POLL: Bush and impeachment

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Exactly chev. That's why I say you can't prove it. Claiming that something is true when it isn't true, isn't lying unless you are deliberately trying to deceive. That's why I think that we can never prove that Bush lied. I do believe that he honestly thought that there were WMD in Iraq. As you said, that makes him incompetent, and to that list, I'd like to add poorly informed, and just plain wrong, but it doesn't necessarily make him a liar.

 

Well if he's incompetent, he should still be removed before he screws up anything else. And I'm not willing to wait three years.

 

I believe I have been misunderstood. I am not saying that Saddam had WMD and the U.S. like a bunch of bungling idiots was unable to find them. Instead what I am saying is that Iraq did not go out of there way to disprove their existance. For years they led the weapons inspectors on wild goose chases, forbidding them access to places, letting them into places, then evicting them, etc. etc. It is only now in hindsight (which is 20/20) that we realize that Iraq was playing a game to tweak the noses of the west, scare their neighbors, and gain stature in the muslim world.

To put it another way. Pretend you are a policeman and you pull over a known drug dealer. You ask them if they have any contraband in the trunk. They say no. You ask them to open the trunk, they so no. What else are you supposed to think?

 

But keep in mind that just before the war Saddam let in the international inspectors to see if he had or not WoMD.

 

For what it's worth -- the Wall Stree Journal poll that was just released yesterday.

I think the delusion is long gone.

 

We'll have a more similar situation if we added the drug dealers girlfriend and son to the situation and the police officer was forced to shoot both of them to get to the drugs only to find out that there was none.

 

But Tal...it wasn't just the US that thought Iraq had WMD. Russia, The UK, China all had intelligence that considered it to be highly likely or pre-existing. Sure, the French were skeptical...but they may have only been hoping for one less national enemy to surrender to.

 

And whats that based on?

 

Ummm.... History?

 

Dream on. Bush did not lie about the WMDs. We know for a fact that Iraq had them as late as 1998, when the inspectors were kicked out. We damned sure know he used them. Just ask any Kurd or veteran of the Iranian army. But rather than asking where the weapons are, you people will pretend that they were not there. There's no proof that he destoyed them, so where did they go? For all we know, they could have been shipped to mosques in DC, London, and Rome. Or they could be buried in the Iraqi desert.

 

Actually, the "French" part is very important. 6 months before the war and particularly about 1 month before, how much attention was paid towards actual evidence of WMD's and how much attention was paid towards some Euros don't saying "yes, you are absolutely right, smart one, WMD's all over".

The Euros still are an important part of the argumentation that there was actually reason to believe that there would be WMA's. If the Euros say there are no WMD's, the likelyhood of existing WMA quadruples, of course! One of strongest indications for the existence of WMA's: An Euro "no".

So, no. In Europe at that time, the believe that WMA's existed was distinctively less spread. All over Europe. And I think that's tight to important military heads and heads of military-science departments judging the whole story as a piece of ****.

Ironically, this also explains the easily made observation that a lot of people in Europe think of Americans as not too bright. The syllogism is the following:

1 -> very shaky rumours about WMD's
2 -> Americans buy it
3 -> Americans seem to buy very shaky rumours rather easily.

Leads to value judgement: Critical Thinking department does not seem that developed.

Oh, of course, I hold all members of this board in highest estimation. Particularly their brains.

Impeachement?

1 - Did he lie?

Yes, he did.

2 - Does he have to be impeached ?

No, he does not. It's no crime for a president to fool his own people.

P.S. The British I know are much more the way the Americans would actually expect the French to be.

[ October 14, 2005, 19:57: Message edited by: Iago ]

 

Of course we all know that he had WoMD in the past (and he used them) but that doesn' meen he still had them 3 years ago.

And there is no proof that he didn't. Of course they could be shipped abroad but that would meen that Saddam wasn't lying about having WoMD in Iraque.
They could be also burried in desert sands but how to find them? And according to law of any counrty you MUST HAVE a proof to acknowlage one's guilt. No weapons=no proof=innocence. And as long as those weapons are not found I will say that Bush lied. Show me those weapons and I will change mu view about Bush's statement.

 

Just to make things clear: for me, WMD stands for nukes. I know that technically it can encompass biological or chemical agents (which the Iraqis had some), but I think what Bush used to sell the war on was "the mushroom cloud". Actually, I think the term "WMD" as such appeared rather late in the drive to war, when it sort of became clear that actually there was not much nuclear material to speak of; so the geniuses responsible for selling the war turned around and started talking about WMD (which the general population still took as shorthand for nukes, of course).

 

I disagree. WMD means any means of killing mass amounts of people quickly. This includes nukes, chemical, biological, and I don't know what else.

 

I second that.

 

The W.M.D's were 'almost' found at crucial times, just like bin Laden had been cornered many times over the past few years.

 

Oh, come on. Would anyone have cared if Saddam had chemical weapons (in fact he had such). The whole brouhaha was over nukes. The Bush administration cleverly moved to use the WMD term, so that the average guy would understand nukes, while retaining some chances of covering their asses in case none were found. It is a classic case of using `code words`, and the people in power now are masters at this.