[SOC] presidential lies

[JMcAulay]

At 02:05 PM 07/17/2003 -0700, Lloyd Lachow wrote, in part:

>Bush lied
>about the imminence of the threat from Iraq, getting
>thousands dead and homeless and squandering decades'
>worth of good will? 

Lloyd, you write as if you have some proof that Iraq was *not* an imminent
threat.  If you do, please display it for all to see.  Of course, if Saddam
Hussein could show himself right now, he might raise your thousands by a
few hundreds of thousands.  And what on earth "decades of good will" are
you talking about?  You mean the warmth and goodness felt for the US in so
much of the Islamic world which culminated in the Al-qaeda attack of
September 11, 2001?  Hey, Lloyd, wake up and smell the support for the US
from many predominately Arab and other Musliom nations.  Millions of their
people don't care for us now, but millions of them didn't care for us
before.  Of course, many governments don't especially care for us right
now, but that's nothing new.

Oh, yeah, another item.  Our "adventurism" in Iraq aroused the ire of
Nelson Mandels, who says Bush paid no attention to the UN because it's run
by a black man.  Everyone who believes that, please raise your hand.
That's funny, Bush seems to pay attention to the US State Department.

>  At issue is Bush riding roughshod over world opinion
>to promote this war, right in the midst of Saddam
>allowing more and more inspection, due to world
>pressure.

THAT is at issue?  We should bow to world opinion?  World opinion will save
us if we are in serious danger?  I don't think so.  

And you bet, Saddam was allowing more inspections!  After twelve years of
denying UN inspectors the ability to examine "Presidential Palaces" and
lots of other areas, kicking them out of the country now and then,
following them around, and generally hobbling their attempts to do their
jobs, he was actually allowing them to visit... er, well... SOME of those
places, anyway.  And, gee whiz, Saddam finally was allowing his top
scientists to be interviewed.  Of course, as he wanted them to feel at home
and comfortably protected, they were accompanied by Iraqi Government
representatives.  

On 1 March 2003, around twelve years after the 1991 suspension of
hostilities, UN Chief Inspector Hans Blix reported to the UN Security
Council that Iraqi actions to comply with the Security Council requirements
laid on Iraq after that cease-fire had been �very limited.�  He also
reported that Iraq had disputed his direction to destroy all Al-Samoud-2
missiles, known to have a range greater than that permitted by the Security
Council.  The Iraqis had claimed that the range would not be excessive if
each missile carried a large warhead.  Finally agreeing to destroy the
missiles, the Iraqis then offered the utterly incredible position that they
didn�t know how.  During March 2003, after Blix�s report was presented to
the UN, the Iraqis somehow overcame this amazing technological hurdle and
began destroying the missiles.  

One person who makes no bones about his belief that Saddam Hussein was
concealing Weapons of Mass Destruction was Blix.  Blix also, by the way,
was against the US invasion.  He thought after twelve years of positively
establishing very little, a few more months might do the trick.

>  It's laughable to hear the dittoheads equate Bush's
>lies with Clinton's...

Lies?  What lies?  You seem to be hung up on the concept that Bush lied.
British intelligence *still* says they have evidence of Saddam Hussein's
having tried to obtain uranium from Africa.  As far as I am concerned, no
one has yet furnished any evidence that such a finding is not true.  I know
of one item that once was thought to support that position and now does
not.  It's one piece of evidence the CIA says was forged (they also say
this was not known until they saw the document).  So this single piece of
evidence does not, in fact, exist.  But absence of evidence does not
constitute evidence of absence, and while the Brits still stand behind
their information, well, I suppose if someone wants to think Bush lied, so
be it.  People believe what they want to believe, anyway.  One man's
plausibility is another man's absurdity.

Some years ago, a former friend approached me with a bit of �news.�  �Have
you heard,� he asked, �McDonald�s is putting earthworms in their hamburgers!�

I enquired why he thought McDonald�s could conceivably want to do that,
since at the time, the cost of earthworms was about three times as much per
pound as ground beef.

He looked puzzled for a moment, with wrinkled brow, and then replied
(almost triumphantly, it seemed):  �I don�t know, but they�re doin� it!�

Perhaps I might today ask such a person:  �If Iraq truly had no Weapons of
Mass Destruction, why did they waste years arrogantly refusing to prove
this to UN Inspectors, fully understanding that because of their delay,
they were losing millions of dollars every hour?�

I can imagine his befuddled reply (wrinkled brow and all):  �I don�t know,
but they did it!�

73
John WA6QPL  SOC 263