How Do You Explain The Bush Lies That Inspired These Comments?

Some of my family are avid Bush supporters... STILL...
ANd when I tell them that the Iraq War was all Bush's idea, and a REpublican war that we got into because of fabricated artificial facts (Lies!), they immediately want to share the blame with Democrats by bringing up these comments from the left?
So what do you say to explain these comments from pre- 9-11 and pre- bush?
ANd how do you explain the ones that are the result of BUsh's witholding of facts and misinformation propaganda?

•  I can post another link? I just couldn't make it

  work. Thanks

  by Mutual Assured Destruction on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 12:02:07 PM PDT

•  New Link posted. THanks!

  by Fireshadow on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 12:03:29 PM PDT

•  if only 2002 and beyond

  were

  comments from pre- 9-11 and pre- bush?

  that would be a dream come true!

  but small technicalities aside, comments in that video include sound bites of senators speaking about the dangers of allowing Saddam to re-arm following his disarming by the UN.  They're regarding the secrecy associated with not knowing what was going on in Iraq after he ejected the weapons inspectors.

  One or two (Rockefeller I believe) mentioned 'evidence' of 'nuclear weapons' which is total bullshit.  I wonder if he was speaking about that memo which the Bush administration was pushing as their hard evidence...  If so, it would be understandable to have concern.  The issue wasn't whether the Dems were concerned about Saddam or duped by faulty intelligence.

  The issue was 1)the evidence was cherry-picked and falsified to promote a call to war, and 2) the only option Bush allowed for was war.

  That propaganda video is attempting to equate 'concern by dems over Saddam' to evidence that 'dems felt war was a good idea'.  That's a common tactic of the right wing who failed logic 101.

  by pullbackthecurtain on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 12:06:40 PM PDT

  •  some more right-winger faves:

    ad hominem

    and

    post hoc ergo propter hoc

    by pullbackthecurtain on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 12:16:20 PM PDT

    •  nice links

      Yeah, look at the dearth of actual comments before 2000... if I recall correctly, we conducted air strikes in Iraq in '98...

      ah well, if you can't beat 'em, change the game and hope no one notices.

      by remingtonsteele on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 12:21:45 PM PDT

•  Easy...

  Just point out that all (or virtually all, except for Bayh's) these comments were made BEFORE Saddam let the weapons inspectors back in in 2003.  We told them where to look, and they found bupkis - the inspectors called our intelligence "garbage".

  Given this, the decision to go to war has to be judged based on what was known when Bush pulled the inspectors out -- that none of our WMD intel had panned out and that containment appeared to have worked.

  As such, statements made in 1998 (when Saddam kicked out the inspectors) are pretty much irrelevant to judging the decision to invade - after inspections turned up NOTHING - in 2003.

  by chill on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 12:26:32 PM PDT

•  Great background music.

  Does the GOP owe Traffic royalties for that?

  by DPear on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 12:29:53 PM PDT

•  A combination of two basic choices

  1. Be willing to throw some Dems under the bus as complicit (examples: Sen. Rockefeller helping with the coverup, Dick Durbin as a coward who knew what was happening).

  2. Other House and Senate Dems were duped. E.g. Sen. John Edwards didn't have access to good intelligence.

  If it comes down to this, I'd be willing to do a combination of #1 and #2. You'd gain credibility with a winger by a willingness to discredit your own party (who may deserve it - there's still a lot we don't know). It would show that you aren't a blind follower.

  Here's a couple points I jotted down while watching the video:

  There was a lot of time between Bill Clinton's 1998 statements and the 2003 invasion. Saddam did have WMD during Gulf War I, and you might want to point out that Reagan & Bush were the ones who helped Saddam get the WMD in the first place, and then Reagan-Bush helped hide the WMD use from the international community, in addition to military equipment and monetary aid to Saddam during his WMD heyday.

  Getting back to the difference between 1998 and 2003. The Bush Administration had NO (zero, nadda, zilch) information in 2003 that Saddam had WMD. The Bush Administration made it's BEST case for WMD using cartoons of mobile labs (the fantasy of "Curve Ball", aluminum tubes (they blatantly lied about those conclusions, because DoE strongly disagreed the tubes could be for nuclear), links to Al Qaeda (totally false. Not only no evidence, but Saddam and OBL don't like each other, etc), and there was the Niger Uranium documents.

  To re-state that more succinctly: the Bush Admin had to put forth it's BEST case with information that was either very very weak & never verified, blatant lies, forged documents, etc. Whereas the information that there were NOT WMD was more solid. We had informers who were validated by the CIA, including members of Saddam's inner circle.

  You can bring this up: I have to wonder if Pelosi's decision to take impeachment off the table was not because Bush didn't deserve it, but because the investigation would show that she was partly to blame.

  Sen. Rockefeller, to me, looks like he is helping the coverup.

  And I remember Sen. Dick Durbin saying on the Senate floor (early/mid 2007 perhaps?) that he, as a member of the intelligence committee at the time, knew that the Bush admin was saying things in public that didn't match the intelligence they saw in private. Durbin said that's why he voted "No" on the AUMF. In an arguement with a winger, I'd throw Durbin under the bus as a coward who didn't speak out when he should have. Durbin claims he'd have gone to jail if he revealed secrets, but I don't buy that he couldn't have spoke publicly about Bush's selling of the war.

  I hope some of that helps.

  by bejammin075 on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 12:30:06 PM PDT

•  Thanks! To all of you!

  YEs, i will definitely send him a reply asap!

  by Fireshadow on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 12:49:33 PM PDT

•  Look our intelligence sucked big time

  That is the first truth that you ought to tell them. Our intelligence agencies/community made a huge mistakes and they said so. Just watch a Frontline documentary called Bush's War and you will noticed that the intelligence was very selective. There was a top-down pressure to select the intelligence that made the case and they ignored the one that did not. A classic case of selection bias (they selected on the dependent variable). They fed that intelligence to Congress and the ball got rolling from there. I don't think that the intelligence agencies did that in purpose though, but the results were catastrophic. That is post-9/11

  Pre 9/11, Iraq did have a WMD program, Saddam suspended it and no one believed that he did. Of course, he did not say so because as a dictator, he made a very rational calculation: if he came out and said that he dismantled his program due to pressures put on him by the US, he would look weak to his domestic audience (thus serious threats of a coup from his generals or a massive rebellion in the south from the Shi'i aided by the Iranians) and he would embolden Iran which was pursuing the same kind of program. So, as a dictator, Saddam thought that he should keep the appearance of having a strong WMD to fool everyone even though he would pay a serious price. The other alternative was also deadly to him too. If he declared that "Oh wait, i have no longer any WMD. I destroyed them because the US said so (the international community and the UN did not matter to him or his domestic audience), he would have been dead/killed/deposed in less than a year. So both outcomes were bad for him and he chose, rationally, the less harmful to him and the one that would complicate things for the west.  

  Now, us westerners do not understand this mentality because we are not used to it and we do not live in that very tough neighborhood. However, if you are a dictator who controls his country through terror, you have one thing going for you: that is you have to look strong and ruthless ALL THE TIME. If you do not look strong and ruthless and you give in to exogenous pressures of a super power like the US, you would look weak and it would be the end of your power.

  Understanding how dictators think is crucial in deciphering their behavior. Unlike what most people in America think, dictators think/act in a very rational way. Their rational is always guided by one major fact: How do i stay in power? And what do i need to do to stay in power?

  If you think along these lines, Saddam's behavior would look perfectly logic to you. There were some in the intelligence agencies who argued this point, but they did not do it strongly or it wasn't take into consideration by the administration or the leadership of those agencies.

  Now about how to talk to military families or pro-war families:

  Unfortunately, there is not a short cute answer that would help you debate/convince with/your family. We are used to those pentagram kind of answers, simple but dumb answers. What you say to those family is: first don't tell them that this is Bush's War or the Republican's War. It is America's war because no mother or father wants his son or daughter to put her life on the line for a political party. Second, tell them that everyone got it wrong pre-9/11 and post 9/11. Tell them that the threat that America is facing in these modern times is real and serious, but in order to win (win is not the right word, but i advise you to use it) or minimize this threat, we have to start thinking on another level and use tools from our toolbox besides heavy military involvement and engagement. Tell them that this threat is going to stay with us for a long time and we have to use intelligent/smart powers (not soft power and not hard power) which is a mixture of law enforcement efforts, intelligence gathering and analysis, economic aids, heavy and smart PR campaign to ameliorate our image, and heavy diplomacy with huge carrots and a long long stick. Tell them that we cannot fight a billion people at once, no one can and if we do, we will lose. Tell them that our future job is to make and push those societies in the middle east to isolate their own fanatics first and then we can step in and help them in their fight by providing them with the necessary assistance. Tell them, there is no easy solution in Iraq, pulling our troops has to be done carefully, very carefully and slowly in order for us to leave the region in some kind of stability. Tell them the front lines against terrorism (or what people like to call the war on terror which is a totally dumb name) are not in Iraq, but they are in Afghanistan/Pakistan (militarily)and Egypt/Saudi Arabia (ideologically). Tell them the more we stay heavily involved in Iraq, the less we become able to effectively fight against terrorism.

  Just be respectful and courteous in your discussion.  Use the cold war as an example (if your dad and mom are old enough like me to remember the Missile Cuban crisis and the Cold War). Tell them we fought the Soviet and won without firing a nuclear weapon against them. Tell them that was the smart way  fighting. Tell them that if the US had fought the Soviet during the Cold War like we we are fighting terrorism right now, the US would have nuked the Soviet and that would have been the end of life on earth as we know it. Tell them we fought that war (that is the Cold War) in a smart way and we prevailed, there is no reason why we should not we can't do the same now.

  Look, this post is already getting very long. I think we should exchange emails and take this talk outside the blog.

  by Mutual Assured Destruction on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 01:16:14 PM PDT

•  Dems were largely dupped by

  fixed "intelligence".

  by jimG on Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 01:38:56 PM PDT