The Truth About 935 Bush Lies

Now you know, Bob, they'll say you're just a Commie Islamic sympathizer.

Bob, since these organizations are non-profits, where did the funds for this study come from? Bob, do you want to go on record that there were no comments about the danger of Hussein and AQ from the administration that proceeded Bushco? Bob, since you have been all over this story for 5 years now, what does this study reveal that hasn't already been talked about many times before? Isn't it about time to drive through life looking ahead instead of permanently gazing through the rear view mirror?

casualobserver, isn't that just a string of red-herrings? You attempt to malign the study by raising doubts about its funding, rather than questioning any of its concusions (the funding sources are HERE). You seem to be saying "what if Clinton lied too?" (so what!). You want us to just move on, rather than be "permanently gazing through the rear view mirror." Let me remind you that over 10,000 American soldiers won't be moving on and letting bygones be bygones. If they are dead or crippled because of lies told us by our government in the service of ideology, I for one want every sordid detail of their betrayal by BushCo exposed and yes, punished.

casual - Why didn't we do same thing during the Nixon and Clinton misdeeds, forgive and forget(?). If the 935 lies are correct, tell the thousands of dead Iraqis and US soldiers families not to look in any mirrors. Lies about Vietnam and Iraq can't be ignored.

A perfect example: (ht Crooks & Liars)

In ‘01, Cheney said this on MTP:

CHENEY: It‘s been pretty well confirmed that he did go to Prague and he did meet with a senior official of the Iraqi intelligence service in Czechoslovakia last April.

on 6/19/04 CNBC, he said:

GLORIA BORGER, TV SHOW HOST: You have said in the past that it was, quote, “pretty well confirmed.”
CHENEY: No, I never said that. BORGER: OK.
CHENEY: I never said that. BORGER: I think that is…
CHENEY: Absolutely not.

Video of both instances

So, please post (for the first time in 5 years of replaying the tape recorder) the evidence these are "lies".......and stick with the dictionary definition of the word. What I see is bad information, bad interpretation of information and bad judgements rendered off of unverified information.

Give me an example of contemporaneous "good information" that Bush had and how he lied about its existence.

If the left would stick with Bush was not competent in handling the matter as opposed to always feeling the need to overplay the hand, it would undoubtedly actually be more influential.........5 years later. (Have you convinced a majority of Americans after 5 years of trying?)

casualobserver - So, please post (for the first time in 5 years of replaying the tape recorder) the evidence these are "lies"

I just did. Replay the Cheney video and then explain how Cheney was telling the truth ".......and stick with the dictionary definition of the word."

Dick Cheney has proven time and time again that he has no respect for, or need of, the truth.

False statement =/= a lie. See Dave Schuler's excellent post on the subject.:

A lie has three components. First, the statement made must be untrue. Second, the person making the statement must know it is untrue. Third, there must be an intention to deceive.

By the standards of this report, almost everything the Clinton administration said about Iraqi WMD was false too, but the authors decided not to open that can of worms.

Fine, casual and Andy, let's open the records of both administrations and take a look at what information they had, which they have hid from us, and now we find, destroyed to prevent its disclosure. I believe this administration knew these statements to be untrue and made them with intent to deceive. It is our right (or at least the right of a court) to know what they knew to assess their guilt or innocence. And if they knowingly destroyed evidence of their crime, then prosecute them for that. I think you all know that if any of us falsely asserted that someone was a terrorist with means and intent to attack American civilians, we would be in deep trouble.

Doesn't matter what the Clinton admin said or didn't say about Iraq. He wasn't the one that started a war. War is the worst of all crimes, as it is comprised of every other crime and multiplied anywhere from hundread to millions of times. In any given war there will be rape, torture, murder, maiming, criminal negligence, robbery, mayhem, kidnapping, you name it. So before you engage in one you better make damn sure you're doing so because its necessary.

Bush did not do that. He failed in the single most important duty any head of state has, to prevent war if it is preventable. Everything else is secondary. I have my own doubts about Bush merely making a bad call. Among the mountain of evidence including the Downing street memo, it would seem that Bush was hellbent on going into Iraq for whatever reason he could dig up. It would also appear that he was willing to present as truth to the american people things he knew to be sketchy at best.

In short, casual, you would ask me to look to the future and in effect forget these facts. That a man put into motion the deaths of thousands and the misery of millions on a hunch. I will not do that and neither should you. It is the worst sort of incompetence when you frivolously spent the lives of others for your ends and don't even do your homework beforehand. I only wish there was some way the law could handle this and punish the president.

Doesn't matter what the Clinton admin said or didn't say about Iraq. He wasn't the one that started a war.

If you're going to use what an administration stated and claim that those statements were intentional lies to support the war, then yes, similar or equivalent statements by previous administrations do matter. The fact of the matter is that the US believed Iraq had WMD long before Bush ever got elected and the fact is that what the Bush administration claimed about chemical weapons was pretty much the same as what we believed in the 1990's. The false Bush-only claims that might constitute lying were limited to certain aspects of Iraq's biological and nuclear programs.

Fine, casual and Andy, let's open the records of both administrations and take a look at what information they had

Much of this information has been released or summarized in other forms. We actually have quite a good understanding now of what occurred.

OK, knock yourselves out guys. You hardly need to worry what I think anyway. However, Pelosi seems to be a more relevant problem.

I'm more concerned with actions and outcomes than words on this topic. Whatever the Clinton administration SAID, what they DID was a policy of containment that kept the peace and considering what we found after we invaded seemed to have been effective at keeping Saddam from creating nuclear weapons. The lies of the Bush administration wouldn't piss me off anywhere near as much if there wasn't a needless war going on because of them. I don't care if he got up and said "I've seen them, he has like 100 ready to shoot right now" as long as he didn't waste lives trying to back up those lies. Do you see the difference?

The weapons inspectors were in Iraq and painted a different picture than what this administration wanted to here. Clenis lobbed some cruise missiles and the Right screamed "wag the dog". If Clenis did listen to Kristol and Gingrich and go to war with Iraq during Monicagate, the CDS crowd would be more rabid and vocal than the current BDS crowd. A few Liberal site listed quotes from a good number of Repuglicans during Bosnia and Kosovo. The likes of Banjo Boy and Sanctorum didn't support ClenisinChief, and sounded like traitors.

Rudi, you're a capable historian. Quick, who were these "other Repuglican liars"?

"The debate over Iraq is not about politics. It is about national security. It should be clear that our national security requires Congress to send a clear message to Iraq and the world: America is united in its determination to eliminate forever the threat of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction."
-- October 10, 2002

"Iraq does pose a serious threat to the stability of the Persian Gulf and we should organize an international coalition to eliminate his access to weapons of mass destruction. Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to completely deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power."

"I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil." Henry Kissinger, Sunday Washington Post

Who cares what anyone in Congress had to say on the matter? None of them were anywhere near as informed as the President was. He's the one the intelligence agencies ultimately report to and take orders from.

Slamfu,

You're right to point out the resulting policy was different, but the issue here, from the title of this thread, is "lies." I suspect a good majority of those 935 or whatever "lies" were the same in content as Clinton administration statements. One wonders what difference now makes them lies as apposed to mere inaccuracies....

Still, your point is taken. The fact remains, however, that the sanctions regime and "containment" was collapsing and we now know that Saddam did not have weapons, but he certainly preserved his programs and had every intent of reconstitution them once sanctions were gone. And lets be honest, would the situation we have today be any different if weapons were found? The failed phase IV planning and incompetent post-war effort are independent of the causes or justifications for the war.

GreenDreams,

Everything we do in the middle east is ultimately rooted in oil, and with good reason. It's the world's and America's most important strategic resource. If the Gulf region had no oil then I suspect US policy there since the 1930's would resemble that of sub-saharan Africa. 1991 was a war for oil. Praying Mantis was a war for oil. Our very presence is about oil and it will remain so regardless of who occupies the White House. It is indeed sad that admitting it is so politically inconvenient.

Slamfu,

Who cares what anyone in Congress had to say on the matter? None of them were anywhere near as informed as the President was. He's the one the intelligence agencies ultimately report to and take orders from.

Well, here you're flat wrong. Let's leave aside for a minute that many in Congress did not even bother to read the intelligence reports on Iraq before voting - much less make any greater effort to inform themselves on the subject. The voted for war in willful ignorance and then have the temerity to complain they were "lied" to.

Congress matters because they are the "co-equal" body that authorizes war. If it's not Congress's business to make themselves informed then I might suggest they're not fulfilling their most important Constitutional duty. You don't care what Congress said? Incredible - there would be no war were it not for Congress. Whose fault is it that Congress failed in its responsibility? The answer is not the executive branch.

I meant what does a member of Congress know that a president doesn't? Congress authorized the war, they are very important in that regard. I meant its easy for a president to mislead Congress. He is the one that controls the CIA, the NSA, et al. They generate reports that can be skewed. And while I'm sure certain members of Congress can get detailed information, their abiltity to not only get information, but to shape how it comes from the intelligence organs of this country are no where in line with what a president can do if he wishes to.

Thats why people are calling Bush and his cabinet liars on this matter, not say, Trent Lott or Tom DeLay who also pushed for the war.

casualobserver said: "Quick, who were these "other Repuglican liars"?"

For starters let's name the perpetrators of the Iraq War: Elliott Abrams, Gary Bauer, William J. Bennett, Jeb Bush, Dick Cheney, Eliot A. Cohen, Midge Decter, Paula Dobriansky, Steve Forbes, Aaron Friedberg, Francis Fukuyama, Frank Gaffney, Fred C. Ikle, Donald Kagan, Zalmay Khalilzad, I. Lewis Libby, Norman Podhoretz, Dan Quayle, Peter W. Rodman, Stephen P. Rosen, Henry S. Rowen, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz.

Sounding familiar yet? They should, they are a virtual Who's Who of the Bush Administration and boys in the back rooms that have been running the show for the last 7 + years... They are also the signators of the "Statement of Principles" of the neo-cons aka The Project for a New American Century.

I meant its easy for a president to mislead Congress.

Only if Congress abdicates its duties - which it did. The executive also does not "control" the intelligence community as much as manage it. Despite many accusations there is very little evidence the intel community purposely lied at the behest of Administration with the possible exception of senior IC leaders like Tenet, which were Clinton appointees!

In any event, Congress controls the purse strings and Congress has powerful oversight authority should it choose to exercise it. Congress could have done any number of things to get more information prior to voting but opted not to - in fact they didn't even bother, in many cases, to read the intelligence that was there, much less question it. That's willful ignorance. If the Congress was trying to get at the truth before their vote and the Administration purposely misled them that's one thing, but in this case Congress itself did not even attempt to learn much on its own. Again, that is the fault of Congress, not the administration.

If I put a contract in front of you to sign and you sign it without reading it, whose fault is that? Mine or yours? The responsibility for making war lies with CONGRESS and the responsibility to ensure the war is just, honorable and based on sound reasoning belongs to CONGRESS. In this case they shirked their duty.

I'm no expert on contract law but I believe if you are blatantly misrepresenting facts then a signed contract is invalid. So it would be your fault. But I'll give you Congress should never have authorized Bush to go into Iraq. Everything you said about Congress, the willful ignorance, not doing the research, is dead on. The GOP controlled Congress wasn't going to put up much of a fight with Bush no though was it?

Any way you slice it though you will never convince me that the President doesn't have far and away the best access to information of any elected official in this country. There are several pieces of information stating that policy to invade Iraq were in the make long before it was brought to congress and that fact were being arranged around policy not the other way around. And only the president is in a position to make that happen. Bush's fault. The Dems should have grown a pair and fought as they could, but it wouldn't have changed anything except proving maybe a presidential candiadate other than Obama saw this coming.

Andy said: "Only if Congress abdicates its duties - which it did."

Yes, a REPUBLICAN congress gave W everything he wanted.

"The executive also does not "control" the intelligence community as much as manage it."

Boy have you been drinking the kool-aid or what!

Playing with what it's called doesn't change the facts. The Executive MANAGED to control the information that came from the intelligence community to Congress. The Republican controlled Congress controlled who and what were to be investigated and still there are those who want spread the responsibility for the Iraq fiasco equally on the Democrats and Republicans... The Congress and the Executive and that's just plain ridiculous which brings back to the original point of this thread... LIES.

Casual - You forgot some other key elements from the Edwards op-ed.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/news/...

It should be clear that our national security requires
Congress to send a clear message to Iraq and the world: America is
united in its determination to eliminate forever the threat of Iraq's
weapons of mass destruction.
Fast congressional action to reinforce our resolve is more imperative,
not less, in light of Saddam Hussein's recent overture to allow U.N.
inspectors back into Iraq.
...
The resolution should be strong and unambiguous. It should not be a
blank check for the administration, but neither should it try to
micromanage a war from Capitol Hill. It should spell out the broad
elements of a process that will preserve the legitimacy of American
actions, enhance international consensus and strengthen our global
leadership.
Here's what I believe the resolution should say. First and foremost,
it should clearly endorse the use of all necessary means to eliminate
the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction.
Second, the resolution should call for an effort to rally the
international community under a U.N. Security Council mandate. The
president's speech last week was an important first step, and his
belated diplomatic efforts have already borne fruit. At the same time,
we must not tie our own hands by requiring Security Council action.
Congress should authorize the United States to act with whatever
allies will join us if the Security Council is prevented from
supporting action to enforce the more than 16 resolutions against
Iraq.
Third, Congress should demand that the administration take real steps
to win the peace. The only chance for Iraq to become a democratic,
tolerant state -- and a model for the Arab world -- will be through
sustained American involvement. We will need to help provide security
inside Iraq after Hussein is gone, work with the various Iraqi
opposition groups, reassure Iraq's neighbors about its future
stability and support the Iraqi people as they rebuild their lives.
Congress also should consider authorizing funds now to support such
efforts, rather than waiting for events to force us to act with
emergency spending.

The inspectors were finding nothing. The Pentagons WMD experts found nothing. The UN didn't give Bush a mandate, he interpreted previous resolutions as a justification.

The GOP controlled Congress wasn't going to put up much of a fight with Bush no though was it?

Naturally. I'm a non partisan, or rather an anti-partisan, meaning I hate the two parties and the two-party system. Which brings me to my response to your quote:

What, exactly, has the dem controlled Congress done since they took control? That's right, not much. I see little difference between the two parties in this regard.

There are several pieces of information stating that policy to invade Iraq were in the make long before it was brought to congress and that fact were being arranged around policy not the other way around.

Yes, that was obvious even then. So, why did Congress roll over? That's the point.

As for contracts, it depends on jurisdiction, but if you sign you sign. There's a reason we used signed documents as binding agreements. If you don't bother to read what you're signing and sign anyway, how can that be anyone's fault but yours, no matter what was said to you? If verbal assurances trumped a signed contract then what is the point of signing a contract at all? Similarly, what matters in Congress is how they vote and it is the responsibility of Congress as a whole and individual Senators and Representatives to inform themselves before voting. Taking the executive's "word for it" on issues of war and peace is nothing short of abdication of Congress' most important duty.

SteveK,

Playing with what it's called doesn't change the facts.

Since I used to be a member of the so-called "intelligence community" I think I know a thing or two about this area. Congress has extensive oversight powers of the intelligence community including the power to summon officials to testifiy in open or closed session. Congress can order NIE's to be written - in fact the latest Iranian NIE was ordered by Congress. Added to that are several laws on the books that require Congress be informed in various situations among other things. Instead what did Congress do? In many cases they failed to even read the most fundamental reports prepared for it prior to voting. They could have called Tenet and other senior IC leaders to provided detailed justification for the 2002 NIE, but of course that's hard to do when so many in Congress didn't even read it to begin with.

there are those who want spread the responsibility for the Iraq fiasco equally on the Democrats and Republicans

One might suggest that anyone, regardless of party, who voted for the AUMF is responsible, but that position requires nuance which doesn't seem to fit well into simplistic "Bush lied, people died" memes - after all, 3 out of 2 Democratic Senators vote for war....

And this is not to excuse the GoP - far from it. As a group, they do deserve most of the blame for the war. Furthermore, it's my view that simple majority party control of the various committees and instruments of oversight is a bad thing.

Rudi,

It should not be a blank check for the administration, but neither should it try to micromanage a war from Capitol Hill.

That's a nice thing for Edwards to say, but the resolution was a blank check and legally authorized the war - the title of the resolution was, A joint resolution to authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against Iraq! Oh, and Edwards voted for it.

Yes Andy Edwards did vote Yea, and Voinovich and Hagel also voted Yea. But the two Republicans I just mentioned have changed their positions just like Edwards.

SteveK,

FWIW, I agree, Cheney lied.

I do find it to be curious, however, that the original charge that "...he (M. Atta) did go to Prague and he did meet with a senior official of the Iraqi intelligence service..." has never been refuted by the Czechoslovakian intelligence services, the organization that claims to have evidence of the meeting. Last that I read on this, they were still very adamant that this meeting had, in fact, happened.

Additionally, during the same week in June '04 that Cheney sat down with GloriaBolger, he told CNBC that ..."we've never been able to confirm or to knock it down" with regard to the Czech report.

What is the "truth"?

Here is one more ..
Clinton to Saddam: You cannot defy the will of the world