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Edited on Wed Nov-24-04 04:32 PM by Mabus
About a year ago I kept hearing that Dean was the first but the earliest reference I could find that Dean was anti-war was in Feb. 2003.
I'm really curious if anyone knows who said what when. Know what I mean?
on edit: oh man, Gore nailed it! He even talked about the politicals of it during the 2002 election cycle. That's one thing I've respected about Gore is that he was right both times on Iraq. He voted "yes" the first time and voiced his opposition the second.
From the speech (from your link):
I don't think we should allow anything to diminish our focus on the necessity for avenging the 3,000 Americans who were murdered and dismantling the network of terrorists that we know were responsible for it. The fact that we don't know where they are should not cause us to focus instead on some other enemy whose location may be easier to identify. We have other enemies, but we should focus first and foremost as our top priority on winning the war against terrorism.
Nevertheless, President Bush is telling us that America's most urgent requirement of the moment - right now - is not to redouble our efforts against Al Qaeda, not to stabilize the nation of Afghanistan after driving its host government from power, even as Al Qaeda members slip back across the border to set up in Afghanistan again; rather, he is telling us that our most urgent task right now is to shift our focus and concentrate on immediately launching a new war against Saddam Hussein. And the president is proclaiming a new, uniquely American right to preemptively attack whomsoever he may deem represents a potential future threat.
Moreover, President Bush is demanding in this high political season that Congress speedily affirm that he has the necessary authority to proceed immediately against Iraq and, for that matter, under the language of his resolution, against any other nation in the region, regardless of subsequent developments or emerging circumstances. Now, the timing of this sudden burst of urgency to immediately take up this new cause as America's new top priority, displacing our former top priority, the war against Osama Bin Laden, was explained innocently by the White House chief of staff in his now well-known statement that "From a marketing point of view, you don't introduce new products in August."
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