Posted on 10/10/2004 12:17:57 PM PDT by wagglebee
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic vice presidential candidate John Edwards on Sunday disputed a White House assertion that it was right to topple Saddam Hussein even if he had no illegal weapons because he posed a future threat.
The North Carolina senator, appearing on several television news programs, said Saddam's intention to eventually gather weapons of mass destruction was one of dozens of such threats.
"There are lots of threats waiting to happen all over the world," Edwards said. "That doesn't mean that that justifies invading a country."
Edwards was responding to U.S. national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, who told "Fox News Sunday" that President Bush was "absolutely" correct to have launched the invasion of Iraq even if they had known, as they do now, that the former Iraqi president had no stockpiles of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons.
Saddam was "a major and growing threat to the international community" with "an insatiable appetite for weapons of mass destruction," Rice said.
"It was time to take care of him. And this president, post-September 11th, was not going to let threats continue to gather," she added. "It was only a matter of time."
The two continued a debate that has dominated the U.S. presidential campaign in recent weeks and intensified with the final report of chief U.S. weapons inspector Charles Duelfer, who concluded Iraq had no unconventional weapons -- a main rationale for going to war.
"You know, the Bush administration's explanation is: 'We invaded a country because at some point in the future they might get weapons of mass destruction?' ... I mean, the bottom line is, this is a convoluted logic to try to justify in hindsight what we now know wasn't true," Edwards said on CNN's "Late Edition."
Bush says his Democratic rival, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, agreed in the spring of 2003 it was the right decision to invade Iraq but now says it was the wrong war. Kerry has said repeatedly that Bush rushed to war without a strong coalition or a plan to win the peace.
"We did not authorize this president to make the mess that he has now made in Iraq," Edwards said on NBC's "Meet the Press."
The first-term senator also noted that of the three countries singled out by Bush as part of an "axis of evil" -- Iraq, North Korea and Iran -- "you know, we invaded the one of those three that doesn't have nuclear weapons."
Edwards predicted the situation in Iraq, where a violent insurgency has raged for more than a year after Saddam was ousted, "and whether the president's going to level with people about that ... will drive the decision on November 2nd."
"I think he did help alleviate some of the concerns that people in that area had about this "axis of evil" comment."
If North Korea is not evil, then Saddam Hussein was a boy scout....give me a break. They don't get any more evil than madman Communists with nukes and starving people...
Kerry- & Edwards (aka Liar-Thief) are too stupid (or at least blinded by ambition) to see the truth.
Yes, there are problems all over the world.
I've seen projections by conservative experts that put the death toll of provoking an 'armed conflict' with Korea at over a million. And Iran hasn't, so far, really given us an excuse.
Sudan has, but it's very interesting, because HERE, GWB is trying to work with the U.N. to no avail. China is making money selling arms to Sudan, and France and other "allies" also have thier own priorities (like they did in Rwanda while the UN, Bill Clinton, and Kofi Annan sat on their thumbs), which don't include protecting the innocent.
If GWB did as Kerry suggests and went in alone, Kerry would accuse him of 'stretching our military' too thin. He doesn't need to know what GWB is doing on any subject to be absolutely certain it is wrong.
Edwards visited Afghanistan, but I don't think either of the dynamic duo have been to Iraq.
Maybe he DID vote against it, but his vote was distorted by a hanging chad.
Personally, I think he looks like a weasel. Beady eyes close together. (and Kerry looks like Lurch)
The only problem is that he'd have to deal with people a little less gullible than the average jury. It isn't insurance money people are spending, and BS won't work with leaders of foreign nations (or Republican members of Congress).
Kerry listed his requirements for a VP quite some time before picking Quayle, I mean Edwards. Edwards didn't fill a single requirement.
Maybe Edwards was supposed to deliver the 'stupid woman' vote (liberal attitude that many women vote based on looks), and the southern vote. So far he hasn't managed to do either.
Edwards reminds me of the 'autopilot' dummy from Airplane. Someone let the air out and send him home.
Yes, but how many of them do we have 12 UN resolutions against, signed a peace agreement with us, and continue to shoot at us every day? They conveniently forget to mention that in any of their speeches.
Not to mention the fact that he used them before, and we are still finding them.
I subscribe to the cheeseburgers in California analogy.
Becki
Another goal was to dominate an oil rich region: Iran, Kuwait and I am most certain he would have gone after Saudi Arabia next. Had he been left unchecked, he could have hijacked a staple energy resource of the industrialized world, particularly western nations. France and Russia should have learned long ago that appeasement to such dictatorships is foolish and benign neglect.
As far as I can tell, the Liberals of this country often mistake what is a truly negotiable situation with the false sense of security in pacts and deals with an entity that never plays by the rules to begin with.
After reading her biography I honestly think that after her term in the administration is up Condi is going back to academia to teach and wait for the NFL Commissioner's job to open. But it still makes me laugh to think that after having his a** handed to him by an old man with a heart condition, Edwards decides to take on a 5' 9" black woman with the brains to run Stanford, the talent and discipline to be a professional pianist, the athletic ability to have been a top figure skater, and the common sense to be (at least on foreign policy) a conservative.
To: The AWOL for years but still collecting his wages, aleged to be Senator from NC.
You are out of order, you ambulance chasing punk!
We the people of these United States of America, authorized our always present for duty President George W. Bush, to make the decision of what is best for America and the free world.
Bush made the right decision on Iraq, and Bush is right for America.
Kerry and Edwards are right for the enemies of America.
What exactly is the cheeseburgers in California analogy?
Edwards says "how I learned to stop worrying and love the terrorist."
It was posted here on FR by another FReeper when we first went into Iraq. And it made perfect sense.
Iraq is roughly the size of California. We know there are cheeseburgers in California. We've seen them and people who have eaten them have told us. But cheeseburgers are illegal so we go in to inspect.
Before we go in, we spend 6 months getting buy-in from all the other states. In those 6 months California shuts down all of the places that sell cheeseburgers and move any remaining cheeseburgers to Oregon and Washington. So by the time we get there, we find cows, wheat, lettuce fields, tomatoes, and grills. The butchers are now only butchering pigs and chickens. But we find no cheeseburgers.
Everything to make them is there, easily available and the people who know how to make them are there. And the day we leave, there are again cheeseburgers in California.
That's the way I see the WMD in Iraq. And I am glad we went in.
Becki
I believe you are correct. Id still like to see her kick silk ponys butt. ;^)
This Kerry/Edwards ploy of Monday-morning-quarterbacking is little more than a trial-lawyer distraction technique. By this logic, anyone who threatens to hijack an airplane with a concealed weapon need fear no consequences, so long as it turns out he/she didn't actually possess the weapon they claimed to have had. Or the bank robber who has his hand in his jacket pocket, claiming to have a gun -- if there's no gun (or it turns out to have been fake), then apparently, according to the Kerry/Edwards logic, no crime would have been committed. In their world, the arresting officers would have erred, because they made everyone else believe the perpetrators were armed.
Yeah, these guys are just what's needed to lead the free world. What a dynamic duo. Kerry, the public defender, and Edwards, the trial lawyer.
Let's save it for 2008
Edwards and Kerry are liberals. That makes them smarter than everybody else.
Us common folk are just too dumb to understand that...
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