There has been a flurry of commentary in the wake of the
R.M.S. Titanic Bush press conference today. And many have also commented about an exchange where Bush goes even further in stating that Iraq has nothing to do with 9/11 than he ever has (when will that ever sink into the craniums of the Bush-bot base who still believe that Iraq was involved in the WTC attacks?)... but I feel I must share my reaction, if for no other reason than a cathartic release so as to not shred the remains of relaxation I managed to stitch together in my vacation trip to San Francisco this past weekend to catch the
Gary Numan concert at
The Fillmore (which was a phenomenal show).
Follow me below the fold with my running talk-back to the Idiot-in-Chief.
From today's presser with the chimp in charge:
Q: A quick follow-up. A lot of the consequences you mention for pulling out seem like maybe they never would have been there if we hadn't gone in. How do you square all of that?
BUSH: I square it because imagine a world in which you had a Saddam Hussein who had the capacity to make a weapon of mass destruction,
But he didn't.
who was paying suiciders to kill innocent life,
You mean like the Saudi Royal family have been doing for decades?
who would -- who had relations with Zarqawi.
But he didn't.
Imagine what the world would be like with him in power.
You mean like when we were not at war and had a booming economy? Yes, I imagine what that world would be like often.
The idea is to try to help change the Middle East.
By killing tens of thousands of civilians.
Now, look, I -- part of the reason we went into Iraq was --
Is it "we" or "I" there? BTW, your Freudian slip is showing.
the main reason we went into Iraq at the time was we thought he had weapons of mass destruction.
Yes, after scouring our intel for the most dire "intelligence" (i.e. crack-pot shit sold by known fabricators) in order to scare the crap out of the public to support a war, by linking the threat of WMDs with what.. Oh yeah.. 9/11 which we will get to in a moment.
It turns out he didn't, but he had the capacity to make weapons of mass destruction.
But he didn't.
But I also talked about the human suffering in Iraq,
You mean that suffering which back then was less to the average Iraqi than what we have brought them?
and I also talked the need to advance a freedom agenda.
The freedom agendaTM...?
Does that begin with "We the people, in order to save the village, must kill the villagers"...?
And are those related to Freedom FriesTM?
And so my question -- my answer to your question is, is that imagine a world in which Saddam Hussein was there,
Peace and prosperity.
stirring up even more trouble
Even though your own Secretary of State at the time and your then NSC advisor said he wasn't and had no capacity to do so until you began to push for invading.
in a part of a world that had so much resentment and so much hatred that people came and killed 3,000 of our citizens.
Wait for it
You know, I've heard this theory about, you know, everything was just fine until we arrived and, you know, kind of -- the "stir up the hornet's nest" theory. It just doesn't hold water as far as I'm concerned. The terrorists attacked us and killed 3,000 of our citizens before we started the freedom agenda in the Middle East. They were --
Q: What did Iraq have to do with that?
BUSH: What did Iraq have to do with what?
Q: The attack on the World Trade Center.
BUSH: Nothing, except for it's part of -- and nobody's ever suggested in this administration that Saddam Hussein ordered the attack. Iraq was a -- Iraq -- the lesson of September the 11th is take threats before they fully materialize, Ken.
Did he just say what I think he said?
Nobody's ever suggested that the attacks of September the 11th were ordered by Iraq.
Oh really?
So we invaded Iraq to take out a threat that didn't exist, before it could materialize because Iraq which had nothing to do with killing any Americans, had to be taken out because terrorists that had nothing to do with Iraq killed Americans. Can someone show me where this Möbius strip ends? I want to get off now.
I have suggested, however, that resentment and the lack of hope create the breeding grounds for terrorists who are willing to use suicides to kill to achieve an objective.
Which has nothing to do with Iraq prior to our invading, though somehow I don't think an invading army that is getting tens of thousands of civilians in Iraq killed, like say your parents, your kids, your neighbors, is what I would call "eliminating resentment" and providing hope to people. Somehow turning your neighborhood into Thunderdome and making your life worse than it was under Saddam isn't going to achieve your empty rhetoric goals. Color me a pessimist.
I have made that case.
No, you have trotted out yet another lame, ineffectual, and sad attempt at an excuse and rationalization for your fucked war... but you most certainly have not made any case. Somehow arguing that "the problem" is resentment and lack of hope in people who had nothing to do with attacking us on 9/11, and the best course of actions is to then bomb the shit out of the homes of those people who had nothing to do with attacking us on 9/11, and make their lives a living hell, one worse than under Saddam, isn't making the case. Kinda the exact opposite. You know, like "Clear Skies Act" which increases levels of pollution is not making the case we are improving air quality.
And one way to defeat that -- you know, defeat resentment, is with hope.
Yes, nothing gives me more hope than if you were to invade my country, blow up the infrastructure, unleash a sectarian civil war, kill my friends and family and make my life worse than it was under a universally reviled asshole you helped gas others in my country during a war you backed our asshole in against our neighbor... all because my country no longer had WMDs and never attacked yours. My hope would be to not receive that sort of hope.
And the best way to do hope is through a form of government.
Ah... Who was it that said that hope is not a plan?
I can't recall (snark) but I am also pretty sure it is not a form of government either.
p.s. Stalinism was also a form of government, so can we be a little more, I don't know, robust in our plans than moronic shit like what you just shat on the podium?
Now, I said going into Iraq we got to take these threats seriously before they fully materialized.
You mean that threat that didn't exist?
I saw a threat.
That wasn't there.
p.s. there is a guy wandering around downtown screaming at buildings and panhandles to eat who sees some pretty interesting things that aren't really there, but he is clinically mentally damaged, so should we draw conclusions based seeing shit that isn't there, across the board?
I fully believe it was the right decision to remove Saddam Hussein, and I fully believe the world was better off without him.
Based on what? Because here in reality, the world is demonstratively worse off with you trying to build a nation in Iraq than Saddam doing so. It certainly cost less Iraqi and American lives than removing Saddam who had nothing to do with 9/11 and was no threat did.
Now, the question is, how do we succeed in Iraq?
Now the question is? Don't you think that might have been a rather important one to have a bullet proof answer for (on the ground and not in sound bites) before you fucked up the place? Oh wait, you and your team thought we would have been showered with flowers and chocolates and left after 6 months (which was 3 years ago since your watch seems to have stopped).
And you don't succeed by leaving before the mission is complete, like some in this political process are suggesting.
Ah, your "mission" is digging the hole deeper and deeper. Somehow I think our "mission" will be complete when you are driven from office.