Posted on 02/20/2004 6:04:02 AM PST by SJackson
Edited on 04/22/2004 11:51:08 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
In the increasingly out-of-body experience that has become politics and the news about politics in America, it is getting harder than ever to separate fact from fiction. This matters, because the facts could kill us.
In the past week, stories about what President Bush knew about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction (WMD) have been appearing almost literally alongside stories of the efforts by many nations to produce or acquire a nuclear bomb.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Sorry, but neither of those were falsehoods. The links to Al Qaeda are well established, as are the WMD programs and capabilities. Just because we have not yet come up with actual weapons, it doesn't in any way mean they don't exist or the threat wasn't real.
To take one example, how do you propose to improve welfare? The welfare-to-work program (which conservatives proposed and "progressives" screamed at - it was 'cruel') has done exactly what you propose - get people "back on track".
And if you can give some examples of how current policies actually let someone who has encountered some bad luck "fall through the cracks," I sure would like to see them.
And I wish you would take a look at the long list of quotes from "progressives" in post no. 23 and explain why Bush is the only one lying when he says the same thing.
At yesterdays press conference with Paul Bremer, the first question asked had to do with just that subject.
Q (Through interpreter.) (Name and affiliation inaudible.) Mr. Bremer, good evening. My question is, what is the American strategy, the case of winning or losing by President Bush toward Iraq? Will the American strategy change if President George Bush loses the election? Thank you.MR. BREMER: I try to make it a habit not to answer hypothetical questions. But in this case, I don't expect President Bush to lose the election, nor do I expect there to be any change in the American policy. The American people understand the importance of what we have done here, liberating 25 million people from a vicious tyranny, fighting the global war on terrorism and bringing democracy and pluralism to this country. We will continue on that until we succeed.
The video should be available at C-SPAN.
Yes, there are. We have some threads around here outlining them in detail. If nobody directs you to them, please remind me later. The problem is the critics want 100%, burying-a-reasonable-doubt proof. That doesn't often occur in life, and it's an extremely rare occurrence in the intel world, where one is trying to assess current and future intent and capabilities of an adversary that is usually doing its best to hide such information.
As for the WMDs, the talk in the run up to war about weapons with Cheney even stating, "We know where they are."
So? Intel is perishable. They probably did know where the weapons were, IMHO. And if they did, after the public announcement of such a thing to convince the critics, what do you think the regime might have done? Move them, perhaps? If I post that "today is Friday," yet you don't read my post until tomorrow, does that make my assessment incorrect? Of course not. The difference is I have a time stamp by my post, but the coalition doesn't (at least yet) have the weapons with a log of when/where they were stored.
And please remember, these same critics of the Administration were publicly berating them for not doing more before 9/11 - when we had MUCH less intel regarding that threat. In the post 9/11 world, this Administration was not willing to give the proven-ad-nauseam murderer and liar (Hussein) the benefit of the doubt. Had they not taken action, IMHO they would have been negligent in their duties.
It is well-established that WMDs were talked about as a certainty by the UN AND the previous administration.
Progressives' glory days are over. Now it's the conservatives who have the intellectuals and ideas to move us forward.
1) Keep in mind America's definition of poverty often means the people only have a VCR and not a DVD player (exaggerated for effect). Most in our blessed nation have no idea about true poverty.
2) Most conservatives have very kind hearts. But many of us feel there should be less government involvement and more work by private institutions like churches. That's where I personally hear many of the success stories. I think liberals and conservatives can often reach agreement that the government rarely does something as efficiently as the private sector.
I have very strong problems with someone like Kerry who states now that he was misled when, at the time, he didn't do his job as a Senator and ask the tough questions.
I sincerely appreciate your recognition of this hypocrisy.
Also, good point about private institutions. I find they tend to provide money AND more personal care whereas the government's churns out the paychecks with less personal care and little or no accountability.
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