Byrd: 'False Premises' Prompted Iraq War (BARF ALERT!!!)

Associated Press ^ | Wed May 21, 7:42 PM ET | KEN GUGGENHEIM

[pittsburgh gop guy]

Byrd: 'False Premises' Prompted Iraq War

Wed May 21, 7:42 PM ET

Add Politics - U. S. Congress to My Yahoo!

By KEN GUGGENHEIM, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Sen. Robert Byrd (news, bio, voting record) accused the Bush administration of using "false premises" to get Americans to accept what he said was an illegal and unprovoked attack on Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s government.

AP Photo

Latest news:

·	UN Votes to Lift Iraq Sanctions by 14-0 Reuters - 12 minutes ago

·	Impact of New Post-War Iraq Resolution AP - 20 minutes ago

·	After decades of Saddam's terror, resistance bastion finally mourns AFP - 29 minutes ago

Special Coverage

His remarks on the Senate floor Wednesday made for some of the toughest criticism of the Iraq (news - web sites) war from Congress.

Referring to turmoil in postwar Iraq, Byrd, D-W.Va., said: "If the situation in Iraq is the result of liberation, we may have set the cause of freedom back 200 years."

The White House dismissed his comments.

"It was widely known before the conflict began that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, as was determined by the United Nations (news - web sites)," White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan said. "In fact, we have already found at least two mobile labs" suspected of being capable of producing biological weapons, she said.

Administration officials believe the weapons themselves will be found eventually, Buchan said.

Byrd's comments come at a time that Democrats are increasingly criticizing Bush's handling of the war's aftermath and the fight against terrorism.

In recent days, Sen. John Edwards (news, bio, voting record) of North Carolina said "America's postwar policy has been confused and chaotic." Sen. Joe Lieberman (news - web sites) of Connecticut said "In Iraq, shock and awe is giving way to stumble and fumble."

Edwards and Lieberman are presidential candidates who supported the war. Byrd, 85, speaks as the Senate's most senior member and one of the strongest opponents of the war.

Earlier this month, he criticized Bush as a "desk-bound president who assumes the garb of a warrior" after Bush flew onto an aircraft carrier to declare an end of major fighting in Iraq.

In his speech Wednesday, Byrd stepped up the rhetoric.

"It appears to this senator that the American people may have been lured into accepting the unprovoked invasion of a sovereign nation, in violation of long-standing international law, under false premises," Byrd said.

"There is ample evidence that the horrific events of Sept. 11 have been carefully manipulated to switch public focus from Osama bin Laden (news - web sites) and al-Qaida, who masterminded the Sept. 11th attacks, to Saddam Hussein who did not."

He accused the administration of brushing aside revelations that seemed to refute its case against Saddam.

"Instead of addressing the contradictory evidence, the White House deftly changes the subject," he said. "No weapons of mass destruction have yet turned up, but we are told that they will in time."

He said the administration's talk of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction to justify the war "has become more than embarrassing."

"It has raised serious questions about prevarication and the reckless use of power," he said. "Were our troops needlessly put at risk? Were countless Iraqi civilians killed and maimed when war was not really necessary? Was the American public deliberately misled? Was the world?"

He said the United States "appears to be pushing off Iraq's clamor for self-government."

"It is becoming all too clear that the smiling face of the U.S. as liberator is quickly assuming the scowl of an occupier," he said. "The image of the boot on the throat has replaced the beckoning hand of freedom."

Byrd also criticized his congressional colleagues, saying they have not asked the tough questions, such as how many troops will have to stay in Iraq and how much will it cost.

[pittsburgh gop guy]

I searched to see if someone posted this article already and could not find it.

It appears that Byrd has just totally lost it. Something to keep in mind is that W won West Virginia in 2000 - which is one of the reasons he is in the White House - and not ALGORE. I see all of this as a combo of Byrd being senile and a partisan, flak.

And don't forget he was in the KKK.

And I take the following as insulting the U.S. military:
""It is becoming all too clear that the smiling face of the U.S. as liberator is quickly assuming the scowl of an occupier," he said. "The image of the boot on the throat has replaced the beckoning hand of freedom." "

For the entire speech, go to his Senate website

[The Duke]

The senator forgets one basic principle - "The oil justifices the means!"

[hnorris]

The Byrd is the word!

I just hope the fool can't stop talking!

[anniegetyourgun]

It's also probably not wise for the former Klansman to use phrases like: "The image of the boot on the throat has replaced the beckoning hand of freedom."

[hnorris]

Byrd also criticized his congressional colleagues, saying they have not asked the tough questions, such as...

How come they let a KKK racist represent them?

When will West Virgina be renamed Robert C. Byrdistan?

[Shermy]

He seems to forget the part of the story where we've been bombing Saddam for 12 years previous, enforcing no-fly zones, protecting the Kurds in the then continuing quasi-civil war.

But that was mostly under Clinton...

[BonnieJ]

Sen. Byrd has apparently been chosen to lead the most blatant attacks on Pres. Bush. We will probably be hearing a lot more from him, but the words originate from McAuliffe, Hillary & Bill Clinton. Unlike the other Dems who will quickly parrot and paraphrase his words, the old senator doesn't have anything to lose, & he has already lost most of his credibility outside his own party. But his statements get lots of coverage and are played over & over...and that's all they care about.

[hnorris]

I'd pay money to see a Congressional Page hand Byrd a rope with a hangman's noose while he's in the well of the Senate.

Or maybe a KKK hood, folded up nice and neat.

[N. Theknow]

More pathetic prose from Sen. Shakes Lickspittle.

[Havoc]

Prediction: Given the past dealings of Bush with these blab-o-matics, The proof is already there - just giving the big mouths enough slack to hang themselves before he sticks it to them before the people :)

[lilylangtree]

Rec'd an email on May 21 from Grassfire.net with the following related to Bobby "Monsoon" Byrd:

"Last week your Grassfire team was on Capitol Hill
delivering more than 300,000 'I Support the Commander-in-Chief' petitions to Senator Robert C. Byrd's office in Washington, D.C., as part of an EMERGENCY PETITION DELIVERY.

"Senator Byrd's dubious attacks on the President's landing on the USS Abraham Lincoln caused a fury among our Commander-in-Chief petition signers--many of whom asked us to take action against the senior Senator from West Virginia.

"Afterall, who would oppose a Commander-in-Chief for personally thanking his troops and welcoming them home?

"Grassfire has made dozens of petition deliveries, and in virtually every case, we have been able to document the delivery with a photo. Not so with Sen. Byrd and his staff, who refused--even after we explained that 2,000 petitions were from West Virginia residents!

"In light of Sen. Byrd's comments, and his office's refusal to have a photo taken, Grassfire placed an audacious, full-page ad in this week's (May 19-25, 2003) Washington Times edition questioning the Senator's motives for his comments against the President. See http://www.grassfire.net/26/images/byrd.gif

"With the war in Iraq over, we can expect attacks against our President to escalate in the months ahead, and as is the case with the Byrd attack, we must be ready to defend when necessary. That's why we need help. See http://www.grassfire.net/26/petition.asp?PID=3824653"

[jagrmeister]

False Premises spur Klansman Byrd to lynch Black people

Senator Byrd today admitted that false pretenses, wrong conceptions about the inferiority of black people, led him to lead lynchings of blacks in his early adulthood. In fact to this day, he continues to use N word but justifies it from the recurrence of these false premises in his mind.

[stop_fascism]

"Members of the African-American Republican Leadership Council and the Washington, D.C., chapter of FreeRepublic.com staged the sit-in in Byrd's Hart Building Senate office on Tuesday, where Byrd's press secretary Tom Gavin fielded questions for about 20 minutes.

"We asked Gavin, does he know what Sen. Byrd did while he was in the Klan?" Kristinn Taylor, co-leader of the FreeRepublic group, told NewsMax.

"He didn't know," Taylor recalled. "He said he hadn't talked to Byrd about it."

"We asked Gavin if he knew what the Klan was doing in West Virginia in the 1940s when Sen. Byrd was a member," added Taylor.

Byrd's spokesman pleaded ignorance again.

"Were they lynching black people?" came the next question. "Again, Gavin didn't know," Taylor said.

Then the protesters wanted to know, did Byrd's Klan chapter burn crosses on black people's lawns and run them out of town?

"He didn't know. He had no idea," came the response from the Byrd press aide.

When pressed on why Gavin didn't try to find out more about Byrd's Klan past in the wake of last month's Trent Lott fiasco, the spokesman said only that he had failed to do so and didn't explain why, according to Taylor."
- NewsMax Friday, Jan. 10, 2003

Senator, Explain what you did in the klan or shut your mouth.

[pittsburgh gop guy]

From his Senate website:

"The Dean of the Congress
The West Virginian of the 20th Century"

PUKE!

Yeah, The West Virginian of the 20th Century!!!!!! Guess he never crossed bill clinton's bridge to the 21st Century!

[Lazamataz]

Byrd: "Wah, we went all the way to Iraq, and we didn't lynch ev'n one n****r!!! What a waste!!!"

[Geezerette]

Did anyone hear Rush refer to "Byrd Droppings" today when he played the audio clips?

Too funny!

g

[Paul Atreides]

Time for the official Robert Byrd theme song...

Dancing In The Sheets

Dancin’ in the sheets
Dancin’ in the sheets

I caught you smilin', you know I’ve seen you here before
How come you’re hidin’, hey, you'll wanna hit the floor
The cross is burning so maybe you don’t like the heat
I got a burnin' torch in my hand
So let me make you live somewhere else instead

Dancin’ in the sheets
Dancin’ in the sheets

Grab your coat and wave goodbye to your friends
I wanna take you where the night never ends
I feel the need to sweep you off my street
You'll see me and I will be dancin’ in my sheets

Dancin’ in the sheets

We got the hoods, we got the fire on our side
If you go with us, you bet you’ll have a one-way ride, oh, oh
Your hands are cold, so maybe we could make some heat
Hate is always born in my dance
So run away from me and I'll dance, dance, dance

Dancin’ in the sheets
Dancin’ in the sheets

Grab your coat and wave goodbye to your friends
I wanna take you where the night never ends
I feel the need to sweep you off my street
You'll see me, and I'll be dancin’ in my sheets

Dancin’ in the sheets

Grab your coat and wave goodbye to your friends
I wanna take you where the night never ends
I feel the need to sweep you off my street
You'll see me and I'll be dancin’ in my sheets

Dancin’ in the sheets

[CyberAnt]

Rush has a new saying for Byrd's comments - "Byrd droppings" ROTFLOL!!