Cynical Nation

It'll be an interesting election.

I've read that LePen's two major issues "France for the French" (an anti-immigration view) and a common French identity (language, borders, culture) have been adopted by both the Centrist and Sarkozy.

I hope that's true.

At any rate, either Sarkozy or Bayrou would appear to be better than Chirac....from an American point of view.

I personally hope that Royal will win the elections. In my opinion she is the best candidate there. Although it looks that Sarkozy has a slight lead in the polls, most of europe has been electing leftist goverments the last few years, and I would not be surprised if Royal wins tomorrow. She is the equivalent of the progressive wing of the democratic party here. No matter who wins tomorrow, a second round will be needed. There will be no definitive winner tomorrow.

P.S. LePen is a fascist (a real one) and noone takes him seriously in europe (except the 5-7% that vote for him in France).

"most of europe has been electing leftist goverments the last few years, and I would not be surprised if Royal wins tomorrow." (BW)


BW, why do you substitute wishful thinking for facts?

Germany put Leftist Gerhard Schroeder out to pasture last Fall.

Remember this, “As Germans prepare to elect their next government at the weekend, polls suggest that Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's ruling party is narrowing the gap with that of his conservative challenger, Angela Merkel?”

The “conservative challenger (Merkel) won.

It’s a delicious irony that Bush and Blair have outlasted the two biggest allies of Saddam in Europe (Schroeder and Chirac) and the anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim platform that was once “extreme” is indeed part of the mainstream “centrist” platforms in Europe.

A very good sign for the U.S. will be the day that Europe vomits out the bulk of its “Muslim problem.”

It'll be a sign that the rest of the West is fully on board with America's war against radicalized Sharia-based Islam.

"BW, why do you substitute wishful thinking for facts?

Germany put Leftist Gerhard Schroeder out to pasture last Fall. "

Hey,
Do I really? How about Italy, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and Norway? I thought they were all in Europe. They all have leftist (socialist-democratic or liberal) goverments that were elected recently. Oh, and the party of Schroeder in Germany is sharing power with Merkel. The election was tied and a deal was broken for co-governance. Nothing has changed in the German positions. Sorry for you, but you are VERY wrong.

In Sweden the Freedom Party (their version of the Libertarian Party) has gained seats in the last four election cycles, Germany turned away from the Left and embraced Merkel who pushed for "an American styled economic system," and Britain will most likely oust the Labor Party in favor of the more Conservative Tories fairly soon.

Europe's most "Leftist" governments are as far from "socialist" as we are, which is to say they ALL have private ownership of business and industry and they heavilly regulate the market (as we do)....that's more aptly called "Corporatism."

Uhhhh, the German election for PM wasn't "tied," Merkel was declared the winner and has moved with other right of center and centrist groups to enact legislation.

The writing's on the wall for Europe, they simply can't afford the lavish welfare state they once did and they cannot continie with the level of workplace protections that have made Europe's workforce one of the least productive and competitive in the world today.

It would be nice if there was such a thing as "free cake," (which is what Leftists & socialists promise) but the reality is that there isn't, and when the "cake" is distributed by government, it tends to be ultimately more expensive and of poorer quality.

If there COULD be something like "free cake," or "a free lunch" then even I'd be pro-socialist.

Sadly, the calculations don't work out.

EVERYthing that government offers for "free," is paid for by the people/taxpayers and at a much higher cost and almost always of lower quality, than had it been provided by the private sector.

That's the basic problem with socialism BW, it doesn't work.

JMK,
You seem to be missing the point as always and you try to defend the indefensible as always. Of course and the socialist and social democratic parties in europe support free market economy. In reality they are pro-growth and pro-capitalism with a human face. The are like the progressive and liberal democrats here. Of course and they are not "socialists" with the old meaning. Thats why I support them over the conservatives there (most of whom are still to the left of the republicans here, at least socially). Does Tony Blair look like a communist to you? You are more confused than ever. Words mean nothing, policies and actions matter. Sorry :)

Liberals here and Leftists in Europe support bigger government, a more intrusively "helpful government" (or "Nanny State"), that helps almost no one.

Therein lies the problem.

Both America and Europe need far fewer social programs not more.

We do need a more intrusive security arm of government however, given the current terrorist threat.

Lower tax rates (ie. the G W Bush across the board tax cuts) have halved the deficit over the past few years and increased government revenues.

While I'll agree that we need more government revenues now, during wartime, in peacetime, that would be a disastrous thing - the last thing we need is more government, especially more government social programs.

Normally, I'd support tax levels to the level where they actually reduce rfevenues and force government to reduce spending.

Sadly, we can't do that at this juncture.

they still harbor delusions of grandeur about France being a major country or something.

I agree with that, but I wonder then why so many on the right get so upset when the French don't agree with what the US does? France joined us in Afghanistan and then said "No thank you" to the Iraq misadventure. Events have proven the French to have shown more sense in this than we had. Yet there was all that Freedom Fries stuff and all that stuff about boycotting French wines. So what was the damage if they're such a nothing country? I didn't see what the deal was on that.

(By the way, I seriously wanted the boycott of French wines to take place because I hoped it would bring the price down and I could increase my collection. Instead, the damned dollar fell like a rock and the price of French wines went higher, dammit. I did get a lovely bargain on some Chateau-neuf-duPape Mont Redon when I was in France last year, but I couldn't bring back enough bottles of the stuff to satisfy myself. Still have four bottles left, though. And you can get the Mont Redon at Costco now, though not the 2000 vintage, which has the softest tannins I've ever tasted. All I saw at Costco was the 2003, and that isn't priced as low as the 1999 and 2000 that I brought back with me. And I haven't seen any of the Roget Sabon around. The 2000 Roget Sabon whites were absolutely lovely. My stash of that is gone now. Sigh.)

>I agree with that, but I wonder then why so many on the right get so upset when the French don't agree with what the US does? France joined us in Afghanistan and then said "No thank you" to the Iraq misadventure.

That's sanitizing French behavior somewhat, because they were nowhere near that passive. Rather, they went to great lengths to actively undermine U.S. policy. Had they simply said "No thank you," we might have been disappointed, but there would be nowhere near the strain on Franco-American relations we see now.

"Rather, they went to great lengths to actively undermine U.S. policy. "

Barry,
Wrong. They did not undermine the US policy. They undermined the Bush policy. And they were absolutely right. If only the democrats and some rational republicans had done the same with the French and Germans then, we would not have the Iraq disaster now.

>They did not undermine the US policy. They undermined the Bush policy.

Blue, whether you want to admit it or not, the majority of America was supportive of invading Iraq at the time. It *was* U.S. policy, and the support of it was ratified in Congress by a large majority, including John Kerry, John Edwards, and Hillary Rodham Clinton.

I've always believed that if the French had gotten on board with us to pressure Saddam into accepting exile on the French Riviera instead of encouraging him to defy us we might have avoided the war altogether.

You're probably right, WF. But then again, the French had no vested interest in doing that, did they?

"It *was* U.S. policy, and the support of it was ratified in Congress by a large majority, including John Kerry, John Edwards, and Hillary Rodham Clinton.

It was Bush policy that was accepted as US policy, based on very obvious lies. The French called the obvious lies then. Thats what the democrats should have done then also, and we would not have the Iraq disaster today. Some democrats did so (i.e. Feingold), but most went along for political reasons. The French did the right thing then.

All the French did was try to keep their gravy train from being overturned, and if they could stick it to Americans in the process, so much the better.

So who was right then Barry? The French and Germans, or Bush? Should we have gone into Iraq? Yes or no?

Neither France nor Germany "called" the U.S. & the UK on "the obvious lies," because there were no "obvious lies."

French and German Intelligence believed as did virtually the rest of the world that Saddam's Iraq had those stockpiles of WMDs.

In fact EVCERY Iraqi general believed the very same thing, as Saddam Hussein used that belief in a strategy of "detterance by doubt."

All of that is well documented.

Even the NY Times acknowledged that in this piece; http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/12/international/middleeast/12saddam.html?_r=2&adxnnl=0&adxnnlx=1142132938-g+zmA6soi5lK28n2EbRmqQ&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin

France and Germany sought to undermine the American and British action in Iraq in order to preserve illicit and highly illegal deals with Iraq, in violation of the Oil for Food program which was BOTH U.S. & UN policy.

>So who was right then Barry? The French and Germans, or Bush?

What, you mean those are my choices? I have to either side with an incompetent American president, or self-serving, disingenuous, anti-Americans who tried to prop up a ruthless dictator at every turn?

Geez, and I thought you liberals were into "nuance."

BTW, JMK is right -- French intelligence believed Iraq still had WMD. So I know you'd love to believe the French opposed the war for the most noble and lofty reasons, but the truth is they were on Saddam's payroll. No heroes to be found there, I'm afraid.

Here's the problem that I have with those who claim the initial invasion of Iraq was wrong/illegal and "based on lies."

That above NY Times article attests that pre-invasion Iraq, virtually all the world's Intelligence agencies believed Saddam's Iraq had WMDs. It also attests to the fact that all of Saddam's Generals also believed that, because he actively encouraged that belief both inside and outside of Iraq, as a part of a strategy called "detterance by doubt."

That strategy put him on a collision course with both Britain and the USA, especially after 9/11/01, as those nations feared Iraq handing over some of that alleged stockpile to various alleged terrorist groups.

That's why America & Britain went to the UNSC to get 1441 passed, calling it a "Last Chance Resolution."

Once Saddam Hussein refused to cooperate with 1441, the invasion was all but assured.

The initial invasion and "war against Saddam's Iraq" went great!

It was over in just three short weeks!

Saddam was captured in a "spider hole" in December of 2003.

The post-Saddam occupation has not gone well at all and that is partly due to the current administration's incompetence and partly due to Iraq's inability or unwillingness to put old ethnic rivalries aside and forge ahead with that "unity government."

Those who take some perverse pleasure in the post-Saddam occupation going badly are indeed "rooting against America's and the West's best interests."

Post-Saddam, both Syria and Iran have financed and trained jihadists and "insurgents" in Iraq. That too has been well documented.

The war there has decimated al Qaeda, devastated both the Syrian and the Iranian economies and shaken much of the Arab world's faith in jihad.

That's almost certainly one of the reasons that there have been no attacks on American soil since 9/11...that and domestic provisions like the Patriot Act and the FBI & NSA wiretap programs.

Initially I'd have preferred we had just taken Saddam out and let Iraq re-partition, but that has been explained as "an unviable option" for a number of reasons.

The support for an Iraqi "unity government" and training both the Iraqi military and Iraqi police was always a risky venture and it seems like Iraq is not going to be able to hold up its end.

That doesn't negate either the initial need for America & Britain to invade Iraq and remove Hussein, nor their attempt to bolster that "unity government" in Iraq, nor does it negate the "good" done there - decimating al Qaeda ad devastating both the Syrian & Iranian economies - BOTH enemies of the West.

For you, BW, to ascribe motives that didn't exist, for France & Germany, is ridiculous. They did what they did to protect their own petty self-interests via Saddam Hussein.

The fact that they KNEW the danger he posed to the West makes them (the Chirac & Schroeder governments) moral cowards.

Ironically enough, both Bush & Blair will apparently outlive BOTH Schroeder (ousted last Fall) and Chirac (on his way out next month).

It remains to be seen who Blair (this summer) and Bush (January '09) will be replaced with, but for our continued safety, hopefully it will be someone who (1) understands what's at stake in this war between strict Sharia-based Islam and the West and (2) is committed to that war, no matter what.

"I have to either side with an incompetent American president, or self-serving, disingenuous, anti-Americans who tried to prop up a ruthless dictator at every turn?"

"BTW, JMK is right -- French intelligence believed Iraq still had WMD. "

Well, I dont think it is that complicated. It was not just the French who opposed that war. It was pretty much most of the world. I am not here to defend the French, and I dont like them in particular. However, they are not anti-american. They are our allies.

To me it was obvious then that there were no WMDs and the whole thing was a lie. And so it was to the 23 democratic senators and 1 republican (Chaffee) who voted against the war then. Are you also accusing them (like you are accusing the French) that they believed that Iraq had WMDs and still voted against the war because they were after their own interests? or were they also anti-american like the French?

Engalnd, America, Australia, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Poland, the Czech Republic, Albania, Japan (among others) in favor)....France, Germany, Russia, and Belgium opposed.

That's not "most of the world," BW...and those four all had deals with Saddam Hussein in violation of the Oil-for-Food progam, which the USA and the UN rightly forged into world policy.

Maybe those Dems put Party politics above national interest.....Ya think???

Geez, Blue, it really is all-or-nothing with you, isn't it? Is there truly no room in your worldview for a senator to believe that Saddam had WMDs, but oppose a U.S. invasion in good conscience nonetheless?

I'm sick of JMK saying "EVERYONE though Iraq had WMDS!!!"

I know one group who didn't, they were called THE U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTORS and they said REPEATEDLY that they found NO EVIDENCE of WMDs.

People of JMKs ilk, feed by the felon drug-addict Rush Limbaugh, constantly lambasted the U.N. Inspectors as a bunch of bumbling idiots.

They weren't. The did their jobs. They didn't find what wasn't there.

So they were ridiculed and Bush lied and lied and lied about mushroom clouds over America until the weak-minded (most of America, all of the Republican sheep) gave in and decided on war with a country that had not provoked us in any way.

So, everyone who knew jack shit about the situation said that there WERE NO WEAPONS. Bush and the Rove attack machine went into full swing, and with spin and outright lies changed perceptions.

Bush is a war criminal and a traitor.

The UN weapons inspectors said no such thing....they said they couldn't reach a reliable conclusion because Saddam Hussein was leading them around to sterile sights.

Ergo, THAT is why the UNSC was so easily convinced to pass that "LAST CHANCE Resolution" - 1441.

When Saddam Hussein refused to cooperate with 1441, that invasion was made inevitable.

France's, England's, Germany's, Spain's, Italy's, Russia's and virtually the entire world's Intelligence agencies all claimed to believe that Saddam's Iraq had those WMDs...so did the CIA....and so did Saddam's own Generals!

Now maybe dopey Barely thinks the world's Intelligence community "didn't know jack shit," about Iraq, but I'm supposing that even you'll concede that Saddam's own Generals sure did!

And yes, Saddam's Generals believed that Iraq had those WMDs and were counting on them to repel an invasion.

Now I don't know where your assessment of Bush comes from, but I do know (from your posts) that you're hopelessly naive and simplistic in your views.

Hey JMK,
I can not believe that you still believe that invading Iraq was justified. It is almost funny. You must be one of a handful of people in the country who still believes that (along with McCain and maybe Bush).

Actually BW, the folks who believe the invasion was "based on lies" or was somehow "illegal" are the ones who have it wrong.

Virtually everyone in the world believed Saddam's Iraq had those WMDs. Even his own Generals believed that.

He used that belief as a strategy of "detterance by doubt."

After 9/11, both America abd Britain feared those WMDs and those in the former Soviet Union getting into the hands of terrorists.

We set up a program to secure the former USSR's border, giving them detection equipment to make sure no radiologicals crossed that border undetected and we got the UNSC to sign onto what Britain and America called "A last chance Resolution" - 1441.

It was Saddam's refusal to comply with 1441 that initiated the March 2003 invasion.

The initial opposition to that invasion was purely politically motivated and much of the subsequent opposition has been fueled by America's frustration with not getting immediate results. People have grown increasingly tired of the ongoing occupation.

The initial invasion was a resounding success. It was over in three weeks, with Saddam's government ousted and the Republican Guard defeated. Saddam himself was caught in a hole in December of that year.

Since then, the U.S. & England have worked to train Iraqi police and military units and help stabilize Iraqi's "unity government."

That's been made more difficult because both Syria & Iran have trained and funded jihadists and insurgents in Iraq.

The wars in Iraq & Afghanistan have decimated al Qaeda and done damage to the Syrian & Iranian economies....as a result, not a single attack on U.S. soil in going on six years.

The post-Saddam occupation has been often mismanaged, poorly executed and the Iraqis themselves have shown little enthusiasm for either democracy or that unity government, apparently preferring the familiar age old ethnic rivalries.

That's not just bad for Iraq....it's bad for us as well.

Ed Koch just about nailed a year ago, when he said, "We may face, if we're lucky and ae successful in Iraq and Afghanistan, a 25 to 30 year with radicalized Islam. More likely, we face 100 years of long, protracted, intermitant warfare with an increasingly radicalized Arab world."

It looks like increasingly likely that we'll be facing a long, protracted, viscious war with radicalized Islam.

My firm belief is that most Democrats refuse to acknowledge the inevitability of this war and fewer still, have the wherewithal, or fortitude to fight it.

"Actually BW, the folks who believe the invasion was "based on lies" or was somehow "illegal" are the ones who have it wrong.

lol lol!

"Virtually everyone in the world believed Saddam's Iraq had those WMDs."

LOL LOL LOL LOL !!!!

I should've just copy and pasted that Ed Koch quote: "We may face, if we're lucky and are successful in Iraq and Afghanistan, a 25 to 30 year war with radicalized Islam. it seems more likely that we're going face 100 years of long, protracted, intermitant warfare with an increasingly radicalized Arab world."

I'm not happy about that, I just believe it's inevitable.

Ed Koch is as demented as it gets.

Blue is having another giggle fit. Apparently he believes there were *plenty* of people who believed Saddam was clean with regard to WMD.

I'm not sure who those people are, but I'm sure who they're not. They're not Hillary Clinton. They're not John Edwards. They're not John Kerry. They're not Al Gore. They're not Bill Clinton. They're not Ted Kennedy. They're not Nancy Pelosi. They're not Joe Biden. They're not Tom Daschle. They're not Madeleine Albright. They're not Sandy Berger. They're not Dick Gephardt.

All of those people are on record as talking about Saddam's WMD and how big a threat he was.

Don't know what kind of majority that was, but then again, I can't keep track of when appeals to the majority (e.g., Iraq) and when he doesn't (e.g., partial birth abortion and the Lamont-Lieberman race.)

Hey Barry,
You are mixing apples with oranges. For starters, Gore, Bill Clinton and Ted Kennedy *never* endorsed the Iraq war. You are mixing what they said about Saddams WMDs in the past, years before the war. In fact, Saddam, DID have WMDs in the 90s and used them on the Kurds, but at that time he was an ally of the republican administration of the time (and noone tried to stop him) and that's the time of the famous picture of Saddam with Rumsfeld.

Several democrats (i.e. Kerry, Edwards, Hillary, Biden, Daschle) did vote for the war, but essentially all of them have regretted their vote.

You have every right to believe that the politicians who supported the war then did it for a "legitimate" fear of WMDS. I dont think so. I think they did it either because they liked the neoconservative plans or for political reasons (see Kerry, Hillary, Edwards, Biden).

The fact remains that the vast majority of the world then did NOT want the war then and did NOT think that Saddam posed an immediate threat to the US. They were proven right, while supporters of that war (and I assume you were one of them at the time) were proven VERY wrong.

Koch was not only one of the best Mayors New York City ever had ("How'm I doin?"), he remains an astute independent observer of both domestic and world politics.

You should be so "demented."

All the folks Barry mentioned supported a "much stronger stance against Iraq" in 1998 than the Clinton bombings....in fact, John Kerry was on record saying that an invasion should be at least tabled (considered) at that time.

Virtually every Intelligence agency in the world believed that Saddam's Iraq had those stockpiles of WMDs in 2003. Britain's, France's, Germany's, the Czech Republic's, Poland's, Italy's, Russia's, all believed that Saddam's Iraq had those WMDs.

So did Saddam Hussein's own Generals!

Hussein used that widespread belief and encouraged it as part of his strategy of "detterance by doubt," as the NY Times article I referenced points out.

"The fact remains" that the vast majority of the world joined with the British & American coalition.

Notably absent were France, Germany, Russia, China and Belgium.

Those nations don't comprise "the vast majority of the world."

I didn't say that all those figures supported the invasion. I said they were all on record as believing SH had WMD's *after* the first Gulf War.

For my part, I never bought the argument that the war was about WMD. To me, it was fairly obvious that emphasizing Saddam's WMD was a convenient ploy to try and buy international support. It was also very clearly not the primary impetus for the invasion.

That's why I believe it's quite possible to believe the WMD existed, but to oppose the war nonetheless, and vice versa. Your view of things seems to be considerably more deterministic.

"For my part, I never bought the argument that the war was about WMD. To me, it was fairly obvious that emphasizing Saddam's WMD was a convenient ploy to try and buy international support. "

Well thats exactly the point I am trying to make. It was obvious not only to you, but to many many others that the real reason for the Bush-Lieberman war was NOT WMDS. It was SO obvious that you had to be blind not to realize then that it was a "ploy" (or as I would call it, a "lie").

But that's *not* what I said. Although I knew that WMD was not the primary reason for the invasion, I nonetheless believed them to exist. As, I believe, did the president. That's my problem with the whole "Bush Lied!" narrative.

But Bush made the case to go to war because WMDs were an "imminent threat". That's the reason he gave to go to war. Whether he believed or not that Saddam had WMDs, that was NOT his real reason to go to war. You yourself wrote above that it was a "ploy". If what Bush did is not lying, what is lying?

>But Bush made the case to go to war because WMDs were an "imminent threat".

He did not. In fact, he even explicitly stated that the threat was *not* imminent, and that we would not wait until it became so. We've rehashed this a thousand times, but no matter how many times you assert the contrary, it's still not true.

WMD was one of the many justifications for the invasion, but far from the only one. Even though it was not primary, IMO, the administration emphasized it more heavily than the others because Bush and Blair thought that reason stood the best chance of winning international buy-in.

That does not constitute a "lie." If Bush knew in advance that SH had no WMD, that would certainly qualify as a "lie," but I do not believe that to be the case.

Either way no matter who wins they will still be cheese eating surrender monkeys,

Ok Barry,
We will not agree on this. I believe that they lied. But I have a question for you. Do you think that that war was a good idea? Are you still supporting that war? Just curious.

Honestly, I have a hard time knowing how to answer questions like "Do you support the war?" or "Do you support the president?" with simple yes or no answers. I wasn't blogging when the war began, and although I'd made my thoughts known on other discussion boards, I've never really laid it out here before. Perhaps I should do that in a post one day.

The bottom line is this. I had grave, serious doubts about whether the war was a good idea or not. I knew that either way it was a *huge* gamble, and that the costs would be high if we lost. I also knew it was a war of choice, and not one of necessity.

The night before the invasion began, I had this sick dread in the pit of my stomach. I hoped for the best but feared the worst. I could not understand people like Andrew Sullivan, with his rah-rah cheerleading. Even if you support the war, how could you be so glib about the grim reality of it? (The fact that he has since done such an about face as soon as things started getting ugly was the last straw. He was once my favorite blogger and now I find him almost insufferable.)

So if I were president? I don't think I would have decided to invade Iraq. But guess what? That decision was made anyway. And after the war began? You're damn right I supported it. The stakes were high, and I wanted my side to win. I didn't gleefully trumpet every bit of bad news like the lefty bloggers often do, with some snarky headline like "Mission Accomplished." I wanted victory, not defeat. I still do. I'm just giving up on it.

Pretty much exactly my position on the war, Barry. I was probably somewhat more negative on it beforehand than you were, but once it started, I had no question about which side I was on and who I wanted to see win. But I was never gleeful or enthusiastic about it.

I actually thought that total U.S. deaths would be much higher than they turned out to be. I expected 3000 or so KIAs in Baghdad alone and a total of 10,000 - 12,000 by the end of the war, which I thought would be over in late 2003.

Of course, things played out very differently. I haven't given up on victory yet, but I'm afraid we have become a society that is satisfied with defeat as long as there isn't too much pain in it.

Agreed, WF. I expected many more casualties as well. The liberals are fond of mocking the "cakewalk" predictions, and, no doubt, those were ill-advised and intemperate words to speak. Nonetheless, the military campaign to unseat Saddam was, for the most part, a cakewalk. It's the ill-planned occupation that's proved problematic.

I also agree with you about our society. I think the biggest mistake I made in the build-up to the war was in telling myself that, after 9/11, America *finally* had the stomach to fight a real war. I was wrong. We do not.

"I also agree with you about our society. I think the biggest mistake I made in the build-up to the war was in telling myself that, after 9/11, America *finally* had the stomach to fight a real war. I was wrong. We do not."

You are completely wrong. Of course and America has the stomach to fight and win wars when needed. It was proven again and again in the past. But noone wants to fight a wrong war started for no reason by an incompetent (and in my opinion deliberately lying) president. That war was morally wrong from day 1. It should have never ever been started.

Dont blame America, blame the incompetent president you voted for. At least I knew better not to vote for him.

>Of course and America has the stomach to fight and win wars when needed. It was proven again and again in the past.

Sorry, but I see no evidence for it in recent history.

"Sorry, but I see no evidence for it in recent history."

Read the rest of my entry then. Dont you think Wold War II proves that?

Sure, 65 years ago things were different. Your point is?

My point is that wold war II was a justified war (and so is Afganistan now). Iraq and Vietnam were not. It is that simple. You are so wrong to blame Americans for the disastrous behavior of some politicians. I am sure you realize that. And, at least, you have openly regretted your vote for Bush. Remember that in 2008 before you vote for another potentially disastrous candidate :)

The inane claim that "Bush lied" is proven false by the fact that Saddam's own Generals believed Iraq had those WMDs.

Given that the NY Times accepts that fact, BW;

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/12/international/middleeast/12saddam.html?_r=2&adxnnl=0&adxnnlx=1142132938-g+zmA6soi5lK28n2EbRmqQ&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin

I'll presume you accede to that fact as well.

For better or worse, Britain and the U.S. successfully got the UNSC to sign onto that last chance Resolution 1441, so when Saddam Hussein refused to cooperate with 1441, that invasion became inevitable.

Perhaps, you could even say, that as soon as the ink dried on 1441 that invasion was inevitable...maybe so.

The fact is the invasion was based on the world accepting the need for 1441, and they did that because virtually the entire world believed that Saddam's Iraq had those WMDs.

In fact, British Intelligence still believes that Iraq tried to purschase yellow cake uranium from Niger...they swear by it.

Again, the invasion was an unmitigated success!

The "war" was over in three weeks and Saddam's government was ousted and the Republican Guard defeated.

The subsequent occupation has been mishandled and the Iraqis have not held up their end, BUT it's decimated al Qaeda and put a very heavy strain on the economies of Syria & Iran, which have been good things.

This "war" (WoT) isn't done, until Sharia goes under the gun.

I just made that slogan up, but I think that's pretty much what faces us...a long, bloody and protracted war with the adherants to strict (or "radicalized") Sharia-based Islam.

Now THIS really IS funny!

Above I noted that "British Intelligence still believes that Iraq tried to purschase yellow cake uranium from Niger...they swear by it."

Well, on Wednesday the NY Times apparently disagreed, calling that report "discredited" in its online story.

But then they agreed! As by Thursday, that term had been edited out of the story.

Reuters had gone even further, referring to the "administration's warnings, later proven false, that Iraq had sought uranium from Niger for nuclear arms."

Thankfully, the WSJ went to the source to rebuke both the Times and Reuters, in getting the story correct;

"In fact, the claim has not been disproved or discredited at all, as the nonpartisan Factcheck.org explained in 2004:

"After nearly a six-month investigation, a special panel reported to the British Parliament July 14 that British intelligence had indeed concluded back in 2002 that Saddam Hussein was seeking to buy uranium. The review panel was headed by Lord Butler of Brockwell, who had been a cabinet secretary under five different Prime Ministers and who is currently master of University College, Oxford.

"The Butler report said British intelligence had "credible" information - from several sources - that a 1999 visit by Iraqi officials to Niger was for the purpose of buying uranium:

Butler Report: "It is accepted by all parties that Iraqi officials visited Niger in 1999. The British Government had intelligence from several different sources indicating that this visit was for the purpose of acquiring uranium. Since uranium constitutes almost three-quarters of Niger's exports, the intelligence was credible."

"The Butler Report affirmed what the British government had said about the Niger uranium story back in 2003, and specifically endorsed what [President] Bush said [in that year's State of the Union Address] as well.

"The erstwhile Iraqi regime's quest for uranium appears to have been in vain. But the claim that Iraq didn't seek uranium is simply false. News organizations that repeat it are serving, wittingly or unwittingly, as propaganda outlets for those who oppose the U.S. war effort."

http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/

WoW!

Looks like I'm right and the NY Times is wrong, yet AGAIN!

Sarkozy wins! FRANCE WINS!!!

Sarkozy was elected! Segolene Royal conceded defeat.

This was an election for France's future. Royal sought to appease and enable the anti-European Muslims in their midst and to preserve the unworkable French welfare state.

This was a very good sign for Europe....maybe Europe will wake up and not continue its slide toward Eurabia.

Merkel in Germany, Sarkozy in France, Howard re-elected in Australia, Stephen Harper in Canada - the Weat has embraced leaders who've embraced war with strict ("radicalized") Sharia-based Islam....and that is GOOD.