The Worst Lies from Politicians

[LordsFire]

And 'there were totally WMDs' was the 2004 version of 'Hillary didn't acid-wash her emails'; technically accurate, but misrepresentative of the issue at hand. The fact of that matter is that the evidence of WMDs he presented to the American people was completely fabricated; it does not matter that Saddam actually had WMDs, Bush still lied to justify a war we had no business fighting, and that ultimately made things worse for us in the long run.

You're going to have to present some evidence of that claim before I'll believe you.

Interestingly enough, I've come to the opinion (for other reasons) that Bush made a mistake in going into Iraq, but that doesn't mean I think he lied about the intel they had (and didn't have) on WMDs.

 

[Abhorsen]

You're going to have to present some evidence of that claim before I'll believe you.

Interestingly enough, I've come to the opinion (for other reasons) that Bush made a mistake in going into Iraq, but that doesn't mean I think he lied about the intel they had (and didn't have) on WMDs.

It was sold to the American public that they had nukes, from what I recall.

 

[LordsFire]

It was sold to the American public that they had nukes, from what I recall.

It was WMDs in general, from what I remember. It's been seventeen/eighteen years, but I was following it pretty closely, given I was living in the ME at the time.

I particularly remember the news article about how they found warheads used for chemical or biological weapon dispersal, sans the actual payload. Also, how the relevant Iraqi scientists weren't allowed to meet with weapons inspectors without a 'political officer' being present for said meetings.

 

[Abhorsen]

The ISG (Iraq Survey Group) found no evidence that Iraq had WMDs since 1991, when it destroyed its nuclear and chemical warfare program.

Iraq Survey Group - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[LTR]

Speaking of controversy and George W. Bush, how about the time he insisted we needed to invade Iraq because they had "weapons of mass destruction"? Weapons he couldn't prove they had, weapons we couldn't find after all was said and done, weapons his administration fabricated evidence of in order to convince the American people to go to war.

Except Bush didn't lie. He believed he had weapons that everyone actually believed he had including his own leadership...

Spoiler: Blah

"The discovery of a number of 122-mm chemical rocket warheads in a bunker at a storage depot 170 km southwest of Baghdad was much publicized. This was a relatively new bunker, and therefore the rockets must have been moved there in the past few years, at a time when Iraq should not have had such munitions. . . . They could also be the tip of a submerged iceberg. The discovery of a few rockets does not resolve but rather points to the issue of several thousands of chemical rockets that are unaccounted for." -Hans Blix

"What is at stake is how to answer the potential threat Iraq represents with the risk of proliferation of WMD. Baghdad's regime did use such weapons in the past. Today, a number of evidences may lead to think that, over the past four years, in the absence of international inspectors, this country has continued armament programs." -Jacques Chirac

"The French came in the middle of my deliberations at the CIA and said, we have just spun aluminum tubes, and by god, we did it to this RPM, et cetera, et cetera, and it was all, you know, proof positive that the aluminum tubes were not for mortar casings or artillery casings, they were for centrifuges. Otherwise, why would you have such exquisite instruments? We were wrong. We were wrong." -Lawrence Wilkerson

"In the late spring of 2002, I participated in a Washington meeting about Iraqi WMD. Those present included nearly twenty former inspectors from the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM), the force established in 1991 to oversee the elimination of WMD in Iraq. One of the senior people put a question to the group: did anyone in the room doubt that Iraq was currently operating a secret centrifuge plant? No one did." -Kenneth Pollack

"When Clinton was here recently he told me was absolutely convinced, given his years in the White House and the access to privileged information which he had, that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction until the end of the Saddam regime." -Jose Manuel Durao Barroso

"There is a problem--the probable possession of weapons of mass destruction by an uncontrollable country, Iraq. The international community is right to be disturbed by this situation, and it's right in having decided Iraq should be disarmed." -Jacques Chirac

"A lot of people believed that he did have weapons of mass destruction. President Clinton did, in fact. I was over there with the U.N. weapons inspector and it was not clear. I would fly over later acres and acres and miles and miles of what they call igloos. These are ammunition storage depots, and General Petraeus said to me one day, "We don't know what's in there." Well, it turns out not much because he was trying to kind of rope a dope Iran, trying to persuade Iran that he had weapons of mass destruction. And my own belief is that some of his colonels generated a lot of paper that indicated they had weapons, they were getting money from him, and some of that money may be stored away somewhere." -Tom Brokaw

"The biggest surprise for him was that they've found no weapons of mass destruction (WMD), the "reason we went to war." He says multiple Middle Eastern leaders, including Jordan's King Abdullah and Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, told Franks that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. In January 2003, Mubarak said point blank to Franks, "Saddam has WMD-biologicals, actually-and he will use them on your troops." - General Tommy Franks

"Saddam’s removal is necessary to eradicate the threat from his weapons of mass destruction." -Jack Straw

"Sabri said Saddam desperately wanted a bomb, but would need much more time than that. Sabri was more accurate. On the issue of chemical weapons, the CIA said Saddam had stockpiled as much as "500 metric tons of chemical warfare agents" and had "renewed" production of deadly agents. Sabri said Iraq had stockpiled weapons and had "poison gas" left over from the first Gulf War. Both Sabri and the agency were wrong." -Naji Sabri

"As a member of the House Intelligence Committee, I am keenly aware that the proliferation of chemical and biological weapons is an issue of grave importance to all nations. Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process.” - Nancy Pelosi

"Mark my words, Saddam will develop weapons of mass destruction. He will deploy them, and he will use them." - Bill Clinton

"He will rebuild his arsenal of weapons of mass destruction, and some day, some way, I am certain he will use that arsenal again, as he has 10 times since 1983." - Sandy Berger

"Mr. President if we had a human source who had told us directly that bin Laden was living in that compound, I still wouldn’t be above 60 percent. And I’m telling you, the case for W.M.D. wasn’t just stronger—it was much stronger.” - Mike Morell

“In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including Al Qaeda members, though there is apparently no evidence of his involvement in the terrible events of September 11, 2001. It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons. Should he succeed in that endeavor, he could alter the political and security landscape of the Middle East, which as we know all too well affects American security.” - Hilary Clinton

"Mr. Speaker, the front page of The Washington Post today reported that all relevant U.S. intelligence agencies now say, despite what we have heard from the White House, that "Saddam Hussein is unlikely to initiate a chemical or biological attack against the United States." Even more importantly, our intelligence agencies say that should Saddam conclude that a U.S.-led attack could no longer be deterred, he might at that point launch a chemical or biological counterattack. In other words, there is more danger of an attack on the United States if we launch a precipitous invasion." - Bernie Sanders

And so forth...

No worries, I'm sure in a few years y'all will be rejecting Trump thanks to the media drowning out all other voices to the contrary...

 

[Bigking321]

Keep in mind we gave a week or two warning to Iraq to submit or we would invade.

What happened during that time? A whole lot of shipments of "something" were sent from Iraq into Syria. It's never confirmed what was in those shipments.

A few years later the Syrian leader is in trouble for gassing his own people and we aren't finding the amount of wmds we expected in Iraq. Hmmm..

I'm no genius but if you get warned by the police they are going to raid your house for drugs tomorrow, it might be a good idea to see if your neighbor could hold onto some "stuff" for a bit.

I still remember the news covering the countdown to invasion and talking about the huge heavily guarded convoys going to Syria.

And I'm just "well no wonder we didn't find much, you gave them a literal countdown to invasion you idiots!".

 

[Terthna]

Except Bush didn't lie. He believed he had weapons that everyone actually believed he had including his own leadership...

Spoiler: Blah

"The discovery of a number of 122-mm chemical rocket warheads in a bunker at a storage depot 170 km southwest of Baghdad was much publicized. This was a relatively new bunker, and therefore the rockets must have been moved there in the past few years, at a time when Iraq should not have had such munitions. . . . They could also be the tip of a submerged iceberg. The discovery of a few rockets does not resolve but rather points to the issue of several thousands of chemical rockets that are unaccounted for." -Hans Blix

"What is at stake is how to answer the potential threat Iraq represents with the risk of proliferation of WMD. Baghdad's regime did use such weapons in the past. Today, a number of evidences may lead to think that, over the past four years, in the absence of international inspectors, this country has continued armament programs." -Jacques Chirac

"The French came in the middle of my deliberations at the CIA and said, we have just spun aluminum tubes, and by god, we did it to this RPM, et cetera, et cetera, and it was all, you know, proof positive that the aluminum tubes were not for mortar casings or artillery casings, they were for centrifuges. Otherwise, why would you have such exquisite instruments? We were wrong. We were wrong." -Lawrence Wilkerson

"In the late spring of 2002, I participated in a Washington meeting about Iraqi WMD. Those present included nearly twenty former inspectors from the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM), the force established in 1991 to oversee the elimination of WMD in Iraq. One of the senior people put a question to the group: did anyone in the room doubt that Iraq was currently operating a secret centrifuge plant? No one did." -Kenneth Pollack

"When Clinton was here recently he told me was absolutely convinced, given his years in the White House and the access to privileged information which he had, that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction until the end of the Saddam regime." -Jose Manuel Durao Barroso

"There is a problem--the probable possession of weapons of mass destruction by an uncontrollable country, Iraq. The international community is right to be disturbed by this situation, and it's right in having decided Iraq should be disarmed." -Jacques Chirac

"A lot of people believed that he did have weapons of mass destruction. President Clinton did, in fact. I was over there with the U.N. weapons inspector and it was not clear. I would fly over later acres and acres and miles and miles of what they call igloos. These are ammunition storage depots, and General Petraeus said to me one day, "We don't know what's in there." Well, it turns out not much because he was trying to kind of rope a dope Iran, trying to persuade Iran that he had weapons of mass destruction. And my own belief is that some of his colonels generated a lot of paper that indicated they had weapons, they were getting money from him, and some of that money may be stored away somewhere." -Tom Brokaw

"The biggest surprise for him was that they've found no weapons of mass destruction (WMD), the "reason we went to war." He says multiple Middle Eastern leaders, including Jordan's King Abdullah and Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, told Franks that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. In January 2003, Mubarak said point blank to Franks, "Saddam has WMD-biologicals, actually-and he will use them on your troops." - General Tommy Franks

"Saddam’s removal is necessary to eradicate the threat from his weapons of mass destruction." -Jack Straw

"Sabri said Saddam desperately wanted a bomb, but would need much more time than that. Sabri was more accurate. On the issue of chemical weapons, the CIA said Saddam had stockpiled as much as "500 metric tons of chemical warfare agents" and had "renewed" production of deadly agents. Sabri said Iraq had stockpiled weapons and had "poison gas" left over from the first Gulf War. Both Sabri and the agency were wrong." -Naji Sabri

"As a member of the House Intelligence Committee, I am keenly aware that the proliferation of chemical and biological weapons is an issue of grave importance to all nations. Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process.” - Nancy Pelosi

"Mark my words, Saddam will develop weapons of mass destruction. He will deploy them, and he will use them." - Bill Clinton

"He will rebuild his arsenal of weapons of mass destruction, and some day, some way, I am certain he will use that arsenal again, as he has 10 times since 1983." - Sandy Berger

"Mr. President if we had a human source who had told us directly that bin Laden was living in that compound, I still wouldn’t be above 60 percent. And I’m telling you, the case for W.M.D. wasn’t just stronger—it was much stronger.” - Mike Morell

“In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including Al Qaeda members, though there is apparently no evidence of his involvement in the terrible events of September 11, 2001. It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons. Should he succeed in that endeavor, he could alter the political and security landscape of the Middle East, which as we know all too well affects American security.” - Hilary Clinton

"Mr. Speaker, the front page of The Washington Post today reported that all relevant U.S. intelligence agencies now say, despite what we have heard from the White House, that "Saddam Hussein is unlikely to initiate a chemical or biological attack against the United States." Even more importantly, our intelligence agencies say that should Saddam conclude that a U.S.-led attack could no longer be deterred, he might at that point launch a chemical or biological counterattack. In other words, there is more danger of an attack on the United States if we launch a precipitous invasion." - Bernie Sanders

And so forth...

No worries, I'm sure in a few years y'all will be rejecting Trump thanks to the media drowning out all other voices to the contrary...

Nancy Pelosi, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders... truly, statements from individuals blessed with outstanding moral fiber such as them are the best corroborating evidence. After all; not one has ever been know to lie when it suits their purposes.

Look, I get that saying what I did about Bush was never going to go over well on a forum that leans right (admit it, it does), but could we please refrain from making attacks on my character, implying that I'm some sort of fool who believes whatever the Mainstream News Media tells me? Because I thought I'd made it rather clear elsewhere on this forum that I don't.

 

[LTR]

Nancy Pelosi, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders... truly, statements from individuals blessed with outstanding moral fiber such as them are the best corroborating evidence. After all; not one has ever been know to lie when it suits their purposes.

So your counter-argument to sixteen different statements is that they were all lying about WMD's without any underlying reason by pointing out four of them are politicians?

Look, I get that saying what I did about Bush was never going to go over well on a forum that leans right (admit it, it does),

Stop being a victim. If you don't want anyone to disagree with you, then don't post your opinions. Don't try and preface your arguments by stating "I get that saying what I did was never going to go over well" like your this forums Patrick Henry. That's like Bush League (pardon my pun) era internet debating.

Whining about this forums political bias is hilarious considering the huuuuuuge gulf between Trump's brand of right wing politics and Bush's era of Neoconservatism is yuuuuuuuge and we live in an era of Never Trumpers and liberals fawning over Bush and people on here comparing George W. Bush to Vlad the Impaler (which is awesome btw).

but could we please refrain from making attacks on my character, implying that I'm some sort of fool who believes whatever the Mainstream News Media tells me? Because I thought I'd made it rather clear elsewhere on this forum that I don't.

It's not an attack on your character. It's just pointing out how obviously people seem to trend to just be populist lemmings. The whole 'Bush Lied' thing is literally a manufactured story which has become gospel because the mainstream media repeated it enough and everyone ate it up.

 

[Terthna]

So your counter-argument to sixteen different statements is that they were all lying about WMD's without any underlying reason by pointing out four of them are politicians?

Your argument was essentially that they said they didn't lie, therefore they didn't lie. The fact that you quoted those particular individuals, people you yourself have called liars, and expected me to take them at their word? I'm sorry, but not only is that hypocritical on your part, it's also asinine reasoning on the face of it. If I believe that they're lying, in what world does it make sense for me to accept their assertions that they did not, in fact, lie?

It's not an attack on your character. It's just pointing out how obviously people seem to trend to just be populist lemmings. The whole 'Bush Lied' thing is literally a manufactured story which has become gospel because the mainstream media repeated it enough and everyone ate it up.

Are you sure about that? Because it seems you're begging the question and asserting that everyone who thinks Bush lied are all "populist lemmings".

 

[LifeisTiresome]

Guys, does it matter whether Saddam has WMD's or not? Even if he had them, he did nothing with them cause he cared about staying in power not launching WMD's for the sake of launching WMD's and learned the hard way, that foreign adventures were not allowed.

What I feel matters is that the Iraq war is a mess that should never have happened.

 

[Husky_Khan]

Guys, does it matter whether Saddam has WMD's or not? Even if he had them, he did nothing with them cause he cared about staying in power not launching WMD's for the sake of launching WMD's and learned the hard way, that foreign adventures were not allowed.

What I feel matters is that the Iraq war is a mess that should never have happened.

Actually what matters in regards to this thread is whether Bush perpetuated (one of) the Greatest Lie in all of Political History.

Whether the Iraq War was justified or not in regards to WMD intelligence being accurate or not is a separate issue beyond this thread.

 

[Terthna]

So your counter-argument to sixteen different statements is that they were all lying about WMD's without any underlying reason by pointing out four of them are politicians?



Stop being a victim. If you don't want anyone to disagree with you, then don't post your opinions. Don't try and preface your arguments by stating "I get that saying what I did was never going to go over well" like your this forums Patrick Henry. That's like Bush League (pardon my pun) era internet debating.

Whining about this forums political bias is hilarious considering the huuuuuuge gulf between Trump's brand of right wing politics and Bush's era of Neoconservatism is yuuuuuuuge and we live in an era of Never Trumpers and liberals fawning over Bush and people on here comparing George W. Bush to Vlad the Impaler (which is awesome btw).



It's not an attack on your character. It's just pointing out how obviously people seem to trend to just be populist lemmings. The whole 'Bush Lied' thing is literally a manufactured story which has become gospel because the mainstream media repeated it enough and everyone ate it up.

Could you ignore my last reply? I was clearly getting defensive and lashing out, and I'd like to try again with a cooler head.

I don't actually know if Bush lied or not for certain; all I have to support that claim is examples where he and his administrating made contradictory statements, which could have just as easily been due to incompetence as opposed to a deliberate attempt at subterfuge.

Some examples of which, quoted from a 2008 article from The Center for Public Integrity (which, fair warning, does lean to the left, and more recently suffers from TDS), are as follows:

On August 26, 2002, in an address to the national convention of the Veteran of Foreign Wars, Cheney flatly declared: “Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us.” In fact, former CIA Director George Tenet later recalled, Cheney’s assertions went well beyond his agency’s assessments at the time. Another CIA official, referring to the same speech, told journalist Ron Suskind, “Our reaction was, ‘Where is he getting this stuff from?’ “​

​

In the closing days of September 2002, with a congressional vote fast approaching on authorizing the use of military force in Iraq, Bush told the nation in his weekly radio address: “The Iraqi regime possesses biological and chemical weapons, is rebuilding the facilities to make more and, according to the British government, could launch a biological or chemical attack in as little as 45 minutes after the order is given. . . . This regime is seeking a nuclear bomb, and with fissile material could build one within a year.” A few days later, similar findings were also included in a much-hurried National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction — an analysis that hadn’t been done in years, as the intelligence community had deemed it unnecessary and the White House hadn’t requested it.​

​

In July 2002, Rumsfeld had a one-word answer for reporters who asked whether Iraq had relationships with Al Qaeda terrorists: “Sure.” In fact, an assessment issued that same month by the Defense Intelligence Agency (and confirmed weeks later by CIA Director Tenet) found an absence of “compelling evidence demonstrating direct cooperation between the government of Iraq and Al Qaeda.” What’s more, an earlier DIA assessment said that “the nature of the regime’s relationship with Al Qaeda is unclear.”​

 

[LordsFire]

Could you ignore my last reply? I was clearly getting defensive and lashing out, and I'd like to try again with a cooler head.

I don't actually know if Bush lied or not for certain; all I have to support that claim is examples where he and his administrating made contradictory statements, which could have just as easily been due to incompetence as opposed to a deliberate attempt at subterfuge.

Can you answer a very simple question:

What would Bush's motive for lying to the American people about all of this been?

 

[Lord Sovereign]

Munich, largely in ethos based on the belief of the self-determination of peoples, lead to the break-up of the Czechoslovak state. The result was a Czech rump that *could not* survive - strategically, economically - on its own. That is the fault of Munich: not realizing this effect. That can be laid at the feet of all the participants. Going by the knowledge that these people had at the time, it could not have been apparent that war became an inevitability. Especially because Germany's actions so far had been achieved peacefully. The Anschluss had been overwhelmingly welcomed by the Austrians. Sudetenland was decided peacefully via a treaty. It only all went off the rails when Germany unilaterally annexed the Czech rump rather than play smart for a diplomatic solution.

There is also the problem that the political elite of France and Britain simply did not understand Nazism. None of them had read Mein Kampf (I think Churchill might have, hence his shouting from the rooftops that appeasement was a bad idea) and thought Hitler was like them. Hence how he was able to run roughshod over them for quite a while.

One of the worst aspects of Munich is that if war had broken out in 1938, it would likely have gone very badly for the Germans. Can you imagine the Wehrmacht throwing Panzer Is, IIs, and IIIs at the Sudetenland defences, which would be garrisoned by a rather large Czech army? It could well have turned into Hitler's very own "Winter War" and bled him dry. But Chamberlain was a bumbling coward (Stanley Baldwin had started rearming for fuck's sake) so we'll never know. When even Clement Attlee's Labour are going nuts over what you've done and will thus only work with war hawk Churchill, you know you screwed up.

 

[PsihoKekec]

A few years later the Syrian leader is in trouble for gassing his own people and we aren't finding the amount of wmds we expected in Iraq. Hmmm..

Syria had it's own WMD program.

I still remember the news covering the countdown to invasion and talking about the huge heavily guarded convoys going to Syria.

Funny how there were no satellite or aerial pictures of said convoys.

The fact is that Iraq did indeed dispose of it's WMDs and in a rather crude way, burning the component chemicals in improvised fire pits, poisoning the water table in much of the Southern Iraq for years, blaming the consequences on UN sanctions. They did run deception propaganda to convince the Iran they still had the capabilities, as they feared Iranian invasion. The CIA and State Department knew this was false, but since they couldn't tie Saddam to 9/11 and had to go to Afganistan instead of Iraq in 2001, so they came up with propaganda campaign about fairy tale WMD that Saddam could use against Europe and USA in 24 hours. The campaign was full of idiocies, like claim that Iraq bought thousands of Playstations 2 to build a supercomputer to build a more powerful WMDs, with general public eating up the bullshit, because post 9/11 fear was still strong.

I still remember channel flipping through TV on some boring day and suddenly I was like ''Wait was that Tony Blair on MTV?'' Went back a few channels and yes, there was Tony Blair with his treadmark fake smile on MTV explaining to the crowd of 18-20 years olds in the studio why they need to liberate the shit out of Iraq. And then one guy in the crowd introduces himself as Iraq and thanks because he will liberate the shit out of his homeland.

The entire propaganda campaign was fake and cringey, but they pushed it through, so they could do their Middle East reshaping.

 

[Zachowon]

How about that time Obama said “There is no spying on Americans, we don’t have a domestic spying program” on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno? Mind you, this was right after the Snowden leaks.

Except he is right in that regard and there is more about what happend with Snowden then the US Government is going to say because we arnt stupid enough to both give away how and what we do, plus there are Open source documents that go even more in depth about what they are legally allowed to do. Look them up.

I'll be honest, I don't get why chemical weapons count as WMD's. I'm happy they aren't used, but they really are missing the mass descruction potential. I mean, carpet bombing does similar levels of damage.

They can cause death on a mass level, which is what WMDs are known to cause.

 

[Terthna]

Except he is right in that regard and there is more about what happend with Snowden then the US Government is going to say because we arnt stupid enough to both give away how and what we do, plus there are Open source documents that go even more in depth about what they are legally allowed to do. Look them up.

I'm not going to get into another defensive argument, especially considering we've already done this particular song and dance before; but suffice to say I don't believe that, and you're not going to give me what I need to make me believe it.

 

[Zachowon]

I'm not going to get into another defensive argument, especially considering we've already done this particular song and dance before; but suffice to say I don't believe that, and you're not going to give me what I need to make me believe it.

BECAUSE I LEGALLY CANT! That is the whole point. You may get to find out in about 30 years when methods change...hopefully. or when or of he is ever brought back to the States and tried...

 

[Terthna]

BECAUSE I LEGALLY CANT! That is the whole point. You may get to find out in about 30 years when methods change...hopefully. or when or of he is ever brought back to the States and tried...

I understand that and, for what it's worth, despite my desire to stick to my established position on the subject, I accept that the possibility I'm wrong and you're right exists. Perhaps I will find out that's the case in 30 years; but until then, with what I have to work with, I just don't believe that's the case.

I've been an asshole to you before though, when discussing this topic, so I'd like to take this opportunity to apologize for that; I said some things I should not have said, things you didn't deserve to hear and that really have no place in any discussion. I'll try to be less defensive, and more understanding of the fact that not everyone shares my perspective on various issues.

Can you answer a very simple question:

What would Bush's motive for lying to the American people about all of this been?

The war with Iraq itself. As for why, I've heard any number of potential reasons; getting to finish what his daddy started, making a lot of money via the military industrial complex, sending a message to other antagonistic nations that America isn't some pushover, the list goes on and on.

 

[Zachowon]

I understand that and, for what it's worth, despite my desire to stick to my established position on the subject, I accept that the possibility I'm wrong and you're right exists. Perhaps I will find out that's the case in 30 years; but until then, with what I have to work with, I just don't believe that's the case.

I've been an asshole to you before though, when discussing this topic, so I'd like to take this opportunity to apologize for that; I said some things I should not have said, things you didn't deserve to hear and that really have no place in any discussion. I'll try to be less defensive, and more understanding of the fact that not everyone shares my perspective on various issues.




The war with Iraq itself. As for why, I've heard any number of potential reasons; getting to finish what his daddy started, making a lot of money via the military industrial complex, sending a message to other antagonistic nations that America isn't some pushover, the list goes on and on.

I can understand, and there being things we hide from people like you can make it seem like leaks from Snowden and the like make It seem like we are doing horrible things and breaking the law. You can feel strongly in what you see and think and it is possible for that to be a reason to not trust the government.

Also the war in Iraq was kinda...pointless once we got rid of Saddam. We should have left right after and then only return to deal with ISIS and then leave once again.