Senate rules be amended slowly and with careful bipartisan deliberation," Reid said, stressing that the House didn't spend much time on their version.

Okey dokey. I'm sure Reid would like to see them amended real slowly... like maybe after the next Highway Bill is passed, or better yet, after he retires to enjoy the fortune he's made in real estate.

Now, normally, I would be pretty dismissive of Republicans who want to get tough all of a sudden this early in the game after their 12-year reign of corruption. Just last week I lampooned ridiculous arguments by the Republican "Truth Squad" in the House, including the very silly Patrick McHenry (R-NC). But this is different. The DeMint amendment simply applies the same rules to Senate earmarks that have already been passed in the House. It's precisely what Reid should have already come up with during all those weeks burning the candle at both ends with Mitch McConnell.

Russ Feingold, Jim Webb, and Jon Tester were among a handful of Senate Democrats who went against the grain and spoiled Harry Reid's tactics to water down the Senate's earmark reform bill. When I see Russ Feingold going against something that seems fishy already, it tends to confirm my belief that I'm not just missing something.

Even if DeMint's amendment isn't perfect, it's pretty obvious that Harry Reid, and perhaps a lot of other Senate Democrats, would rather not be bothered with the requirements of tough earmark reform, now that Democrats are in the majority. But that's short-sighted, and it's not what I voted for. I voted for transparency in government. Period.

The House Democrats got it right... now Harry Reid needs to get with the program, stat.

**********************************

 

 

If that's not holding Democrats' feet to the fire, I don't know what is going to satisfy you. Show me where you have ever held Republicans to a similar standard and then you'll have proved your integrity to me.

………… parent

It is not a "Republican" culture of corruption.

Recent case in point: Dianne Feinstein's funneling MILCON work to her husband's companies.

Another case in point: Rostenkowski and Jim Wright as you yourself point out.

Yet you STILL term it a "Republican" Culture of Corruption. Why is that?

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

A few more words on this one ...

Since I ran across this as I was reviewing the 9/11 Commission Report for a separate post I came across the following:

Page 128:

The following is the text of an item from the Presidential Daily Brief received by PresidentWilliam J. Clinton on December 4, 1998. Redacted material is indicated in brackets.

SUBJECT: Bin Ladin Preparing to Hijack US Aircraft and Other Attacks

1. Reporting [—] suggests Bin Ladin and his allies are preparing for attacks in the US, including an aircraft hijacking to obtain the release of Shaykh ‘Umar ‘Abd al-Rahman, Ramzi Yousef, and Muhammad Sadiq ‘Awda. One source quoted a senior member of the Gama’at al-Islamiyya (IG) saying that, as of late October, the IG had completed planning for an operation in the US on behalf of Bin Ladin, but that the operation was on hold. A senior Bin Ladin operative from Saudi Arabia was to visit IG counterparts in the US soon thereafter to discuss options—perhaps including an aircraft hijacking.

• IG leader Islambuli in late September was planning to hijack a US airliner during the “next couple of weeks” to free ‘Abd al-Rahman and the other prisoners, according to what may be a different source.

• The same source late last month said that Bin Ladin might implement plans to hijack US aircraft before the beginning of Ramadan on 20 December and that two members of the operational team had evaded security checks during a recent trial run at an unidentified New York airport. [—]

2. Some members of the Bin Ladin network have received hijack training, according to various sources, but no group directly tied to Bin Ladin’s
al-Qa’ida organization has ever carried out an aircraft hijacking. Bin Ladin could be weighing other types of operations against US aircraft. According to [—] the IG in October obtained SA-7 missiles and intended to move them from Yemen into Saudi Arabia to shoot down an Egyptian plane or, if unsuccessful, a US military or civilian aircraft.

• A [—] in October told us that unspecified “extremist elements” in Yemen had acquired SA-7s. [—]

3. [—] indicate the Bin Ladin organization or its allies are moving closer to implementing anti-US attacks at unspecified locations, but we do not know whether they are related to attacks on aircraft. A Bin Ladin associate in Sudan late last month told a colleague in Kandahar that he had shipped a group of containers to Afghanistan. Bin Ladin associates also talked about the movement of containers to Afghanistan before the East
Africa bombings.

• In other [—] Bin Ladin associates last month discussed picking up a package in Malaysia. One told his colleague in Malaysia that “they” were in the “ninth month [of pregnancy].”

• An alleged Bin Ladin supporter in Yemen late last month remarked to his mother that he planned to work in “commerce” from abroad and said his impending “marriage,” which would take place soon, would be a “surprise.” “Commerce” and “marriage” often are codewords for terrorist attacks. [—]

When I mentioned that I thought that the information in the Presidential Briefing that you referenced came from the Clinton years I guess that I was remembering the briefing listed above. Note that this briefing also mentions Bin Laden wanting to hijack aircraft and that this is (likely) the source of the information provided in the 2001 briefing (which notes the 1998 date and the linkage of the two is the reference to "al-Rahman and the other prisoners".

Clinton also knew that al-Qaeda wanted to attack not just ANY NY buildings but specifically the World Trade Center based on the 1993 bombings and the fact that they were financed by al Qaeda member Khaled Shaikh Mohammed.

Why is it that Clinton did not connect THESE dots and take the extra-ordinary measures you seem to expect of Bush to clamp down on airport security and, more specifically, to safegard the World Trade Center against the use of hijacked airplanes being flown into them?

I mean Bill Clinton had 3 YEARS to put some safegards in place. Given the date of the briefing that you cited Bush had just over a month.

The answer is simple. Bill Clinton nor anyone else ever anticipated them hijacking airplanes to use them as bombs. Before 9/11 hijackings were merely used as a form of hostage taking.

Bill Clinton didn't connect this dot yet you expect Bush to have done so. Is this not just another example of you holding the Republican to a different standard than the Democrat?

Given that the logical leap that you expect to have been made here is (a) unfounded since the briefing clearly does NOT mention flying planes into buildings and there was no historical precent for that, and (b) it evaded the Deomcrat President for more than 3 years, I maintain that your assertion is unreasonable.

Therefore, since it is unreasonable to have expected Bush or anyone else to have drawn this specific conclusion Bush, once again, did not lie.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Because

1. 9-11 did not happen on Clinton's watch.

2. The section I originally noted said this:

We have not been able to corroborate some of the more sensational threat reporting, such as that from a ---- service in 1998 saying that Bin Laden wanted to hijack a U.S. aircraft to gain the release of "Blind Sheikh" Omar Abdel Rahman and other U.S.-held extremists.

Nevertheless, FBI information since that time indicates patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York.

In other words, there was new information since the 1998 memo to Clinton you are discussing. So Bush still lied.

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

No he didn't. n/t

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Yes. He. Did. n/t

………… parent

No he didn't. n/t

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Can you reply to the

content rather than returning to third grade?

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

I already told you I was done with the Bush Lied meme

and that the liberals could have the last substantive post. Hence, my remaining posts will not be substantive.

Edit:

Besides, I'm having fun playing with missliberties, my fair lady!

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Did so!

………… parent

Didn't!

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Uh Huh!

phhhhhhhhhfffffffftttttttttttt........... razzzzzpberry!

I win! :+)

………… parent

Perhaps you have forgotten,

but I have not, that during this time the Clinton administration was focusing on plots aimed at Millennial Celebrations. And they were successful at foiling ALL those plots. Bush must accept responsibility for what happened on his watch, for it was on his watch, not Bill Clinton's, that 9/11 happened. If you want to know exactly what Bush and his team failed to do that allowed 9/11 to happen, Eric Massa has laid out of lot of details here .

………… parent

They are all

Lies!

Just a few minutes from where I live, Bush came to tout his support of alternative energy by stopping by to visit the National Renewal Energy Labratory, in Golden, Co.

HIs speech was how much he "supported" renewable energy, blah blah blah.

The problem was they had cut the funding for NREL in the Bush budget, and the lab was forced to lay off many long time employees. Oops! The NREL was being used as a backdrop prop for Bush's re-election. Bush to people, "I support alternative energy", (in reality, "I slashed the budget for the research.").

It was a joke. Just days before Bush's arrival he gave an anemic dollar amount to the lab, so the people standing behind him would at least not be flipping him off in the background. (Noting that this lab was started by Jimmy Carter, explains why Bush hated it so much)

it was all about the photo-op and the sound byte to convince people like GoRight what a great President Bush is.

OH thy hypocrisy!

++++++++++++++small rant below++++++++++

Some people are still buying "the lies" soley for the sake of the ideological battle of our generation and the threat of Isamofascim taking root in America.

"They" are coming over here to take our way of life and eat your children.

If our moral values are so weak that folks worry about a takeover by Islam, then we ARE in trouble. But our values are not weak, in spite of the right's insistance.

Notice that the right thinks America IS weak because our society is in a moral state of decay. They tell us this constantly.

They attack the media, education, universities, condums, gays, birth control and everything as representing the weakness and moral depravity of our society.

Yet those on the left say our individual values are strong and we are fighting hard to save them.

Because the left actually believes in individual freedom. The right is afraid of it.

………… parent

Cognitive dissonance once again.

None of them are lies.

You only hear what you WANT to hear, and only remember what you WANT to remember, because the truth creates so much cognitive dissonance for you that you simply blot out the parts that don't fit with your (inaccurate) perception of the world around you.

A case in point is your comment above:

Just a few minutes from where I live, Bush came to tout his support of alternative energy by stopping by to visit the National Renewal Energy Labratory, in Golden, Co.

HIs speech was how much he "supported" renewable energy, blah blah blah.

The problem was they had cut the funding for NREL in the Bush budget, and the lab was forced to lay off many long time employees. Oops! The NREL was being used as a backdrop prop for Bush's re-election. Bush to people, "I support alternative energy", (in reality, "I slashed the budget for the research.").

It was a joke. Just days before Bush's arrival he gave an anemic dollar amount to the lab, so the people standing behind him would at least not be flipping him off in the background. (Noting that this lab was started by Jimmy Carter, explains why Bush hated it so much)

it was all about the photo-op and the sound byte to convince people like GoRight what a great President Bush is.

But somehow you conveniently forget the follow-up to this event :

GOLDEN - President Bush on Tuesday blamed a budget mix-up for the layoffs at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory earlier this month.

The jobs were reinstated by the federal government a day before his visit to the lab.

So, in the one hand you seek to tell half-truths to rip Bush for cutting the jobs like this was the worst thing to ever happen, but then when he admits the mistake and reinstates the jobs you term it "an anemic dollar amount".

I will simply repeat your own words right back at you: "OH thy hypocrisy!"

And this example is representative of what the left has done in almost every example you people have raised as a Bush lie: you have relied on half-truths, out of context quotes, and intentional misreading of the intents.

So don't complain when I do the same things right back to you. I am not going to sit back and let you have an unlevel playing field in terms of this type of rhetoric. If spinning half-truths as lies is what you all consider "acceptable behavior" then that is what I intend to give you right back. I am looking to YOU to set the bar for the level of discourse.

EDIT:

Because the left actually believes in individual freedom. The right is afraid of it.

Oh yea, and I almost forgot. This is a lie too, you have our respective positions reversed.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Enjoy your fantasy

Because that is exactly what it is.

He did not reinstate all the jobs.

You can't bullshit me on this one, because I have friends that work there.

………… parent

I merely highlighted the exact words of a news article.

If the quote is inaccurate complain to the news source, not me. Do you have any news reports that contradict the one I have provided?

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Yes.

………… parent

I don't care

how you word it, blaming Bill Clinton is a cop out and does not excuse what the current President is doing.

………… parent

I like the way

you state things clearly with so few words.

………… parent

:) Thanks!

………… parent

I stated it clearly above as well.

Bush has not lied.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Your statement...

...lacks the virtue of being true.

Which means Bush has company.

I came. I saw. I posted.
Veni, Vidi, Bitchy.

………… parent

Which part is untrue?

I DID say "Bush has not lied" above as I had indicated AND as I have clearly demonstrated above, he hasn't.

So where is the untruth which you so desperately seek?

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

that part...

I have clearly demonstrated above, he hasn't.

...would be the lie, right there. What you've demonstrated is you have no shame in making the most asinine arguments and will continue making them despite how transparently false they are.

I know you aren't so dumb as to actually believe what you say because you haven't shorted out your keyboard with drool. That only leaves one possibility.

I came. I saw. I posted.
Veni, Vidi, Bitchy.

………… parent

So when you merely assert that you are

correct and have somehow proven your point we are all supposed to just accept the matter as settled, but when I assert the same privilege I am being asinine?

How arrogant and self-righteous of you. I see that you are a legend in you own mind. Take, for example, this little gem:

... despite how transparently false they are.

Equally as bald a statement as mine was. I guess that makes you a liar. If anyone is being transparently false here it is you.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

After a while your excuses and rationalizations get old

You sound like a broken record.

That hit song you have on eternal replay re Clinton, it's no longer in the top ten of the billboard charts.

………… parent

And I can make the very same claim ...

about 99% of the stuff that appears under a blue line on this (and any left wing) site as well.

I am simply not going to let the bombastic cries of the left go unanswered any longer. As long as you are here spouting left wing propaganda I will here countering it on a post for post basis.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

See ya around

………… parent

For sure, fair maiden. n/t

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Ok, I want to play too

How about the notoriously famous 16 words:

"The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

Not true and he knew it (or at the very least his government knew the information was false).

Oh yeah, two more words regarding this lie: Joe Wilson .

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

Well, at least you keep me honest.

But you sure do make me waste time digging up all of the counterpoints. I reviewed, briefly, your references cited above. These are all old news that has been debunked for years.

In response I provide a Washinton Post piece which provides the following key points:

Former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, dispatched by the CIA in February 2002 to investigate reports that Iraq sought to reconstitute its nuclear weapons program with uranium from Africa, was specifically recommended for the mission by his wife, a CIA employee, contrary to what he has said publicly.

In other words, he lied.

The subsequent Senate Hearings chaired by the Democrats (where Valerie herself testified) as well as the following excerpt from your own source provides ample proof of his wife's involvment sending him to Niger:

Notes - Niger/Iraq uranium Meeting CIA, 2/19/02

Meeting apparently convened by Valerie Wilson, a CIA WMD managerial type and the wife of Amb. Joe Wilson, with the idea that the agency and the larger USG could dispatch Joe to Niger to use his contacts there to sort out the Niger/Iraq uranium sale question.

But if that was not enough here is the relevant except from the Washington Post article cited above:

The report states that a CIA official told the Senate committee that Plame "offered up" Wilson's name for the Niger trip, then on Feb. 12, 2002, sent a memo to a deputy chief in the CIA's Directorate of Operations saying her husband "has good relations with both the PM [prime minister] and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity." The next day, the operations official cabled an overseas officer seeking concurrence with the idea of sending Wilson, the report said.

Wilson has asserted that his wife was not involved in the decision to send him to Niger.

"Valerie had nothing to do with the matter," Wilson wrote in a memoir published this year. "She definitely had not proposed that I make the trip."

Poor Joe isn't looking so credible anymore. That's all fine and good, you say, but it doesn't change what Wilson found out, right? Well, here's another excerpt:

Wilson's assertions -- both about what he found in Niger and what the Bush administration did with the information -- were undermined yesterday in a bipartisan Senate intelligence committee report.

The panel found that Wilson's report, rather than debunking intelligence about purported uranium sales to Iraq, as he has said, bolstered the case for most intelligence analysts. And contrary to Wilson's assertions and even the government's previous statements, the CIA did not tell the White House it had qualms about the reliability of the Africa intelligence that made its way into 16 fateful words in President Bush's January 2003 State of the Union address.

...

The report also said Wilson provided misleading information to The Washington Post last June. He said then that he concluded the Niger intelligence was based on documents that had clearly been forged because "the dates were wrong and the names were wrong."

"Committee staff asked how the former ambassador could have come to the conclusion that the 'dates were wrong and the names were wrong' when he had never seen the CIA reports and had no knowledge of what names and dates were in the reports," the Senate panel said. Wilson told the panel he may have been confused and may have "misspoken" to reporters. The documents -- purported sales agreements between Niger and Iraq -- were not in U.S. hands until eight months after Wilson made his trip to Niger.

...

Wilson said that a former prime minister of Niger, Ibrahim Assane Mayaki, was unaware of any sales contract with Iraq, but said that in June 1999 a businessman approached him, insisting that he meet with an Iraqi delegation to discuss "expanding commercial relations" between Niger and Iraq -- which Mayaki interpreted to mean they wanted to discuss yellowcake sales. A report CIA officials drafted after debriefing Wilson said that "although the meeting took place, Mayaki let the matter drop due to UN sanctions on Iraq."

According to the former Niger mining minister, Wilson told his CIA contacts, Iraq tried to buy 400 tons of uranium in 1998.

Just so it is blazingly obvious to all, let me just highlight that all of the above amounts to strong evidence that Joe Wilson is simply a liar. And not the kind where we can quibble about the meaning of the word, liar, but a full on caught in the act type of liar. He claimed to come to conclusions based on information and data that he could not possibly have had, because the CIA didn't even have it for eight months after his so called trip.

Now, with regards to the INR memo it proves nothing. Zip, zero, nada. This is for the following reasons:

1) We have no proof that this memo was ever made available to Bush. Even the Truth Out article on the topic admits: "The memo does not say that the State Department alerted the White House on January 12, 2003, about the bogus uranium claims." (Carl Ford's conjectures in interviews not withstanding.)

2) This only indicates that INR had concerns over the Niger intel, but others in the intelligence community and most specifically the British continued to stand by it.

3) When confronted with conflicting intel and/or opinions from trusted sources, it is ultimately the President's judgement on which to believe and which not to believe on matters of national security. That is what he was elected to do.

So even if one organization considers something "dubious" but others still maintain that it is credible, it is up to the President to make the ultimate judgement call. So soon after 9/11 it is completely understandable and reasonable for the President to come down on the side of believing the worst to protect the American people.

Doing so in good faith does not constitute lying.

Thus far we have addressed only the Niger issue. Your National Journal reference focuses, however, on a separate but equally important issue. That of the aluminum tubes. From your own article we have:

... Rove expressed his concerns shortly after an informal review of classified government records by then-Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen J. Hadley determined that Bush had been specifically advised that claims he later made in his 2003 State of the Union address -- that Iraq was procuring high-strength aluminum tubes to build a nuclear weapon -- might not be true, according to government records and interviews.

Hadley was particularly concerned that the public might learn of a classified one-page summary of a National Intelligence Estimate, specifically written for Bush in October 2002. The summary said that although "most agencies judge" that the aluminum tubes were "related to a uranium enrichment effort," the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research and the Energy Department's intelligence branch "believe that the tubes more likely are intended for conventional weapons."

In other words, MOST agencies were of the opinion that the tubes were related to uranium enrichment, while SOME agencies did not agree. This is hardly proof that he was presented with a definitive statement that the tubes were NOT uranium enrichment related. Quite the contrary under the circumstances.

Even so, the point is totally moot from the perspective of whether he lied or not. Here is his quote direct from your source:

Three months after receiving that assessment, the president stated without qualification in his January 28, 2003, State of the Union address: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa. Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production."

Let me highlight the most significant part: "Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production."

There is no disagreement on whether the tubes were being purchased or not, they were. So that part of the statement is undeniable true.

There is also no disagreement on whether the tubes could have been used to enrich uranium, they clearly could. So the claim that Iraq was attempting to purchase aluminum tubes "suitable for nuclear weapons production" is clearly true as well.

Given this I claim that (this part of) his statement was 100% true and thereby could not possibly be a lie.

The fact that the various agencies were in disagreement as to Iraq's actual intended use is not even pertinent to the determination of whether the statement made is true or not. But even if it WAS pertinent, the mere fact that "most agencies" thought that they were intended for uranium enrichment sort of trumps any INR qualms. So again, he was not lying.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

Thanks for

all your hard work here. I will try to respond tomorrow. My bed is calling now. :-)

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

Wilson's own words

The Office of the Vice President requested that the CIA investigate reports of alleged uranium purchases by Iraq from Niger. The CIA setup a meeting to respond to the Vice President's inquiry. Another CIA official, not Valerie Wilson, suggested to Valerie Wilson's supervisor that the Ambassador attend that meeting. That other CIA official made the recommendation because that official was familiar with the Ambassador's vast experience in Niger and knew of a previous trip to Africa concerning uranium matters that had been undertaken by the Ambassador on behalf of the CIA in 1999.

"Valerie Wilson's supervisor subsequently asked her to relay a request from him to the Ambassador that he would like the Ambassador to attend the meeting at the CIA. Valerie Wilson did not participate in the meeting."

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_con...

………… parent

Well apparently Valerie's account doesn't

reconcile with all of the other investigative evidence in the matter. What does that imply to you about whether she was, ummm, lying or not?

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

I don't care who sent him

All I know is that Joe Wilson was right, and Bush was wrong about the situation (I'm not discussing the aluminum tubes, but, yes, there was prior controversy about the consensus about these too).

As far as the forged documents Bush relied upon to make his case, they were not even checked on for accuracy before being used:

CARLO BONINI: Prime Minister at the time. Berlusconi had won the general election five months before. He was eager, and he was pushing for strict, direct relationships with President Bush. The intelligence about Niger was a wonderful opportunity in terms of - I mean, politically speaking, it was a wonderful opportunity for SISME to please the government, the Italian government. It was a wonderful opportunity for the Italian government to please the White House. And probably what happened was that no one at SISME would ever thought that the story could go so far.

BILL MOYERS: So your speculation is that this guy (Rocco Martino) was trying to make some money. Some Italian agency, SISME agents, realized that they could make Burlesconi happy if they could give him information that he could bring to Washington and convince President Bush that he was on the President's side.

CARLO BONINI: Absolutely correct. That's basically - I mean, that's not what I believe. That's what facts that we've been reporting.

BILL MOYERS: When Prime Minister Berlusconi came to the White House with the story, do you think he knew the documents had been forged? Do you have any evidence that he knew?

CARLO BONINI: I don't have any evidence. But what I know, what I do know is that, as soon as the story took off, there is no chance, no chance that the government didn't ask the Secret Service for a full account of what was going on.

BILL MOYERS: I remember those pictures of Berlusconi coming to the White House, the coverage of it. He seemed a very happy man, when he was leaving.

CARLO BONINI: Absolutely. I would have died to be up there in a corner listening at that meeting.

BILL MOYERS: He gave the President something the President needed to make a case?

CARLO BONINI: Absolutely. And it was more than a smoking gun. It was a mushroom cloud. I mean, back in October, 2001, and early winter, 2002 - the White House had what he had been looking for for months. The final evidence that Saddam was restarting the nuclear program.

BILL MOYERS: By looking for this yellow cake?

CARLO BONINI: Absolutely.

Furthermore, if you've been paying attention this week you would've noticed that Tenet, the head of the CIA said the WH had its mind made up about iraq no matter what. (There's another lie: War with Iraq is a last resort ), but Tenet says the war was settled as a goal even before Bush got in the WH. They created the evidence around the goal as seen by the use o the forgeries.

All in all, Joe was right and Bush is a liar.

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

You are still wrong.

But you can have the last substantive post in this thread.

I'm the Bugs Bunny of Swords Crossed!
-4 Strongly Disagree - 0 Meh - Strongly Agree +4

………… parent

GoRight

I think you are taking this 'liar' theme pretty far. Don't get too riled up about it. Politicians lie. Machiavelli actually advocates it , but he argues the lie should lead to a positive result. The problem here is the negative results (in the eyes of the majority of the populace).

Do you really think that Bush has never lied in his political life? What is your aim here? To save his legacy? To convince us that we should stop saying he lied because of the most twisted nuances you can come up with? This is unnecessary stress to yourself, and you are going to give yourself a heart-attack taking up this cause this way.

I also find it humorous that you think lying (or the setting of the current political bar for public discourse) was set by Clinton. Do you recall the Iran-Contra hearings? The 'read-my-lips-no-new-taxes'? The 'I am not a crook'? The infidelity of Clinton, Kennedy, and even Franklin. We can go back to the Greeks ('Et tu, Brutus') and Romans to find politicians lying, and if there were records, I'm sure we would find pre-historic tribal leaders lying. It is nothing new.

I think what makes the Bush case striking is two things: 1) the advocacy of personal responsibility by conservatives, and the failure to live up to these standards by the people who advocate this conduct themselves, and 2) the negative results of these lies (going back to Machiavelli's justification for lies being positive results). We are losing/stuck in an unnecessary war with no end (nation building), and we saw a lack of preparedness for a natural disaster here. We need to address these issues and rightly so. If the war went swimmingly, no one would care about these lies, but since the results are bad, we are faced with confronting these issues.

Don't get so worked up about it. Bush will be gone in another year and a half regardless. Focus on the present, or better yet the future, instead of the past. Let this thread go and join us in the other threads. :-)

We are all mediators, translators. - Derrida
http://signicide.blogspot.com/

………… parent

Obvious difference...

When the Democrats were in power they apparently didn't want to set any timetables, so now that is the norm. By calling for them now THEY are the ones changing their tune. We merely want to play the game by the same rules which they applied to themselves.

Obvious difference being that Democrats are setting timelines FOUR F*CKING YEARS into the war, while Republicans were calling for timelines from DAY F*CKING ONE of NATO involvement in Kosovo.  NATO involvement in Kosovo began in March '99, Bush's timeline comments were in April '99. 

I see that you didn't leave your spin and bias at your folks' house ;-)

………… parent

I like the quote from Senator Webb (VA) I read yesterday.

He said:

"There's also a lot of rhetoric that's been going around over the past couple of days about defeatism and surrender and accusations of betraying the troops. I think we need to calm down a bit. There's no one in this Congress who wants anything more than to support those people that we put into harm's way, and I believe people should be very careful on this floor to discuss political motivations of our military, which reflects very closely the political views of the country at large. Poll after poll shows that. In respect to these accusations about defeatism and surrender, the question becomes: defeat by whom? And surrender to whom?

We won this war four years ago. The question is when we end the occupation. "

Thank you Jim. When are YOU running for President?

…………