So: Bush is devious and incompetent? Or: Bush's public statements were part of what has been a brilliant strategy for controlling Iran?
Critics seized on the new National Intelligence Estimate to lambaste what Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards called "George Bush and Dick Cheney's rush to war with Iran." Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.), echoing other Democrats, called for "a diplomatic surge" to resolve the dispute with Tehran. Jon Wolfsthal, a scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, termed the revelation "a blockbuster development" that "requires a wholesale reevaluation of U.S. policy."Is anyone switching sides over this? You can read the spin elsewhere. I'm just putting up this post so you won't keep talking about this in the comments to other posts.
But the White House said the report vindicated its concerns because it concluded that Iran did have a nuclear weapons program until halting it in 2003 and it showed that U.S.-led diplomatic pressure had succeeded in forcing Tehran's hand. "On balance, the estimate is good news," said national security adviser Stephen J. Hadley. "On the one hand, it confirms that we were right to be worried about Iran seeking to develop nuclear weapons. On the other hand, it tells us that we have made some progress in trying to ensure that that does not happen."
I feel I have nothing I can contribute at this point. I don't understand why reports like this come out when they do, in the form they do or how these things play behind the scenes and are coordinated with the President's public statements. I'd like to see some expert discussion about that. Let me know if you see any.
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«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 207 of 207I just love Cedarford's version of history. The Jews are responsible for both Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany. But of course Nazi Germany was a good thing. They had no choice but to attack Russia and the U.S. It was of course the perfidy of the Russians that forced Hitler into war with the USSR, it would have never crossed his mind if not for their violation of the pact, after all he was a man of honor. As for the Americans, the Germans did everything they could to avoid war, so what if a few stray torpedoes hit American ships, they were asking for it.
You really shouldn't trust the scholars over at Stormfront to look for support for the "ironclad" case for Germany's war declaration against the U.S.
"I'm perfectly willing to accept that Clinton committed a war crime in taking us into Kosovo. I frankly don't know enough about the details of what happened to assert it was a war crime, because I wasn't paying close attention at the time,"
Funny how few people really paid attention to what Clinton did or did not do during his tenure.
I can't speak for others, but, for what it's worth, at the time of our involvement in Kosovo, I was dealing with a life-threatening illness that had me in and out of the hospital; I was a tad bit more concerned about personal matters than political issues at the time.
As an aside, I didn't have a computer then and to the degree I did try to pay attention to foreign affairs, I could only rely on our MSM's fairly poor reporting of world news to glean what little I did know about Kosovo at the time.
"don't assume Clinton gets a free ride from the left."
No of course not. The mass protests, demonstrations and outcry over the illegality of the war are seared, seared into my memory.
Well, you assume that the mass of people who protest our criminal invasion and occupation of Iraq are leftists; I don't. I assume they're mostly concerned citizens from across the political spectrum, of which a small number may be committed lefties.
In the case of Clinton, aside from the hard right, it is the hard left who most vilify him, as they have probably done the most looking at his record. (Those in the broad middle largely like him then and still do.)I don't see myself as a hard lefty, but I turned away from Clinton when he gutted welfare; in the next election I voted for Nader.
I doubt most Americans paid much attention to our activities in Kosovo at the time, as it was a relatively brief involvement that was sold (rightly or wrongly) as a "humanitarian intervention" to "stop a genocide." Well, most Americans who today abhor our involvement in Iraq did not abhor it in the beginning, and probably don't see it as the war crime it is, but have only come to scorn it over time, and mostly because we didn't "win" quickly and because it's become apparent what a waste of human lives (and money) it is. Had our engagement in Kosovo lasted longer, cost more money, cost more American lives, and resulted in the violations to our Constitution as has our "war on terror" (sic), I'm sure we would have seen protests and marches larger against that war. As it was, it was over before most Americans were probably even really conscious of it.
NATO members thought the war was a threat to the peace and stability of Europe
That's nice, but the NATO treaty doesn't authorize bombing people in order to protect "the peace and stability of Europe".
And I was entertained by the notion that fulfilling our NATO obligations would require the approval of Congress.
No wonder you flunked out of law school.
I never realized he'd actually have to wait for Congress to assemble itself and give him the go-ahead.
The legal consensus is that the President has the authority to respond to immediate military threats without a declaration of war (that would be the "pushing the button" scenario you describe). A 13-week bombing campaign undertaken after months of negotiations and arguing is not a response to an immediate military threat. Any prolonged military action (such as, hint hint, a three-month bombing campaign) requires Congressional authorization.
Japan actually bombed American territory and FDR still needed Congress' permission to go to war with them. Clinton just granted himself permission based on the transparent lie that NATO was in immediate danger. But then the law never meant anything to Clinton, did it?
cedarford, cedarford, just when i think you can't go any lower, you go and defend the biggest bunch of criminals in the history of the world -- how shocking that an appalling anti-semite like yourself would be a closet nazi.
The case against America was even easier, as for 6 months FDR had blatantly violated laws of neutrality to help Britain, Canada and the Germans thoroughly documented each breach. For those 6 months, the Germans hoped against hope that they could avoid fighting America and maintain neutrality. Then Japan attacked and Germany figured that it had to war to cut war supplies America was sending the UK and the Soviets.
this is ignorant of history, patriotism, and common sense.
And the irony about the Nazis is that if wild-eyed radical Jews had not been principals in creating the Red Terror, killing millions, and launching the transnational Communist Revolution and scaring the shit out of the rest of Europe - chances are the Nazis would have never arisen as a political entity in reaction to the Terror and the people behind it. Nor the Fascists of Italy.
simply.disgusting.
C-fudd gets his talking points from his idol and main suckee Pat Buchanan (obviously C-fudd is too stupid to have ever had an original idea of his own in his life). Of course Peppermint Patty himself is one of the all-time jokes and losers of American politics, as you would expect from an admiree of C-fudd.
I don't see myself as a hard lefty, but I turned away from Clinton when he gutted welfare;
To me it was his finest moment considering the dismal failure welfare has been for the last oh, 40 years.
Had our engagement in Kosovo lasted longer, cost more money, cost more American lives, and resulted in the violations to our Constitution as has our "war on terror" (sic), I'm sure we would have seen protests and marches larger against that war. As it was, it was over before most Americans were probably even really conscious of it.
I guess that translates into get it over quick and cheap and regardless of the legalities, you get a pass.
"I guess that translates into get it over quick and cheap and regardless of the legalities, you get a pass."
That depends on what you mean by "a pass."
If you mean: most Americans won't notice what's happening and will not look beyond the rhetoric employed by the government to justify it's actions...yes, of course! That's why Rumsfeld wanted to go into Iraq with a small force, and why Gen. Shinseki was sacked for providing a more realistic--but undesirably (to the administration) larger--estimate of the force of men that would be needed to successfully take the country and maintain stability. They were afraid of a public outcry against such an obviously major committment of men and materiel.
If you mean the actions--if criminal--are somehow "not criminal," no, of course not.
But then, who beside the American public at large has given Clinton a pass? The hard right and the hard left both hate him and deem him criminal, and rightly so. Although, if the hard right were intellectually honest and consistent, they would then also hate Li'l Butch for his criminal acts and rape of the Republic.
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