Matt,

You "misunderestimate" the party. While Republicrats have to campaign on issues like gay marriage and abortion rights, you have given us all the ammunition we need, infact you've left all your normally winning platforms behind. Now in november and beyond we can campaign on 4th amendment issues and small government, fiscal responsibility and allow us to rail against debt spending and "earmarking", your own leaders support for a corrupt democratic congressmans right to keep bribes in his office, as well as our own base winners, I don't think i'm ready to call it check-mate because i know how stupid-silly the Dems can get with a lead, but aside from defrosting Osama, you guys are gonna find it pretty tough to rally the faithful over fags and "honoring the troops by killing more of them"

LOL!!

TEO, if you want to see a real hissy fit among the Dems, watch the Republicans try to eliminate earmarking, and/or initiate a line-item veto for the president. Just because this Republican pres has been in charge of some massive government spending, to the dismay of his supporters, don't let yourself be fooled that this is a Republican trait. Every time anyone has tried to decrease entitlement spending, decrease pork, eliminate the ability to tag a spending allotment onto an otherwise unrelated bill, or let the president veto parts of bills, it has been the Dems screaming and hollering.

I'd love to watch the Dems campaign on "..small government (and) fiscal responsibility..." What a hoot. It would be like watching Clinton campaign on a platform of marital fidelity and sexual responsibility.

The discussion over the rights of congressmen to have offices free from searches by the FBI has nothing to do with efforts to hide evidence of corruption as much as efforts to determine constitutional protections for congressmen. And this issue was brought up by Dems, with some minor support from some on the right. Yeah, let's let the Dems run on that----against the Republicans who supported their crook's right to avoid searches of his office.

However, back to the thread...

Biden would also have to convince people that he "misunderstood" the entire top level of Democratic leadership, including himself. I saw him trying to tapdance away from his own statements, and it was bizarre. The problems the Dems have is that those who really knew what was going on, and cared, and talked about it, now have to try to distance themselves from their own comments and calls to action, because it took a Republican to actually act on what they were calling for. The other Dems, such as Kennedy, can only fall back on bragging about their ignorance or indifference to what was going on. Neither position is a winner.

Matt,

An awful lot has changed since that vote on the war. I respect those who are willing to modify their views base on new information. That is why the administration and the let's never "cut and run" factions are in the minority now and quite reviled. They simply refuse to adapt to new information and hold stubbornly to the "stay the course" mentality.

As a matter of fact, I have more respect for Sen. Biden because he was able to change his views as new intel comes in.

I think he could make a very good and responsive president.

Almaranta,

So you're telling me that "kill em all and let allah sort em out" is the policy of choice for this election?

You think that the american people are going to vote AGAINST their wallets this time around, we are going to pound the debt spending numbers, and you're gonna alienate your own uber-conservative base with immigration and fiscal responsibility.

you can ignore all the ill will the protection of some imaginary seperation of powers gambit is having at LGF and Redstate, but the rest of your rabid theo/eco-cons are howling their deck shoes off about it. It only took you guys 12 years of lockstepping towards a cliff before you went critical-lemming, enjoy political irrelavancy for the next 30-50 years. LOL!!

not just Biden & Hillary, I also believed the President (& especially Colin Powell) when he said there was WMD in Iraq.

and, one day, we may still discover Iraqi WMD stashed by the Syrian Baathists. after all, those huge, pre-war truck convoys into Syria had to have been carrying important materials.

why we didn't strike those convoys is beyond me.

If there is no war in '08, the war will not be an issue. The neo-cons in the Democrat Party are working as hard as they can to make that happen. The end of the war will accelerate after November, when the damage done by the electorate to the Republican Party is analyzed. Paece

Ash, states of Slow Joe Biden, "I think he could make a very good and responsive president". President ..... MAYBE the local Kiwanis club.

WOW, one of the dimmest bulbs in the Senate. Right down there with Mark Dayton.

There's only one good thing I can say about Slow Joe; he provides great entertainment value.

Matt,

The vote you keep refering to was to authorize Bush the use of necessary force. It was not a "do you think we should invade Iraq" vote.

Bush pushed the button. Bush flipped the switch. Bush was the decider. Bush and only Bush took us to war in Iraq.

Bush then tried to blame his bad decision on bad intelligence.
Good intelligence, or bad intelligence, it was Bush's decision to take us to war.

Bush's attempts to spread the blame made him look like a wimp, a wimp that refused to take responsibility for his own actions.

Bush's decision to invade Iraq will have no impact Biden, or Clinton's chances at the 2008 nomination.

Almiranta---Both parties have an addiction to earmarks---remember the bridge to nowhere-earmark by Ted Stevens, Repub. Senator from Alaska----or Trent Lott's earmark to move the railroad tracks in Mississippi?
The Republicans have been in control of both houses of Congress since 1994, so trying to blame the Democrats for overspending strains credibility. Plus, GWB has YET to use the veto power after almost 6 years in power. Try to avoid sweeping generalizations, because someone will always find exceptions.

LaMano- You can call Biden, Slow Joe, but I see him as a leader who sees the complexities of the issues facing us, and is willing to put the effort into thinking things out, instead of jumping into action like "Quick-Draw McBush". We have had our fill of reactionary government policies that think expanding our military presence is justified as long as we're "spreading democracy".

The failures of this administration in dealing with Iraq, Afghanistan, Katrina, immigration, social security, the trade deficit, the ports deal, gas prices, members of their own party, corruption, etc, etc, has just given a huge boost to whoever the Democratic candidate is in '08.

Orrin,

Maybe when we dig up Hoffa, he can let us in on where those crafty Ba-athists hid all that non-existant WMDs. Isn't it much more plausible they were trafficking party loyalists, or butt tons of cash and treasures?

If they had WMDs, don't you think they would have used them once the idea of a full scale invasion was imminent, Saddam already used them against iranians, why would he ever NOT use them against us?

... MAYBE the local Kiwanis club.

I suspect most Kiwanis clubs are better run than this administration!

Biden is a wonderful representative of his party.

He was for the war before he was against the war. He was balding before he was hair plugs. He was slow and stupid before...ok, on that one he remains firm.

Normally, a Presidential ticket just has two members, Prez/VP, but I am liking the Democratic slate so much so far that I want the ticket to be Gore/Clinton/Biden/Feingold 2008.

And Turd-Eye just keeps pushing the "I don't know nuthin' about no WMDs going to Syria" line just hoping if he repeats it enough we'll buy it.

Marines slaughtered dozens in Haditha? Oh, he'll believe that based solely on a sound bite on al-Jezeera. But we have satellite photos of Saddam's WMD going to Syria, we have everything but a Fedex tracking number, and suddenly Three Day Blinds has his head in the sand.

Conservative to the core,

I'll repeat your own mantra, where is the evidence...hidden with your Mobile Chemical labs, or your aluminum tubes that don't fit anything remotely resembling a cascade enrichment system?

where are the WMDs Conservative to the bitter end? WHERE ARE THEY?

well 3d eye, the Iraqi Baathists would NOT have used WMD on us if they strongly felt that an active insurgency would render our occupation unsustainable.

in that event & subsequent to our withdrawal, they would've sought to recover their WMD from their syrian breathern.

this is consistent w regard to Sadaam's behavior when he had the Iraqi AF fly their MIGs to Iran to be impounded prior to Gulf 1.

Thats doesn't jive with what we know about the man, if that were the case, why wouldn't he have just moved ALL his weapons across the boarder, wait for the insurgency, then bring everything to bare?

That is the dumbest excuse ive ever heard!

But we have satellite photos of Saddam's WMD going to Syria, we have everything but a Fedex tracking number, and suddenly Three Day Blinds has his head in the sand.
osted by: Conservative to the Core [TypeKey Profile Page] at June 5, 2006 12:02 PM

So are we letting Syria get away with WMD's? I thought the policy was to take over every third world country that has them. Because "they might give them to terrorists".

I've heard nothing about these former Iraqi-now Syrian WMD's. It must be your "liberal media" at it again huh?

Birch,

I get tired of smacking down these guys' logic flaws, do they sit around and talk about how all this stuff is possible?

'I respect those who are willing to modify their views base on new information.'

Not quite. Biden and the others have become willing partners of the 'Bush lied' crowd, and have done as much as they could to cover up their decades of previous support of actions against Iraq. They never claimed that Clinton lied when he shot missiles into Iraq using the same intelligence sources, and they all supported Bubba's claims that Saddam Hussein and Iraq were a danger to the region. It has become selective amnesia, not based on new information, but a desire to be accepted by the MoveOn/Code Pink wing of the Dem party.

Hermie,

Why was it, that less than 8 months before they had this glut of information about how imminent a threat Saddaam was, was Colin Powell and Condy and Der Leader saying that he wasn't a threat? Why did Condi say in january, "He's being kept in his box"? You're telling me that they all of sudden realized that Sadaam was working on WMDs and doing all around bad things AFTER 9/11?

"I've heard nothing about these former Iraqi-now Syrian WMD's. It must be your 'liberal media' at it again huh?" - Birch Barlow

Exactly. I'm glad to see there are patriots like yourself, who actually get this stuff.

Absurd Eye Open

Why is you hate America so much?

Of course the Bush Administration can't show "proof" of the Syrian WMDs, or they would be forced to invade Syria, and we know the plans to invade Syria have been derailed by a constant stream of negativity in Iraq.

It is people like you who are tying Bush's hands and making the world unsafe.

Don't you have anything to add to the discussion, besides your hateful ranting about Bush? Can't you put aside politics for even a second? Read Birch's post...he gets it, why don't you?

Conservative,

I hope you haven't bred, and if you have PLEASE tell me aren't homeschooling them. LOL

If it takes me screaming at the top of my lungs until I fall over dead to stop you guys from invading ONE more country pre-emptively, then I will, if you havea hard-on for killing, start with yourself.

I love my country, I hate its leaders, the American people do more for this world than anyone, ever, combined! Our leaders, both democratic and republican are making a mockery of the good will we enjoyed as late as 9/11, anyone who supports the unmitigated killing of innocent civilians through occupation deserves neither peace nor liberty.

Third Eye

How dare you bring my children into this this? What kind of lowlife takes a simple discussion and attacks children?

Shame on you!

Third Eye Blind:

Biden and the rest still haven't explained how the same intellifgence sources were good enough for them when Clinton was in office; When the regular Congressional briefings by the CIA, NSA, etc, were sufficient in the Bubba years; and yet they all of a sudden are 'lies'.

The 'Inconvenient Truth' is that the Dems want to make people think that they were always against the war, if they believe it will get them closer to their goal of retaking the Congress and the WH.

Conservative,

Sorry man, my apologies to your kids.

hermie,

I dont care what letter the prez. has behind its name I wouldnt want Clinton OR Bush doing it, and noone asked me if i thought it was Kosher.

The FBI needs to get a warrant to search Biden's office to find his crack pipe.

Third Eye, if we received 100% valid information that Iran was giving nuclear material to terrorists to use against the USA, should we wait till one of the bombs goes off in your hometown, or attack them first?

Third Eye Open....if we knew it was a lie about WMD answer these questions for me

1) Why did we have our troops wearing WMD protection
2) If he lied about WMD, why wouldn't he continue to lie and just plant WMD in Iraq? If you're going to lie...why not continue to lie
3) Why would Saddam move cash on trucks to Syria. Wouldn't moving WMD be much more advantageous because they would be in tact to be used later.

Thanks...very much looking forward to your answer.

Third Eye

You've laid it out well for us. A country is about to drop 3 nukes on the USA...you want us to wait until they drop the nukes.

That's what you are saying. Basically, it is because of Conservatives and people with balls that we allow you to continue to think the idiotic way that you do. Because if we didn't act, we wouldn't be around any longer.

I cannot speak for TEO ... however:

1) We all know Bush is dumb - but, come on, man - he's not *that* dumb. The troops were lied to also, remember. They actually thought they were going in to find WMD - don't you think they'd be expecting to wear this "protection"? What a stupid question.

2) How do you go about "planting" WMD in another country? I'd be real curious to hear that one. Besides, it doesn't matter. Bush lied to get us INTO Iraq - then he finally admitted it. But we're already there. So now he can trump the "finish the job," "stay the course," "don't let the fallen soldiers die in vain," yada yada yada bullsh*t - and then you fools eat it up, hook, line, and sinker - and parrot it back on blogs like these. According to Bush (and, as a result, according to you), there is no turning back now, WMD or no WMD.

3) If Saddam "moved" WMD into another country, how would we not be able to detect this? And if he did this to "use them later" ... why did he NEVER use them!? Also, if what you say is true, and Syria now has these WMD - why the heck haven't we pre-emptively invaded & occupied them?

He admitted lying? Please give me the source and quotes of that Maf....this ought to be good.

As for planting WMD...you actually don't have to. All you need to do is plant documents that said they had them until 48 hours prior to the war or you plant documents that say they were moved to Syria and then put it on Syria to prove a negative.

Finally, how would we not know they moved WMD into another country? Are you serious? By the way...HE DID USE THEM. Kurds anyone? How are we supposed to detect if they moved them or not? We can see convoys, we can't see into convoys. We know convoys existed but we don't know what the cargos are. What do you think we have, xray vision satellites (I work in the satellite industry...I can assure you that doesn't exist).

Why haven't we gone into Syria? Let's see, has Syria defied 17 UN Resolutions? Has Syria used WMD on their own people? Has Syria refused to let UN inspectors into their country for years? Who knows, Syria could be next and that would be great if they were but the difference between Syria and Saddam is huge on the world stage and you know it.

Seriously, let's see those quotes where it says "I lied about WMD"...this ought to be great.

We will be waiting.

Did Biden Plagiarize anything on tv yesterday? he has a habit of doing that.

Testing ...

Okay, let's see if it posts now ...

Read between the lines, War Boy:

"In October, Duelfer released a preliminary report finding that in March 2003 -- the month of the invasion -- Saddam did not have any WMD stockpiles and had not started any program to produce them.

The Iraq Survey Group report said that Iraq's WMD program was essentially destroyed in 1991 and Saddam ended the country's nuclear program after the Persian Gulf War in 1991.

The report found that Iraq worked hard to cheat on United Nations-imposed sanctions and retain the capability to resume production of weapons of mass destruction at some time in the future. (Full story)

"[Saddam] wanted to end sanctions while preserving the capability to reconstitute his weapons of mass destruction when sanctions were lifted," a summary of the report said.

After Duelfer delivered his Iraq Survey Group's report to the Senate, *****Bush acknowledged that Iraq didn't have weapons of mass destruction at the time he ordered the invasion***** but said Saddam was "systematically gaming the system" and that the world is safer because he is no longer in power."

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/01/12/wmd.search/

As for Syria, you're joking, right? Yeah, they're our best friends. Let's see, an official state sponsor of terrorism, and, according to you, they have WMD ... but you don't want to invade? Hmmm ...

"There is no doubt that many past Syrian actions are in direct conflict with U.S. interests in the region and that the current posture of the Syrian government towards terrorism continues to be wholly unacceptable. As a state sponsor of terrorism, Syria has repeatedly shown an unwillingness to fundamentally change its behavior regarding support for terrorism. While we continue to have hope for eventual improvements in Syrian attitudes, policies and actions, we see little at this time to indicate that Syrian support for terrorism is diminishing.

Syria remains a security concern not just because of terrorism, but also because of its pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. Since Undersecretary John Bolton has recently testified on the latter, which is his area of expertise, I will focus on the former. The threat to our country posed by states who both sponsor terrorism and pursue weapons of mass destruction is one which we cannot and will not ignore."

http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/rm/2003/25778.htm

You got some splainin' to do, War Lover.

War Boy says: "By the way...HE DID USE THEM. Kurds anyone?"

I meant on OUR military, genius - if Saddam had those WMD in Syria, just waiting to use them when we invaded ... ummm, then why didn't he use them!?!?

IslamHater1: if Islam needs to be utterly destroyed, as you so eloquently posit, then how do you explain the millions & millions of peaceful, law-abiding Muslims, who CONDEMN the terrorist acts carried out in the name of Islam?

More importantly, how do you explain the rhetoric of your Dear Leader, the Decider-in-Chief? Here we have one of the most insensitive, ignorant, and arrogant leaders of our lifetime (see: blacks/the poor (Katrina), Muslims (Iraq), and gays), and yet he is always saying Islam is a religion of peace.

Why?

You've laid it out well for us. A country is about to drop 3 nukes on the USA...you want us to wait until they drop the nukes.

Now War Lover, consider your question from an Iranian's point of view. They might think we are going to drop three nukes on them. Using your rationale, why should they wait for us to act. Why shouldn't they have the right to attack a hostile preemptively. See the stupidity of your philosophy?

Warmonger - what gets your willy more excited: the thought of bombing Syria, or the thought of bombing Iran? Surely you have a preference.

War Lover must be outback building his bomb shelter.

Ash

When you are right, you are right, boy!

We should definitely drop three nukes on Iran. Everyone else would just get in line, lickety-split.

Good thinking, Ash! I thought you were a liberal But maybe I've just been misreading you.

maf

Between those two, I've got more of a hard-on for Syria. They are some bad folks in charge there, and they get my willy excited, maf.

Of course, you don't even allow for bombing both countries.

Think about it, if we took care of both of them at the same time...we'd have dominion over Afghanistan directly to iran, directly to Iraq, directly to Syria, directly to Israel. It would be a stripe right through Asia.

No wonder you guys don't like Rumsfeld. You have no idea the scope of his thinking. Not since Alexander the Great could anyone think on such a scale.

....Bwahahahahahahahaha

We should definitely drop three nukes on Iran. Everyone else would just get in line, lickety-split.

-- They sure would, the UN would get in line and have to figure out a way to disarm America, for it will have proved itself a "rogue nation" and no longer capable of being trusted with weapons of mass destruction.

Amazing. Questions are asked of Lefties on whether they basically support protecting America first, and they turn it around to the protection of Iran, or any other country that may attack the USA, first.

Then again, not so surprising. They really do hate America.

TEO, you say:
"So you're telling me that "kill em all and let allah sort em out" is the policy of choice for this election?"

However, there is absolutely nothing in my post to indicate anything even close to this bizarre statement. I posted about the efforts of Joe Biden to distance himself from his own calls to action regarding Iraq, after some comments about your claims that the Dems would be running on a platform of small government and fiscal responsibility. I know you have all these hateful negative spiteful "ideas" churning around in your head, and that you desperately need to get them out of there, but please don't attribute them to me.

You also say:
"You think that the american people are going to vote AGAINST their wallets this time around, we are going to pound the debt spending numbers, and you're gonna alienate your own uber-conservative base with immigration and fiscal responsibility."

Good. If any Democrat can actually come up with a platform based on fiscal responsibility, it would be worth seeing. You know, being the first time in history and all.

The Dems define "fiscal responsibility" as the reallocation of assets----other peoples' assets---by those who somehow are better at deciding what to do with them than are those who earned them in the first place. One of many problems with this is that it smothers economic growth, thereby decreasing the amount of assets available to the Dems for confiscation. So they have to up the percentage of assets they confiscate, which in turn inhibits economic growth even more.

So far at least, historically, the Dem approach to what you call "fiscal responsibility" has been a weird combination of emotion-based punitive action against those who, somehow, 'deserve' to be punished for the sin/crime of being good at what they do, and a naive shortsighted belief in what is essentially a giant pyramid scheme.

The Bush administration has not held govenrment spending as conservatives had hoped. So we're not going to vote for him again.

However, we also understand that a huge amount of the spending was done to rebuld a military gutted by his predecessor, who used the "savings" to contribute to the 'surplus' you all love so much. Never mind that the government holding more money than it spends means only that they are taking too much from us, or not spending it wisely----the economically unsophisticated just LOVE the idea of a "surplus".

So what is the Dem platform going to be, immigration-wise? Got a plan, or are you all just waiting for the R's to come up with one, so you can sneer at it?

And what is the Dem platfrom going to be on "fiscal responsibility" aside from socking it to those hated "rich"?

Yes, Willian, the lefties do hate America, and are becoming more brazen about it. For a while they lied about it, with coy little comments along the lines of being "for the troops but against the war" or "loving America but hating what she stands for" (?)

But lately the cesspool of hatred and spite and general meanness has become too foul to bother trying to hide, so we have charming idiots like the axis of ignorance and maf and Ash and TEO just bubbling over with their cherished loathing and actually bragging about it.

And they think they represent the majority of Americans. All they represent is the majority of the few who listen to Air America. They simply do not realize how distasteful this constant harping and criticizing and sneering and carping is. They never have an idea, never have a good thing to say, never have anything but constant hatred and stupidity to offer.

Conservative to the Core

So it is, as you admit, the Bush administration's agenda to invade & control the Middle East?

I think, Conservative, that this might be your weak attempt at satire. Either that, or, you have revealed what deep, dark thoughts neo-cons harbor in their cold, cold hearts.

Almaranta,

Excuse me, I was getting ahead of myself, without explaining where the comment was coming from, let me rephrase and expand.

The policy Bush is pushing, and by extension the W-brand Republicans, is that we are staying the course, and that we are in the final throws of the insurgency (again). Once Iraq has a government, all the death and bombing will subside, and the Mahdi Army, the Badr Brigade, the foreign insurgents, the oil revenue sharing, the autonomous wants of the Kurds and any number of smaller national and local issues will fall into place, and everyone will begin talking their problems out. Instead no one but a few ignored portions of the government are talking about the apparent civil war raging or how we can help to stop it, since we are just another militia there. You don't think we are going to rail on the fact that no Republicans can come up with an alternate plan, ANYTHING, other than "stay the course"? It's gonna get harder and harder to keep making middle america believe that our debt load can be sustained for a "long war" while the country continues to degrade, day after day, while we are but mere observers to the violence...so that should quialify my previous statement.

my view, and the Democratic views on immigration are two different things, a vast majority of both partys are beholden to a big business model that encourages illegal immigrants to come here looking for loosely regulated and comparatively well paying jobs. if you want MY solution, just ask, but im not going to bother, since you probably don't care.

Fiscal responsibility means nothing to the guys you have up there, you've had control of the government for 12 years, and have managed to do pretty much nothing except complain about a clinton recession that you guys were holding the purse strings to, so yeah, i bet that a lof of outsiders on the Donkey side will have a lot of numbers and rhetorical spurs to stick on their elephant counterparts, but we will just have to see. As it has been said before, "This is why we play the game"

Almaranta,

Excuse me, I was getting ahead of myself, without explaining where the comment was coming from, let me rephrase and expand.

The policy Bush is pushing, and by extension the W-brand Republicans, is that we are staying the course, and that we are in the final throws of the insurgency (again). Once Iraq has a government, all the death and bombing will subside, and the Mahdi Army, the Badr Brigade, the foreign insurgents, the oil revenue sharing, the autonomous wants of the Kurds and any number of smaller national and local issues will fall into place, and everyone will begin talking their problems out. Instead no one but a few ignored portions of the government are talking about the apparent civil war raging or how we can help to stop it, since we are just another militia there. You don't think we are going to rail on the fact that no Republicans can come up with an alternate plan, ANYTHING, other than "stay the course"? It's gonna get harder and harder to keep making middle america believe that our debt load can be sustained for a "long war" while the country continues to degrade, day after day, while we are but mere observers to the violence...so that should quialify my previous statement.

my view, and the Democratic views on immigration are two different things, a vast majority of both partys are beholden to a big business model that encourages illegal immigrants to come here looking for loosely regulated and comparatively well paying jobs. if you want MY solution, just ask, but im not going to bother, since you probably don't care.

Fiscal responsibility means nothing to the guys you have up there, you've had control of the government for 12 years, and have managed to do pretty much nothing except complain about a clinton recession that you guys were holding the purse strings to, so yeah, i bet that a lof of outsiders on the Donkey side will have a lot of numbers and rhetorical spurs to stick on their elephant counterparts, but we will just have to see. As it has been said before, "This is why we play the game"

So let me get this straight Maf, you admit he used them against the Kurds but yet he didn't have them?

Man are you a walking contradiction.

How the hell should I know why he didn't use them. Why didn't he use them in Persian Gulf War...he had them then as well did he not? Of course he did.

Maybe he thought if he used them that we would turn his country into a glass sheet.

On Syria and Iran....I hope we don't have to bomb either one. Just as we waited years on Iraq and gave him chance after chance after chance.

No one likes war, but sometimes it's necessary.

Now...why do these muslims hate Oh Canada so much... LOL

I haven't found anything that discounts this:

Ali Ibrahim Al-Tikriti (x-General in Saddam's army)
I know Saddam's weapons are in Syria due to certain military deals that were made going as far back as the late 1980's that dealt with the event that either capitols were threatened with being overrun by an enemy nation. Not to mention I have discussed this in-depth with various contacts of mine who have confirmed what I already knew. At this point Saddam knew that the United States were eventually going to come for his weapons and the United States wasn't going to just let this go like they did in the original Gulf War. He knew that he had lied for this many years and wanted to maintain legitimacy with the pan Arab nationalists. He also has wanted since he took power to embarrass the West and this was the perfect opportunity to do so. After Saddam denied he had such weapons why would he use them or leave them readily available to be found? That would only legitimize President Bush, who he has a personal grduge against. What we are witnessing now is many who opposed the war to begin with are rallying around Saddam saying we overthrew a soverign leader based on a lie about WMD. This is exactly what Saddam wanted and predicted.

Warriornation,

Sorry it took so long to get back to you, I didn't even see your post from yesterday until now, but ill go ahead and respond:

1. Planting documents: It's gonna be real hard to do such things since there are alot of Ba'ath party members who are still in the new government, you're gonna look like an idiot when some fake papers resurface with one of their signatures on it, and it blows up in your face, so I would assume THATS why they haven't planted anything.

2. Moving WMD: We obviously were very interested in large convoys, as you can attest to, during the run-up to war. Now it stands to reason that the inspectors had been over just about every foot of possible storage and manufacturing facilities that were known about since 1991. We had the UN and Mr. Blix in there doing doubletime scurrying before the bombs started falling. Now with that in mind, if our sat images were showing a convoy from any of those locations we would have had this info all over the nightly news, "See, See, trucks with who knows what coming from locations we KNEW were harboring WMDs"
Infact I would surmise that if the military had ANY doubt these were anything but benign, they would have sent predators in to make them crispy, but instead they were let go on their merry way.

You and I are making guesses, man. The point is simple, without proof we are limited by international law as to what we can and can't do. You can't go blowing stuff up and invading nations because you don't like them or you think something bad can happen. It sucks that we are beholden to laws and conventions we have signed, but this is how civilized nations who don't gas, rape, and murder handle their problems. When we went against international convention in Iraq we have obliterated our respect and our international weight to get the things done that we need to. They very well may have moved some WMDs to Syria, but if you can't prove it, then thats how the ball bounces, its a small what if, that was pretty much smacked down by the years of sanctions and monitoring. Do you have any trust in the guys on the ground who were highly trained in making assertions about the viability of WMD claims, or do they have an agenda too?

basically, dude. If we really want to make this world safer, we need to learn how to use the world to get what we want done, we could have easily waited a few more months, double checked our facts, went directly to the security council and made plans to allow Muslim nations to play police and logistics roles after major combat was over, but instead we decided we knew better, and look what we ended up with, a civil war.

".....so I would assume THATS why they haven't planted anything."

Of course you would. But the simplest, and most correct, reason is that they don't HAVE to plant anything, and would not anyway. Your entire supposition is based on your bias against the administration, and without that blind hatred of All That Is Bush it simply falls apart.

"...we would have had this info all over the nightly news, "See, See, trucks with who knows what coming from locations we KNEW were harboring WMDs"

And we did. That was what was driving so many of us crazy---the reports, the satellite coverage, the photos and videos, of the convoys leaving the factory sites and crossing the border, unimpeded.

But Bush, back when he was more naive, really thought that if he went along with the Left, and did what they demanded of him, he would disarm them and deprive them of future attacks. So he bowed to their demands for repeated---REPEATED---trips to the UN with hat in hand, begging them to allow us to defend ourselves. He agreed to keep asking Congress for more votes allowing military action. He got all his ducks in a row, getting lib after lib ON THE RECORD as agreeing with him and supporting the invasion. And all this time, people were wringing their hands and yelling at their TV sets to just do what had to be done and ignore the libs, they would turn on him anyway.

We were right. He was wrong. But that media coverage was extensive. Well, maybe not on CNN. But it was there, with almost exactly the same narrative you snidely said would have happened if we had seen the footage.

I understand that it is helpful to just wipe the memory banks every few hours, so there is no nasty continuity to have to deal with. That way, the latest Ranty Rhodes crap has plenty of room to percolate. But the footage WAS there, and we did fret about it.

"When we went against international convention in Iraq we have obliterated our respect and our international weight to get the things done that we need to."

When we went against WHAT "international convention"? We had the approval and permission of the United Nations, we had dozens of other nations backing us and fighting alongside us, and the only countries that did not support us later turned out to be profiting from our failure to invade, or were stated enemies of the U.S. Yeah, I really worry about the opinions of the criminal profiteers who were raking in the dough and objected to us stopping the gravy train. (See part about wiping memory banks clean...)

And thank you, Kimberly, for injecting some fact into the discussion. It was ignored, as usual, but hey, why should the libs listen to someone who was there and a part of the whole thing when they have their handlers at home telling them what to think.....

While the ISG did conclude that the convoys that went into Syria probably did not contain the stockpiles of WMD, they did conclude that it warrants further investigation. Due to the security situation they were unable to complete the investigation. This investigation should be completed. Hopefully some enterprising reporter will get to work on this. Unfortunately, if the conventional wisdom turns out to be incorrect, finding out what happened here might interfere with the conclusions they have already reached. Perhaps someone within the CIA could investigate this more completely but unfortunately some people have staked their careers on the fact that Saddam did not have stockpiles of WMD. If WMD stockpiles were moved into Syria prior to the war, this is perhaps an impeachable offense for this administration and perhaps the military planners could be court martialed. This is a competence issue. It would mean that the administration was right to invade Iraq but may not have executed the invasion as well as they should have. Actually I think removing Saddam was the correct decsion with or without the WMD. The reasons for the invasion are spelled out in the Congressional resolution authorizing the use of force. It goes beyond WMD. Ultimately leaders will be judged by what they actually accomplish and not by what they intended to accomplish.

I think Almiranta pretty much nails it. We did not do anything about the convoys because were wasting time trying to get assistance from the UN.