We appear to have a disagreement here. I'm willing to accept that some illegal votes will be cast in exchange for minimizing the number of legit voters denied the vote. You appear to be willing to accept that some legit voters will be denied the vote in exchange for minimizing the number of illegal votes.
The problem is that the US Commission on Civil Rights failed to find a single person who would testify that they were incorrectly denied the right to vote. They received testimony from several people who were incorrectly identified as potential ineligible voters, but everybody they heard from eventually was allowed to vote.
The Miami Herald, on the other hand, estimates that 5,600 convicted felons voted in the Florida 2000 election because counties completely scrapped the felon list.
Most importantly, your claim that the felon list was in any way just a suggestion is flat out 100% untrue. You can see the law for yourself at http://www.flsenate.gov/statutes/index.cfm?App_mod e=Display_Statute&URL=Ch0097/ch0097.htm which clearly states that the chief election officer is ordered to (11) Create and maintain a statewide voter registration database.
You are reading the wrong law. The administration of the statewide voter database is detailed in Chapter 98 of Florida Election laws, specifically 98.0977:
(d) When the supervisor of elections finds information through the database that suggests that a voter has been convicted of a felony and has not had his or her civil rights restored or has been adjudicated mentally incompetent and his or her mental capacity with respect to voting has not been restored, the supervisor of elections shall notify the voter by certified United States mail. The notification shall contain a statement as to the reason for the voter's potential ineligibility to be registered to vote and shall request information from the voter on forms provided by the supervisor of elections. As an alternative, the voter may attend a hearing at a time and place specified in the notice. If there is evidence that the notice was not received, notice must be given once by publication in a newspaper of general circulation in the county. The notice must plainly state that the voter is potentially ineligible to be registered to vote and must state a time and place for the person to appear before the supervisor of elections to show cause why his or her name should not be removed from the voter registration rolls. After reviewing the information provided by the voter, if the supervisor of elections determines that the voter is not eligible to vote under the laws of this state, the supervisor of elections shall notify the voter by certified United States mail that he or she has been found ineligible to be registered to vote in this state, shall state the reason for the ineligibility, and shall inform the voter that he or she has been removed from the voter registration rolls. The supervisor of elections shall remove from the voter registration rolls the name of any voter who fails either to respond within 30 days to the notice sent by certified mail or to attend the hearing.
(e) Upon hearing all evidence in a hearing, the supervisor of elections must determine whether there is sufficient evidence to strike the person's name from the registration books. If the supervisor determines that there is sufficient evidence, he or she must strike the name.
You will notice that the entire responsibility of verifying the names on the statewide list, notifying potential ineligible voters, and striking ineligible voters from the registration rolls is soley in the hands of the County Election supervisors. The State Department of Elections has no discretion in the matter beyond providing list of potential ineligible voters. The State doesn't even have any say in the appeals process -- it is handled by the county circuit court in a de novo trial goverened by the rules of that county.
Ah, yes, those spooooky felons trying to cast votes. The reason for the big crackdown? It turns out that felons cast about 100 votes in the 1997 Miami Mayoral election, out of a few hundred thousand cast.
Like it or not, felons who have not received clemancy are not allowed to vote in Florida. You cannot fault Florida election officials for trying to enforce a law that has been on the books for decades.
Ah, the "pass the buck" game. "We're going to make this list of tens of thousands of felons, and you have to guess which ones are actually felons!" Bullshit. If the state is going to spend 2.3 million dollars for a list that's 95% wrong, it is squarely the fault of the people who paid for that list. And if she tries to make a list for 2002, even when the FL legislature passed a law saying she couldn't, I imagine that's the fault of the Democrats, too?
Florida Election Laws clearly place the responsibility of maintaining county voter registration rolls on the county election officials. There was no legal way for Jeb Bush or Catherine Harris to remove registered voters from the rolls.
That's probably why you didn't have any references, just assertions.
The only "references" you provided were from Greg Palast, whose assertions were thoroughly debunked by the US Civil Commission on Civil Rights.
Twirlip-
I agree with your assessment on bin Laden, but what is your response to the CIA concluding that the bin Laden tapes were "likely" authentic, including the last tape that was released in April 2004 which mentioned the Madrid bombings? Why would the CIA say they were "likely" authentic despite all of the evidence that you presented?
What did Iraq have to do with 9/11? Attacking Iraq after 9/11 makes as much sense as the United States invading Brazil after Pearl Harbor. The two were not related at all, as numerous bipartisan investigations have confirmed. That lie, more than anything else, is why Bush adminstration is despised. We can not trust this administration with the power of war.
I know this requires critical thinking skills, but please try to keep up. Iraq didn't have anything to do with 9/11, and nobody from the Bush administration has made that claim. The claim that they did make, that is just as valid today as it was before we attacked Iraq, was that we could no longer allow potential threats to go unchecked. For 9 years, we allowed Al Qaeda to go unchecked and it came back and bit us on the ass. George W. Bush made the case that Saddam Hussein and Iraq posed a similar threat to us, and he vowed he would not allow these threats to go unchallenged.
Saddam's economy was in the tank. His infrastructure to reconsititue any weapons program was evicerated and atrophied to the point of being worthless. The bogus "intellegence" we were being fed about Iraq was coming from dubious sources. Furthermore, during the rush to war, the intellegence was not vetted. Instead it shoved directly to Doug Feith and the ominously named "Office of Special Plans". But it wasn't simply all the intellegence about Iraq. It was sifted first. Anything that supported a reason to invade, was good. Anything that didn't was disregarded.
This is just plain wrong. There is one group in the world that has people on the ground in Iraq now assessing the WMD capibilities Iraq had prior to March 2003. They have issued several reports that are publically available. It is obvious that you can't be bothered to read these reports because they say the exact opposite of what you are claiming here. Buy why let a little thing like facts get in the way of your uninformed rant?
The neocons would ask the CIA what they knew about Chalabi's claims. Not having many sources in Iraq, the CIA would ask the countries we formerly considered allies (i.e. Europe), if they could check in to it. The allies, not having sources in Iraq either, would ask each other what they knew. The allies would then tell each other that they too had heard these reports from secret sources too. Of course, their secret source was us. The nations-formerly-known-as-allies would then say "Yeah, we've heard these reports from secret sources too." Q.E.D.
Ohh. Looks like we have an expert on international intelligence here. Tell me, what spy agency are you in charge of?
Everybody, including UNSCOM headed by Hans Blix, declared Iraq in material breach of the chapter VII UN requirements. It wasn't some pipe dream by Chalabi and those evil "neocons". UNSCOM declared Iraq in material breach, and we have found overwhelming evidence proving UNSCOM was correct.
The irony is that since there were no weapons, and so Saddam was in complience afterall.
Again, the mere fact that you can make this claim despite the overwhelming evidence that we now have against Saddam shows your complete ignorance and blindness to this subject.
No. The consequence is losing all legitimacy.
See, this is the big difference between the right and the left today. You are worried about "legitimacy", while George Bush is worried about national security.
But, I'll let you in on a little secret. If you think we were "legitimate" before the Iraq war, you are a fool. For 13 years, we had proven to the world that we were anything but legitimate in our foreign relations. Saddam Hussein was in direct and open defiance to the US, the UN, and the world, and the only consequences he received were harsh words and new security council resolutions. He was writing a playbook for every despot in the world to defy the US. How is that "legitimate"? How does that do anything besides help those who wish to harm us?
Ok, searching done. Abu Wael wasn't senior, and al-Zarqawi was not then (and isn't now) a member of al-Quaida. Besides the fact that the CIA pegs him as outside of Iraq at that time.
Better search again. al-Zarqawi was a close associate of Bin Laden throughout the '90s, and the CIA has confirmed that he received surgery in a Baghdad hospital in the summer of 2002.
Note the irony that Clinton repeatedly ordered Osama's death, while one of Bush's first acts on taking office was to make nice with the Taliban.
Nope -- the 9/11 report cited at least 3 instances where Bin Ladens location was certain and Clinton had the opportunity to take him out, and in every instance he backed off for fear of collateral damage. (The 9/11 commission didn't fault him for this -- we were living in a different time when the nature of this threat was not fully appreciated)
Bush didn't claim that Iraq was a potential threat- he said it was an immediate threat, right now.
When is the better time to defend yourself? When your attacker is methodically assembling his gun and loading it with ammo, or when he has the barrel pointed at your head with his finger on the trigger and one in the chamber?
Note that by invading Iraq, and pulling away the troops hunting Al Quaida, he is allowing them to go unchecked again.
Not according to what the 9/11 commission found. They concluded that at least 75% of Al Qaeda is dead, and our constant pressure is making it very difficult for them to assemble with any kind of large scale organization.
Note that if you want to talk about threat potential, then Iran and North Korea dwarf anything Iraq had.
And there is still plenty of diplomacy to be tried with both North Korea and Iran. Neither of these countries is in direct defiance of 17 Chapter 7 UN resolutions.
Look, do you not REMEMBER that Bush asked the UN for a resolution authorizing the invasion of Iraq? It's baffling* how people can support Bush, yet refuse to even listen to his own words.
Wrong. We were not seeking a resolution authorizing the invasion of Iraq -- we already had 17 of those. We were seeking a resolution that would give our allies justification for themselves to enforce existing resolutions that were already on the books. It's baffling how people can ignore the 13 years of history preceeding the war in Iraq.
Here's one lie: "The Iraqi regime has acquired and tested the means to deliver weapons of mass destruction"
No lie there. Since the March 2003 invasion we have uncovered Iraqi plans to aquire the 1300km range No Dong missile from North Korea, and have uncovered stocks of SCUD missile propellant. Both of these delivery systems were capable of delivering WMD and were prohibited by the UN.
Here's another: "We also know that Iraq is harboring a terrorist network, headed by a senior al Qaeda terrorist planner."
No lie there. Do a google search on Abu Wa'el and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi if you don't believe me.
That's how GWB made his case for war. Bush didn't focus on the minutiae of UN resolutions- he made a bigger, bolder case. So when I choose to judge him by the position he took, you can't fall back on a little detail which by itself would never have justified the expensive occupation.
Bush's case for the war was that we could not allow potential threats to go unchecked, as we did with Al Qaeda all those years. Saddam Hussein, with his weapons of mass destruction and ties to international terrorism, was a direct threat to us. So far this case has not been disproven nor discredited.
I love that! Made their word strong by going against their specific directions! "Vigilantism" is the most generous way to describe it.
Bzzzt. Their specific directions were clearly laid out in resolution #687 (and 16 subsequent resolutions) which gave full authority to make Iraq comply by using military force. For 13 years that really didn't mean anything until we came along and proved to every tyrannical leader in the world that defiance to UN resolutions is not going to get you empty, harsh words and a corrupt oil for food program to build your palaces with.
Guess what? The UN has no executive branch. They are a bunch of old guys sitting in New York with headphones on. Enforcement of the UN resolutions is the duty of the member states. If the matter falls under the 7th chapter of the UN charter (as all 17 resolutions against Iraq were), member states are required to enforce them.
The US, UK, Spain, Australia, Hungary, and many other member states made the UN word strong by enforcing resolutions that had been on the books for 13 years.
Of course, I expected the same response from you, because I explained it all to you 2 years ago.
Well, you were dead wrong 2 years ago, just as you are dead wrong now.
GWB has passed no legislation domestically to follow-through on his campaign promises of the last election,
Lets see what his 2000 promises were:
1) Tax cuts. Got those passed 5 months into office, and got a second round passed 2 years later. 2) Education reform. Signed NCLB less than 2 years into office with wide bipartisan support (in fact, most of it was written by Democrats). 3) Prescription Drug Benefit. Passed this 3 years into office, and benefits take effect early next year. 4) Social Security Reform. Didn't get his inititive passed that would allow a portion of our SS benefits to be invested in the private sector.
So, 3/4 aint bad, especially considering the minor event that took place less than 8 months into his presidency that kinda shifted the focus off domestic policy.
Well, Saddam was in cahoots with Al Qaeda. There are extensive Iraq/Al Qaeda ties dating back to 1998 when Saddam offered political asylum to Bin Laden.
And before you make any claims about WMD, I suggest you read the reports from the Iraqi Survey Group (ISG). They are the only team in the world in Iraq looking for WMD (besides the terrorists), and they provide explicit details of what they have found. (Here is a teaser: They have found a lot more than a defective Sarin IED)
until you realize that the brother of the other candidate is governor
Well, the Governor does not supervise elections. County election officials do. And the county election officials in the three counties in question were all democrats.
not to mention Black voters illegally and unjustly barred to vote "by mistake".
You mean all 4 of them that the US Civil Rights Commission could find to testify? Oh wait, 3 out of those 4 actually ended up voting.
I should also point out that white people were twice as likely to be incorrectly removed from the voter list than black people.
but total recount would, but was infeasible, so the candidate with the most votes actually lost the elections. Which is a prime example of excellent democracy for the world. Not.
You are also forgetting the estimated 5,600 convicted felons who illegally voted in the election because local county supervisors abandoned the felon scrub list altogether. With 80% of the convicted felon vote going to Gore, this represents 4,500 illegal votes for Gore counted in the 2000 Florida election.
Maybe thats because the Supreme Court has nothing to do with the electoral system.
NOTE: The only exception to the above statement is when your idiotic poltical candidate argues for selective recounts in the counties that he had the most support in. Then again, those selective recounts would not have gotten him enough votes to win anyways, so it is still a moot point.
Wrong. Between 1973 and 2002, the US accounted for less than 1% of all Iraqi arms imports. And the WMD that he did use wasn't from us, either. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute concluded that the weapons used were either from Japan or Germany:
The UN report provides only negative evidence of the origin of the mustard gas sample. The absence in the sample analysed in Sweden and Switzerland of polysulphides and of more than a trace of sulphur indicates that it is not of past US-government manufacture, for all US mustard was made by the Levinstein process from ethylene and mixed sulphur chlorides. That process is also said to have been the one used by the USSR. From similar reasoning, British-made mustard, too, can probably be ruled out, even though substantial stocks were once held at British depots in the Middle East. For more positive evidence other sources of information must be used. Over the years since the mid-1960s quite a lot of information has been published purporting to describe Iraqi chemical weapons, but much of it is contradictory and all of it is of a reliability which SIPRI is in no position to judge. A major caveat must be entered: chemical warfare is such an emotive subject that it lends itself very readily to campaigns of disinformation and black propaganda, campaigns which the politics both of the Gulf War and of the current chemical-weapons negotiations have unquestionably stimulated to no small degree.
What does the war in Iraq have to do with the "War on Terror"?
Well, considering that Iraq had been on the US State Department list of state sponsors of terrorism since 1979, I think the answer should be pretty clear to you.
Choice A) Experience inconvienence at the airport, including the slight possibility of being delayed getting on a flight. Sucks.
Choice B) Look out your office window and see a fuel-laden 767 coming towards you at 550MPH piloted by islamic terrorists praising Allah. Sucks even more.
VI. The Commission's Analysis of the Felon List is Misleading
The report asserts that the use of a convicted felons list "has a disparate impact on African Americans." "African Americans in Florida were more likely to find their names on the list than persons of other races." Of course, because a higher proportion of blacks have been convicted of felonies in Florida, as elsewhere in the nation. But there is no evidence that the state targeted blacks in a discriminatory manner in constructing a purge list, or that the state made less of an effort to notify listed African Americans and to correct errors than it did with whites. The Commission did not hear from a single witness who was actually prevented from voting as a result of being erroneously identified as a felon. Furthermore, whites were twice as likely as blacks to be placed on the list erroneously, not the other way around.
The compilation of the purge list was part of an anti-fraud measure enacted by the Florida legislature in the wake of a Miami mayoral election in which ineligible voters cast ballots. The list for the 2000 election was over-inclusive, and some supervisors made no use of it. (The majority report did not bother to ask how many counties relied upon it.) On the other hand, according to the Palm Beach Post, more than 6,500 ineligible felons voted.
Based on extensive research, the Miami Herald concluded that the biggest problem with the felon list was not that it wrongly prevented eligible voters from casting ballots, but that it ended up allowing ineligible voters to cast a ballot. The Commission should have looked into allegations of voter fraud, not only with respect to ineligible felons, but allegations involving fraudulent absentee ballots in nursing homes, unregistered voters, and so forth. Across the country in a variety of jurisdictions, serious questions about voter fraud have been raised....
The table reveals that 239 for the 4,678 African Americans on the Miami-Dade felons' list objected when they were notified that they were ineligible to vote and were cleared to participate. They represented 5.1 percent of the total number of blacks on the felons list. Of the 1,264 whites on the list, 125 proved to be there by mistake--which is 9.9 percent of the total. Thus, the error rate for whites was almost double that for blacks...
Most notably, the Commission did not hear from a single witness who was prevented from voting as a result of being erroneously identified as a felon. One witness did testify that he was erroneously removed from the voter list because he had been mistaken for another individual on the felon list whose name and birth date were practically identical to his. However, he was able to convince precinct officials that there had been a clerical error, and he was allowed to vote.
So, basically, the majority opinion of the USCCR study concluded that most of the people that were not allowed to vote were incorrectly included on the list even though they didn't receive testimony from a single person who fit this scenario. That sounds like some good investigative work.
How come US Civil Rights Comission couldn't find a single person that was incorrectly denied the right to vote? They found about 1,000 people who shouldn't have been on the list, but every one of those people ended up voting in the 2000 election.
Thats funny, because the public official who hired the contractor was Ethel Baxtor, and she is a Democrat. But let me guess, thats not kind of "regime change" you were talking about, is it?
So the systematic purging of likely Democratic voters from the 2000 Florida roles was an accident?
Nope, it was no accident. Florida State Law requires that convicted felons be purged from the voting rolls. This law dates back to 1836, so you can hardly blame it on those evil Republicans in Florida today.
I think you are forgetting a huge difference between Iraq and DPRK. Iraq and Saddam have used WMD in the past, while Kim Jong II has done nothing but wave his weapons around until somebody threw some humanitarian aid his way. It is clear from the past that North Koreas nuclear program was designed to gain diplomatic leaverage rather than physically intimidate anybody.
By the way, from your post, I can assume that if we launched an invasion against North Korea tomorrow, that you would be the first person to throw your support behing President Bush. Correct? Or are you just trying to find something to complain about this Administration?
how can you call it one of the most stunningly successful military campaigns ever when it isn't over yet?
You simply can't ignore the fact that we defeated and ran over the regions largest military force in a matter of weeks, and our enemy now has to resort to kidnapping random non-military foreigners to try and extort governments to withdraw their troops.
I would suspect that Iraq is going to be viewed by history as a pointless exercise that achieved nothing other then wasting American blood and prestige
There are 25,000,000 Iraqis that no longer live in fear of the government who disagree with you.
Slashdot Mirror
We appear to have a disagreement here. I'm willing to accept that some illegal votes will be cast in exchange for minimizing the number of legit voters denied the vote. You appear to be willing to accept that some legit voters will be denied the vote in exchange for minimizing the number of illegal votes.
The problem is that the US Commission on Civil Rights failed to find a single person who would testify that they were incorrectly denied the right to vote. They received testimony from several people who were incorrectly identified as potential ineligible voters, but everybody they heard from eventually was allowed to vote.
The Miami Herald, on the other hand, estimates that 5,600 convicted felons voted in the Florida 2000 election because counties completely scrapped the felon list.
Most importantly, your claim that the felon list was in any way just a suggestion is flat out 100% untrue. You can see the law for yourself at http://www.flsenate.gov/statutes/index.cfm?App_mod e=Display_Statute&URL=Ch0097/ch0097.htm which clearly states that the chief election officer is ordered to (11) Create and maintain a statewide voter registration database.
You are reading the wrong law. The administration of the statewide voter database is detailed in Chapter 98 of Florida Election laws, specifically 98.0977:
(d) When the supervisor of elections finds information through the database that suggests that a voter has been convicted of a felony and has not had his or her civil rights restored or has been adjudicated mentally incompetent and his or her mental capacity with respect to voting has not been restored, the supervisor of elections shall notify the voter by certified United States mail. The notification shall contain a statement as to the reason for the voter's potential ineligibility to be registered to vote and shall request information from the voter on forms provided by the supervisor of elections. As an alternative, the voter may attend a hearing at a time and place specified in the notice. If there is evidence that the notice was not received, notice must be given once by publication in a newspaper of general circulation in the county. The notice must plainly state that the voter is potentially ineligible to be registered to vote and must state a time and place for the person to appear before the supervisor of elections to show cause why his or her name should not be removed from the voter registration rolls. After reviewing the information provided by the voter, if the supervisor of elections determines that the voter is not eligible to vote under the laws of this state, the supervisor of elections shall notify the voter by certified United States mail that he or she has been found ineligible to be registered to vote in this state, shall state the reason for the ineligibility, and shall inform the voter that he or she has been removed from the voter registration rolls. The supervisor of elections shall remove from the voter registration rolls the name of any voter who fails either to respond within 30 days to the notice sent by certified mail or to attend the hearing. (e) Upon hearing all evidence in a hearing, the supervisor of elections must determine whether there is sufficient evidence to strike the person's name from the registration books. If the supervisor determines that there is sufficient evidence, he or she must strike the name.
You will notice that the entire responsibility of verifying the names on the statewide list, notifying potential ineligible voters, and striking ineligible voters from the registration rolls is soley in the hands of the County Election supervisors. The State Department of Elections has no discretion in the matter beyond providing list of potential ineligible voters. The State doesn't even have any say in the appeals process -- it is handled by the county circuit court in a de novo trial goverened by the rules of that county.
Ah, yes, those spooooky felons trying to cast votes. The reason for the big crackdown? It turns out that felons cast about 100 votes in the 1997 Miami Mayoral election, out of a few hundred thousand cast.
Like it or not, felons who have not received clemancy are not allowed to vote in Florida. You cannot fault Florida election officials for trying to enforce a law that has been on the books for decades.
Ah, the "pass the buck" game. "We're going to make this list of tens of thousands of felons, and you have to guess which ones are actually felons!" Bullshit. If the state is going to spend 2.3 million dollars for a list that's 95% wrong, it is squarely the fault of the people who paid for that list. And if she tries to make a list for 2002, even when the FL legislature passed a law saying she couldn't, I imagine that's the fault of the Democrats, too?
Florida Election Laws clearly place the responsibility of maintaining county voter registration rolls on the county election officials. There was no legal way for Jeb Bush or Catherine Harris to remove registered voters from the rolls.
That's probably why you didn't have any references, just assertions.
The only "references" you provided were from Greg Palast, whose assertions were thoroughly debunked by the US Civil Commission on Civil Rights.
Twirlip- I agree with your assessment on bin Laden, but what is your response to the CIA concluding that the bin Laden tapes were "likely" authentic, including the last tape that was released in April 2004 which mentioned the Madrid bombings? Why would the CIA say they were "likely" authentic despite all of the evidence that you presented?
What did Iraq have to do with 9/11? Attacking Iraq after 9/11 makes as much sense as the United States invading Brazil after Pearl Harbor. The two were not related at all, as numerous bipartisan investigations have confirmed. That lie, more than anything else, is why Bush adminstration is despised. We can not trust this administration with the power of war.
I know this requires critical thinking skills, but please try to keep up. Iraq didn't have anything to do with 9/11, and nobody from the Bush administration has made that claim. The claim that they did make, that is just as valid today as it was before we attacked Iraq, was that we could no longer allow potential threats to go unchecked. For 9 years, we allowed Al Qaeda to go unchecked and it came back and bit us on the ass. George W. Bush made the case that Saddam Hussein and Iraq posed a similar threat to us, and he vowed he would not allow these threats to go unchallenged.
Saddam's economy was in the tank. His infrastructure to reconsititue any weapons program was evicerated and atrophied to the point of being worthless. The bogus "intellegence" we were being fed about Iraq was coming from dubious sources. Furthermore, during the rush to war, the intellegence was not vetted. Instead it shoved directly to Doug Feith and the ominously named "Office of Special Plans". But it wasn't simply all the intellegence about Iraq. It was sifted first. Anything that supported a reason to invade, was good. Anything that didn't was disregarded.
This is just plain wrong. There is one group in the world that has people on the ground in Iraq now assessing the WMD capibilities Iraq had prior to March 2003. They have issued several reports that are publically available. It is obvious that you can't be bothered to read these reports because they say the exact opposite of what you are claiming here. Buy why let a little thing like facts get in the way of your uninformed rant?
The neocons would ask the CIA what they knew about Chalabi's claims. Not having many sources in Iraq, the CIA would ask the countries we formerly considered allies (i.e. Europe), if they could check in to it. The allies, not having sources in Iraq either, would ask each other what they knew. The allies would then tell each other that they too had heard these reports from secret sources too. Of course, their secret source was us. The nations-formerly-known-as-allies would then say "Yeah, we've heard these reports from secret sources too." Q.E.D.
Ohh. Looks like we have an expert on international intelligence here. Tell me, what spy agency are you in charge of?
Everybody, including UNSCOM headed by Hans Blix, declared Iraq in material breach of the chapter VII UN requirements. It wasn't some pipe dream by Chalabi and those evil "neocons". UNSCOM declared Iraq in material breach, and we have found overwhelming evidence proving UNSCOM was correct.
The irony is that since there were no weapons, and so Saddam was in complience afterall.
Again, the mere fact that you can make this claim despite the overwhelming evidence that we now have against Saddam shows your complete ignorance and blindness to this subject.
No. The consequence is losing all legitimacy.
See, this is the big difference between the right and the left today. You are worried about "legitimacy", while George Bush is worried about national security.
But, I'll let you in on a little secret. If you think we were "legitimate" before the Iraq war, you are a fool. For 13 years, we had proven to the world that we were anything but legitimate in our foreign relations. Saddam Hussein was in direct and open defiance to the US, the UN, and the world, and the only consequences he received were harsh words and new security council resolutions. He was writing a playbook for every despot in the world to defy the US. How is that "legitimate"? How does that do anything besides help those who wish to harm us?
Ok, searching done. Abu Wael wasn't senior, and al-Zarqawi was not then (and isn't now) a member of al-Quaida. Besides the fact that the CIA pegs him as outside of Iraq at that time.
Better search again. al-Zarqawi was a close associate of Bin Laden throughout the '90s, and the CIA has confirmed that he received surgery in a Baghdad hospital in the summer of 2002.
Note the irony that Clinton repeatedly ordered Osama's death, while one of Bush's first acts on taking office was to make nice with the Taliban.
Nope -- the 9/11 report cited at least 3 instances where Bin Ladens location was certain and Clinton had the opportunity to take him out, and in every instance he backed off for fear of collateral damage. (The 9/11 commission didn't fault him for this -- we were living in a different time when the nature of this threat was not fully appreciated)
Bush didn't claim that Iraq was a potential threat- he said it was an immediate threat, right now.
When is the better time to defend yourself? When your attacker is methodically assembling his gun and loading it with ammo, or when he has the barrel pointed at your head with his finger on the trigger and one in the chamber?
Note that by invading Iraq, and pulling away the troops hunting Al Quaida, he is allowing them to go unchecked again.
Not according to what the 9/11 commission found. They concluded that at least 75% of Al Qaeda is dead, and our constant pressure is making it very difficult for them to assemble with any kind of large scale organization.
Note that if you want to talk about threat potential, then Iran and North Korea dwarf anything Iraq had.
And there is still plenty of diplomacy to be tried with both North Korea and Iran. Neither of these countries is in direct defiance of 17 Chapter 7 UN resolutions.
Look, do you not REMEMBER that Bush asked the UN for a resolution authorizing the invasion of Iraq? It's baffling* how people can support Bush, yet refuse to even listen to his own words.
Wrong. We were not seeking a resolution authorizing the invasion of Iraq -- we already had 17 of those. We were seeking a resolution that would give our allies justification for themselves to enforce existing resolutions that were already on the books. It's baffling how people can ignore the 13 years of history preceeding the war in Iraq.
Here's one lie: "The Iraqi regime has acquired and tested the means to deliver weapons of mass destruction"
No lie there. Since the March 2003 invasion we have uncovered Iraqi plans to aquire the 1300km range No Dong missile from North Korea, and have uncovered stocks of SCUD missile propellant. Both of these delivery systems were capable of delivering WMD and were prohibited by the UN.
Here's another: "We also know that Iraq is harboring a terrorist network, headed by a senior al Qaeda terrorist planner."
No lie there. Do a google search on Abu Wa'el and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi if you don't believe me.
That's how GWB made his case for war. Bush didn't focus on the minutiae of UN resolutions- he made a bigger, bolder case. So when I choose to judge him by the position he took, you can't fall back on a little detail which by itself would never have justified the expensive occupation.
Bush's case for the war was that we could not allow potential threats to go unchecked, as we did with Al Qaeda all those years. Saddam Hussein, with his weapons of mass destruction and ties to international terrorism, was a direct threat to us. So far this case has not been disproven nor discredited.
I love that! Made their word strong by going against their specific directions! "Vigilantism" is the most generous way to describe it.
Bzzzt. Their specific directions were clearly laid out in resolution #687 (and 16 subsequent resolutions) which gave full authority to make Iraq comply by using military force. For 13 years that really didn't mean anything until we came along and proved to every tyrannical leader in the world that defiance to UN resolutions is not going to get you empty, harsh words and a corrupt oil for food program to build your palaces with.
UN resolutions are for the UN to enforce.
Guess what? The UN has no executive branch. They are a bunch of old guys sitting in New York with headphones on. Enforcement of the UN resolutions is the duty of the member states. If the matter falls under the 7th chapter of the UN charter (as all 17 resolutions against Iraq were), member states are required to enforce them.
The US, UK, Spain, Australia, Hungary, and many other member states made the UN word strong by enforcing resolutions that had been on the books for 13 years.
Of course, I expected the same response from you, because I explained it all to you 2 years ago.
Well, you were dead wrong 2 years ago, just as you are dead wrong now.
GWB has passed no legislation domestically to follow-through on his campaign promises of the last election,
Lets see what his 2000 promises were:
1) Tax cuts. Got those passed 5 months into office, and got a second round passed 2 years later.
2) Education reform. Signed NCLB less than 2 years into office with wide bipartisan support (in fact, most of it was written by Democrats).
3) Prescription Drug Benefit. Passed this 3 years into office, and benefits take effect early next year.
4) Social Security Reform. Didn't get his inititive passed that would allow a portion of our SS benefits to be invested in the private sector.
So, 3/4 aint bad, especially considering the minor event that took place less than 8 months into his presidency that kinda shifted the focus off domestic policy.
Well, Saddam was in cahoots with Al Qaeda. There are extensive Iraq/Al Qaeda ties dating back to 1998 when Saddam offered political asylum to Bin Laden.
And before you make any claims about WMD, I suggest you read the reports from the Iraqi Survey Group (ISG). They are the only team in the world in Iraq looking for WMD (besides the terrorists), and they provide explicit details of what they have found. (Here is a teaser: They have found a lot more than a defective Sarin IED)
NEWSFLASH:
If you do not agree with something, it is not a "lie".
until you realize that the brother of the other candidate is governor
Well, the Governor does not supervise elections. County election officials do. And the county election officials in the three counties in question were all democrats.
not to mention Black voters illegally and unjustly barred to vote "by mistake".
You mean all 4 of them that the US Civil Rights Commission could find to testify? Oh wait, 3 out of those 4 actually ended up voting.
I should also point out that white people were twice as likely to be incorrectly removed from the voter list than black people.
but total recount would, but was infeasible, so the candidate with the most votes actually lost the elections. Which is a prime example of excellent democracy for the world. Not.
You are also forgetting the estimated 5,600 convicted felons who illegally voted in the election because local county supervisors abandoned the felon scrub list altogether. With 80% of the convicted felon vote going to Gore, this represents 4,500 illegal votes for Gore counted in the 2000 Florida election.
Maybe thats because the Supreme Court has nothing to do with the electoral system.
NOTE: The only exception to the above statement is when your idiotic poltical candidate argues for selective recounts in the counties that he had the most support in. Then again, those selective recounts would not have gotten him enough votes to win anyways, so it is still a moot point.
Unless, of course, you try to hold up a Anti-abortion sign. If you do that, a Kerry staffer will rip the sign from your arms and tear it to pieces.
Wrong. Between 1973 and 2002, the US accounted for less than 1% of all Iraqi arms imports. And the WMD that he did use wasn't from us, either. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute concluded that the weapons used were either from Japan or Germany:
The UN report provides only negative evidence of the origin of the mustard gas sample. The absence in the sample analysed in Sweden and Switzerland of polysulphides and of more than a trace of sulphur indicates that it is not of past US-government manufacture, for all US mustard was made by the Levinstein process from ethylene and mixed sulphur chlorides. That process is also said to have been the one used by the USSR. From similar reasoning, British-made mustard, too, can probably be ruled out, even though substantial stocks were once held at British depots in the Middle East. For more positive evidence other sources of information must be used. Over the years since the mid-1960s quite a lot of information has been published purporting to describe Iraqi chemical weapons, but much of it is contradictory and all of it is of a reliability which SIPRI is in no position to judge. A major caveat must be entered: chemical warfare is such an emotive subject that it lends itself very readily to campaigns of disinformation and black propaganda, campaigns which the politics both of the Gulf War and of the current chemical-weapons negotiations have unquestionably stimulated to no small degree.
What does the war in Iraq have to do with the "War on Terror"?
Well, considering that Iraq had been on the US State Department list of state sponsors of terrorism since 1979, I think the answer should be pretty clear to you.
Choice A) Experience inconvienence at the airport, including the slight possibility of being delayed getting on a flight. Sucks.
Choice B) Look out your office window and see a fuel-laden 767 coming towards you at 550MPH piloted by islamic terrorists praising Allah. Sucks even more.
How about:
Remember when a bunch of islamic bastards hijacked airplanes and flew them into buildings, killing 3,000 innocent Americans? That sucked.
- Workindev
they're this administration's accomplices in starting this illegal war and invasion of a sovereign country
Just because you do not agree with something does not make it "illegal".
Then allow me to quote from the Dissenting Statement from 2 commission members:
VI. The Commission's Analysis of the Felon List is Misleading The report asserts that the use of a convicted felons list "has a disparate impact on African Americans." "African Americans in Florida were more likely to find their names on the list than persons of other races." Of course, because a higher proportion of blacks have been convicted of felonies in Florida, as elsewhere in the nation. But there is no evidence that the state targeted blacks in a discriminatory manner in constructing a purge list, or that the state made less of an effort to notify listed African Americans and to correct errors than it did with whites. The Commission did not hear from a single witness who was actually prevented from voting as a result of being erroneously identified as a felon. Furthermore, whites were twice as likely as blacks to be placed on the list erroneously, not the other way around.
The compilation of the purge list was part of an anti-fraud measure enacted by the Florida legislature in the wake of a Miami mayoral election in which ineligible voters cast ballots. The list for the 2000 election was over-inclusive, and some supervisors made no use of it. (The majority report did not bother to ask how many counties relied upon it.) On the other hand, according to the Palm Beach Post, more than 6,500 ineligible felons voted.
Based on extensive research, the Miami Herald concluded that the biggest problem with the felon list was not that it wrongly prevented eligible voters from casting ballots, but that it ended up allowing ineligible voters to cast a ballot. The Commission should have looked into allegations of voter fraud, not only with respect to ineligible felons, but allegations involving fraudulent absentee ballots in nursing homes, unregistered voters, and so forth. Across the country in a variety of jurisdictions, serious questions about voter fraud have been raised....
The table reveals that 239 for the 4,678 African Americans on the Miami-Dade felons' list objected when they were notified that they were ineligible to vote and were cleared to participate. They represented 5.1 percent of the total number of blacks on the felons list. Of the 1,264 whites on the list, 125 proved to be there by mistake--which is 9.9 percent of the total. Thus, the error rate for whites was almost double that for blacks...
Most notably, the Commission did not hear from a single witness who was prevented from voting as a result of being erroneously identified as a felon. One witness did testify that he was erroneously removed from the voter list because he had been mistaken for another individual on the felon list whose name and birth date were practically identical to his. However, he was able to convince precinct officials that there had been a clerical error, and he was allowed to vote.
So, basically, the majority opinion of the USCCR study concluded that most of the people that were not allowed to vote were incorrectly included on the list even though they didn't receive testimony from a single person who fit this scenario. That sounds like some good investigative work.
How come US Civil Rights Comission couldn't find a single person that was incorrectly denied the right to vote? They found about 1,000 people who shouldn't have been on the list, but every one of those people ended up voting in the 2000 election.
Thats funny, because the public official who hired the contractor was Ethel Baxtor, and she is a Democrat. But let me guess, thats not kind of "regime change" you were talking about, is it?
So the systematic purging of likely Democratic voters from the 2000 Florida roles was an accident?
Nope, it was no accident. Florida State Law requires that convicted felons be purged from the voting rolls. This law dates back to 1836, so you can hardly blame it on those evil Republicans in Florida today.
I think you are forgetting a huge difference between Iraq and DPRK. Iraq and Saddam have used WMD in the past, while Kim Jong II has done nothing but wave his weapons around until somebody threw some humanitarian aid his way. It is clear from the past that North Koreas nuclear program was designed to gain diplomatic leaverage rather than physically intimidate anybody.
By the way, from your post, I can assume that if we launched an invasion against North Korea tomorrow, that you would be the first person to throw your support behing President Bush. Correct? Or are you just trying to find something to complain about this Administration?
how can you call it one of the most stunningly successful military campaigns ever when it isn't over yet?
You simply can't ignore the fact that we defeated and ran over the regions largest military force in a matter of weeks, and our enemy now has to resort to kidnapping random non-military foreigners to try and extort governments to withdraw their troops.
I would suspect that Iraq is going to be viewed by history as a pointless exercise that achieved nothing other then wasting American blood and prestige
There are 25,000,000 Iraqis that no longer live in fear of the government who disagree with you.