Saddam, if you're reading this - this Briton thinks you're a lying, murderous sack of camel excrement who should swing from a lamppost like Mussolini. Get out or die, you fool.
Regards, Ivan
Posted on 02/26/2003 3:32:34 PM PST by MadIvan
SADDAM HUSSEIN says that he would rather die than go into exile, that Iraq has no links with Osama bin Laden and no plans to destroy its oil wells in the event of a US-led invasion. But he is also curious about what Americans think of him.
During a wide-ranging interview in Baghdad with the American television network CBS, the Iraqi leader suddenly ordered the cameras switched off and turned the tables. After fielding questions from the veteran American broadcaster Dan Rather for 90 minutes, he led the journalist to his private office and began grilling him.
Rather, who first interviewed Saddam in August 1990 before the Gulf War, was offered an overstuffed leather chair by the Iraqi leader.
“He had questions about American public opinion and President Bush,” the 71-year-old CBS anchorman said.
“I said, ‘Mr President, you asked me and I will try to answer you. A lot of these answers I don’t think you’re going to like.’
“There’s always some discomfort in that kind of situation. I wasn’t going to trim the answers to suit what I thought he wanted to hear. I told him American public opinion was behind Bush.”
Saddam, an avid watcher of American news networks, responded: “Not as much as it was.”
Rather responded: “Americans like to debate and discuss things and vent,” but he told the Iraqi leader that they were still backing Mr Bush.
When Saddam asked about American opinions of the war, Rather said that he was just a reporter, “not a politician or academic or diplomat or soldier”.
Saddam replied: “Yes, yes, but you are also a citizen, and an experienced journalist.”
It says a lot about Saddam that he considers Rather a journalist rather than a left wing propagandist - Ivan
During Rather’s filmed interview, the first with an American journalist for more than a decade and extracts of which were aired yesterday, Saddam was asked if he had any connection with bin Laden, the al-Qaeda leader.
The charge that Iraq supports terrorists and that Baghdad had given refuge to an al-Qaeda agent was an important element of the case against Iraq made by Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State, to the UN Security Council on February 5.
“Iraq has never had any relationship with al-Qaeda and I think that Mr bin Laden himself has said recently, in one of his speeches, given such an answer that we have no relation with him.”
Rather asked Saddam if he had been offered asylum by another regime. “I was born here in Iraq,” he replied. “I am proud to have been born fearing God and I have taught my children the value of history and the value of human stands.
“Whoever decides to forsake his nation from whoever requests (it) is not true to his principles. We will die here. We will die in this country and we will maintain our honour. I believe that whoever offers Saddam asylum in his own country is in fact a person without morals.”
Saddam indicated that he would not set fire to Iraq’s oilfields or destroy its dams in the event of war. During the 1991 Gulf War, Iraqi troops set fire to hundreds of Kuwaiti oilfields as they were driven from the country.
“Iraq does not burn its wealth and it does not destroy its dams,” he told Rather.
Rather says that when he arrived in Baghdad, he sat in front of a mirror in his hotel room practising his questions, pretending Saddam was on the other side.
The first time he was summoned to interview Saddam, in 1990, it was late at night, he was unshaven, running a fever and without a fresh shirt.
This time, the CBS anchor said, he received the call to meet Saddam early in the evening. “I had my shoes shined, my trousers pressed and my best white shirt on,” Rather said.
And your lips puckered no doubt, in case Saddam offered his posterior for you to kiss - Ivan
Saddam denied the assertion by Hans Blix, the chief UN weapons inspector, that Iraq’s al-Samoud missiles are illegal.
He also challenged Mr Bush to a live television debate via a satellite link between Baghdad and Washington, with Rather as intermediary.
Rather: “I paused and said — I’m not proud of this — ‘Mr President, I have enough troubles already’. He chuckled at that.” Saddam insisted that the offer was not a joke, but Washington officials said that it produced the odd guffaw inside the White House yesterday.
Rather said that after the interview he was left in no doubt that Saddam views war as inevitable, but that he expects to survive it.
After arriving in Baghdad the TV reporter had met Tariq Aziz, the Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister, on Sunday night. Rather, who has known Mr Aziz since the late 1980s, said that Mr Aziz cautioned him: “There may be no interview with anyone. I don’t make the decision. The President makes the decision.”
Saddam, Rather said, “was to all outward appearances calm. He was unhurried. He comes across as confident. Some may argue this was studied.” He added: “He smiled some. But not a lot.”
Answering back
The bin Laden connection
SH: “Iraq has never had any relationship with al Qaeda.”
Given Saddam's Clintonian relationship with the truth, we can take this as confirmation of a relationship with Al Qaeda - Ivan
Going into exile
DR: “Would you, under any circumstances, consider going into exile to save your people death and destruction?”
SH: “I was born here in Iraq. I have taught my children the value of human stands. Whoever decides to forsake his nation is not true to the principles. We will die in this country and we will maintain our honour.”
Burning the oil fields
DR: “If there is an invasion, will you set fire to the oil fields? Will you blow the dams?”
SH: “Iraq does not burn its wealth and it does not destroy its dams.”
Al-Samoud missiles
DR: “Do you intend to destroy the al-Samoud missiles that the UN prohibits?”
SH: “The missiles you are talking about, the missiles that are against the resolution of the United Nations, these do not exist and they have been destroyed.”
Approach to war
DR: “What is the most important thing you want the American people to understand?”
SH: “Iraqi people are not the enemy of the American people. I am ready to dialogue with Bush and to appear together before the television. I would say what I have to say about the American policy and he can say things about the Iraqi policy on television in a just and fair way.”
Saddam, if you're reading this - this Briton thinks you're a lying, murderous sack of camel excrement who should swing from a lamppost like Mussolini. Get out or die, you fool.
Regards, Ivan
I'm glad Dan Rather is around, if for no other reason, than to keep Texans from getting too big fer their britches.
I presume you are just trying to be pretentious like those German and French prats. For all you know, Osama was vapourised when he met Miss Daisy Cutter in Tora Bora. She has rather a way of making an entrance.
When Saddam is indeed dangling from that lamppost in Baghdad, I certainly hope you will have the good taste to take a massive dose of "shut the hell up", if not while the troops invade.
Ivan
Did he wear a funny hat and paste a caterpillar under his nose while he did it?
He clearly savors the war protestors and the Democrats. It influences his decisions on how far he will go playing games. The more attention the protestors get, the harder our soldiers job becomes. The war protestors and Democrat leaders anti-american efforts will result in getting many more people killed on both sides.
Saddam, I think of you as dead. Next question please.
There is something to be said for Saddam...
It has to be said because it is unprintable!
Also, for what it's worth, he didn't shade the truth- he said: "I told him American public opinion was behind Bush.”
I can imagine other lefties bringing up protests, letters to the editors, et.al. Not a fan of Rather, but he seems to have done okay here.
All I said was that he will die just like they died.
He we will be vapourised in a massive explosion and no trace will ever be found.
Dan: Gad, Saddam, it is hard to think with Janeane Garofalo's hand up my a$$.
Well, that's funny. You see we took away his Texas Citizenship and sent the SOB up north to lord it over you Yankees!
Payback's a bitch, ain't it?
Hitler also liked Hollywood and he promised his little Eva that when the war was over, he'd take her there. Hollywood, at the time, lead efforts to fight Hitler. Some of them even enlisted in the military.
If only today's celebs were one-tenth as wise.
What a stroke of luck, there are 150,000 American troops in your neighborhood just itching to assist you with your desire...
One word.
Toast.
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