Deserving of its own thread, I've decide to "piggyback" Dave_in_paradise's post (http://www.discussanything.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1366191&postcount=32)with more detail... .This is in response to all of those who happily cry "No WMDs!"

Lets get just a few actual facts straight here. This whole mess started over Saddams refusal to let UN Inspectors do there jobs in accordance with standing UN resolutions. Think back, think beyond the claims of WMD's, Beyond the accusations of Yellow cake from Africa, Think back to when we really started putting the pressure on Saddam. Once he refused to cooperate, once he threw that final straw on the camels back, the administration started building a case for invading Iraq. It wasn't that we could prove what he had or didn't have, it was that we couldn't disprove it and by UN resolution, he was suppose to open his facilities to inspectors in order to do just there, Verify he didn't have the means. Anyone, ANYONE, who believes that Saddam would have hestitated one second to unleash any type of attack, be it conventional, terrorist, or WMD against America given the means and opportunity needs to really go back and study there history. Not charts, graphs, predictions or polls, but the Mans history. So, like it or not, he brought the war on himself. If he had abided by the resolutions the UN set forth, he'd still be here kicked back in one of his palaces, having his smartest people who refused to join the Baath party relagated to taxi drivers and brick layers, deciding what district of Baghdad got a couple hour of power today and eating mango's. Oh, and Oday and Kusay would still be partying there asses off at the average Iraqi's expense and killing off more of Iraq's Olympic hopefuls.

I submit this to you. Define a WMD. Weapon of Madd Destruction? Right? I submit that Saddam HIMSELF was a WMD! By his personal order, he caused the deaths of more Iraqi's than either atomic bomb in WWII.

And please, please don't try to tell me he didn't have anything over here. Been there, Done that, seem the empty flippin' crates and boxes spread across the desert floor of WAY to many ASP's. (Ammunition storage points). It's a pretty clear indication that somethings going on when you can sift through tons and tons of conventional ammunition, but, when you come across a box with a nuclear, biological or chemical marking on it, it's been busted open and there's nothing inside. Now, some folks would say "See! They destroyed it like they were suppose to!" I say...Hmmmmm....Basic forensics 101, the rest of these crates are coated with dust and sand to the point you can't read them...these boxes aren't. Hell, they still have handprints on them. Something fishy here...Sorta reminds me of the first gulf war. Everyone SWORE that chemical weapons weren't used. Well, technically, they weren't. But, riddle me this Batman....You are leading a unit into an area, you are moving into the wind. You discover opposition from a bunker about 2 clicks out and you engage them. After just a few minutes of direct fighting, the bunker just flippin explodes...But, the smoke doesn't just float up and away, and the funny colors, it sort of fall's to the ground and the wind starts carrying it your way...what's that burning sensation? cough, cough, damn...What was in that bunker?? No, no chemical weapons were used in the first gulf war. But, plenty of them were destroyed intentionally or otherwise by either us or them. Argue it all you want, but unless you were standing right next to me laughing at me for a bad case of sand rage or something, you don't have a clue....

In 1998, the UN weapons inspectors found WMDs...That is fact...What does that have to do with the war?...keep reading...

The inspectors were then kicked out by Cindy Shee....whoops!...wrong thread!...I mean, "Saddam"...:2wave:

In 2002/3 the new team of weapons inspectors showed up...Before we get any further, an explanation must be made...

Do not confuse the term "inspector" with "hunter"...The UN inspection team was NOT there to look for weapons...That his one of the biggest things some people latch onto, but it is completely false...

Guess what the UN inspection team was there to do?...Any guesses???....To INSPECT!...not "look for"..not "hunt"....simply to INSPECT....

And what were they there to inspect? They were there to inspect the inventory and facilities that were ALREADY known through the 1998 team...So when they showed up and said "Where's the stuff the previous team saw?", Saddam said "Uhhhh...we don't know what you're talking about."

So the Inspection team said, "Yes you do...we have positive proof that you HAD them...what happened to them?"...Saddam's reply?..."uhhhhh...We destroyed them."

Now...as stated, the inspection team was NOT there to look for anything...they were only there to inspect...and this is VERY important...

The burden of proof was on Saddam and his regime...NOT the inspection team!

I will say it again because some of the forum members are not up to speed with this...

The burden of proof was on Saddam and his regime...NOT the inspection team!

This part is really important, so I will type slower....

The fact that they weren't found IS the problem!...The 1998 inspection team PHYSICALLY saw them...So the question is "Where are they NOW?"...The burden of proof fell on Saddam to PROVE what happened to them...NOT for the inspection teams to FIND them.

Remember...According to the 1991 cease-fire agreement with Iraq, the U.N. had agreed not to lift sanctions until Iraq's full compliance had been verified.

Anyone want to guess why the sanctions were STILL on Iraq at the time of the war?...Simple...Iraq was not in FULL COMPLIANCE. If the 2003 inspection team was allowed to continue, would "full compliance" have been met?...Nope...Saddam didn't grant them "unfettered access", which means the actual inspections would never have been complete...Just like the previous inspection team's...THAT is what Saddam was counting on...another "shell-game" that would've ended with the UN giving in...
You may want to believe otherwise, but history has shown this to be the case...The term "This time we mean it!" has been used by the UN before, and every single time Saddam laughed at them...

If the US didn't throw in the monkey wrench, the UN would've lifted sanctions WITHOUT full compliance, and this would be more proof to the world that the UN is toothless...Their resolutions are meaningless...
So the question still remains....What happened to them?...This is a question that may take years, if ever, to actually find the truth...There are many possibilities, but "He never had them" is not one of those possibilities...

Saddam's burden of proof was not met...He provided no sources for his claim that everything was destroyed...And when some people say "There were no WMDs", they are saying, "Even though Saddam didn't prove that he got rid of them...I believe him when he says that he did."

Congratulations!...I'm sure you will all make great character witnesses at his trial.

49. The Commission has a certain degree of confidence in the accounting for proscribed items declared by Iraq as having been destroyed during the 1991 Gulf war. The Commission has accepted through its verification the destruction of 34,000 special munitions and 823 tonnes of key precursors. Outstanding issues remain. These include the accounting for 2,000 unfilled and 550 filled special munitions.

50. The Commission has a lesser degree of confidence in accounting for proscribed items declared by Iraq as having been destroyed unilaterally. These include 15,900 unfilled and 100 filled special munitions, the CW agent VX and 50 tonnes of a precursor for the production of VX. Nevertheless, the Commission has accepted through its verification the destruction of 13,660 special munitions and about 200 tonnes of key precursors. However, residual questions remain with respect to proscribed items destroyed unilaterally. The presentation by foreign suppliers of information on the delivery of munitions and precursors requested by UNSCOM could be helpful in the verification of this area.

51. The priority should be given to the resolution of the most important outstanding issues. These include: material balance of chemical munitions (including verification of the expenditure of special munitions in the 1980s, which is required to increase a degree of confidence with respect to Iraq's declarations of chemical weapons remained in Iraq in 1991; the accounting for 550 artillery shells filled with mustard; verification of the unilateral destruction of R-400 chemical and biological aerial bombs); accounting for the production of the chemical warfare agent VX, and; verification of the completeness of declarations provided by Iraq on the material balance of CW production equipment removed from the Muthanna State Establishment (MSE) prior to the UNSCOM inspections.

http://www.fas.org/news/un/iraq/s/990125/

This is just a sampling...Why?...go to the website and see...This report is a freakin' BEAR!...If you want to read the whole thing, bring coffee and a pack of No-Doz.:2razz:

I went directly to the "Chemical Weapons"...My snippets are taken from the bottom under "Assessment"...

Just start reading at the top on what UNSCOM DID see and supervise the destruction of and your eyes will pop out of your sockets...Read my first snippet...34,000 special munitions and 823 tonnes of key precursors...823 ton(nes)?!?!?!...WTF?!?!?!? And this was JUST the "chemical" aspects!!

Remember...they were kicked out by IRAQ BEFORE the completion of the inspections, so they didn't get to supervise the remaining weapons DECLARED by Iraq...Even if Iraq omitted things in their summary, there isn't any evidence that they destroyed everything that WAS in the summary.

What next?...Do I have to go to the inspectors houses for interviews?

Now, for the next question of the 2002 Inspection team seeing the "tagged" WMD destined for destruction but not actually destroyed because they were kicked out, look no further than the first paragraph from the December, 2002 update taken DIRECTLY from the International Atomic Agency's website...

6 December 2002 -- Based on reports from the UN, inspectors visited Al-Mutanna, north of Baghdad, where Iraq once had a chemical weapons (CW) warfare programme. During past visits to the site before the 1998 suspension of the UN arms probe, thousands of CW shells and agents had been destroyed by the UN. Dimitri Perricos, the leader of the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspections Commission (UNMOVIC) inspection team, told reporters today that experts wanted to know if some shells containing mustard gas, which were left out at the site, were still stored there. Mr. Perricos said that in fact the team had found the shells stored at the site.

http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/MediaAdvisory/2002/ma_iraq_0612.shtml

All I can say is......."Damn".....You did your homework! LOL

With all those questions about the verification that remained to be done, and the UNSCOM saying that they were still making progress in doing the verification, it seems like you just made a pretty good case for not attacking Iraq, and letting the inspectors do their jobs, instead. It would have cost 2500 soldiers, 10000 civilians, and a quarter trillion dollars less, and that doesn't even include the security and diplomatic costs.

Seems like lying about WMD intel and starting a war is just as bad an idea after reading your excuses as it was before reading them. It was just a stupid and dishonest move that has had an extremely negative effect on America.

Uh, we didn't kick them out Saddam did. Several times. Hence the UN resolutions.

UNSCR 1284 - December 17, 1999

Created the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspections Commission (UNMOVIC) to replace previous weapon inspection team (UNSCOM).

Iraq must allow UNMOVIC "immediate, unconditional and unrestricted access" to Iraqi officials and facilities.


UNSCR 1205 - November 5, 1998

"Condemns the decision by Iraq of 31 October 1998 to cease cooperation" with UN inspectors as "a flagrant violation" of UNSCR 687 and other resolutions.

...reading your excuses...

Excuses??? Solid, factual data presented in a respectful manner is not an "Excuse".

Uh, we didn't kick them out Saddam did.


Saddam kicked them out in the past. We kicked them out in 2003. Well, we didn't tell them they had to leave, just that, if they didn't, we were going to kill them with cruise missles. That pretty much counts as the same thing.

Excuses??? Solid, factual data presented in a respectful manner is not an "Excuse".

Yes, all of that tripe was excuses. "Whaaa it's all Saddams fault whaaaa." We made a decision to start a war, not Saddam. While Saddam may have deserved it, or "brought it upon himself", that doesn't change the fact that the United States took unnecessary actions that are detrimental to the United States. That has nothing to do with Saddam. We had it completely in our power to allow the inspections to continue to verify or discredit the fears we had about his "vast stockpiles of WMDs" (later known as "WMD related program activities").

No ammount of whining can change that. It was a stupid move.

Boo, they're not whining. They're presenting a case for going to war that was not presented to the United States public-or anyone else for that matter-by anyone of consequence as a justification for war. No, we went to war because Rumsfeld, Bush, Cheney, and co. all alleged to know for a fact and beyond all doubt that Saddam had WMD, and we, the USA, knew where they were located. This was later stated to be an error in that those same Senior White House officials denied knowledge of WMD. That's when we went hopskipping around to different reasons for going to war, such as the liberation of Iraq from a terrorist dictator who had ties to OBL (which has recently also been denied. This denial is much more plausible, since those connections were only implied, and never really directly stated).

Boo, they're not whining. They're presenting a case for going to war that was not presented to the United States public-or anyone else for that matter-by anyone of consequence as a justification for war. No, we went to war because Rumsfeld, Bush, Cheney, and co. all alleged to know for a fact and beyond all doubt that Saddam had WMD, and we, the USA, knew where they were located. This was later stated to be an error in that those same Senior White House officials denied knowledge of WMD. That's when we went hopskipping around to different reasons for going to war, such as the liberation of Iraq from a terrorist dictator who had ties to OBL (which has recently also been denied. This denial is much more plausible, since those connections were only implied, and never really directly stated).

FL, you're presenting a distorted picture when you say "Rumsfeld, Bush, Cheney, and co". There were many democrats that said the very same thing, many who were around in Washington long before Bush arrived on the scene.

Again, not that Fact's will change anything. But, Bushes letter to the house and senate clearly states two reasons for the invasion of Iraq. 1) Them being a continued threat and 2) There lack of adherence to UN resolutions.

Text of a Letter from the President to the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the President Pro Tempore of the Senate




March 18, 2003

Dear Mr. Speaker: (Dear Mr. President:)

Consistent with section 3(b) of the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 (Public Law 107-243), and based on information available to me, including that in the enclosed document, I determine that:

(1) reliance by the United States on further diplomatic and other peaceful means alone will neither (A) adequately protect the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq nor (B) likely lead to enforcement of all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq; and

(2) acting pursuant to the Constitution and Public Law 107-243 is consistent with the United States and other countries continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001.

Sincerely,

GEORGE W. BUSH

This thread does not need to go any further then post number 2(excellant posts BTW). Once the the parrots come on and repeat the lines and lies they have drilled into the public for 5 years(facts become excuses, popular world opinion becomes neo-con conspiracy lies) it just becomes a pissing match.

This thread does not need to go any further then post number 2(excellant posts BTW). Once the the parrots come on and repeat the lines and lies they have drilled into the public for 5 years(facts become excuses, popular world opinion becomes neo-con conspiracy lies) it just becomes a pissing match.

Now now.....I'm sure the parrots will post some helpful links proving Bush hates poor black people, is banging Condi, does a couple lines of coke before his morning cabinet briefings, and is personally heading up the neo-con program to destroy the American economy.

Oddly enough, I finished this thread and went on to read the rest of the new posts and found Dave's original post that started this thread and who'd-a-thunk-it....Fabio popped off immediately with neo-con conspiracy nonsense.........I rest my case

You know what Caddis? This just proves that neo-conservatives are insane, they keep repeating the same nonsense over and over and over and over and over again hoping that by doing so it will make it true.

If Iraq had this mythical stockpile of WMD's, show them to us al****ingready, stop beating around the Bush and making excuses, where the **** are they?

This crap is no different from the logic used by those that say the Earth is flat or the holocaust didn't happen, you guys are true believers in the Bush cult so no matter what happens here in the real world you'll continue to believe in fairy tales.

We saw this same crap before the war, now that nothing was ever found you guys are still trying to save face, and it's horribly pathetic..

You know what Caddis? This just proves that neo-conservatives are insane, they keep repeating the same nonsense over and over and over and over and over again hoping that by doing so it will make it true.

If Iraq had this mythical stockpile of WMD's, show them to us al****ingready, stop beating around the Bush and making excuses, where the **** are they?

This crap is no different from the logic used by those that say the Earth is flat or the holocaust didn't happen, you guys are true believers in the Bush cult so no matter what happens here in the real world you'll continue to believe in fairy tales.

We saw this same crap before the war, now that nothing was ever found you guys are still trying to save face, and it's horribly pathetic..

Caddis owes you his thanks, for coming here, and helping make his points. :|

Bushes letter to the house and senate


Bush had to sell his attack on Iraq to the people, too. I'm sure you noticed the thousands of times he and his administration tried to tie Hussein to terrorists and implied (or sometimes said) that an attack is imminenet and we have to defend ourselves immediately.

Truth is, we didn't. We could have waited for the inspectors to finish up, and this whole war could have been avoided. There was no threat from Iraq, we had the capacity to know that, so we're spending all of this "defense"money on something that's totally irrelevant to our actual defense.

Dispite all the condescending and flippant blabber being parroted by the dittoheads, the attack on the Iraqis was a stupid move. It's costing a fortune in a number of areas and there was no need to do it.

"Saddam brought it on himself". So what? Who cares about Saddam? Did the American people bring it on ourselves? Well, truth it, I guess, we did, by not educating our children over the last thirty or fourty years in critical thinking skills and how to identify propaganda.

FL, you're presenting a distorted picture when you say "Rumsfeld, Bush, Cheney, and co". There were many democrats that said the very same thing, many who were around in Washington long before Bush arrived on the scene.

The main proponents and those directly responsible for our presence in Iraq. They were the ones who presented the evidence to the US. That evidence turned out to be incorrect. I place blame on those most directly responsible for this failure.

Also, if I'm not mistaken, the people he mentioned were getting their intel from the criminals you mentioned.

Caddis owes you his thanks, for coming here, and helping make his points. :|


Typical dodging from the facts from you guys..

You guys claim everything that you don't believe is some big conspiracy, you guys repeat old de-bunked lies regarding the WMD issue, and then attack and smear aybody who refutes the BS posted.

And anybody dare place the blame where it belongs (the neo-conservatives), and you guys go nutty and act like there's no such thing.

Well at least I have the facts on my side while you guys rely on lies.

Not necessarily. There were a few, a very few number of Democrats in Congress pushing for military action against Iraq before Bush and Co. even came into the picture. By and large, though, the intel that most Democrats and Republicans were using to form their opinion on the matter leading up to the invasion was supplied by the White House.

CA, coming in here and attacking these guys on a personal level like that isn't helping anything, nor is it conducive to debating or discussion.
Telling them that they're idiots or suckers or morons or whatever is not going to get them to engage in a debate where what they believe to be true versus what is true can be compared, and what they believe can be adjusted accordingly.

Telling them that they're idiots or suckers or morons or whatever is not going to get them to engage in a debate


Neither will pointing out the reality of the situation. All they're going to do is scream "leftist liberal America hater bush-basher leftist liar loony moonbat" and crap like that. That's all they've been doing since the BA first started telling the fibs about Iraq being a threat to the United States, and nothing is going to make them stop.

Basically, they know that we're right, that they really are suckers, that we've been explaining it to them since before the United States even started this war, and they can't handle it, so they keep trying to rationalize away the reality that they're among the slow half of the country that took three years to figure out what the smart half knew way back then: Attacking Iraq is counter productive, costly and a completely unnecessary move.

To be fair, though, pointing it out in a calm, cool, and collected manner gives all the more strength to our argument. For when they flip out and go nuts, as some of them are wont to do, just like some of us are wont to do, they look like idiots. Unified in being right allows us to know that anyone insult hurled our way is a sign of weakness on their part, and our ability to ignore it is a sign of the strength of our position and argument.
Basically, it's all perception, or in a more general sense, it's all psychological.

CA, coming in here and attacking these guys on a personal level like that isn't helping anything, nor is it conducive to debating or discussion.
Telling them that they're idiots or suckers or morons or whatever is not going to get them to engage in a debate where what they believe to be true versus what is true can be compared, and what they believe can be adjusted accordingly.

What are you talking about?


Once the the parrots come on and repeat the lines and lies they have drilled into the public for 5 years(facts become excuses, popular world opinion becomes neo-con conspiracy lies) it just becomes a pissing match.


No need to even attempt to respond, Caddis has already told us anybody who disagrees with him is a "Parrot" who is just repeating lies..

But that's ok..


Now now.....I'm sure the parrots will post some helpful links proving Bush hates poor black people, is banging Condi, does a couple lines of coke before his morning cabinet briefings, and is personally heading up the neo-con program to destroy the American economy.


More insults and baiting.

Ignored, it's oly bad when a liberal does it.

Oddly enough, I finished this thread and went on to read the rest of the new posts and found Dave's original post that started this thread and who'd-a-thunk-it....Fabio popped off immediately with neo-con conspiracy nonsense.........I rest my case

And then this gem, all for responding to a post riddled with errors which I corrected with verifiable facts. He claims I "popped off immediately with neo-con conspiracy nonsense", I'd call that baiting, lying, and an inability to debate. But hey, shame on me for saying anything...:rolleyes: This has become a epidemic here.

And I never called anybody "stupid or morons or whatever". Suckers? Sure, that sure isn't attacking anybody on a personal level, especially compared to their daily rampages.

These same people say that liberalism is a "mental disease", this is posted daily here, and nobody says a peep, but be honest, and oh no....

No, you never directly called them stupid or morons or whatever, but still, your tone was less than civil. Mind you, their tone was less than civil as well, but that's no reason to get personal with them.
And who cares if they call liberalism a mental disease. They know nothing of mental diseases, and I recall a few such individuals denying the existence of several mental diseases. They're being puerile and sophomoric. Responding to such commentary at all only encourages them to continue it.

Neither will pointing out the reality of the situation. All they're going to do is scream "leftist liberal America hater bush-basher leftist liar loony moonbat" and crap like that. That's all they've been doing since the BA first started telling the fibs about Iraq being a threat to the United States, and nothing is going to make them stop.

Basically, they know that we're right, that they really are suckers, that we've been explaining it to them since before the United States even started this war, and they can't handle it, so they keep trying to rationalize away the reality that they're among the slow half of the country that took three years to figure out what the smart half knew way back then: Attacking Iraq is counter productive, costly and a completely unnecessary move.


I was called a conspiracy theorist prior to the war for saying no WMD's would be found in Iraq, now I'm called a conspiracy theorist because no WMD's were ever found in Iraq.. You just can't win these days...:scratch:

That was when they were being nice as well, I can't even repeat the other stuff that was said, so it's pretty shitty for certain people to act all high and mighty. If people could just acknowledge that yea, some of us got it right, some got it wrong, and move on, but no, they keep talking trash and spreading things which just aren't true in light of facts that show otherwise. And it's 3.5 years later and yet we're still bombarded with the same old things.

Forgive me, but the Iraqi war was an insane idea, and now we're reaping the consequences, and we will be for decades because of of the dissastrous decision to do it.

This Frontline piece gives a good background on how the war was manufactured and sold to the world by those who cannot be named..

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/darkside/view/#morelink

Kind of makes the whole thing look ridiculous..

No, you never directly called them stupid or morons or whatever, but still, your tone was less than civil. Mind you, their tone was less than civil as well, but that's no reason to get personal with them.
And who cares if they call liberalism a mental disease. They know nothing of mental diseases, and I recall a few such individuals denying the existence of several mental diseases. They're being puerile and sophomoric. Responding to such commentary at all only encourages them to continue it.


Less than civil, why? Because I give people the same level of dis-respect they show me, I hadn't even posted in this thread yet and I read it only to see I was already bad-mouthed.

When it comes to this issue I find it almost comical that it's even debatable anymore, um, yea, seriously, what exactly is up for debate?:eek7:

Even Bush himself has said they got it all wrong and Iraq had no WMD's, yet he has them again, but we can't see them, and they could somehow justify the war etc. I'd think we'd see a rather large press conference announcing to the world that they were found considering they've been found....:|

As I've said over and over: Who shives a git!!!

We are there now, legally or illegally, with or without subterfuge. The country is a mess. If we leave it probably would get worse, it's unlikely to get better for years. If we stay it probably could get worse, but it migh get better.

At some point in time in the not so distant future the political future of the Presidential candidates will be determined by whether they opt for stay or leave. Whoever's point of view gets elected will have a mandate to follow through.

WMD's are an irrelevant issue lost to history. What is relevant is: Will the course of Iraq increase or decrease the likelihood of:

1. Terrorism against the USA. We don't care about Arab v Arab terrorism (cynicism). If it becomes another pre 9-11 Afghanistan, look out!

2. Growth of Iran in the gulf area. With a Shia govt, and HZB in Lebanon, they wield influence right across Sunni dominated areas.

3. Stability of a "friend" in the ME that might help us diplomatically with Iran.

4. Instability of a country that will split into 3 entities and keep the Shia and Sunni and Turks busy for years! Not to mention us!

This just proves that neo-conservatives are insane, they keep repeating the same nonsense over and over and over and over and over again hoping that by doing so it will make it true.
Thanks CA for offering your own explanation of what constitutes proof of one's insanity :nice:








Oh the irony!......:D :D :D






Caddis owes you his thanks, for coming here, and helping make his points. :| And he owes me half a Dr Pepper for making me spit it through my nose

In 1998, the UN weapons inspectors found WMDs...That is fact...What does that have to do with the war?...keep reading...

The inspectors were then kicked out by Cindy Shee....whoops!...wrong thread!...I mean, "Saddam"...:2wave:

Childish... But besides that--What exactly did they find. How much. Was it merely a container, a dispersable, both? Did it have the capacity to reach the United States? Were our allies under serious threat?



Do not confuse the term "inspector" with "hunter"...The UN inspection team was NOT there to look for weapons...That his one of the biggest things some people latch onto, but it is completely false...

So... Your argument now, is that the UN WEAPONS inspection team was not there to Inspect for WEAPONS?

Interseting argument, at best.


Guess what the UN inspection team was there to do?...Any guesses???....To INSPECT!...not "look for"..not "hunt"....simply to INSPECT....

Christ. Iv never seen such weak attempts at twisting symantics. The absurdity of calling the team the UN Weapon Hunter Team is hysterical, yes, but not at all feasable. Inspection covers the generals of what their agenda was--To, indeed, as much as your against this word... Look.... For dangerous weapons that Iraq may have.


And what were they there to inspect? They were there to inspect the inventory and facilities that were ALREADY known through the 1998 team...So when they showed up and said "Where's the stuff the previous team saw?", Saddam said "Uhhhh...we don't know what you're talking about."

Somehow... Oh wait, no, I know it didnt go down like that. But Im guessing you dont. Otherwise, feel free to provide the full scenario. It would only take you about 2 paragraphs of real events. If you cant provide it, I will.


Now...as stated, the inspection team was NOT there to look for anything...they were only there to inspect...and this is VERY important...

:ROFL: Dude, thats just funny.


The burden of proof was on Saddam and his regime...NOT the inspection team!

Fine. What would have proved it to you? Beyond the numerous videotaped footage of various weapons being destroyed (which, oddly enough, were brought back to life in the US's case against Iraq in their presentation to the UN. Yes, that is right--The US used footage of material that we also had footage of being destroyed in the case against Iraq.)

Again--How do you prove you dont have something you dont have? That, and worse yet--Your asking a blowhard like Saddam this absurd statement. To prove he doesnt have something he doesnt have. Which, in essence, would of course expose his complete vulnerability and weakness. Saddam is evil, and heartless, a merciless bastard. But, he was not stupid enough to simply say 'Yea... We have no weapons. Here's the footage of us destroying all of them. Feel free to take me out now.'


The burden of proof was on Saddam and his regime...NOT the inspection team!

And again--What feasable proof could anyone have asked for? Your asking for PROOF THAT SOMETHING DOESNT EXIST IN A 169,234 SQUARE MILE AREA, with that compounded several times in depth alone. And better yet--Your asking for this in the course of months. Now, again--Given enough time, the UN inspection team had the technology to come up with a very, very good guess at whether he had them or not. Certainly they could have easily proven if certain places being indicated to by the US were chemical weapon facilities with ease. Matter of factly--Afterwords they did.


This part is really important, so I will type slower....

Good. B/C When you post text it can go by so fast...


The fact that they weren't found IS the problem!...The 1998 inspection team PHYSICALLY saw them...So the question is "Where are they NOW?"...The burden of proof fell on Saddam to PROVE what happened to them...NOT for the inspection teams to FIND them.

Right. B/C as said, proving it would be oh so easy, and oh so simple for Saddam to do. It would only require him to admit the complete vulnerability of himself, and the ability to indeed prove at all that they were no where in his massive amount of land in a very, very short period of time that the US at this point was asking for.

And for all your talk--The burden of proof certainly fell off of Saddam who claimed he didnt have it, when the US began claiming that we knew the location and amounts (somehow) of massive piles of chemical weapons, that feasably shouldnt have been able to be produced in such a short period of time by scientific standards.

Oh. And the US has failed horribly to prove this. Iraq, however, has done an amazing job of proving that they were indeed being honest when they said they had no chemical weapons.

But yea. **** Iraq. Honesty bullshit.


Remember...According to the 1991 cease-fire agreement with Iraq, the U.N. had agreed not to lift sanctions until Iraq's full compliance had been verified.
Anyone want to guess why the sanctions were STILL on Iraq at the time of the war?...Simple...Iraq was not in FULL COMPLIANCE. If the 2003 inspection team was allowed to continue, would "full compliance" have been met?...Nope...Saddam didn't grant them "unfettered access", which means the actual inspections would never have been complete...Just like the previous inspection team's...THAT is what Saddam was counting on...another "shell-game" that would've ended with the UN giving in...
You may want to believe otherwise, but history has shown this to be the case...The term "This time we mean it!" has been used by the UN before, and every single time Saddam laughed at them...

Except, this is just blatently wrong. The entire UN Weapons Inspectors team was giving a positive review to the 2003 round. Your making shit up based on the past. However--if the inspections had gone threw, and Saddam was indeed proved clear of Weapons, PNAC would finally lose their window--A republican controlled everything with an administration that is openly for forwardbasing (Note Cheney, Rummy, and Bush are all members of PNAC), and a chance to get a foothold in the middle-east while taking out a dictator. The deal was to sweet to pass up.

THAT, is why Iraq was invaded, in its simplest form. However, they were dissilusional and honestly expected the entire Iraq populace to greet us as liberators... As is well known at this point, Bush had (and most likely has) nearly no comprehension of how the middle-east actually works in terms of religion, especially true in Iraq, not realizing the strong division that drives a wedge into Iraq. Hence the complete failure since the plan began.


If the US didn't throw in the monkey wrench, the UN would've lifted sanctions WITHOUT full compliance, and this would be more proof to the world that the UN is toothless

Well... Assuming the weapon inspectors did their job... Which was to see if Saddam had WMD (despite your odd argument that they werent there to look for WMD), yea. I guess the sanctions would have been lifted. However, your argument that they would have done it without 'Full Compliance' is fanatical, and stupid. You have no reason to believe this. The last thing on the UN table was talks of removing Iraq's sanctions, little-less without compliance. They were debating invading for gods sakes. They werent about to pull a 180, go '**** it', and lift the sanctions.


So the question still remains....What happened to them?...This is a question that may take years, if ever, to actually find the truth...There are many possibilities, but "He never had them" is not one of those possibilities...

Well... Theres the ever possible, He destroyed his dated and mostly worthless weapon piles. Most likely what the inspectors saw the first time was dated and useless anyway (beings a lot of chemical weapons that saddam had had a short shelf-life, and would have expired well by the time the inspectors got their). But, as I said, for Saddam to just blatently admit this would have been the same as the US admitting that our millitary just got dissolved, and we realized we made all of our nuclear weapons wrong back during the cold war. Generally not a good idea for self-preservation, which unfortunate for most of us, Saddam was interested in.


Saddam's burden of proof was not met...He provided no sources for his claim that everything was destroyed...And when some people say "There were no WMDs", they are saying, "Even though Saddam didn't prove that he got rid of them...I believe him when he says that he did."

Although I could go into the factual argument of this, I will simply reply with the same analogy, in retrospect:

When your saying there were WMD, your saying that there were WMD even though we had zero proof at this point that there were any, and Saddam claimed as openly as he could afford that they were destroyed.

You know what Caddis? This just proves that neo-conservatives are insane, they keep repeating the same nonsense over and over and over and over and over again hoping that by doing so it will make it true.

Neo-Conservative? Is that what I am? I think I'll get it put on my business card then. The reason I can effectively repeat the same "nonsense" is because it is well documented fact. UN Resolutions, Fact. Inspectors not being allowed to do there jobs, Fact. Bush's letter to the house and senate stating that one of the two reasons for the invasion was failure to comply with UN resolutions, Fact. WMD's identified in Iraq in the late 90's, Fact. TONS OF WMD's documented in Iraq after the first gulf war was over, Fact. Complete lack of records that would show Saddam's compliance with UN resolutions to destroy them, FACT. It's lies that are hard to maintain, not facts. So, yeah. I guess I'm insane for posting the same facts over and over again and expecting to see anything but slander and hyperbole in return.

If Iraq had this mythical stockpile of WMD's, show them to us al****ingready, stop beating around the Bush and making excuses, where the **** are they?

If he didn't, show me proof of that!! We know he had them, we know he manufactured tons of chemicals. What we don't have is adequate proof he destroyed them. Just show me some proof that what he had is gone! Maybe it's not in Iraq, Maybe he did destroy it all. But, then again, Maybe some of it's in Syria or Iran. I just want to know where the stuff we know he had went.

This crap is no different from the logic used by those that say the Earth is flat or the holocaust didn't happen, you guys are true believers in the Bush cult so no matter what happens here in the real world you'll continue to believe in fairy tales. And this serves to strengthen your argument how? By the way, I don't think Bush is perfect, I'm not in the Bush Cult and I don't agree with everything he does. But, I do think he's a man like the rest of us and fallible.

We saw this same crap before the war, now that nothing was ever found you guys are still trying to save face, and it's horribly pathetic..

Save face? How about save lives. Like I said. I just want proof it's gone. No one can dispute the fact that it was there after we left in '91, UN Teams found it in '98. Those are documented facts. It's simple, I just want to know it's really gone and not say it is just because I can't find it.


Here's a little analogy. Those of you who are really open-minded whether left or right will see the relavance. Others, well, they'll just make fun of me and call me names...in that case, take a number. Here goes:

Lets say a madman broke into your house, a real, honest to god whack job. He said aliens had invaded the world and the only way to identify them was the fact that they never had baby teeth!!! He thinks your one, an alien, and is holding a gun to your head about to blow your head off. He says to you "Prove it, Prove you had baby teeth!!" so you start to explain how everyone does, and the basic infant growth stages, etc....He goes ballistic, "I just want to see your damned baby teeth!!!" Can you show them to him?? We all know they exist, we all know your baby teeth are out there somewhere, it takes century's for a tooth to just crumble to dust, "Come on you pshycho! Everyone knows I had baby teeth!!!" Do you get your head blown off or not??

You know what Caddis? This just proves that neo-conservatives are insane, they keep repeating the same nonsense over and over and over and over and over again hoping that by doing so it will make it true.

If Iraq had this mythical stockpile of WMD's, show them to us al****ingready, stop beating around the Bush and making excuses, where the **** are they?

This crap is no different from the logic used by those that say the Earth is flat or the holocaust didn't happen, you guys are true believers in the Bush cult so no matter what happens here in the real world you'll continue to believe in fairy tales.

We saw this same crap before the war, now that nothing was ever found you guys are still trying to save face, and it's horribly pathetic..


It's liberlism thats a mental illness .

It's liberlism thats a mental illness .

Do you consider John Stuart Mill and John Rawls to be mentally ill?

UN Resolutions, Fact.


UN Resolutions aren't a threat to our national security.


Inspectors not being allowed to do there jobs, Fact.


They said they were making progress, and they wanted more time.


Bush's letter to the house and senate stating that one of the two reasons for the invasion was failure to comply with UN resolutions, Fact.


I think we all know that the population, and therefor the Congress, wouldn't have authorized this war over UN resoulutions. That's why they made dozens of speeches threating the American voters with Nukes over Manhattan and all sorts of other things if they didn't get their war.


WMD's identified in Iraq in the late 90's, Fact.


We're not talking about an invasion and occupation of Iraq in the late 90s.


TONS OF WMD's documented in Iraq after the first gulf war was over, Fact.

We're not talking about invading and occupying Iraq then, either.


Complete lack of records that would show Saddam's compliance with UN resolutions to destroy them, FACT.


Which was the entire point of having the inspectors there.


If he didn't, show me proof of that!! We know he had them, we know he manufactured tons of chemicals. What we don't have is adequate proof he destroyed them. Just show me some proof that what he had is gone! Maybe it's not in Iraq, Maybe he did destroy it all. But, then again, Maybe some of it's in Syria or Iran. I just want to know where the stuff we know he had went.


No one can show proof, because Bush kicked the inspectors out and blew the place up. That's what they were trying to do: To verify the destruction. Bush said we don't need to verify the destruction, because he knew for a fact that they weren't destroyed, that they were still there, that they could be launched at the United States, and that he knew where they were. This was obviously a bunch of lies to scare the population into letting him attack Iraq.


Save face? How about save lives. Like I said. I just want proof it's gone. No one can dispute the fact that it was there after we left in '91, UN Teams found it in '98. Those are documented facts. It's simple, I just want to know it's really gone and not say it is just because I can't find it.


Again: We kicked the inspectors out before they could finish, even though they asked us for more time. Now it's impossible to verify, which is pretty convinient for the Dubya Juanta.


Lets say a madman broke into your house, a real, honest to god whack job. He said aliens had invaded the world and the only way to identify them was the fact that they never had baby teeth!!! He thinks your one, an alien, and is holding a gun to your head about to blow your head off. He says to you "Prove it, Prove you had baby teeth!!" so you start to explain how everyone does, and the basic infant growth stages, etc....He goes ballistic, "I just want to see your damned baby teeth!!!" Can you show them to him?? We all know they exist, we all know your baby teeth are out there somewhere, it takes century's for a tooth to just crumble to dust, "Come on you pshycho! Everyone knows I had baby teeth!!!" Do you get your head blown off or not??

What? Is Bush or Saddam the madman? I think it's Bush, since he was the one holding the gun and demanding proof of something or he'd start shooting, but I'm not sure.

The Tooth Farie, The Easter Bunny, Santa and The Iraq WMD's

Examples of The Hearbreak of Cognitive Dissonance

OK...Some time has passed and rebuttals are in order...

1) Contray to kneejerk reaction, this thread was started NOT to take a polarized partisan stand...Notice there was NO angle when writing the first two posts...

They were intended for information gathering only...so Bush, agendas, or propaganda was avoided...

Example...

When I said "The burden of proof was on Saddam.", This was NOT opinion...

This is directly from the UNMOVIC report to the United Nations...This is from the UN's own website (http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/Bx27.htm)...

On 7 December 2002, Iraq submitted a declaration of some 12,000 pages in response to paragraph 3 of resolution 1441 (2002)....

One might have expected that in preparing the Declaration, Iraq would have tried to respond to, clarify and submit supporting evidence regarding the many open disarmament issues, which the Iraqi side should be familiar with from the UNSCOM document S/1999/94 of January1999 and the so-called Amorim Report of March 1999 (S/1999/356). These are questions which UNMOVIC, governments and independent commentators have often cited.

While UNMOVIC has been preparing its own list of current “unresolved disarmament issues” and “key remaining disarmament tasks” in response to requirements in resolution 1284 (1999), we find the issues listed in the two reports as unresolved, professionally justified. These reports do not contend that weapons of mass destruction remain in Iraq, but nor do they exclude that possibility. They point to lack of evidence and inconsistencies, which raise question marks, which must be straightened out, if weapons dossiers are to be closed and confidence is to arise.


They deserve to be taken seriously by Iraq rather than being brushed aside as evil machinations of UNSCOM. Regrettably, the 12,000 page declaration, most of which is a reprint of earlier documents, does not seem to contain any new evidence that would eliminate the questions or reduce their number. Even Iraq’s letter sent in response to our recent discussions in Baghdad to the President of the Security Council on 24 January does not lead us to the resolution of these issues...


...The nerve agent VX is one of the most toxic ever developed.


Iraq has declared that it only produced VX on a pilot scale, just a few tonnes and that the quality was poor and the product unstable. Consequently, it was said, that the agent was never weaponised. Iraq said that the small quantity of agent remaining after the Gulf War was unilaterally destroyed in the summer of 1991.

UNMOVIC, however, has information that conflicts with this account. There are indications that Iraq had worked on the problem of purity and stabilization and that more had been achieved than has been declared. Indeed, even one of the documents provided by Iraq indicates that the purity of the agent, at least in laboratory production, was higher than declared.

There are also indications that the agent was weaponised. In addition, there are questions to be answered concerning the fate of the VX precursor chemicals, which Iraq states were lost during bombing in the Gulf War or were unilaterally destroyed by Iraq.

Now once again...This thread was not intended to justify the invasion...It is only to support the position that Iraq broke resolution demands that they fully declare what they were in possesion of......

This has been proven to be true...

Now as for the inspection team not being allowed to complete their job...I have a question...

How can they complete their job when the information given them...through Iraq's declaration of weapons on December 7, 2002...was incomplete and riddled with questionable information?...

Are there forum members here that actually believe that the inspection team was to go scan Iraq...a country the size of California...looking for stuff Iraq claimed they destroyed?...Not only would that have taken more than a decade, but it would also NOT prove that the weapons were being moved according to the inspection team's current position...

The second the team gave a site a clean bill of health, Saddam could(would) move those undeclared weapons to that site...Never to be re-inspected again...

Classic shell game...

2) As stated...this thread was only to refute one simple fact...

The assumption that Saddam never had WMDs..

Now there are some from the Left that understand that this is an obvious point...Whether or not is was reason enough to go to war is a debate for another day; and we pretty much know where most of the usual suspects(forum members) stand on this...

For the okis and the PlatyGuys who knew that Saddam had them at a certain time and place, this thread wasn't meant to reassert something they already know...

This thread was meant as a starting point for the Corporate Avengers and Java_mans that go through life without even acknowleding the existance of WMDs...AT ALL...

The sad part is...They still don't believe...The proof is in their own words (http://www.discussanything.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1366309&postcount=14)...

You know what Caddis? This just proves that neo-conservatives are insane, they keep repeating the same nonsense over and over and over and over and over again hoping that by doing so it will make it true.

If Iraq had this mythical stockpile of WMD's, show them to us al****ingready, stop beating around the Bush and making excuses, where the **** are they?

This crap is no different from the logic used by those that say the Earth is flat or the holocaust didn't happen, you guys are true believers in the Bush cult so no matter what happens here in the real world you'll continue to believe in fairy tales.

We saw this same crap before the war, now that nothing was ever found you guys are still trying to save face, and it's horribly pathetic..

And still don't (http://www.discussanything.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1366805&postcount=34)...

The Tooth Farie, The Easter Bunny, Santa and The Iraq WMD's

Examples of The Hearbreak of Cognitive Dissonance

When debating, there has to be a starting point that everyone can agree on to make sure the topic has legitimacy...

As we've seen here on this thread, we have people on the Left acknowleding that WMDs were in existance at some point and others on the Left that will not acknowledge this...

It's tough to debate some who understand the starting point and then switch to those who don't, so I wanted to make sure we were all on the same page from the beginning...

Now it's the turn from the forum members...

Did I fail to present the information properly or do others fail to understand it?...

As far as SwiftSloth's post (http://www.discussanything.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1366496&postcount=29), I won't post a rebuttal based on the fact that anything I write will be disgarded...

In my few years of participating on internet forums, this one exchange just might be the dumbest thing I've ever seen...

His words...

So... Your argument now, is that the UN WEAPONS inspection team was not there to Inspect for WEAPONS?

Interseting argument, at best.

Here is my very next sentence...

Guess what the UN inspection team was there to do?...Any guesses???....To INSPECT!...not "look for"..not "hunt"....simply to INSPECT....

After questioning if I believe if the inspection team was there to inspect, I don't think I could've been more clear when I said that, indeed, the inspection team was there to inspect...

Here was the response given...

Christ. Iv never seen such weak attempts at twisting symantics.

I will stop this post, because I don't believe my vocabulary contains any words that descibe how irrational this exchage was...

I will also disregard smilies, due to the fact that they don't have one that properly displays an anuerysm...

The argument is not that Saddam never had WMD, but that at the time of the invasion, he did not have any WMD.

Thanks CA for offering your own explanation of what constitutes proof of one's insanity :nice:








Oh the irony!......:D :D :D






And he owes me half a Dr Pepper for making me spit it through my nose

Anytime you want to actual prove your claims, we're still waiting...

OK...Some time has passed and rebuttals are in order...

1) Contray to kneejerk reaction, this thread was started NOT to take a polarized partisan stand...Notice there was NO angle when writing the first two posts...


Yea..

This thread does not need to go any further then post number 2(excellant posts BTW). Once the the parrots come on and repeat the lines and lies they have drilled into the public for 5 years(facts become excuses, popular world opinion becomes neo-con conspiracy lies) it just becomes a pissing match.

Oddly enough, I finished this thread and went on to read the rest of the new posts and found Dave's original post that started this thread and who'd-a-thunk-it....Fabio popped off immediately with neo-con conspiracy nonsense.........I rest my case

No shortage of knee jerk reactions..


They were intended for information gathering only...so Bush, agendas, or propaganda was avoided...

Example...

When I said "The burden of proof was on Saddam.", This was NOT opinion...

This is directly from the UNMOVIC report to the United Nations...This is from the UN's own website (http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/Bx27.htm)...



Now once again...This thread was not intended to justify the invasion...It is only to support the position that Iraq broke resolution demands that they fully declare what they were in possesion of......

This has been proven to be true...

Now as for the inspection team not being allowed to complete their job...I have a question...

How can they complete their job when the information given them...through Iraq's declaration of weapons on December 7, 2002...was incomplete and riddled with questionable information?...

Are there forum members here that actually believe that the inspection team was to go scan Iraq...a country the size of California...looking for stuff Iraq claimed they destroyed?...Not only would that have taken more than a decade, but it would also NOT prove that the weapons were being moved according to the inspection team's current position...

The second the team gave a site a clean bill of health, Saddam could(would) move those undeclared weapons to that site...Never to be re-inspected again...


I don't really care about all the semantics, a lot of people are dead and maimed because of this war, all the evidence shows that the WMD's Saddam had were destroyed in 1991.


Classic shell game...

2) As stated...this thread was only to refute one simple fact...

The assumption that Saddam never had WMDs..

Now there are some from the Left that understand that this is an obvious point...Whether or not is was reason enough to go to war is a debate for another day; and we pretty much know where most of the usual suspects(forum members) stand on this...

For the okis and the PlatyGuys who knew that Saddam had them at a certain time and place, this thread wasn't meant to reassert something they already know...

This thread was meant as a starting point for the Corporate Avengers and Java_mans that go through life without even acknowleding the existance of WMDs...AT ALL...

The sad part is...They still don't believe...The proof is in their own words (http://www.discussanything.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1366309&postcount=14)...



And still don't (http://www.discussanything.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1366805&postcount=34)...



When debating, there has to be a starting point that everyone can agree on to make sure the topic has legitimacy...

As we've seen here on this thread, we have people on the Left acknowleding that WMDs were in existance at some point and others on the Left that will not acknowledge this...

It's tough to debate some who understand the starting point and then switch to those who don't, so I wanted to make sure we were all on the same page from the beginning...

Now it's the turn from the forum members...

Did I fail to present the information properly or do others fail to understand it?...


Inventing other people's opinions does nothing to help your case. I have never said or implied Saddam didn't have WMD's at one time, I'm well aware of his friendly relations with the United States during the 1980's and how the west gave him precursors for Weapons of mass destruction. And this is why this whole thing is retarded, even when he did have WMD's back in the 1980's, he wasn't a threat to us, in fact, the Reagan administration relations with him and helped him use chemical weapons against Iran. We know they were destroyed back in 1991, so we know he didn't have these "huge stockpiles" in 2003. And since when he did possess these weapons back in the 80's it was "ok", and he didn't pose a threat, then that is why it's ridiculous to all of a sudden proclaim he was a threat in 02-03. Those of us who kept up on the facts knew these things, we knew invading and toppling the Iraqi government would be a colossal disaster, it's the same reason Bush SR. didn't go all the way to Baghdad in 1991.


So what happened to his vaunted stockpile? It was destroyed in 1991.

From another thread:

Saddam Hussein did not possess stockpiles of illicit weapons at the time of the U.S. invasion in March 2003 and had not begun any program to produce them, a CIA report concludes.

In fact, the long-awaited report, authored by Charles Duelfer, who advises the director of central intelligence on Iraqi weapons, says Iraq's WMD program was essentially destroyed in 1991 and Saddam ended Iraq's nuclear program after the 1991 Gulf War.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/10/06/iraq.wmd.report/

Star Witness on Iraq Said Weapons Were Destroyed
Bombshell revelation from a defector cited by White House and press

2/27/03

On February 24, Newsweek broke what may be the biggest story of the Iraq crisis. In a revelation that "raises questions about whether the WMD [weapons of mass destruction] stockpiles attributed to Iraq still exist," the magazine's issue dated March 3 reported that the Iraqi weapons chief who defected from the regime in 1995 told U.N. inspectors that Iraq had destroyed its entire stockpile of chemical and biological weapons and banned missiles, as Iraq claims.

Until now, Gen. Hussein Kamel, who was killed shortly after returning to Iraq in 1996, was best known for his role in exposing Iraq's deceptions about how far its pre-Gulf War biological weapons programs had advanced. But Newsweek's John Barry-- who has covered Iraqi weapons inspections for more than a decade-- obtained the transcript of Kamel's 1995 debriefing by officials from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the U.N. inspections team known as UNSCOM.

Inspectors were told "that after the Gulf War, Iraq destroyed all its chemical and biological weapons stocks and the missiles to deliver them," Barry wrote. All that remained were "hidden blueprints, computer disks, microfiches" and production molds. The weapons were destroyed secretly, in order to hide their existence from inspectors, in the hopes of someday resuming production after inspections had finished. The CIA and MI6 were told the same story, Barry reported, and "a military aide who defected with Kamel... backed Kamel's assertions about the destruction of WMD stocks."

But these statements were "hushed up by the U.N. inspectors" in order to "bluff Saddam into disclosing still more."

CIA spokesperson Bill Harlow angrily denied the Newsweek report. "It is incorrect, bogus, wrong, untrue," Harlow told Reuters (2/24/03) the day the report appeared.

But on Wednesday (2/26/03), a complete copy of the Kamel transcript-- an internal UNSCOM/IAEA document stamped "sensitive"-- was obtained by Glen Rangwala, the Cambridge University analyst who in early February revealed that Tony Blair's "intelligence dossier" was plagiarized from a student thesis. This transcript can be seen at
http://www.fair.org/press-releases/kamel.pdf.

In the transcript (p. 13), Kamel says bluntly: "All weapons-- biological, chemical, missile, nuclear, were destroyed."

Who is Hussein Kamel?

Kamel is no obscure defector. A son-in-law of Saddam Hussein, his departure from Iraq carrying crates of secret documents on Iraq's past weapons programs was a major turning point in the inspections saga. In 1999, in a letter to the U.N. Security Council (1/25/99), UNSCOM reported that its entire eight years of disarmament work "must be divided into two parts, separated by the events following the departure from Iraq, in August 1995, of Lt. Gen. Hussein Kamel."

Kamel's defection has been cited repeatedly by George W. Bush and leading administration officials as evidence that 1) Iraq has not disarmed; 2) inspections cannot disarm it; and 3) defectors such as Kamel are the most reliable source of information on Iraq's weapons.


* Bush declared in an October 7, 2002 speech: "In 1995, after several years of deceit by the Iraqi regime, the head of Iraq's military industries defected. It was then that the regime was forced to admit that it had produced more than 30,000 liters of anthrax and other deadly biological agents. The inspectors, however, concluded that Iraq had likely produced two to four times that amount. This is a massive stockpile of biological weapons that has never been accounted for, and capable of killing millions."

* Secretary of State Colin Powell's February 5 presentation to the U.N. Security Council claimed: "It took years for Iraq to finally admit that it had produced four tons of the deadly nerve agent, VX. A single drop of VX on the skin will kill in minutes. Four tons. The admission only came out after inspectors collected documentation as a result of the defection of Hussein Kamel, Saddam Hussein's late son-in-law."

* In a speech last August (8/27/02), Vice President Dick Cheney said Kamel's story "should serve as a reminder to all that we often learned more as the result of defections than we learned from the inspection regime itself."

* Deputy National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley recently wrote in the Chicago Tribune (2/16/03) that "because of information provided by Iraqi defector and former head of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs, Lt. Gen. Hussein Kamel, the regime had to admit in detail how it cheated on its nuclear non-proliferation commitments."



The quotes from Bush and Powell cited above refer to anthrax and VX produced by Iraq before the 1991 Gulf War. The administration has cited various quantities of chemical and biological weapons on many other occasions-- weapons that Iraq produced but which remain unaccounted for. All of these claims refer to weapons produced before 1991.

But according to Kamel's transcript, Iraq destroyed all of these weapons in 1991.

According to Newsweek, Kamel told the same story to CIA analysts in August 1995. If that is true, all of these U.S. officials have had access to Kamel's statements that the weapons were destroyed. Their repeated citations of his testimony-- without revealing that he also said the weapons no longer exist-- suggests that the administration might be withholding critical evidence. In particular, it casts doubt on the credibility of Powell's February 5 presentation to the U.N., which was widely hailed at the time for its persuasiveness. To clear up the issue, journalists might ask the CIA to release the transcripts of its own conversations with Kamel.

Kamel's disclosures have also been crucial to the arguments made by hawkish commentators on Iraq. The defector has been cited four times on the New York Times op-ed page in the last four months in support of claims about Iraq's weapons programs-- never noting his assertions about the elimination of these weapons. In a major Times op-ed calling for war against Iraq (2/21/03), Kenneth Pollack of the Brookings Institution wrote that Kamel and other defectors "reported that outside pressure had not only failed to eradicate the nuclear program, it was bigger and more cleverly spread out and concealed than anyone had imagined it to be." The release of Kamel's transcript makes this claim appear grossly at odds with the defector's actual testimony.

The Kamel story is a bombshell that necessitates a thorough reevaluation of U.S. media reporting on Iraq, much of which has taken for granted that the nation retains supplies of prohibited weapons. (See FAIR Media Advisory, "Iraq's Hidden Weapons: From Allegation to Fact," 2/4/03.) Kamel's testimony is not, of course, proof that Iraq does not have hidden stocks of chemical or biological weapons, but it does suggest a need for much more media skepticism about U.S. allegations than has previously been shown.


http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1845


That about does it.

The argument is not that Saddam never had WMD, but that at the time of the invasion, he did not have any WMD.


Bingo

The argument is not that Saddam never had WMD, but that at the time of the invasion, he did not have any WMD.

But that's too difficult to counter, so certain people would rather just make up an argument that's easy to counter, then assign that argument to you, and then proudly and boldly defeat the argument they made up, then pat themselves on the back.

Then your duty is to challenge them to find examples of that argument being used. Failure to do so will lead to the dismissal of such individuals as liars, fabricators, jackasses, or a wide variety of other things. But first, one must give them a chance. Maybe it's a misinterpretation or miscommunication.

Then your duty is to challenge them to find examples of that argument being used.


I've done that quite a few times, and they just ignore it, and repeat the strawman, then lash out at it more.

Geez, I didn't mean to get everyone all stirred up!!! Some of you guys are WAY to sensetive! *Peers over at Fabio and Java_man* (Please take that as the good-hearted ribbing that it's meant to be...)

Please understand a thing or two about me, I'm sorta new around here, but have already gotten to where I enjoy our discussions. I'm conservative, yes. Neo-Conservative?? Naw, I'm not that blind to the realities of the world. I will respect anyone's opinion, I don't care if you believe that Santa came down and took all of the WMD's back to the North Pole with him. If you're firm in that conviction, then I will respect it. Don't expect ME to believe it, but I'll respect your point of view. Hell, even if you have nothing to back your thoughts and/or beliefs, if you just "feel" that way, I will respect that. With that said, all I expect is the same respect. Name calling and BS like that, unless done in jest, serve's no purpose. Now, if we're all just kidding around and calling each other, (what was it boo said...) "leftist liberal America hater bush-basher leftist liar loony moonbat" or saying stuff like "This just proves that neo-conservatives are insane..." and doing it in jest (Or, even half jest), no biggie. Some of the name calling, accusations can be funny as hell. I understand the fustration of discusions or debates when the person your dealing with just REFUSES to see your point, but, after all, I assume were all here for the same reason, to debate issues and expand each others views and or knowledge of things. So, in short, respect will carry a lot of weight with me.....No matter how flippin' insane you think I am, Or, I think you are....MMmmmKay? Take Boo for example, he's flippin out there hanging off the fence in far left field by his fingertips reaching back for his Corky helmet! But, he has always been respectful and has already provided me with some different perspectives to look at and I have the utmost respect for him....make sense?? *S* (Just kiddin' Boo....I really don't think your reaching back for the helmet...*S*)

With all that out of the way....Back to the thread. I will concede this to you...18 months ago, you guys might have convinced me that all his crap was gone, destroyed, whatever AND I will concede that if the UN teams would have been allowed by us and/or Saddam to finish their work, then all of this might have been avoided, you have some solid backing to your statements. BUT...I've spent the last 18 months in this place supporting a company that deals with Saddams stockpiles on a daily basis. The sheer magnitude of the job the UN teams had is unimaginable. Hell, we have 9 mobile teams that do nothing but drive around the desert looking for crap to blow up (Come on, No one can say they wouldn't like to have THAT job! *S*). I have just seen way to much circumstantial evidence at this point to believe it was all destroyed and not moved somewhere else. Whether it be somewhere here in Iraq, or in another country, I don't know. But, nothing will convince me he was in complience when we invaded this country. I have seen artillery shells with Nuclear disignations on them, I have seen shell's with Chemical designations on them...Does that mean they were nukes or chems? Hell no, anyone can run around with a stamp and stamp crap. But, I'll never know. When stuff like that is found, we back off and the Military comes in. When it's clear, were allowed to go back to work and the stuff is gone. I've walked into a sealed bunker that was hundreds of miles from anything and found literally TONS of munitions all lined up coated with so much dust and sand that you can't read them only to come across boxes spread out on the floor busted open and clean as a bell. Or, come to a corner of the bunker and there is a big void in the munitions and the plain outline of a pallet be on the floor. Now, for anyonne who's been here before, they know. It doesn't take long at all for dust and sand to cover crap up here....Even indoors. Hell, I have to blow the dust and sand out of my keyboard once or twice a week. So, yeah, that crap worries me. There a dozen things that could explain it all, but one of those is that the crap is still here somewhere and that scares the hell out of me. Freaks have used chemicals all over the world now, Where are they getting them? It's not like they can run down to the corner drug store and buy a package of VX or Ricin, so where's it coming from. I don't know. Well, that's just my rant for now and my 2cents.

Name calling and debating the posters instead of the posts are against the rules. If you see it happening, report it.

Back to the thread. I will concede this to you...18 months ago, you guys might have convinced me that all his crap was gone, destroyed, whatever AND I will concede that if the UN teams would have been allowed by us and/or Saddam to finish their work, then all of this might have been avoided, ...

The inspectors found nothing. Iraq supplied a 12,000 page document outlining what they did. Now, you can parrot Bush admin lines about the document being incomplete etcetera, but the fact is, the evidence clearly points to there being no weapons in Iraq at the time of the invasion.

Look, if Saddam was the threat he was painted to be by the BA, why didn't he use these alleged weapons on the battlefield during the invasion? Surely he knew, after months of rhetoric from the Bush and Blair admins and after months of forces build-up in the Gulf and in surrounding countries, that his goose was cooked. He would not survive the coming battle in power, if alive. So why not deploy these weapons to take as many of the invaders as he could? He apparently didn't hesitate to use chemical munitions back in the mid-1980s agains the Iranians when things were going pear-shaped for him then so why not now?

What possible use could these weapons be for him in Syria? Or Russia? Why would he go to such lengths to conceal programs, hide them from inspectors and satellites and the like, only to not use them when his very life is in danger? It strains credulity in the extreme to think that this man, given the picture painted by the BA and Blair, wouldn't have used his weapons as a last-resort.

Then there's the issue of the insurgency and the telling lack of use of any such weaponry by them. Surely if the weapons had ended up in Syria some of those "foreign fighters" streaming over the Syrian border would have picked up a few bottle of goo by now and used them. Or if Saddam had socked them away in some underground bunker surely surviving members of his army, out of work and disgruntled and angry, would have led insurgents to the stockpiles for a few bucks. Saddam couldn't have hidden the things by himself...out there in the desert at midnight wheeling a forklift all by himself storing this stuff away... Others must have known and there must be some willing to use them against Shias or Americans or whatever.

Where are they? Why haven't they been used?

you have some solid backing to your statements. BUT...I've spent the last 18 months in this place supporting a company that deals with Saddams stockpiles on a daily basis.

And before you there was Charlie Duelfer who said "“t turns out that we were all wrong” ... “I believe that the effort that has been directed to this point has been sufficiently intense that it is highly unlikely that there were large stockpiles of deployed, militarized chemical weapons there.”"" and before him there was David Kay who resigned after fruitless searches by thousands saying Iraq was WMDless and ""I think there were stockpiles at the end of the first Gulf War and a combination of U.N. inspectors and unilateral Iraqi action got rid of them."" (link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kay)) and before him were the UN inspections that also found nothing of serious note.

But again, the real indication that Saddam, the Butcher of Baghdad, was WMDless was in the failure to use anything both during the short war and during the subsquent insurgency.

... I've walked into a sealed bunker that was hundreds of miles from anything and found literally TONS of munitions all lined up coated with so much dust and sand that you can't read them only to come across boxes spread out on the floor busted open and clean as a bell. Or, come to a corner of the bunker and there is a big void in the munitions and the plain outline of a pallet be on the floor. ...

So why weren't they used? Or perhaps the contents of those pallets are going into IEDs...

And why would you assume chemical or biological weapons? Does it make sense for the regime to store these munitions, munitions that have limited shelf lives, in this way, in uncontrolled environments?

And if the regime is going into these bunkers to take these weapons, what for? Why not booby trap the whole place and blow any nosy US troops to hell with a chemical- and bio-laced mega-explosion? Why take the WMD stuff away and hide it instead of using it?

Freaks have used chemicals all over the world now, Where are they getting them? It's not like they can run down to the corner drug store and buy a package of VX or Ricin, so where's it coming from. I don't know. Well, that's just my rant for now and my 2cents.

Sorry...Where? When?

In the 1995 Tokyo subway sarin attack? A cult that brewed up its own cocktail?

Or the few anthrax letters in the US? Whatever became of that? Seems to have dropped off the radar. hasn't it?

Where else have we seen "freaks" using "chemicals all over the world."?

I don't really care about all the semantics, a lot of people are dead and maimed because of this war, all the evidence shows that the WMD's Saddam had were destroyed in 1991.All the evidence you've chosen to believe says they were destroyed...

But I fear you haven't clicked the actual complete UNSCOM report in post #2...

Here's some more snippets from the report...These are taken directly from Tables 3 & 4...

STATUS OF THE VERIFICATION OF IRAQ'S (http://www.fas.org/news/un/iraq/s/990125/dis-chem.htm)
CHEMICAL WEAPONS PROGRAMME (http://www.fas.org/news/un/iraq/s/990125/dis-chem.htm)

D4*(tabun) - 166 tonnes were destroyed under UNSCOM supervision.

POCl3** (tabun) - 576 tonnes were destroyed under UNSCOM supervision.

Dimethylamino-hydrochloride( tabun) - 272 tonnes were destroyed under UNSCOM supervision.

Thionylchloride***(mustard, GB, GF and VX) - 282 tonnes were destroyed under UNSCOM supervision.

Tabun/sarin plant and hydrolysis plant, P7 (MSE), production of tabun & sarin. - 1) Equipment was partly destroyed during the Gulf war.

2) The hydrolysis plant was used for the destruction under UNSCOM supervision of tabun, sarin and their precursors. After the completion of the destruction of sarin, the remaining 17 pieces of equipment were destroyed under UNSCOM supervision.

Multipurpose plant & associated facilities, A3 (MSE),production of precursors (PCl3, DMPH, MPC), production of phenol and other commercial chemicals. - 40 pieces of equipment were destroyed under UNSCOM supervision

Multipurpose pilot plants, H1, H2, H3 (MSE), production of precursors (D4, DMMP, MPC, MPF), production and distillation of sarin. - 59 pieces of equipment were destroyed under UNSCOM supervisionNow if everything was destroyed in 1991 as you say, then please explain to me all of this tonnage that UNSCOM was destroying AFTER 1991?...Was this just a figment of their imaginations?...

Now I'd like you to explain the President's words in 1999 when he attacked Iraq...

Earlier today, I ordered America's armed forces to strike military and security targets in Iraq. They are joined by British forces. Their mission is to attack Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and its military capacity to threaten its neighbors...

...Saddam Hussein must not be allowed to threaten his neighbors or the world with nuclear arms, poison gas or biological weapons.
I want to explain why I have decided, with the unanimous recommendation of my national security team, to use force in Iraq; why we have acted now; and what we aim to accomplish.

Six weeks ago, Saddam Hussein announced that he would no longer cooperate with the United Nations weapons inspectors called UNSCOM. They are highly professional experts from dozens of countries. Their job is to oversee the elimination of Iraq's capability to retain, create and use weapons of mass destruction, and to verify that Iraq does not attempt to rebuild that capability.

The inspectors undertook this mission first 7.5 years ago at the end of the Gulf War when Iraq agreed to declare and destroy its arsenal as a condition of the ceasefire.

The international community had good reason to set this requirement. Other countries possess weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles. With Saddam, there is one big difference: He has used them. Not once, but repeatedly. Unleashing chemical weapons against Iranian troops during a decade-long war. Not only against soldiers, but against civilians, firing Scud missiles at the citizens of Israel, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Iran. And not only against a foreign enemy, but even against his own people, gassing Kurdish civilians in Northern Iraq.

The international community had little doubt then, and I have no doubt today, that left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will use these terrible weapons again...

...Iraq repeatedly restricted UNSCOM's ability to obtain necessary evidence. For example, Iraq obstructed UNSCOM's effort to photograph bombs related to its chemical weapons program.

It tried to stop an UNSCOM biological weapons team from videotaping a site and photocopying documents and prevented Iraqi personnel from answering UNSCOM's questions.

Prior to the inspection of another site, Iraq actually emptied out the building, removing not just documents but even the furniture and the equipment...

As the UNSCOM reports concludes, and again I quote, "Iraq's conduct ensured that no progress was able to be made in the fields of disarmament.

"In light of this experience, and in the absence of full cooperation by Iraq, it must regrettably be recorded again that the commission is not able to conduct the work mandated to it by the Security Council with respect to Iraq's prohibited weapons program."

...In short, the inspectors are saying that even if they could stay in Iraq, their work would be a sham.

Saddam's deception has defeated their effectiveness. Instead of the inspectors disarming Saddam, Saddam has disarmed the inspectors. Now why would Clinton have anything to worry about since everything was destroyed in 1991?...The fact that he even quoted the UNSCOM report itself has no bearing on your beliefs?...

Maybe he should've just asked you...:rolleyes:

The inspectors found nothing. Iraq supplied a 12,000 page document outlining what they did. Now, you can parrot Bush admin lines about the document being incomplete etcetera, but the fact is, the evidence clearly points to there being no weapons in Iraq at the time of the invasion.Did you NOT see this?..It was posted less than six hours before your post...:confused:

This is directly from the UNMOVIC report to the United Nations...This is from the UN's own website (http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/Bx27.htm)...

On 7 December 2002, Iraq submitted a declaration of some 12,000 pages in response to paragraph 3 of resolution 1441 (2002)....

One might have expected that in preparing the Declaration, Iraq would have tried to respond to, clarify and submit supporting evidence regarding the many open disarmament issues, which the Iraqi side should be familiar with from the UNSCOM document S/1999/94 of January1999 and the so-called Amorim Report of March 1999 (S/1999/356). These are questions which UNMOVIC, governments and independent commentators have often cited.

While UNMOVIC has been preparing its own list of current “unresolved disarmament issues” and “key remaining disarmament tasks” in response to requirements in resolution 1284 (1999), we find the issues listed in the two reports as unresolved, professionally justified. These reports do not contend that weapons of mass destruction remain in Iraq, but nor do they exclude that possibility. They point to lack of evidence and inconsistencies, which raise question marks, which must be straightened out, if weapons dossiers are to be closed and confidence is to arise.


They deserve to be taken seriously by Iraq rather than being brushed aside as evil machinations of UNSCOM. Regrettably, the 12,000 page declaration, most of which is a reprint of earlier documents, does not seem to contain any new evidence that would eliminate the questions or reduce their number. Even Iraq’s letter sent in response to our recent discussions in Baghdad to the President of the Security Council on 24 January does not lead us to the resolution of these issues...

Now how are you equating the actual UN's report with "Bush parroting"?...:confused:

Posted: May 17, 2004
1:25 p.m. Eastern



© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com

Two separate discoveries of chemical weapons, possibly among the weapons of mass destruction Saddam hid from inspectors, were reported today in Iraq by U.S. officials.

The Iraq Survey Group, assigned the task of searching for WMD, confirmed a roadside bomb that exploded Saturday near a U.S. military convoy in the area of Baghdad International Airport contained sarin nerve agent.....

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38528

Posted: June 26, 2004
11:28 a.m. Eastern

Editor's note: Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin is an online, subscription intelligence news service from the creator of WorldNetDaily.com – a journalist who has been developing sources around the world for the last 25 years.

© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com

A day after the head of the CIA weapons inspection team warned that terrorists in Iraq are trying to get their hands on the Saddam Hussein regime's chemical weapons of mass destruction, Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin reports the first attack with these weapons of mass destruction has been launched inside Baghdad's Green Zone......

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=39158

And before you there was Charlie Duelfer who said

BTW....Charles Duelfer was the head of the CIA weapons inspection team mentioned in this article...Read on...

On Thursday, Charles Duelfer, the head of the CIA weapons inspection team, said terrorists in Iraq are seeking chemical arms and expertise left over from the Hussein regime for possible use against U.S. and allied troops. He added that his team has so far found as many as a dozen chemical-filled bombs – far more than previously reported.

Sorry...Where? When?

In the 1995 Tokyo subway sarin attack? A cult that brewed up its own cocktail?

Or the few anthrax letters in the US? Whatever became of that? Seems to have dropped off the radar. hasn't it?

Where else have we seen "freaks" using "chemicals all over the world."?

Damn it....You win that one. The Toyko attack you mentioned, The Anthrax letters, hushed up or not. I goofed, I thought the Madrid bombing had a chemical property to it, but I re-read the stuff and it was only "suspected" that a chemical was used early on and then dismissed. Besides those and the one in Jordan that got discovered and snuffed out (see below) there have only been limited uses....O.K. Gotta get my game on, see if I can't even the score! *S*

Jordan discloses persons involved in the chemical attack that would kill 80,000 persons
Jordan, Local, 4/27/2004

The Jordanian government yesterday confirmed earlier news on that it was able to foil a huge attack by chemical weapons against the headquarters if the Jordanian intelligence in Amman. It said that the attack would have led to the killing of 80,000 persons in what seems to be the biggest aggression on the history of the Kingdom.
http://www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/040427/2004042714.html

The anthrax letters were traced to a strain developed by the US Army that never left a labratory, but we haven't heard anything about that since that discovery. The Tokyo subway bombing was using home-made poisons.

Also, World Net Daily regularly makes stuff up, so you're not going to get very far using them as a source. If I wanted to address that stuff, I'd have to go out and find a news organization and compare WND to legit news to see if what they are saying is true or make-believe. Just so you know, the only people here who are going to take a WND article seriously already agree with you on the war (except that some of them believe, mostly because of crap they read on WND, that we actually did find the stockpiles of WMDs, and that Hussein really did have a hand in 9-11). No one who doesn't already agree with with the war is going to take that organization seriously. It's like citing Pravda archives to evidence that the Soviet Union was wonderful.

LOL - So legit news is only the news that agrees with YOU on the war. Imagine that!

WND = crap
Truthout.org = gold

Boo, you make me laugh.

Truthout.org = gold

Boo, you make me laugh.

Hey, F&L, I have an idea. Why don't you make up a rediculous argument, assign it to me, then lash out at it.

Oh, wait . . .

Is it really that ridiculous? I guess I shouldn't have singled you out since everyone wants to believe that the sources that agree with them are the only ones beyond reproach. Sure, it was an absurd example, but there are people here who regularly use truthout as a source. Feel free to insert whatever media outlet you believe is gold. But, don't expect it to have credibility with the other side. Since this is off topic, I'll start a thread to see what news orgs people think are legitimate. I've pretty much come to the conclusion that there are none left. I hope you'll contribute.

The anthrax letters were traced to a strain developed by the US Army that never left a labratory

No shit? I didn't know that....Damn it, your gonna make me go out and research now, you got my curiosity up! LOL

Also, World Net Daily regularly makes stuff up, so you're not going to get very far using them as a source. If I wanted to address that stuff, I'd have to go out and find a news organization and compare WND to legit news to see if what they are saying is true or make-believe. Just so you know, the only people here who are going to take a WND article seriously already agree with you on the war (except that some of them believe, mostly because of crap they read on WND, that we actually did find the stockpiles of WMDs, and that Hussein really did have a hand in 9-11). No one who doesn't already agree with with the war is going to take that organization seriously. It's like citing Pravda archives to evidence that the Soviet Union was wonderful.I have to agree with BooBooKitty on this one...

There are quite a few sources that are so partisan, that even when they do come up with something factual(which I call "The blind squirrel finding a nut" theory), it is still dismissed...

truthout.org, worldnetdaily, MediaReasearch, DemocracyNow, etc...all reek of political agenda that the 10% they show to be true is blurred by the 90% trash they sprew....

If you really want to show what they said to be true...and if it really is true...I'd go to a more objective source...If they don't say the same thing, then you should question the legitimacy...

If a partisan site shows a story with a link to the original source, I'd link to the original source before the site I found it out from...

truthout.org, worldnetdaily, MediaReasearch, DemocracyNow, etc...all reek of political agenda that the 10% they show to be true is blurred by the 90% trash they sprew....

The vast majority of articles available at truthout.org are gathered from other sources, such as national and regional newspapers. Therefore, your statement insofar as it relates to truthout is meaningless.

As pertaining to the chemical plot in Jordan, I believe CNN should suffice (http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/04/26/jordan.terror/)at credible...

AMMAN, Jordan (CNN) -- Jordanian authorities said Monday they have broken up an alleged al Qaeda plot that would have unleashed a deadly cloud of chemicals in the heart of Jordan's capital, Amman.

The plot would have been more deadly than anything al Qaeda has done before, including the September 11 attacks, according to the Jordanian government.
Among the alleged targets were the U.S. Embassy, the Jordanian prime minister's office and the headquarters of Jordanian intelligence...

...In a nighttime raid in Amman, Jordanian security forces moved in on the terrorist cell. After the shooting stopped, four men were dead. Jordanian authorities said. They said at least three others were arrested, including Azmi Jayyousi, the cell's suspected ringleader, whom Jordanian intelligence alleges was responsible for planning and recruiting.

On a confession shown on state-run Jordanian television, Jayyousi said he took orders from Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a suspected terrorist leader who has been linked to al Qaeda and whom U.S. officials have said is behind some attacks in Iraq...

...In a series of raids, the Jordanians said, they seized 20 tons of chemicals and numerous explosives. Also seized were three trucks equipped with specially modified plows, apparently designed to crash through security barricades.

Is it really that ridiculous? I guess I shouldn't have singled you out since everyone wants to believe that the sources that agree with them are the only ones beyond reproach. Sure, it was an absurd example, but there are people here who regularly use truthout as a source. Feel free to insert whatever media outlet you believe is gold. But, don't expect it to have credibility with the other side. Since this is off topic, I'll start a thread to see what news orgs people think are legitimate. I've pretty much come to the conclusion that there are none left. I hope you'll contribute.

"News" doesn't have an "other side". If there is an "other side", then the "news" has a side, which means it's not "news", it's "propaganda". WND is a good example of that.

truthout.org, worldnetdaily, MediaReasearch, DemocracyNow, etc...all reek of political agenda that the 10% they show to be true is blurred by the 90% trash they sprew....


True. I don't bother to read the liberal rags, because, on the issue of the war and the general dishonesty of the Bush Administration, they're just going to be saying what I already think, and I hate being pandered to.

I do read the right-wing rags, which I shouldn't do, because it just further degrades my opinion of Republicans as a whole, but it's mostly just as a study in persuasive writing. I enjoy reading them because they're good at what they do, which is to keep people from considering anything that doesn't agree with their politics. (Probably the same thing as Daily Kos, but I don't know, because I really don't read those. I'd be shocked if it was anything but, though.)

The vast majority of articles available at truthout.org are gathered from other sources, such as national and regional newspapers. Therefore, your statement insofar as it relates to truthout is meaningless.Not only is this false, but it doesn't pertain to the legitimacy of using them as a source...

Let me just simply ask you a simple question...

If I post an article, would you be swayed more towards its credibility by me linking it to conservativerightwingnmews.com or objectivenewsoutlet.com?

I would assume you...and any other living breathing person...would say the latter...

The first one obviously has an agenda...

truthout.org IS one of these places with an agenda...don't believe me?...

Then how do explain Cindy Sheehan being a "contributing writer"?...:confused:


Contributing Writers Some of Truthout's prominent contributing writers include David Bacon, Dean Baker, Tom Engelhardt, William Fisher, Scott Galindez, Dahr Jamail, Jason Leopold, Ray McGovern, William Rivers Pitt, J. Sri Raman, Cindy Sheehan, Norman Solomon, David Swanson and James Zogby. They supply our readers with a valuable roster of opinion, news analysis and special reports, and have covered such underreported topics as the war on journalists, US human rights violations and the worldwide energy crisis.

You wanna name me the conservative in the group...

Hint: Don't bother...Every one is a Liberal...

After questioning if I believe if the inspection team was there to inspect, I don't think I could've been more clear when I said that, indeed, the inspection team was there to inspect...

.... *sigh* I was mocking your argument. Sorry you didnt get it. But the notion that the word inspect couldnt be associated with looking, or hunting, when thats exactly, exactly what to inspect means (You are LOOKING for something).


I will stop this post, because I don't believe my vocabulary contains any words that descibe how irrational this exchage was...

Your lack of vocabulary is certainly not a surprise, when you dont think that the UN Weapons Inspection team was there to look for WMD. But to Inspect for them.

Christ. Do you even realizez what your saying?! This is like me saying 'Im not here to start the party... Im here to get it going!', or 'Dont start the car. Just turn the key untill the engine revs'. Your twisting symantics to get the exact same ****ing meaning but you dont seem to realize it?

Just for fun, lets use a thesaurus, just so you understand the absurdity of your statement (bolds mine):

Main Entry: inspect
Part of Speech: verb
Definition: examine
Synonyms: eyeball, go over, go through, inquire, interrogate, investigate,look over, look-see, notice, observe, oversee, probe, question, review, scan, scope, scout, scrutinize, search, study, survey, view, watch

http://thesaurus.reference.com/search?q=Inspect&x=0&y=0

All of them work, but some fun ones we have---Look over, Investigate, Probe, Search, Scrutinize... But of course, we musn't think that the Un Weapons Inspection team was actually searching, looking, probing, investigating, nor going through Saddams things for WMD. They were just inspecting...? Christ. I have to be wasting my time here...

Let me put it this way: Your argument was phrased where the UN weapons inspection team wasnt there to look, nor hunt for WMD. However, included in the most basic meaning of the word investigate these are primary meanings. So what exactly do you consider inspecting, if not to look for things.

BTW--Im quire dissapointed you left the rest of my post untouched.

Not only is this false, but it doesn't pertain to the legitimacy of using them as a source...

On today's truthout page, the left column of articles is called "on the issues."

I find the following articles:

GOP Candidate Says 9/11 Attacks Were a Hoax
By Albert McKeon
The Nashua Telegraph

Inquiry Opened Into Israeli Use of US Bombs
By David S. Cloud
The New York Times

Bush and Saddam Should Both Stand Trial, Says Nuremberg Prosecutor
By Aaron Glantz
OneWorld.net

Chirac Offer of 2,000 Troops Breaks Impasse on Lebanon Peacekeepers
By Ewen MacAskill and Rory McCarthy
The Guardian UK

Shays Urges Iraq Withdrawal
By Anushka Asthana
The Washington Post

British Leave Iraqi Base; Militia Supporters Jubilant
By Amit R. Paley
The Washington Post

Friday 25 August 2006

On the right, there's a column called "Op-ed editorials," where I find the following:

Supporting the Troops
By William Rivers Pitt
t r u t h o u t | Perspective

How to Look Like a Failure
By Sidney Blumenthal
The Guardian UK

It's Up to Europe to Promote Hopes of Peace
By Hervé de Charette
Le Monde

Losing Afghanistan
The New York Times | Editorial

Dangerous Days
By Michael Hirsh
Newsweek


Of 11 articles appearing on truthout, I found exactly 1 that is not from another source. I stopped sampling at this point because it's enough to show that you are mistaken.

"News" doesn't have an "other side". If there is an "other side", then the "news" has a side, which means it's not "news", it's "propaganda". WND is a good example of that.You had me until the last sentence...

In my posts on this thread, where have I linked to anything other than the sources of the information themselves?

When I wanted to show what UNSCOM reported, I went directly to the actual UNSCOM report (http://www.fas.org/news/un/iraq/s/990125/)...not a partisan site...

When I wanted to show what UNMOVIC reported, I went directly to the UNMOVIC report (http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/Bx27.htm) which was directly from the UN...not a partisan site...

When I wanted to show what IAEA reported, I went directly to IAEA's website (http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/MediaAdvisory/2002/ma_iraq_0612.shtml)...not a partisan site...

Now why won't you believe them?...:confused:

No shit? I didn't know that....Damn it, your gonna make me go out and research now, you got my curiosity up! LOL

Well, it's been a couple of years. I went and looked for an article, but I haven't found one that says it was definately US Army, but I thought I remembered that being a solid conclusion. So far, all I've found is articles saying it was a strong probability. I may be wrong that it was found to be an absolute fact.

For search fodder: The U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) at Fort Detrick, Md. was the custodian of the Ames strain of Anthrax, and the stuff that was being used in those attacks was a genetic match to the strain that was grown by the Army (I think in CIA labs). They shipped it to a small number of other labs. Also, the dry, weapons grade anthrax is extremely difficult to manufacture, so it's not something that was done in someone's garage in Trenton, or something.

Here's something http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/2196008.stm


An FBI forensic linguistics expert believes the US anthrax attacks were carried out by a senior scientist from within America's biological-defence community.

Professor Don Foster - who helped convict Unabomber Ted Kaczynski and unveiled Joe Klein as the author of the novel Primary Colors - says the evidence points to someone with high-ranking military and intelligence connections.

Speaking about the investigation for the first time, Prof Foster told the BBC he had identified two suspects who had both worked for the CIA, the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) and other classified military operations.

Controversially, Prof Foster says the killer is likely to be highly patriotic individual who wanted to demonstrate that the US was badly prepared for an act of biological terrorism.

The weapons-grade anthrax was posted in letters just days after the 11 September terror attacks, leaving five people dead, 18 injured and 35,000 forced to take precautionary antibiotics.


http://archives.cnn.com/2001/HEALTH/conditions/12/18/anthrax.investigation/index.html


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The anthrax found in letters sent to two U.S. senators is a genetic match to a strain of the bacteria maintained by the Army since 1980, a senior government official said Tuesday.

The official cautioned that does not really narrow the possible source for the anthrax, because the Army distributed it to labs in the United States and overseas.

A spokesman for the Army's medical laboratory for biological warfare defense at Fort Detrick, Maryland, which maintained the anthrax and studied the letter sent to Sen. Patrick Leahy, concurred.


But I haven't found anything conclusive, so I may well have been wrong to say that it definately came from Army labs, just that it was a genetic match, that the strain itself was developed by the Army, but since they've distributed it to private sector researchers, it may not have come straight from the bottle from a base.

Of 11 articles appearing on truthout, I found exactly 1 that is not from another source. I stopped sampling at this point because it's enough to show that you are mistaken.But if you notice, all of the legitimate articles from other websites are anti-Bush, anti-America, and anti-Israel...

Where are the ones denouncing Hezbollah?...Where are the ones that say what Bush is doing is right?...

They are out there, but your truthout.org won't link to them...

When there are two reports in the world that say two different things on the same subject, the objective thing to do is display both of them and let the readers decide...

Instead, truthout picks and chooses from the full array of stories only to show you WHAT THEY WANT...

That's not only disingenous, but goes againsts the true tenants of journalism...

But if you notice, all of the legitimate articles from other websites are anti-Bush, anti-America, and anti-Israel...

Where are the ones denouncing Hezbollah?...Where are the ones that say what Bush is doing is right?...

They are out there, but your truthout.org won't link to them...

When there are two reports in the world that say two different things on the same subject, the objective thing to do is display both of them and let the readers decide...

Instead, truthout picks and chooses from the full array of stories only to show you WHAT THEY WANT...

That's not only disingenous, but goes againsts the true tenants of journalism...

Your statement was this:

truthout.org, worldnetdaily, MediaReasearch, DemocracyNow, etc...all reek of political agenda that the 10% they show to be true is blurred by the 90% trash they sprew....

Because truthout is really just a clearingho