David Kay Report

Top 14. Jan 31, 2004 1:42 PM

» malthus6 - Re: Re: Re: "cherry picked" evidence?

In response to message posted by Frank_Monaldo:

No one argued pre-war that the WMD did not exist. Everyone with access to US intelligence (including Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee) came to the same conclusion.

I guess that the affected parties, including the Democrats, had, in the past, found U. S. intelligence to be trustworthy. They therefore placed too much credence in it.

But I recall listening to Senator Byrd asking some very pertinent questions e. g. "What has changed?" "What is the evidence of an immediate threat?"

I wonder if a new administration (Bush) brought about a change in personnel or (more probable) policy within the intelligence establishment? I can imagine the people in the Whitehouse instructing the intelligence people "If we aren't sure these weapons do not exist, then assume that they do." (In case of doubt or uncertainty, the safe course must be taken)

It was conceded by all, that Iraq had not accounted for WMD as required by the cease fire agreement and UN resolutions.

I recall the charge that the voluminous response provided by Iraq was taken to the Whitehouse and when delivered to congress a few days later, was altered and with pages removed.

Frank, if I appear hypercritical, it is because it was very obvious that George was intent upon invading Iraq. When this determination becomes apparent, one is inclined to suspect that perhaps George is building a case and maybe some of his "facts" are suspect.

By not accounting for WMD, Saddam was not acting in his own best interests

So what do we conclude? Did Sadam believe George was bluffing? I think not. If he thought that, he was alone and/or poorly advised. Not at all likely.

Did Sadam think he could withstand the U. S. forces? If so, he is insane. Maybe.

Most likely, Sadam resigned himself to fate. "This is the way it is, I can't change it."

If Iraq accounted for WMD, sanctions would have been lifted and Saddam would have access to even greater amounts of oil revenue.

Maybe Sadam really thought that he had complied! Ever think of that? Maybe the Whitehouse altered the documents to make it appear that he had not. After all, we have never seen the volume and would hardly understand it if we did.

I don't know what Clinton thought about the intelligence, nor do I know what intelligence he received. At any rate, Clinton did not feel that the intelligence demanded an immediate move to war.

A stupid Bush would know what the intelligence indicated if he were guilty of formulating such intelligence to justify a war.

Do you really want to make such a case? You are arguing that George Bush (with 3 years experience) is a far more acute consumer of intelligence than Clinton (8 years experience). If you want to make that case, try. I am not sure you will persuade many people.

I submit that Clinton never saw the intelligence because it was, if not manufactured, at least misinterpreted by the Bush people. Is it too much to ask,

"IF CLINTON SAW THIS (ERRONEOUS) INTELLIGENCE WHICH SHOWED SADAM POSSESSED WMD AND A METHOD OF DELIVERING THEM TO OUR EAST COAST CITIES, AND HE FAILED TO IMMEDIATELY TAKE STEPS TO COUNTERACT THIS THREAT, THEN HE IS GUILTY OF GROSS DERELICTION OF DUTY"

Are you making that case?

-- posted by malthus6

http://www.jrwhipple.com/war/wmd.html

Top 15. Jan 31, 2004 6:30 PM

» Frank_Monaldo - Re: Re: Re: Re: "cherry picked" evidence?

In response to message posted by malthus6:

Dear Malthus,

You are mixing up a few things. When I said that all people with access came to the same conclusion, the conclusion was tht Saddam had WMD. Bryd's argument in the Senate was that this was not sufficient to act upon. He never once questioned the conclusion. (See quotation below.)

It is getting a little tedious to deal with some of your wild charges --- charges supported by less evident than Saddam had WMD. Saddam turned over the papers to the United Nations not the US so it is unlikely that exculpatory was hiden.

Actually, Saddam thinking was explained somewhat by a chief advisor Aziz. He says that the French assured Saddam that they could prevent an attack in the UN. When this seemed to fall through, the said the US would begin a war with an aerial campaign and if Saddam could hold the French or the Russian could broker a cease fire.

You right, "Maybe Saddam really thought he complied." First, there have been disarmament in other countries and they have been easy to identify. Saddam is not so stupid as to believe he complied. Even Inspector Blix will attest to that. No need to try to re-write history.

Second, Kay concluded that Saddam was in violation of UN requirements:

"In my judgment, based on the work that has been done to this point of the Iraq Survey Group, and in fact, that I reported to you in October, Iraq was in clear violation of the terms of Resolution 1441. Resolution 1441 required that Iraq report all of its activities: one last chance to come clean about what it had. We have discovered hundreds of cases, based on both documents, physical evidence and the testimony of Iraqis, of activities that were prohibited under the initial U.N. Resolution 687 and that should have been reported under 1441, with Iraqi testimony that not only did they not tell the U.N. about this, they were instructed not to do it and they hid material."

Bush made the claim that Saddam had WMD and with terrorist help, they could be delievered to the US. Don't you remember those killed by the anthrax. Anthrax possessed be Saddam could easily be used against the US in the same way.

Clinton made the same assessment. Some have indeed claimed that he neglected his duty. I have tried to be more generous. September 11 changed a lot of perspectives on risk. If 9/11 had never happened, perceptions of risk by a Bush Administration would be different.

For the record, here are some pre-war assessments:

"The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capabilities. Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons..." Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 2002.
"Iraq is a long way from [here], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face." Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of State, Feb 18, 1998.
"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line." President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998
"Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power." Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002.

There are a lot more at:

-- posted by Frank_Monaldo

Top 16. Jan 31, 2004 10:09 PM

» spondulix - Re: "cherry picked" evidence?

In response to message posted by BrianTubbs:

brian. "Virtully the INTIRE world community believed Saddam possessed WND, including those nations that wished to give the UN inspectors more time and or opposed the use of force against Iraq."....Both Bush and his predecessor, Bill Clinton, believed that Saddam possessed WMD.....If that is true, then Bush hardly stood alone."

Brian in responding to your quote, having a belief and acting on a belief are two very different animanls. A white racest may believe that Blacks are no good and deserve to die, but it is only when he acts on his belief that he has crossed a line. So while Bush and others may have held the same belief it was the act of going to war based on that belief that is distinctive.

It's interesting watching the President play the innocent victim. That appears to be exactly what his republican administration seems to be gearing up for.We are seeing a effort already underway by conservatives to shift blame from Bush for misleading the country to war to the intelligence community. I guess we know where the Buck stops with this administration and that is anywhere but the oval office.

So the question should be what action did Bush take as oppossed to all those others who according to you also believed that Saddam had WMD?
The acessment of any given situation should take into account the level of response to the situation. In this case Bush was making a case for invading using military force, another country based on his doctrine of pre-emption. This of course differed greatly from Clintons response that called for a much smaller demonstration of force. So logically speaking the smaller the response the less damage that could be done to credibility should the evidence proove less than accurate. Brian does that sound reasonable enough so far.? So the level of proof should match the gravity of the response. So Brian What President Bush did that no one else had done was to raise the level of his response to the highest levels with the exception of his using WMD himself. Which of the leaders that you cite did the same? Is it fair therefore to acess them using the same standards of Bush. Just for example lets say Clinton had decided to invade Iraq in a simular manner as Bush did, can you really say that he would have been willing to do so based on that evidence, since he didn't it is likly he didn't feel the evidence was conclusive enough to justify such a move. In the case of Bush however, he was making a pitch for invading another country with military force based on his new doctrine of pre-emption. When he presented why it was so imparative to invade now, Bush listed his reasons why we could not afford to wait. He futher stated that he was 100 % sure that the information was accurate.
So when you attempt to draw a comparrison between what Bush said and did, to what Clinton said and did, it just doesn't pass the smell test.
The standard or burden of proof that the Bush administration should have applied should have been beyond any reasonable doubt. So was there reasonable doubt? Once again Bush reassured us that he was 100 % sure of his evidence, no reasonable doubt there. If Clinton had invaded Iraq based upon poor quality evidence then and only then would your point be valid, and only if it could be reasonably demonstrated that Clinton had been informed that the intelligence he was basing such a claim was of low calibar in it's scope.
Brian, do you know if Clinton was ever told by the various agencys or warned by them that the document he was citing as evidence was of low or less than certain quality?
Brian do you know if Clinton ever was warned by the Defense Intelligence Agency, in a like manner that Bush was warned that a Iraq Nuclear threat didn't exist?
Brian do you know if Clinton was ever informed by the CIA that Iraq was not engaged in terriorism and wasn't arming al-Qaeda? Well Bush was.
Brian was Clinton ever informed by the CIA as was Bush that no evidence existed that Saddam Hussein provided Chemical or Biological weapons or related materal to terrorist groups? But we know Bush was.

Brian do you know if Clinton was ever warned by the Defense Intelligence Agency that There is no reliable information on whether Iraq is producing or stockpiling chemical weapons? We know that Bush was.
Brian, do we know if Clinton was ever warned by the U.S. airforce that unmaned aerial drones could not be used to transport a nuclear weapon, because we know that Bush was.

Brian and Frank, what I have presented here is a reasonable and logical answer to why Bush does stand alone and that why there are certain circumstances that are only appliciable to Bush.
The following list once again is the Bush administration rethoric of why they said it was necessary to go to war.

The danger to our country is grave and it is growing.
The unique and urgent threat possed by Iraq.
A significant threat-a real and dangerous threat.
A serious and growing threat-a threat of unique urgency.
A grave threat.
A mortal threat.
This is about an imminent threat.

So on the one hand we have evidence where the Bush administrations rhetoric is pushing that the threat from Iraq is so grave as to justify a preemptive war with them. And on the other hand we have examples of the Intelligence agency attempting unsussefully to warn the President against using evidence they know was of the lowest standard. There fore the evidence seem to strongly suggest that it was the Bush administration that was Cherry Picking evidence, and in many cases in direct opossition to what they were being told by the very Intelligence agency that the Bush administration is now attempting to blame.

This administration has no credibility, and zero respect.

Spondulix

-- posted by spondulix

Top 17. Feb 1, 2004 5:47 AM

» Brian Tubbs - Good posting, Spondulix

In response to message posted by spondulix:

Though I most certainly don't agree with your conclusion, I appreciate the time and effort you put into this posting. What you've done is something I've been arguing for, for some time, and that is to separate the belief from action.

In other words, the point I've been making is that most of the world community as well as Bush's predecessor believed that Saddam possessed WMD. Thus, there wasn't a "manufacturing" of evidence to lead to a belief that ALREADY existed.

The difference is how President Bush ACTED on those beliefs and assumptions regarding Saddam as opposed to his predecessor and the other leaders of the world.

I'm more than willing to enter into a fair and vigorous debate over the appropriate response to the intelligence that Bush, Clinton, and the other leaders of the world had before them.

I continue, however, to strongly object to the argument that Bush deliberately lied about the evidence in order to get us into a war. Such an accusation is frankly outrageous and outlandish.

With my 5-year old daughter on my lap and the family about ready to leave for church, time won't permit me to type longer. So, I'll tag Frank for now, and return to this debate later today. :-)

-- posted by Brian Tubbs

Top 18. Feb 1, 2004 6:16 PM

» spondulix - Re: Good posting, Spondulix

In response to message posted by BrianTubbs:

Brian,

thanks for the words. I only wish I could say things better sometimes.

But your conclusion that "there wasn't a manufacturing of evidence to lead to a belief that ALREAdDY existed." isn't quite right, at least in the way I have stated the case, when I claim that Bush Cherry Picked the evidence means that he only excepted evidenice that supported his pre conceived view of invading Iraq. That's not the same as actually "manufacturing evidence" as in from scratch, but it has the exact same result. That Bush did was to look for only the evidence that supported what he wanted to do, was going to do in any case. It didn't matter to him what the level of reliability of that information was, so that when he was informed that it was considered by the intelligence community that it was of the lowest caliber and not reliable the President made a conscience effort to include it in all his speeches and talks explaning why it was imparative to attack then.
Brian that is anything but an honest process.
We know this was the Presidents mode of operation, we know that he was repeatedly warned about the quality of the information that he none the less used to make his case. If not a lie, what would you call it. Brian keep in mind I am going to hold you to the standard you used in calling Clinton a liar with regards to his speech to the public that he didn't have sex with that woman. Clintons defense after having uttered those imfamous words was to say he didn't lie, because he defined having sex the same way that Newt G. had instructed the conservative faithfull to respond to such questions, which was your not having sex unless you went all the way. (Plausable denibility) But as I have conceded the lie was the intent on Clintons part to deceive. That's exactly what Bush has done with regards to lying about the evidence of WMD. He was fully aware that the evidence he was baseing his accertion for war on were at best very poor, we know this because we have the reports from those intelligence agency telling him so.
Even so he used them because he believed that Iraq had them on matter what the evidence did or didn't say and once we arrived in Bagdad he could simply show the evidence to the world. Brian remember when I wrote about how a persons sincerity of belief could be a bad thing. I believe that Bush was so sincere that Saddam had those WMD, that he was willing to release evidence that he know was wrong because it didn't matter in the end because he would be able to show the world first hand that the evidence was accurate. This is also how folly occurs, Bush was not going to be deflected by the facts.
Therefore Bush had to have lied outright, or is incompetent.
I am still waiting for your response explaining why my position is so unreasonable that Bush lied.

Spondulix

Good to see your at church today. We are supposed to be getting ready for a ice strom here.

Spondulix

-- posted by spondulix

Top 19. Feb 3, 2004 2:33 PM

» buzzcook - Did Bush lie then?

I think he did as did most of his administration.

But it is 100% sure that he is lieing now.
Twice Bush has said he had to invade because Saddam "wouldn't let the inspectors in".
Was Hans Blix was an illusion? Well he must have been because now members of the administration are now echoing Bush's statement.

http://www.startribune.com/stories/561/4...
"Let's be clear: The failure of the administration's evidence on Iraq's WMD is not a case of 20-20 hindsight, as some apologists for Bush assert. The president himself was flat-out wrong when he said last week that Saddam Hussein refused to "let us in." Before the war, Blix's weapons inspectors were on the ground in Iraq examining the specific sites and looking for the precise materials mentioned in the brief Powell presented to the U.N. Security Council. And they were finding nothing. Very few people worldwide bought the American case for war -- before the war started."

-- posted by buzzcook

Top 20. Feb 7, 2004 10:51 AM

» Brian Tubbs - Clinton's lie

In response to message posted by spondulix:

Clinton didn't say "sex," he said "sexual relations." I quote: "I did not have sexual relations with that woman...Miss Lewinsky." Now, THAT, is a lie..pure and simple.

But it was not sufficient for impeachment. I never would've called for Clinton to be impeached if that had been the extent of his lying. Lying in and of itself is not an impeachable offense for a President. Disgraceful, yes. Impeachable, no.

-- posted by Brian Tubbs

Top 21. Feb 7, 2004 10:57 AM

» Brian Tubbs - Re: Did Bush lie then?

In response to message posted by buzzcook:

Show me the exact Bush quotes. I don't know what the context was (or when they were said), but IF Bush was referring to specific access points within Iraq, he is correct. Iraq was not fully cooperative with Hans Blix, and Blix said as much. Yes, they were allowed IN Iraq, but that's not good enough.

Still, I'd be interested in seeing those quotes.

What perplexes me is that Blix, Kay, and so many people have confirmed that Iraq was not fully cooperative, and that there were many items and sites uncovered that raised very serious questions about Iraq's intentions. Kay has stated that Iraq was poised to develop WMD - that it had the motive, intent, and capability to do so. This is largely unreported in the media and, of course, is completely ignored by Bush critics.

-- posted by Brian Tubbs

Top 22. Feb 7, 2004 12:27 PM

» malthus6 - Criminal vs. naughty actions

At the Super bowl, a young woman's breast was exposed. The howl that this caused would have been sufficient to protest a foreign war where five hundred plus young men have been slaughtered and where thousands have lost limbs and worse.

What in the world is wrong with the American people? I suspect that those prudish folk who are screaming about the breast did a little peeping tom act as did I and all of my friends when we were young. The very act of carefully covering breasts excites curiosity in young males resulting in a bit of sneaking around.

Brian, when you were a boy, did you never peek at your sister, mother, or the girl next door? Be honest.

And Bill Clinton fooled around with a young woman who appeared perfectly willing to be fooled with. But George Bush starts a stupid war and people get killed. The Republicans in congress impeach Clinton. But I don't see any move to impeach George.

The powers that be appointed a bird named Starr to investigate Clinton's dealings in a venture named Whitewater. Starr spent million and found nothing, so they impeached Clinton for fooling around!

George W. Bush was up to his eye brows in a crooked swindle named Enron. When will the impeachment proceedings begin?

Where does the power lay? Who runs this mess?

The buck never stops at a Bush

-- posted by malthus6