Possible source of the quotelist

[0rganism]

This guy has a copyright tag on the page, so it might be his creation. I will keep looking, tho -- he may not be the quoteminer.

http://www.palletmastersworkshop.com/tongues.html
"~ © 2003 - David L Griffith ~"

[DoctorMyEyes]

1. huh?

what am I missing?

(btw -the ellipses are usually dead giveaways. Find the original quotes, the missing words may change the entire context.)

Repugs are tricky with that. They cut and paste a sentence together until it fits their agenda. They also often resort to people quoting other people.

For instance:

Bush claimed that "Iraq is a great and gathering threat".

Repug version: "Iraq is a great and gathering threat" - Doctormyeyes, December 24, 2003

[0rganism]

2. By the way, here is my reply to the spam -- it's been frequent here lately

From a previous locked thread at
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=955796

First of all, what we have here is a list of out-of-context quotations from various Dems, with respect to Saddam's alleged stockpiles of WMDs. For the moment, let's assume that ALL the statements are quoted exactly, without doctoring or invention. The premise here is that if the Democrats can be shown to have concerns about the WMDs, then bush's actions are supposedly exonerated.

The important attack occurs here:
> How can we say that Bush* lied?

Very simply: he lied. Not only did he lie to the American people in his SOTU speech, he and/or his cabinet members lied to the UN, and to congressional intelligence committees. In fact, those lies account for some of the quotations cited starting about halfway down the list.

As for the pre-2000 comments by Mr. Clinton, we absolutely have to consider
(1) methodology for resolution, and
(2) circumstance of allegation

For example,
> "One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity
> to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver
> them. That is our bottom line." President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998.

What method did Bill Clinton use? Full scale invasion? No. He relied on the UN inspectors, an embargo (which was itself questionable), and occasional "surgical strikes" (also questionable). But NEVER did he risk the regional instability and loss of life that the invasion has caused.

> "If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is
> clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's
> weapons of mass destruction program." President Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998.

Very Clintonian. However, the premise of this statement is, "if Saddam rejects peace." There is no indication that he did so, after 1992. Furthermore, Clinton refers to a "program", not a stockpile. Keep in mind that inspectors were in Iraq until the USA opted to remove them in 1998. Saddam did not kick out the inspecetors, as has been all-too-often bandied about.

> "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." Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998.

Indeed, Nancy is right on the money. However, whether those weapons technologies were successfully developed, or ever constituted a serious threat to the United States, is now a resolved question: no, and no. She is correct in stating that the Iraqis were not completely cooperative with the UN weapons inspectors, but THEY WERE NOT EXPECTED TO BE. It is the job of the inspectors to get around those inconveniences.

As for everything south of the letter Bob Graham signed, excepting the comments by Al Gore, we can safely presume that it occurs in the scope of the defective intelligence briefings the bush administration fed to congress for over a year prior to the invasion. Why? There WERE no such weapons found. Supposed stockpiles of potential chemical and biological weapons turn out not to be. Scott Ritter, for all his personal flaws, was apparently correct in his assessment.

We are left with a question, tho, and it is IMHO a reasonable one. Why, if Saddam's regime HAD disarmed, did they continue to give the impression of non-compliance? My hypothesis is twofold: such an impression was a useful deterrent to invasion, and gave them additional power and prestige in the region. I happen to think the USA invaded precisely because we had reliable intelligence that any WMDs were not in a position to be deployed. Would we really have risked the potential bloodbath -- tens of thousands of American troop casualties, not to mention the potential civilian casualties in Kuwait -- had such weapons been high-probability? No, that would have been insane.

Iraq was invaded precisely because their deterrent bluff failed. Furthermore, in order to justify the war, congresspeople were led to believe that the WMDs existed by deception. And THAT is your answer.