In the past, I’ve seen Senator Biden and Senator Obama talk about the cost of the war in Iraq as being $8bil a month, $10bil a month, $12bil a month, back to $10bil a month, $1trillion, $2trillion, everything shy of saying a $gazzilion. Last night was just another installment in a political marketing display of either gross ignorance or very serious distortion of the truth.
We’re spending $10 billion a month while Iraqis have an $80 billion surplus.
…
Look, we have spent more money — we spend more money in three weeks on combat in Iraq than we spent on the entirety of the last seven years that we have been in Afghanistan building that country.
Let me say that again. Three weeks in Iraq; seven years, seven years or six-and-a-half years in Afghanistan.
According to the Congressional Research Service (I believe Senator Obama and Senator Biden are members of Congress) as of July of this year the war in Iraq has cost $444.2billion over the past 66 months (an average of $6billion a month-not $8, $10, or $12bil, but…what’s a few billion among Democratic Party senators?). The problem here is several fold. Read the rest of this entry »
“And so John likes — John, you like to pretend like the war started in 2007. You talk about the surge. The war started in 2003, and at the time when the war started, you said it was going to be quick and easy. You said we knew where the weapons of mass destruction were. You were wrong.
You said that we were going to be greeted as liberators. You were wrong.”-Barry, Presidential debate September 26, 2008, on the campus of the University of Mississippi.
There can be no doubt that the Democratic Party has opposed the war in Iraq since before it started. It was the core of Governor Dean’s 2002 failed Presidential attempt. It was the core of a dozen Democrats who ran for President in 2003 immediately after the invasion started. It was the defining issue of the 2004 election. It was the lie of the 2006 midterms that put Democrats in power. Some Democrats even admit it now.
What’s amazing is that the American people-who have been promised again, and again, and again, and again, and again that if they voted for Democrats, then Democrats would end (not win, but “end”) the war in Iraq by “redeployment” (not retreat?). Since millions of Americans still believe the Democratic Party lies that they will magically make everything better in Iraq (while deliberately, secretly, covertly, and overtly undermining efforts to succeed there)…one cannot reasonably wonder why it is that they opposed efforts to bring peace in Iraq (the Surge), and why they refuse to admit that they were wrong to oppose the effort to succeed (oppose the Surge). To admit such a thing would be to admit that they’ve deliberately misled and lied to the American people, and that would not be politically enabling just 48 days from a national election.
Apparently, Democratic Party leaders do not believe these people…
This morning, like everyone, I checked my email INBOX, and I had an email from a friend that prompted a great deal of thought and reflection on the events that happen every day in Iraq. After a while, I decided to start looking back at my notes and checking out what events have happened on this day, September 17th in the history of the Iraq War (from 1990-today).
The other day ABC’s Charlie Gibson did an interview with Governor Sarah Palin. Rather than air her actual comments, they edited the interview to promote an opinion of her that was not accurate as demonstrated by the sections that were removed. Additionally, Charles Gibson misquoted her then told her address to soldiers going off to war, and he made it sound like she believes the war in Iraq is a holy war (Allah ahkbar!!!!). He said the quote was her “EXACT WORDS”, but it was not. He took an edited quote from an Associated Press article, then edited it himself. Later, he asked Gov Palin about the Bush Doctrine (something that is perceived to be MANY different things by many people). Her answer was edited to make it sound like she was ignorant, but her real answer shows she is not at all clueless about it. Still….Saturday Night Live writers chose to view the manipulated interview footage as if it were fact instead of visual OpEd.
I can’t remember who it was now, but a commenter on another blog posed a challenge to me that echoed what I have already been pondering upon: If Bush didn’t lie, why do (or did) so many Americans think that Saddam is linked to the events of 9/11? Read the rest of this entry »
UPDATED
Kirsten Powers (D) has a great piece at the New York Post. In it, she says ABC bungled their interview with Governor Sarah Palin, and she does a fantastic job of pointing out some of Charlie Gibson’s lies, distortions, falsehoods, etc. However, she does fall short of the mark (perhaps because of space retraints?), and Ms. Powers stops just short of hitting the mark; of asking the really important question.
WHY did ABC do it? This wasn’t just editing, it was manipulation. Why’d ABC do it? Why’d the Washington Post do it as well?
reference:
Governor Sarah Palin’s actual speech to her son and others heading off to Iraq…
UPDATE
The full Palin/Gibson interview w underlined parts showing what was cut out/manipulated
ht Mark Levin show
EXCERPTS: Charlie Gibson Interviews Sarah Palin (September 11, 2008)
THE BOLDED & UNDERLINED PARTS WERE EDITED OUT OF THE INTERVIEW
Last night I watched Hardball with Chris Matthews. As usual he had on spin doctors from both the Democratic Party and Republican Party, and they were discussing the ABC Charles Gibson interview with Governor Sarah Palin. In that interview, Gibson tried to assert that the so-called Bush Doctrine of foreign policy was a practice of pre-emptive attacks on the chance that a nation might someday attack the United States. Governor Palin said that when an attack is imminent from another country (as was the case with Israel in 1967 for example) that the United States would be right to attack given that the intelligence reporting was as good as possible.
It was those two words that Mr. Matthews seized upon, “Imminent Threat.” He claimed that President Bush had said Saddam’s Iraq was an imminent threat, and he specifically said that it was not Democrats who made that claim even when the Democratic Party propagandist he had on as a guest tried to correct Mr. Matthews to no avail. Matthews is wrong, and he is misleading millions of people around the world as well as fueling the lie that Operation Iraqi Freedom is not about freedom (a war Senator Obama promises tp continue for at least a year and a half-perhaps as long as 2013).
Sorry Chris…it was the Democrats who claimed Saddam was an imminent threat-not President Bush.
“Can we really leave this to chance, when we could eliminate this deadly threat by acting now in concert with the international community, or alone if the threat is imminent — which it is not now? In my view, we cannot. ”
-Sen. John Kerry (D) 10/09/2002
If we wait for the danger to become clear, it could be too late.
Sen. Joseph Biden D-Del., September 4, 2002
“911, 911, 911” It’s been seven years, and it’s amazing to think of how many times each of us has heard, “911” or “September 11th”? How many people still happen to notice 9:11 on their clocks? How many tens or hundreds of millions of people have seen that hole in New York City, or the one in a Pennsylvania field? We all want to forget some of that day, but we all know there are people and lessons to remember. Meanwhile the referencing continues unabated, and in a heated political season we’re going to hear a lot more about that date than in non-political years.
…but September 11th wasn’t just an awful day seven years ago. It’s a historical date that interestingly enough proves that the past is prologue. Religion, Liberty, and American history all collide on that fateful date again and again throughout history. Read the rest of this entry »
On the night when Senator Obama accepted his hard fought nomination for the Presidency his opponent, Senator McCain, paid a lot of money to run a TV ad that congratulated him. McCain said that out of respect he wouldn’t detract or distract from the moment with competing campaigning that night. In contrast, on the night that Senator McCain accepted his party’s nomination, Senator Obama scheduled an interview with FOX News’ Bill O’Reilly in an obvious and arrogant attempt at taking some of the spotlight away from Senator McCain. It was not a courteous, respectful, or honorable move. It was also not a truthful interview.
Very often when it comes to the Iraq War people are forced to conclude that a politician who was wrong about something war-related was either ill-informed about a matter or that the politician lied. With President Bush, it’s all too easy to believe that he was ill-informed or incapable of processing information…yet, it’s more politically expedient to believe that he is lying when he’s wrong about something. Often this stems from the intrinsic belief that he gets briefed on all the information the Men-In-Black can possibly give him. Since getting his official nomination, Senator Obama now gets similar briefings. Read the rest of this entry »
The above cartoon by liberal ‘toonist, Clay Bennett, can be viewed glass half-empty/glass half-full. The assumption on his part, of course, is that George Bush’s presidency has been 8 years of failed policies and disaster for our country.
Iraq should be a political winner for Republicans. Not a losing talking point.
2. Pick a running mate who is a conservative white guy or a general or a Republican.
Yes, it will seem like smart politics at first. Shore up Obama’s lack of military experience with a hawk. Be true to Obama’s message that he’ll be a president for everybody by having him run with a Republican. Make a pitch to the purple states of Virginia and Indiana by putting one of their own on the ticket. Or make the red state of Ohio happy by handing the vice presidential slot to its governor. Just so long as Obama’s running mate screams “same old, same old,” making it harder for him to attract the new voters he needs to win.
Former Counter-terrorism Czar from the Clinton Administration, Richard Clarke, would be the perfect Vice President candidate for Senator Obama. While not a general, he is a white, Republican man with a claim to being a veteran of the war on terror. He’s also a hero to the DNC party base. He’s the only person in the Bush Administration to apologize for the 911 attacks. He can claim (albeit falsely) that if it weren’t for Bushco and Darth Cheney then there’d never have been a 911 or an allegedly false pretext for invading Iraq and the subsequent six-eight years of war there. He can claim that while Sen McCain is a war hero, he’s a Vietnam war hero, and a fighter pilot….not a 21st Century counter-terrorism Czar; “hero.”
Will Obama go the smart route and pick a man who the American people will recognize and associate with the faux pre-911 peace sentiment? We shall see, but it would be a lot smarter than someone most Americans need to be introduced to.
Back in April 2008, President Bush requested that Georgia be allowed to apply to join NATO. France and Germany blocked the effort which would have made last week’s invasion turn into a world war. Instead, NATO members quietly agreed to support Georgia regardless. Did that promise work?
Wellllllllll, not exactly. See, right after that NATO conference…Russia started getting aggressive. They built up their military forces in the area, prepped for invasion, and started making probe attacks; doing things like…shooting down Georgia’s unmanned drones which would spot the buildup. Doubt it? whadaya want…video proof? Mmmm, yeah, ok:
Meanwhile, the Democratic Party went into overdrive in forming its platform positions. The DNC Platform takes the same position as those NATO members (the same position accepted by President Bush), and they seem to still think that it would work; that it would prevent a Russian invasion of Georgia and others.
The NEW Democratic Party line is the same as President Bush’s:
We will seek to strengthen and broaden our strategic partnership with Turkey, end the division of Cyprus, and continue to support a close U.S. relationship with states that seek to strengthen their ties to NATO and the West, such as Georgia and Ukraine.
I am NOT at all a fan of World Net Daily, but I can vouch for Ryan Mauro’s piece for several reasons. It corroborates earlier articles from other sources. It corroborates my own research. It revolves around a man of honor-not some political partisan hack or the Maple Syrup King of Vermont/Dr/Gov/Middle East expert and DNC chairman. Lastly, because Ryan is not WND, RNC, or DNC, but because he’s Ryan.
Many people like to stick to the partisan talking point that there was “NO WMD” or “No stockpiles” found in Iraq. This is inaccurate, misleading, and based on politicization of wartime facts. The ISG report found that Iraq was indeed a WMD threat (just as the UN had claimed only 2wks before the invasion), but not in the form of stockpiles. The ISG report even included pictures proving this, but people who believe anything the DNC says, and nothing the Bush Admin says don’t even look at the pictures. They just take other people’s opinions which they find palatable, and parrot them.
A former American overseer of Iraqi prisons says several dozen inmates who were members of Saddam Hussein’s military and intelligence forces boasted of helping transport weapons of mass destruction to Syria and Lebanon in the three months prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Don Bordenkircher – who served two years as national director of prison and jail operations in Iraq– told WND that about 40 prisoners he spoke with “boasted of being involved in the transport of WMD warheads to Syria.”
A smaller number of prisoners, he said, claimed “they knew the locations of the missile hulls buried in Iraq.”
Craig David, you are so wrong. People do not want a crook and a friend of terrorists to handle their money, do they? So they have to know who is the REAL Obama and when they will...
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gra gor But the land | mine part squares with NATO allies objecting to the landmines. | Ya, I got An Idea. Here, hold my sign. Thanks. I’ve got a great idea… lets mine the...
