| But how can this be? We were told there was massive looting of the Museums!
He did so try to make ketchup a vegetable. Yep, Reagan personally. And no, Clinton never made salsa a vegetable. That's BS. |
Posted on 05/05/2003 7:41:04 AM PDT by sjersey
Edited on 05/05/2003 4:46:01 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
BAGHDAD - The vast majority of the Iraqi trove of antiquities feared stolen or broken have been found inside the National Museum in Baghdad, according to American investigators who compiled an inventory over the weekend of the ransacked galleries.
A total of 38 antiquities, not tens of thousands, are now believed to be missing. Among them is a single display of Babylonian cuneiform tablets that accounts for nine missing items.
The single most valuable missing piece is the Vase of Warka, a white limestone bowl dating from 3000 B.C.
Thanks, I tend to forget the foolish and we sure want to leave any deserving party out.
Thanks Gramps for serving up the crow.
Anytime you want to have a serious discussion, and not just call names, I'm ready.
I watch CNN for 20 minutes every day to grasp an understanding of how the "other side" is playing the game. I saw this same agonizing story this morning, switched to Fox and heard the truth. CNN is amazingly, blantantly anti-Bush and anti-military.
Snopes will still phrase the description of the claim so that they can indicate that it was "TRUE". Something like
Claim: "Valuable artifacts from the dawn of civilization were looted from a Baghdad museum while American led troops stormed the city."
Probably in search of a new pair of undies...
Read the article, watch the reports on Fox News, that's as series a discussion as I'm going to have with you on this matter.
You were wrong then, proven wrong now and that, my FRiend, is history.
Admit it and get over it.
An excellent question that goes to the heart of the problem. The media has enormous UNCHECKED power, and can destroy lives and careers with ease, without any consequences. Libel laws were once a check on media power, but along with so much over the past 40 years, they have been severely weakened. It is now very nearly impossible for a libel suit to succeed.
In addition, unlike "truth in packaging," "truth in advertising," negligence, and other grounds on which most corporations can be sued if they harm the public through lies or defective products, media corporations have virtually a blanket immunity from such lawsuits.
Wrong about what? Please quote me instead of making blanket assertions.
Look for them to bury it underneath a ziggurat.
To: optik_b
OReilly was not critical of the troops at all. He was critical of someone up top who obvioulsy placed no priority on protecting these priceless artifacts. It amazes me how some of you guys cannot see how obvious a blunder this is. This is a crime against all of us not just the iraqi people. I guess some of you do not care if massive looting occurs when it could have been prevented.
I agree with you. While I agree with the goals of the war and the way it has been conducted, I think this was a blunder. Here's a few points I'd like to make.
There is a lot we still don't know, but it appears that there was much destruction and possibly some pilfering that took place after our troops arrived in Baghdad. Had we secured the museum, we could have prevented it.
We may never know what was taken before we arrived and what was taken after we arrived. Had we secured the museum, we would know.
Apparently, one of the commanding officers in Baghdad said we were taking fire from the museum grounds and that's why it couldn't be secured. But Central Command and DOD are not saying that we even tried to. Rumsfeld was very dismissive of the issue. Did we try or didn't we? The statement also contradicts a report that we did in fact secure the building for a half hour with a tank and then left. The statement about "taking fire" doesn't really tell us much. If we avoided every place we were "taking fire" from, we wouldn't be in Iraq right now. Does he mean that the Iraqi's chased us off because we had insufficient force? Then had we allocated sufficient force to secure the museum, we could have stopped the looting that transpired and killed some bad guys too.
The looting of this museum following the fall of the regime was entirely predictable. After the Shi'a uprising following the Gulf War, nine museums in Southern Iraq were looted and over 4,000 items stolen. There was much discussion of this fact in the months leading up to this war.
17 posted on 04/18/2003 11:40 PM CDT by Fifth Business
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies | Report Abuse ]
And, further down in the thread:
To: MizSterious
How many of our troops are you willing to sacrifice for those tablets...?
How many of our troops are you willing to sacrifice for the Oil Ministry?
43 posted on 04/19/2003 10:55 AM CDT by Fifth Business
You were wrong in #17 when you called this a "blunder" (how can it be a blunder when most of the looting never occurred in the first place?), and you were wrong in #43 when you ass-u-med that we valued oil more than museums. It doesn't seem to occur to you that perhaps we knew some things about the museum in advance, that perhaps some sort of precautions had been made before the first bombs fell (one of the stories I read said just that). Your question to me on that thread sounded like the anti-war fools chanting "no blood for oil."
The exact number of lost items seems to change, but currently it's ranging between 17 and 38--and I'm betting that even those will turn up. Your hand-wringing was for naught.
Second, your criticism of the war plan was based on DOD not explaining any mitigating factors to your satisfaction. That's like the Dims saying we can't have a big tax cut until Bush explains to their satisfaction how it will spur growth. Setting an imposible standard is intellectually dishonest.
You proved you didn't know anything about the war plan, the geography, or the tactical situation. Example (paraphrasing): we had secured the area with a tank for a half hour. Hint: tanks live outside; buildings enclose space.
I don't understand why people have such a hard time admitting they were wrong. Try it, it's refreshing.
There's your series discussion 5th Biz. Nicley done MizS.
You didn't read the article very well. It says that over 5,000 items were taken, as well as the 38 high-profile items mentioned early in the article. And I still believe it was a mistake not to secure the museum, just as we secured the oil ministry. Had we done so, we would know which items were looted before we even got there.
Am I happy that only a few thousand items disappeared instead of half the collection? Of course! But being happy that the consequences of a mistake were not as great as feared is not the same as saying it wasn't a mistake.
| But how can this be? We were told there was massive looting of the Museums!
He did so try to make ketchup a vegetable. Yep, Reagan personally. And no, Clinton never made salsa a vegetable. That's BS. |
The Chicago Tribune had it above the fold on page 1 today. They've been generally more supportive of the war effort.
If they do, Tough Shiite!
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We will continue to be told that. This story will be spiked, and tales of Museum Woe will continue down the generations, a known Liberal Truth.