Anyway, regarding your points, I realize that Saddam didn't spend the oil-for-food money on food, but I don't really care that he spent it on new palaces either. His nuclear program was destroyed and there is almost no chance of him restarting it (requires large, easily detected facilities). He can produce chem and bio weapons more easily, especially bio. But his means of delivery are limited and detectable. We have vigorously embargoed all materials that could possibly be used for any of these purposes and the rest of the world has joined us.
I trust our satellites and radiation sensors, if there's no facilties, there's no weapons. As for information that has not yet been made public, I'm waiting to hear it. I will make up my mind then.
I suspect some of the info on him is currently classified, but Bush will make his case before Congress and the committees and they will mostly all jump on board, I would think. We dont "have all the facts" right now, but that doesent necessarily make this case weak... Oh, and no matter what, Ramsey Clark wont be "with us". Thats for sure,too.
Not neccessarily, When the former Soviet Union crumbled there were reports of massive amounts of weapons grade nuclear materials un-accounted for. Therefore the facilitied to produce would not be needed if the materials could be purchased on the black market.
None of us have the intel on these matters and I wouldn't expect this administration to explain how the obtained it if it meant exposing our sources. I would expect them to explain if it's a case of Saddam producing the material by showing sattelite photos of the facilities and I would expect them to explain how we know Saddam is attempting to purchase the material. If he is attempting either producing or purchasing these materials he needs to be removed.
Until Saddam can ussure us he doesn't have WMD and he isn't trying to abtain them, The NO Fly Zones and sanctions should stay in place. IMHO Saddam is the one who needs to make the case NOT the United States of America
With the mounting pressure of the possibility of war on Iraq, one or more of Saddam's Generals just might take matters into their own hands and kill him and all of his closest advisors and family and invite the UN and America in to any kind of inspections neccessary to lift the sanctions placed on them.
The other thought is... President Bush will tell the U.N. on Sept 12th that we plan to use military force (if neccessary) to enforce the U.N. Resolutions he agreed upon and conduct highly intrusive weapons inspections or we will use whatever force it takes to remove Saddam and liberate Iraq from his oppressive regime and after his removal, call on the U.N. and NATO to help with rebuilding and becoming a productive member of the peaceful nations of the world.