[spence]

Originally Posted by detbuch

[COLOR="darkgreen"]Obviously, if the evidence has been removed, you will not be able to find it. That is the purpose of removing the evidence, which Saddam had 14 months to do. A report about not finding something (that has been removed) is inconclusively worthless, unless you want to use it as fodder for argument.

So you really want me to believe that an incompetent and corrupted organization could eliminate all traces of an active WMD program and stockpiles of weapons while under US/UN scrutiny?

That simply defies reason.

I love how you can so cavalierly smear someone, who was ACTUALLY IN SADDAMS ADMINISTRATION and would have insights no UN inspector, searching with blinders for something that has been removed, could ever have, and who risks deadly reprisal for publishing his book. Where is your EVIDENCE that he is lying? If you say "the evidence gathered indicates there were no WMD", the VERY POINT OF HIS BOOK IS THAT THE EVIDENCE WAS MOVED!!! And . . . oh, the ton that you've read on the subject, were the purveyors of that ton PAID? Or did they publish for free? You seem to question the motives of those who make a living from what they say (Rush et. al.) when you don't like what they say, but if what they say is OK with you, then money does not seem to be an object.

Read the Duelfer report. I believe they were payed a government paycheck and nothing more.

As for evidence Sada is lying, you're just playing the old game argumentum ad ignorantiam!

Furthermore, Bush never argued that Saddam had produced new stockpiles of WMDs, he argued for stopping him before he acquired them.

Not true, the entire basis for urgency was that Saddam had existing WMD and a relationship with alQaeda.

Saddam never verified that he had destroyed what the UN presumed remained from his previous weapons program. Even the Duelfer report believed there was evidence that he wanted to restart his previous WMD programs after the war. Certainly, all the major NATO countries and many others in the UN believed Saddam had restarted the programs and thought he was farther along than he may have been. And Bush has enumerated several reasons for the invasion other than stopping Saddam from acquiring or producing, AGAIN, WMDs. The lie, told over and over, is that Bush lied about WMDs.

Going into the war there was certainly much that was unknown, and why the International community was behind Bush with a new inspection regime.

Where it all turned was with the Powell speech.

The inspections were not providing the evidence to justify the war his foreign policy team so dearly wanted. Rather than let Blix finish his report, they "shot the messenger" and pressed forward breaking up the International coalition in the process.

I'm not one that believes Bush personally lied about WMD. Frankly I think he was just following the lead of those entrusted to guide him. Did his closest advisors misrepresent the case to the American people and "market" a war of choice? All evidence seems to indicate they certainly did...

-spence