Text 8505, 93 rader
Skriven 2006-09-15 21:43:00 av Robert E Starr JR (9002.babylon5)
Ärende: Re: ABC backs down on 9/1
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* * * This message was from Paul Hahn to rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.m * * *
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@MSGID: <Pine.GSO.4.58.0609142247250.22923@eclipse.wustl.edu>
@REPLY: <se6dnV3pWfdW_5XYnZ2dnUVZ_sSdnZ2d@comcast.com>
On Wed, 13 Sep 2006, Vorlonagent wrote:
> "Paul Hahn" <manynote@wustl.edu> wrote in message
> news:Pine.GSO.4.58.0609130633010.25983@eclipse.wustl.edu...
>> Stipulating that for the moment--even _that_ isn't true.  Richard Clarke
>> has been saying in public for years, and was telling Bush and Cheney in
>> private before that, that Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein were natural
>> enemies and had no connection with each other.  The 9/11 commission
>> report found no significant ties.  And just a few days ago a Senate
>> Intelligence Committee report came out saying that, indeed, Hussein saw
>> Al Qaeda as a threat, not an ally.
>
> I do not accept Richard Clarke as a reliable source.
>
> ....Yet Zarkawi was taken to Iraq for medical treatement when he was wounded
> in afghanistan.

Which proves nothing.  Zarqawi's base was in Northern Iraq, where thanks
to the Kurds and the no-fly zone, Saddam had been irrelevant for years.

> Only of tangential importance to me.  Iraq as a terrorist enabler was the
> important thing.
>
> I'm not willing to agree that Iraq had no ties to Al-Queda.  Certainly
> Saddam would identify Al-Queda as a threat to his long-term aim of
> dominating the mideast, but that wouldn't stop him from working with them in
> 2002.  Iran has the same aim and harbors Al-Queda just fine.  And they're
> Wahabbists--Sunnis--and the Iranians are shia.  Even with extra reasons to
> despise Al-Queda, Iran is providing them a safe haven.  No reason Saddam
> wouldn't have done the same.
>
> "Keep your freinds close, you enemies closer."

Then you are directly denying the conclusions of the 9/11 Commission and
the Senate Intelligence Committee, which you conveniently bleeped over
above.

>>        Look, most Americans had very little reason to suspect Iraq on
>> September 12, 2001, and I'd be willing to wager most of them didn't.
>> Then for months and years, Bush and Cheney both seem constitutionally
>> unable to mention Iraq without mentioning 9/11 in the same sentence.  At
>> By the time of the beginning of the Iraq invasion, and even up to pretty
>> recently, a scary percentage of Americans (pick your survey) believed
>> that Iraq had _something_ to do with 9/11.  If you believe this is a
>> coincidence, I have a bridge to sell you.  The mere fact of the
>> administration _implying_ a connection all those times far outweighs the
>> few times when they were questioned about it and admitted explicitly
>> that there was no causal relationship.  Even when they do, as Cheney did
>> on _Meet the Press_, the phrasing is usually that "we can't _prove_ a
>> connection yet"--the implication being that we still suspect there is
>> one, and that we'll prove it eventually.  Yes, if you parse everything
>> down to the letter, they never out and out _say_ there's a causal
>> connection, but then, if you follow Bill Clinton's reasoning about the
>> meaning of all the words and phrases he used, he never lied about
>> Lewinsky either.
>
> [rearrange]
> As for clinton, there's a stain on a blue dress that proves he lied.  When
> you have such a smoking gun, we can equate Clinton and Bush.  Find something
> reliable that proves the Bush admin drove the an Iraq-9/11 link or Bush
> remains a cut above Clinton by your own comparison.

Actually that isn't proof that he lied, _if_ (as I said, and you
ignored) you follow Clinton's reasoning.

> I take this as an indication you don't have a better link to prove the Bush
> Admin alleged Iraq complicity in 9/11.
>
> I rememeber people thought that there might be an Iraq/Al-Queda link.  I
> don't remember the Bush Admin driving it.  Why did people want to equate the
> two?  Two words: cognitive dissonance.

<sigh>

John, my friend, if that is how you truly feel, there is nothing more I
can do for you.  You have well and truly drunk the Kool-Aid.

I'm outta this subthread.  I have better uses for my time than to talk
to a brick wall.

--p"None so blind as those who will not see"H
                 <manynote@wustl.edu> http://library.wustl.edu/~manynote
    O
   /\        "Foul?  What the hell for?"
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