Posted on 09/09/2006 3:35:56 PM PDT by Armedanddangerous
Edited on 09/09/2006 4:55:19 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
(CBS) When the Senate Intelligence Committee released a declassified version of its findings this past week, the Republican chairman of the committee, Pat Roberts, left town without doing interviews, calling the report a rehash of unfounded partisan allegations.
Its statements like this one, made Feb. 5, 2003, by then-Secretary of State Colin Powell that have become so controversial, implying Iraq was linked to terror attacks.
"Iraq today harbors a deadly terrorist network headed by abu Musab al-Zarqawi, an associated collaborator of Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda lieutenants," Powell said.
But after 2 1/2 years of reviewing pre-war intelligence behind closed doors, the lead Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, Sen. John Rockefeller (D-W.V.), who voted for the Iraq War, says the Bush administration pulled the wool over everyone's eyes.
"The absolute cynical manipulation, deliberately cynical manipulation, to shape American public opinion and 69 percent of the people, at that time, it worked, they said 'we want to go to war,'" Rockefeller told CBS News correspondent Sharyl Attkisson. "Including me. The difference is after I began to learn about some of that intelligence I went down to the Senate floor and I said 'my vote was wrong.'"
Rockefeller went a step further. He says the world would be better off today if the United States had never invaded Iraq — even if it means Saddam Hussein would still be running Iraq.
He said he sees that as a better scenario, and a safer scenario, "because it is called the 'war on terror.'"
Didn't Rockefeller make a trip to Syria prior to the Iraq war? (probably to warn Saddam to move the WMD)
you must be so proud!
Fox showed him making that statement, then a clip from '02 where he declared on the Senate floor that they KNEW Saddam had WMDs, etc.
I think he will die of old age in office.
There is no one in this state with the guts enough to beat him in an election.
It doesn't change the fact that I'm terribly embarassed by this lunatic.
I guess you're right about Iraq, Jay.
(Why can't these anti-American creeps be censured?? Where is the line of treason??)
We're getting close to election time in an even numbered year. He's just following his marching orders handed down to him from the DNC leadership.
As is the MSM:
btt
IAN SCHWARTZ has the video of Christopher Hitchens berating Ron Reagan on MSNBC.
here's a transcript of the heart of Hitchen's rant:Excuse me. When I went to interview Abu Nidal, then the most wanted terrorist in the world, in Baghdad, he was operating out of an Iraqi government office. He was an arm of the Iraqi State, while being the most wanted man in the world. The same is true of the shelter and safe house offered by the Iraqi government, to the murderers of Leon Klinghoffer, and to Mr. Yasin, who mixed the chemicals for the World Trade Center bombing in 1993. How can you know so little about this, and be occupying a chair at the time that you do?
Obviously, Ron doesn't want to hear things that might challenge his world view.
How could Hitch be so insensitive?
http://www.indepundit.com/archive2/2005/07/in_case_you_mis.html
Unfreakinbelievable! Not because we didn't already know there is a Congress full of traitors but that they admit it.
yes!
The world would be MUCH better off today if people like Jay Rockefeller were no longer in office.
And that goes for the whole stinking lot of the Democrats.
http://www.freedomagenda.com/iraq/wmd_quotes.html
"The global community -- in the form of the United Nations -- has declared repeatedly, through multiple resolutions, that the frightening prospect of a nuclear-armed Saddam cannot come to pass. But the U.N. has been unable to enforce those resolutions. We must eliminate that threat now, before it is too late.
But this isn't just a future threat. Saddam's existing biological and chemical weapons capabilities pose a very real threat to America, now. Saddam has used chemical weapons before, both against Iraq's enemies and against his own people. He is working to develop delivery systems like missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles that could bring these deadly weapons against U.S. forces and U.S. facilities in the Middle East.
As the attacks of September 11 demonstrated, the immense destructiveness of modern technology means we can no longer afford to wait around for a smoking gun. September 11 demonstrated that the fact that an attack on our homeland has not yet occurred cannot give us any false sense of security that one will not occur in the future. We no longer have that luxury.
September 11 changed America. It made us realize we must deal differently with the very real threat of terrorism, whether it comes from shadowy groups operating in the mountains of Afghanistan or in 70 other countries around the world, including our own.
There has been some debate over how "imminent" a threat Iraq poses. I do believe that Iraq poses an imminent threat, but I also believe that after September 11, that question is increasingly outdated. It is in the nature of these weapons, and the way they are targeted against civilian populations, that documented capability and demonstrated intent may be the only warning we get. To insist on further evidence could put some of our fellow Americans at risk. Can we afford to take that chance? We cannot!
The President has rightly called Saddam Hussein's efforts to develop weapons of mass destruction a grave and gathering threat to Americans. The global community has tried but failed to address that threat over the past decade. I have come to the inescapable conclusion that the threat posed to America by Saddam's weapons of mass destruction is so serious that despite the risks -- and we should not minimize the risks -- we must authorize the President to take the necessary steps to deal with that threat."
Senator John D. Rockefeller (Democrat, West Virginia)
Also a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee
Addressing the US Senate
October 10, 2002
http://www.senate.gov/~rockefeller/news/2002/flrstmt0102002.html
What took you so long?????????????
OMG! He wrote that in October 2002!
Are you sure his name isn't forged...lol.?
"Iraq is a long way from Ohio, but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face."
Madeleine Albright, President Clinton's Secretary of State
Town Hall Meeting on Iraq at Ohio State University
February 18, 1998
http://www.fas.org/news/iraq/1998/02/20/98022006_tpo.html
Imagine the consequences if Saddam fails to comply and we fail to act. Saddam will be emboldened, believing the international community has lost its will. He will rebuild his arsenal of weapons of mass destruction. And some day, some way, I am certain, he will use that arsenal again, as he has ten times since 1983."
Sandy Berger, President Clinton's National Security Advisor
Town Hall Meeting on Iraq at Ohio State University
February 18, 1998
http://www.fas.org/news/iraq/1998/02/20/98022006_tpo.html
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