If Gore were president, wouldn't you want the IWR?

[carpetbagger]

The original intent of that resolution was to provide a viable threat to Hussein prior to inspections.

I bring this up because this topic seems to be relentlessly coming up in the context of a presidential race. That makes no sense. If Bush chose to, he could have used that resolution to put the inspectors in, keep the heat up, and in retrospect, a full-scale war would not probably have been necessary.

If we win this election, the only wars George Bush will be waging will be against mesquite and feral hogs on his ranch. So why is there so much interest in what people would or did do in the context of a warmonger in the White House? Shouldn't the focus be on what the candidate would have done differently, emphasizing what their vision looked like without the benefit retrospective sight (i.e., what they were saying over the winter)?

[WilliamPitt]

1. "he could have used that resolution to put the inspectors in"

Ah, but you miss the profound and far-reaching prognostication abilities of your fellow DUers, who knew exactly what was going to happen and would never have voted for a resolution like that, even after being told by the Director of the CIA that Iraq was getting uranium for a bomb, etc., etc.

Send Clark a thank you note. He just welcomed you to the biggest DU party of all.

[Cheswick2.0]

7. come on Will, what were all the calls and e-mails about?

What were the protests about? You joined in, why? Because we all, including you, knew exactly what bush is and what he would do with any power given to him.
Kerry knew too and if he didn't he isn't smart enough about people to be President.

[sandnsea]

15. You knew

That is such a crock. You didn't KNOW anything. You are not clairvoyant. You could have strong suspicions, but you couldn't have known. That's saying you can read the minds' of not only Bush, but Powell, Blair, Chretian, Chirac, Schroeder, Putin and everybody else. You couldn't possibly KNOW the intelligence these countries had or what proper diplomacy might have done to change their minds. You didn't know how this would all turn out, nobody possibly could have.

[Eloriel]

10. I never would have expected that from you

My God, man, you're the one who wrote the BOOK on the subject -- with Ritter.

C'mon. Nor was Ritter the only "evidence" that there was no "evidence" of WMDs. Is your memory that poor or your denial and pro-Kerry bias that strong?

Unbelievable.

And very, very sad.

Eloriel

[Mechatanketra]

21. One small problem, William ...

... is that the profound and far-reaching prognostication abilities of the DUers was, uh, right and the Director of the CIA was wrong. Iraq had no uranium, no WMDs, and posed no threat necessitating war.

Funny, that.

I mean, basically, by saying that, you're calling my senator (Dick Durbin) an idiot for not supporting the resolution ... even though as the hand played out, again, he was right.

Let's stop buying into the BULLSHIT. Al Gore wouldn't have needed an Iraq War Resolution, because he wouldn't have needed an Iraq war, because Iraq wasn't a threat. It was, in the words of another senator apparently less gullible than Kerry, a fraud made up in Texas. No Bush, no fraud, no relevance.

[Clete]

2. Other than the fact that Gore would have pursued

making peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians, I don't think Iraq would have been an issue except for the UN.

[Booberdawg]

5. I don't think 911 would have happened with Gore in office.

[Clete]

9. Me neither.

There were security measures in place and future plans for a homeland security, specifically the Hart/Rudman act, which *w blatantly disregarded when he took office.

[Booberdawg]

3. I agree

And I'd go further to say that the Democrats were SMART to vote for the resolution and remove it as an issue the pukes could use as a weapon against them. What some people still can't see or refuse to see is that bush* would have had his war with or without their votes.

It's politcs as usual. They don't call it the GAME of politics for nothin'.

[Cheswick2.0]

6. I disagree

tell me how Bush would have his war without those congressional votes.
specifics please, because I think you are fooling yourself into thinking bush is all powerful. He is not, Congress handed over their power to him.

[Clete]

11. I think he would have gone to war with or without

the resolution. I just think the Dems shouldn't have made it so easy for him to do so. Methinks some of them were only looking after their asses.

[fabius]

4. The wrong way to go to war.

We could have got inspectors back in anyhow, with a big show of force.

Presidents both Dem and Rep. need to stop starting wars without Congress. Congress has the Constitutional power to declare war, not the President.

In fact, this war was a perfect situation to ask for the formal Declaration of War. No big hurry, no emergency. Had plenty of potential support, at first. Could take time to examine the evidence. Lot of good reasons.

[FDRrocks]

8. No.

I wouldn't have wanted it at all. At the most, if Saddam was REALLY ammassing a threat to us (seems to me he was just waiting to die, preserving his position), UN talks could proceed. US backed UN sanctions crippled that country. And people like Kim Jong Il make that man look like "Hello Kitty". Although if Bush's infamous Axis of Evil wasn't put forth, North Korea might not feel the need to be on the defense. <--- That is what the policy of pre-emptive stikes really does. It causes any country that feels that they might be the next victim of US aggression to start ammassing really dangerous weapons.

[carpetbagger]

13. Kim makes Hussein look like "Hello Kitty". LOL.

I agree with your post, but I still liked what we were doing at the time we had inspectors in Iraq. I don't think that would have been possible without sabre-rattling.

I also think that a directed, credible threat of war for the sole purpose of countering nuclear threats, balanced by a policy of holding out an olive branch to our enemies who choose not to pursue that option, would have been, and may still be, a viable and fruitful course of action.

[sandnsea]

14. How to get rid of sanctions?

Since Saddam was not willing to fully cooperate, as stated by Hans Blix, then how do you lift sanctions for the benefit of the Iraqi's? Not to mention the anger of the rest of the ME at the sanctions and harm to the people. UN talks weren't working and weren't going to work. Saddam did not fully agree until after that resolution was passed. So how do you guarantee disarmament and lift sanctions without the IWR and threat of force?

And I can't think of a Democrat who supports the pre-emptive strike policy, Lieberman maybe, but the rest don't. For the exact reason you mentioned.

[FDRrocks]

16. It probably could be done.

I am part of 'the rabble'. I am not trained in foreign relations or economics in foreign countries, so I have no clue.

I do know the sanctions on Iraq served to hurt the people, and empower Saddam further.

I've seen statistics that Iraq had a higher standard of living than 80% of the ME, at the time we attacked them. I cannot readily source it, maybe someone can.

For now, I believe Iraq should've been left alone. If 9/11 happened under Gore, I would trust he would've spotted Saudi Arabia as the main conduit, and attacked, whether directly or complexly over a period of a time, that country.

[Devils Advocate NZ]

22. Actually, Hussein agreed to inspections a month before the resolution...

At that point, Bush started his ploy of saying the inspections wouldn't work and that Hussein would conceal all his weapons. It was Bush who tried to stop the inspectors from going in by adding additional conditions that were designed to provoke a denial from Hussein.

UNITED NATIONS (CNN) -- In a letter handed over to the United Nations on Monday, Iraq said it would allow the return of U.N. weapons inspectors "without conditions" to "remove any doubts Iraq still possesses weapons of mass destruction."

The White House was dismissive of Iraq's pledge: "We do not take what Saddam says at face value," said a Bush administration official, referring to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

<SNIP>

A second senior administration official noted various Iraqi violations of U.N. resolutions, including ones that deal with repression within Iraq and the failure to make reparations to Kuwait.

"If <Saddam> thinks this is about letting inspectors in, or playing the same old game of give a little when under pressure, he is about to learn differently," this official said.

Despite the White House's skepticism, U.N. officials hailed the move as a major step in the right direction.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/meast/09/16/iraq.un.letter/

As this article shows, a month before the congressional resolution Iraq agreed to the return of weapons inspectors without conditions. The Bush cabal IMMEDIATLY moved the goal posts - "If <Saddam> thinks this is about letting inspectors in, or playing the same old game of give a little when under pressure, he is about to learn differently"

The above article was from Sept 17th 2002. The next article is from Sept 20th 2002 - three days later:

The American Secretary of State, Colin Powell, has said the United States will find ways to stop weapons inspectors going back to Iraq unless there is a new United Nations Security Council resolution on the issue.

Addressing a Congressional committee, Mr Powell said the Security Council must spell out to Iraq the serious consequences if it fails to co-operate with the inspectors.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/americas/2269462.stm

So, it is clear that it was the US that was trying to prevent inspections BEFORE the congressional resolution, and thus the congressional resolution only allowed Bush to ignore the inspectors and not care whether they went in or not, because their findings could not prevent him from attacking.

To try and claim now that the congressional resolution that passed a month later had anything to do with getting inspectors in, or that Bush had any intention of letting the inspections do their job, is both factually incorrect, and extremely naive.

[IndianaGreen]

18. No, I wouldn't have wanted the Iraq war resolution

As a matter of fact, I would have expected a President Gore to end the sanctions against Iraq.

[sandnsea]

20. Then what?

You believe Saddam Hussein would have just settled into his old age and spread joy and happiness in the Middle East?

[sandnsea]

12. Gore wouldn't have done it like this

Gore would have had much discussion and much kicking and screaming BEFORE he ever mentioned the word war. And he likely would have said the sanctions cannot continue because of the harm to the Iraq people and the anger in the ME and therefore, something must be done to ensure Iraqi disarmament. He would have just approached the whole thing differently. Even if a war vote was required to get inspectors in, he also would have had more patience, made a sincere effort with the inspection process, respected the UN and Europe, and only went to war as a last resort. And he would have had a UN plan from the second a troop entered Iraq so we wouldn't be in the mess we are today. And there'd still be people protesting the war and calling Gore a PNAC traitor or some such. Some people really do believe the US always has devious motives.

The question really ought to be, was guaranteeing the disarmament of Iraq, in order to lift sanctions for the benefit of the Iraqi people, a legitimate reason to confront Saddam. If yes, then was the threat of force necessary? And again, if yes, was the vote wrong or was Bush wrong?

[genius]

17. They were gullible. Experiences like this wake people up.

They believed that someone who was in the White House would act responsibly. They were trained from the time they were children to trust the government. The programming going on in our schools is extreme. Kerry wasn't pro-war. He was wrong about trusting Bush.

Kucinich woke up a long time ago and that's why he's led the opposition to all of Bush's extreme moves. I think he will make a more enlightened President than the rest. But we need to stop going after the other guys just because they were wrong about trusting someone.

[moondust]

19. Hell no!

It's the wrong thing to want. Concentrating that much destructive power in so few hands is a bad idea. There always need to be checks and balances, a way out of a potential nightmare affecting millions.

No resolution was necessary to keep the heat on Saddam. He and everybody else knew the U.S. had plenty of military muscle to blow away what was left of his decrepit military forces.

[Old and In the Way]

23. Thoughtful post.

If a Democrat was in office, I doubt it would have reached the level of a vote on IWR. But, assuming the same neo-cons were screaming that we were minutes away from a nuclear meltdown, it's conceivable that a Democratic president might have gone to Congress asking for a resolution to strengthen the UN hand in dealing with Saddam. But I suspect that it would have been used to continue a strong inspection program. Of course, eventually everyone would have been satisfied that Saddam was denuked and without WMD. This might have weakened his political position sufficiently to reform and transition the government into a more democratic institution....ironically, Bush's actions may have destroyed this opportunity for generations.

But I also believe there could have been coarser, unspoken reason for the Democrats agreeing to back Bush. And I even think most knew that he'd start his war with their vote because that was apparent to almost all Americans reading this administration's body language.

Consider that 9/11 was only 12 months old...no investigation. Weapons grade anthrax from our military was sent to the media and Democratic leadership...perps not found. What if the Dems had voted against the war on a party line vote? Might this have been followed by another "AL-Qaeda" event on our soil? With our SCLM, wouldn't the Democrats have been instantly branded the Party of Terrorist Appeasers? Would there have been a party to even challenge Bush in 2004? Pragmatically speaking, I believe their vote may have saved the party and made it possible to continue the fight against this administration.