andymoon- I think you've missed that I'm trying to draw a hypothetical scenario with parallels to accusations of the administration exaggerating, misleading and/or lying that conservatives could relate to, to try and get them to talk about the real topic, the core issue at hand. If you have access to info, ignore some, erase some, exaggerate some, hype some, and then present it to the public with an agenda- is that lying? Misleading? What would you call it? How do you feel about it? Still waiting for any conservatives to weigh in. (anyone? basso?)
i understood what you were trying to do, which is why i avoided discussing it. the parallel is not exact. in the one instance, the journalists clearly have an agenda that is at odds with america's best interest, whereas those interest and the security of the country are upper most in the admin's mind. further, your "access to info, ignore some, erase some, exaggerate some, hype some, and then present it to the public with an agenda" angle misstates what the admin did. there may have been conflicting reports at various agencies, but did they all make their way to the WH? we don't know. and even if they did, what was the overwhelming consensus w/in the government, taking into account what the previous admin knew and what was believed by third party intelligence services. finally, Bush had to take all that info, some of which may have expressed doubts, and craft a policy taking into account other recent events, such as 9/11. to say they "ignored some and hyped other" info may be techincally true, but that in no way invalidates the decision to invade iraq. we won't be able to fully judge bush's actions for about 20 years. until then, it's in all our best interests to stop trying to tear down this administration, and help iraqi democracy succeed. it's a very liberal enterprise we've embarked on.
Thanks for replying, though you didn't want to. But you started the thread, after all. There's some hairs I could split here, but won't for the sake of clarity and brevity. I'll tell you what, though- I do actually agree with you that GW thought that he was doing the right thing. He probably also felt that his goal was so lofty that the ends justified the means, and sidestepping basic fundamentals of integrity was okay in this case. You're suggesting that the most powerful people in our government, and the world, didn't have access to all the information? Or that somehow all relevant info didn't get to them? There were a lot of dissenting voices, and more importantly, a lot conflicting evidence. A hell of a lot more than we knew at the time, but which is coming out now more and more. All that evidence was ignored and/or suppressed, and anyone who dared dissent was attacked as unpatriotic. That was wrong, and, ironically, unamerican. Well, we're making progress here. No way in hell you would have posted that a few weeks ago. A year ago you probably would have denounced me as an unpatriotic Saddam lover for even suggesting it. Color me confused. We were given a (very) incomplete picture for the justifications for war, but the war is still justified? You have to explain this more. Wrong- we won't be able to judge the success of Iraq's new democracy, and it's effect on the Middle East overall, for a decade or two; I agree with you there. But that's only two of the nine points in that Tribune article you posted above, proudly trumpeting "Bush lied...Not!" We're all still waiting to hear how you got that thread title from this article. Success on either Iraqi democracy and ME reform, or both, will earn GW much retroactive praise, even from me, though I will always hold him responsible for how he did it. Should it be any other way? But that leaves us seven other points, doesn't it? Four of those seven, even this right-wing biased article admits that evidence against going to war was suppressed and ignored, and evidence for it was hyped and exaggerated! But that's okay? We should just leave it alone? Until 20 years have passed, Bush is above reproach re: Iraq, and any criticism regarding the administrations' handling of the Iraq war is irrelevant, unallowed, and works against our efforts there (and by extension is unpatriotic and even traitorous.) This is a war. People are dying. It's not okay that we were presented a totally warped, manipulated, incomplete picture to justify going to war. It's not okay that we were mislead/lied to on something as important as this. This should and must be investigated now, not later.
We don't need 20 years to know Bush was wrong on everything he claimed to be fact. He is the Commander in Chief and the buck stops with him. This war and Bush's tactics have damaged the credibility of the United States to an incredible degree. Why you have such a problem holding Bush accountable for the war he pushed so hard for and turned out to be so incredibly wrong on is beyond rational explanation. He's not only been dead wrong on the case for war, he's also been horrid in the execution of the war. We've also had these complete embarrassments at Abu Garaib and we've actually had to have a discussion on whether the United States should tortue people with Bush only giving in when it was clear he'd lose a vote??? My god man. He's gambled far too much to gain what is very little as it pertains to the security of the United States. In the meantime, the lunatic running Iran is working towards a nuclear weapon and that is apparently not an exaggeration cooked up by one of Chalabi's "informants". If we are forced to attack Iran to prevent them from getting the bomb, what coalition will be left in the world to follow our lead in actually making the world safe from real WMD?
Questions have still gone unanswered here: If you manipulate information and present it to the public to acheive a particular agenda, is that lying? Why or why not? (good intentions doesn't serve as an answer to the question.) How does the above Tribune article prove that Bush didn't lie? If the war was sold on the following three points: 1) Saddam is a murderous tyrant 2) He has defied the UN 3) We should spread freedom by building democracy in Iraq Would the American public have approved it?
