Yo, just got back from the streets, word.

So, when Bush and his administration deliberately lied to the entire US population on Iraq possessing wmds, something which is actually in contrast relevant, that didn't count, because it wasn't under oath?

Edit: this thread should *REALLY* be split. I want someone to challenge me on evolution.

http://archive.salon.com/comics/boll/2001/02/22/boll/story.gif

Please don't leech images. -DSettahr

Seeing as it's your opinion that Bush lied. No one knows for sure whether he was lying or was genuinely misinformed. It's really the easy road out to say he was lying.




That's why it's a joke.

See, I can post stuff like this forever, and I did, but one part of this forum already takes this for granted, and the other part denies this.

Next up, in the infinite row of arguments against these motives: Powell and Rice deny Iraq is a threat (2001)

Edit: off to bed

It's not perjury, if that's what you're asking.

Deliberatly lied? I really don't see how you can jump to such a conclusion. I'd say it's more then likely he really believed there were WMDs. I'm also amazed at how few people question whether there really are/were some. Iraq had plenty of time to hide/destroy any WMDs they had..I mean they didn't let the UN weapons inspectors in for weeks!

Yep, we need another Creation vs Evolution topic :p

And never mind all those years after the first Gulf War where the UN was being led around on a leash.

Did you even *see* the video I posted? Let me post a transcript, in case you can't see it.

Powell (February 2001): he has not developed any significant capability with resepect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbors.

Rice (July 2001): we are able to keep arms(?) from him. His military forces have not been rebuilt.

See, that's exactly what I mean. One half here saw that video and shrugged it off because it was obvious. The other half saw (?) that video and shrugged it off because it didn't fit in with what they think.

And the other "half" shrugged it off because they're smart enough to realize things changed on 9/11.

Say it to me dude: there were no WMDs, and the US government knew this very well. Say it loud, say it proud.

Oh, shove it. You people never give up.

Even if they did know that it would prove that we are smarter than the rest of the world that claimed he had them. Be that as it may, I find it so funny that people like you focus so much on WMDs (when we learn he supposedly didn't have them, you couldn't care less about them when they really are a threat) when WMD was but one of the reasons. Those of us with functioning grey matter between our ears realize that this is a war on terrorism. And, fortunately, we're the ones running America now.

You bring strong arguments. Now refute the ****ing video.

I watched the video and it has no bearing on your statement. The commentator seems to agree with you but that's it. He's exaggerating the comments.

The video has nothing to refute. You so perfectly bring this thread back to one of its core topics. Most liberals would watch the clip and react like you. Conservatives, however, are intelligent enough to understand the content and that your argument has no foundation based on the material provided.

Powell and Rice are clearly talking about the conventional military threat Iraq posed to it's neighbors. He posed little threat as his military, despite UN corruption, was still in shambles. However, the nature of warfare has now come to focus on unconventional threats.

Let's take for example bin Laden. What kind of military threat did he pose prior to 9/11? Virtually none so does that mean that he was not a threat? Of course not. He managed to pull off the second largest foreign attack on our soil.

I would suggest that you research what Powell and Rice have said about their statements rather than what some editorializing reporter has to say.

If Sarin gas is considered a wmd, they did find atleast a bit of wmds in Iraq.

Remember awhile back when I posted about students blindly sucking up their profs' ideas without ever doing any research themselves, or without being extremely skeptical of everything they're taught that isn't cold hard fact? Tenshu seems like a great example.

Your posts remind me of google. A thousand little irrelevant facts does not an argument make. You need to put things together more and stop flying off the handle with such arrogance. You need to KNOW what you're talking about and make it readily apparent without resorting to obscure references or specific jargon. Also, you might try toning down the cussing a bit.

I suppose this is the part where I get accused of being a hypocrite

I may as well throw in my take on the war:

Did we know there were WMD's? No.
Did we think there were? Probably.
Did we go because of WMD's? No.
Did we go to free the people from Saddam? Partially.
Is the war part of the war on terrorism? Clearly.
Was the war for oil? Obviously not. *
Does Bush suck for not telling the truth? We'll see how history sees him in 40 years
Did we go to war simply to westernize Iraq? Probably.

Do I support it because of this? Yes.

It's pretty simple. Everyone in the mid east has nothing better to do than fight. Idle hands, and all that. So if we westernize them, maybe they'll be more distracted with crap like TV and jobs, and blow less people up with suicide bombers. Sounds like a good plan to me.



* We are currently subsidizing oil in Iraq. That's right boys and girls, we are PAYING for THEIR oil, to give it to THEM for *extremely* cheap prices. The main goal is to help their economy get on it's feet. Since their economy is the entire objective of the war, this makes sense.

Except the invasion was not a war on terrorism.

The invasion was necessary because Saddam Hussein was an imminent threat. That was made pretty clear beforehand. Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and could use them to attack us.
It was only after that was shown to be blatantly false that Bush started to cook up half-arsed explanations of 'war on terror!', and the whole 'brutal dictator!' line. Blair isn't even trying that line, because he knows Britons aren't going to buy that crap. Blair's position is basically "I didn't lie, the intelligence was flawed, I (sort of) made a mistake, and I'm (sort of) sorry, but let's get on with fixing it", which is far braver than Bush trying concoct a load more excuses.

The 'war on terror!' line in particular is nonsense, especially attempts to link Saddam Hussein to the WTC attacks. Iraq had nothing to do with the attacks, so don't even try to use that crap. I do remember a poll a while ago that said that 70% of Americans think Iraq was responsible. I don't think the government is responsible for putting forward such nonsense, but they certainly haven't done much to try and dispell it either.

The 'brutal dictator!' line has slightly more truth to it, but is overshadowed by the fact that everyone in the region is a brutal dictator. By far the worst human rights offender in the Middle East is Saudi Arabia. Saddam Hussein has nothing on them. The question is really, why Iraq?. Most of the Middle East is a brutal dictatorship, most of Asia is a brutal dictatorship, pretty much all of Africa is a brutal dictatorship. So why Iraq? Iraq was nothing different, nothing special, just another dictatorship. Yes Iraqis had little political freedom of expression, but they were much better off than the rest of the Middle East, much because the Ba'ath party were a secular and socialist government. Women's rights were far better in Iraq than anywhere else, and Iraq was the only nation that didn't have any legislation against homosexuals. In most other countries in the Middle East, homosexuality is a capital offense. The Ba'ath party's stance was that they simply didn't care. And the Ba'ath party were committed to providing a reasonable amount of poverty welfare, and health care for Iraqis.

Now compare this to the brutal dictatorships in Africa, where the population is starving to death every day because of the widespread corruption, or being slaughtered by civil war, militias and the like.
The invading Iraq out of 'humantarian concern' line really doesn't hold out for much.

Is Iraq 'better off' now? It's obviously far too early to tell, but it's very unlikely that Iraq will retain the same level of secularisation as it did under the Ba'ath party, and so the rights of women and homosexuals will suffer because of that. A cheap and easy way to win support in Iraq will be to look like a 'good Muslim', and so the more fundementalist candidates will get that support.



That might be true of Saudi Arabia, but Iraq is not Saudi Arabia. After the Iraq-Iran war, Iraq's economy was shattered, and it's just gone downhill since. Iraqis were not the rich princes bumming around Europe with nothing to do. Iraqis could just about feed their families, they didn't have the spare time and money to launch holy jihad on the West.

No, this is the part where he defends himself to the death regardless.

Uh...

Someone give me a context to this: "he has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction"

Really, how can that be read otherwise? Unless he's actually talking about another country like Andorra and the liberal conspiracy edited that part out. I'm reading through these "replies" here and haven't gotten an answer. 'Obscure references'? How much LESS obscure can it get - it's a video of Colin Powell saying Iraq didn't pose a threat WMD-wise.

Not being skeptical? I'm posting stuff like this exactly because I'm skeptical. 'Either you're with us or against us.' - 'Exporting democracy' - 'We have substantial proof of WMDs, which will be presented AFTER the invasion'.

Sorry. That's as far as I could handle. Could be worse. I almost stopped after the first sentence. Maybe overseas you think the war in Iraq was all about WMD. Over here it was clearly the case that WMD was only part of the rationale. And I think it's funny that people seem disappointed there apparantly were none. I would think that a good thing.

Anyways, whatever. I'm not trying to debate the war in Iraq again. Besides, it's a moot point. I was just pointing out Tenshu's obvious misunderstanding of clearly and plainly made statements by Powell and Rice.

... Behind hydropower.

He said "most practical".

Except for the whole nucleat waste thing.

Wookie: Memory is a funny thing, because I remember WMDs being the sole justification for the war for months, with the since-refuted links to al Qaeda as a footnote. Remember, this was when the administration was trying to convince the UN to legitimize an invasion.

As even the most conservative claims were shown to be spurious, increasing emphasis was placed on secondary and tertiary claims, terrorist ties and human rights abuses specifically. I don't remember "bringing democracy" mentioned at all by Bush until recently: probably because it was, and is, a very risky claim.

From the center of both the heartland and Bible Belt, I call bull****. To deny that the administration has dropped certain justifications and invented new ones as the constraints of reality demanded is blatently dishonest or ignorant.

Yeah, so you haven't shown a thing.

Tenshu, there's a big difference between saying that someone does not have significant capability and saying they have no capability at all. I think your post was aiming for the latter.

The word significant itself can cause a lot of controversy.

Hydroelectric generation is a constant and reliable source of energy, unlike solar or wind, and America has a lot of coastline. The coastal cities at least could easily be powered by tidal stream generators.

The US is pretty good with electricity generation from turbines on dams, there probably isn't anywhere else to build ones where there isn't one already or where the environmental effects haven't already been evaluated. The decaying submurged plants produce methane, a 'greenhouse gas', and building dams in some places would produce more methane than the carbon dioxide emission from fossil fuel burning it replaces.

Very true. Pretty much every possible dam site in the US already has a hydro-electric plant on it.

It's impractical because it's inefficient. How many barrels of oil do you think it took to build the Hoover Dam? Compared to properly-regulated nuclear power hydroelectric power is insignificant.

Except for all the waste. Nuclear power isn't a this magical power source you are making it out to be. There is no practical way to deal with nuclear waste.

Yes there is! Shoot it into space!

Into the sun, but that costs way too much.

You're wrong. And funny that you say memory is a funny thing and then cite your own faulty memory of the facts!

Fuel rods last for 3-4 years, after which point they are solid waste and can be contained. Nuclear waste isn't the glowing green goo you see on the Simpsons. Hell, the fuel rods themselves are designed as partial radiation shields. Additionally, certain reactors (like the CANDU reactor) can use American nuclear waste as fuel.

A single uranium pellet the size of the tip of your pinky can provide as much energy as 150 gallons of oil. It is a cure-all.

http://www.nmcco.com/education/facts/waste/waste_home.htm <- Check out this link.

It's also worth mentioning Nuclear Fusion, which is but a few years away now. Although it won't create nuclear waste, it will irradiate the containment vessel which will have to be replaced regularly. The amount of radioactive byproduct would be approximately comparable, and the fuel isn't any safer, but it will generate far more energy.

(FYI: You can handle enriched uranium with your bare hands and experience no adverse side-effects. Before the fission reaction, uranium emits mostly alpha radiation which is stopped by your skin. It only becomes dangerous if you consume it or inhale uranium vapor).

Tell me Wookie and Jon, what about the lowest energy prices in the USA (provided by hudroelectric) is "inefficient" or "impractical"?

I fully agree that nuclear power should be used to replace fossil fuel combustion. But it is worth remembering that nuclear power is not sustainable, it relies upon mining Uranium, and eventually that would not become cost-efficient. Switching to sustainable sources of energy is going to happen, eventually, going nuclear will only buy us some time to work on improving efficiency of solar and wind technology.

You're also being somewhat optimistic about nuclear fusion, it's going to be a long time before it can be used as reasonable source of energy generation. The biggest D-T fusion reactor, JET, only achieved 16 MW for less than a second. Even the proposed ITER will produce 500 MW sustained only for 500 seconds. In comparison, the average nuclear fission plant produces 1 000 MW of constant power.
Of course, JET and ITER are immensely important in studying and improving the storage of high-energy plasmas, and it is a big step for experimental physicists, but it is nowhere near the ability to produce a constant supply of electricity to consumers. JET and ITER are huge international collaborations. Nuclear fusion for commercial use is a long way off.

I'm not denying that Nuclear power is far more efficient than other power sources, but "containing" the solid waste is a "sweep it under the rug and forget about it" solution. It's not a problem now, I guess, but that crap is going to be around forever. Furthermore, if you wouldn't want a nuclear power plant in your backyard, it's not really a viable solution.

If it's anything like the continent it's cheap because it's clean. The goverment does that to encourage its use, either by making 'dirty' power expensive or by subsidation of clean energy (I can't remember which way it works, it's been a while since I studied all this).

Believe me cheap =! efficient.

Hydro power is clean, clever and not very mechanically efficient.