Warmonger in Chief

Charles Duelfer, head of the Iraq Survey Group (the American weapons inspectors in Iraq) presented his final report on Iraqi WMD programs and WMD's themselves. His conclusion:

Saddam was a bad guy, and Iraq was a threat, but Saddam did not have chemical and biological stockpiles when the war began and his nuclear capabilities were deteriorating, not advancing.

Furthermore, there is no evidence suggesting that Iraq produced any weapons of mass destruction after 1991 or that Saddam Hussein’s weapons capability grew during a dozen years of U.N. sanctions before the U.S. invasion last year.

You can read the key findings of the 1000+ page report here.

So what can we infer from this? Well, I infer that President Bush and his administration lied to me, lied to you and lied to the world to rush us to a meaningless war which has cost 1064 American lives, tens of billions of dollars and American security around the world.

Lying is a strong accusation, but I think it fits. Here are just a few examples: President Bush, in a speech on October 7, 2002, said:

“It [Iraq] possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons.” and

“We’ve also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad areas.” and

“Iraq possesses ballistic missiles with a likely range of hundreds of miles — far enough to strike Saudi Arabia, Israel, Turkey and other nations — in a region where more than 135,000 American civilians and service members live and work.”

All of those statements are lies.

Vice President Cheney (the true Warmonger in Chief) said in a speech on August 26, 2002:

“Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies and against us.”

Cheney didn’t say “there is little doubt,” he said “there is no doubt.” If he wasn't sure, why didn't he said that? You know why? He was lying.

Remember on November 2nd:

Blind Faith in Bad Leadership is not Patriotism.