Well, it doesn't matter (which was the whole point of the question. The rantings about Kerry being a candidate the Catholics of the country can't vote for are specious.
Yes. They are nearly as specious as the accusation that George Bush is responsible for the flu vaccine, or that George Bush is going to start the draft in January if reelected, or the entire issue of who did what during the Vietnam War. I really don't think either party has a leg to stand on.
In fact they are pernicious...
As a fan of pluralistic secular liberal democracy, I have to agree. The idea that any particular religious organization should only vote for practicing members of their organization who are in accord with the prevailing views among their church's hierarchy is NOT something that is healthy for the Republic. Of course, very little that happens in an election campaign nowdays is.
I wish you had been at the briefings we got in Kuwait. Suffice it to say, no one who left that briefing wwas worried about a chemical attack, nor a biological one. On the 1st of April, 2003, all troops in the combat zone were allowed to go to MOPP 0.
All I know about were the briefings we got--which did not sound to me like there was much of a biological threat, but our BN S2 was pretty insistent on the mustard gas thing. Of course, I'm a combat engineer, and we don't get much good info, either. And true, I hit ground on 3 APR and did not actually wear the JSLIST overgarment. Not once. Of course by then, if there had been a chemical arsenal available, the military units best prepared to use it were already more or less combat ineffective anyway.
I, and a few others, have said for years, that Hussein's best interests were to have no weapons, dick with inspections; so he could play both David, to our Goliath, and be able to play the victim when he was forced to show he had none (See, I told you they were gone, but you refused to believe me, and made my people suffer). Only problem was this adminstration wasn't willing to let that be an option.
And what would have been in it for us if we had?
Wolfowitz as much as said so, in a Vanity Fair interview, where he said the WMD were used to sell the war, because people wouldn't go for humanitarian reasons.
As for the cease fire violations... if those had been used as the justifications, I would have fewer complaints about the start (but since those were UN terms, and the UN wasn't on board, we tossed them away). The casus belli was the threat to the US, and there was no threat.
That's the biggest thing I don't understand about this war. Hussein had been long overdue a spanking--we should have invaded in 95 or 96 IMHO. There were ample reasons to attack. I will never understand why the Administration used as the primary pretext the hardest thing to verify and the easiest thing to hide.
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Re: Part 1
Date: 2004-10-23 05:57 am (UTC)Yes. They are nearly as specious as the accusation that George Bush is responsible for the flu vaccine, or that George Bush is going to start the draft in January if reelected, or the entire issue of who did what during the Vietnam War. I really don't think either party has a leg to stand on.
In fact they are pernicious...
As a fan of pluralistic secular liberal democracy, I have to agree. The idea that any particular religious organization should only vote for practicing members of their organization who are in accord with the prevailing views among their church's hierarchy is NOT something that is healthy for the Republic. Of course, very little that happens in an election campaign nowdays is.
I wish you had been at the briefings we got in Kuwait. Suffice it to say, no one who left that briefing wwas worried about a chemical attack, nor a biological one. On the 1st of April, 2003, all troops in the combat zone were allowed to go to MOPP 0.
All I know about were the briefings we got--which did not sound to me like there was much of a biological threat, but our BN S2 was pretty insistent on the mustard gas thing. Of course, I'm a combat engineer, and we don't get much good info, either. And true, I hit ground on 3 APR and did not actually wear the JSLIST overgarment. Not once. Of course by then, if there had been a chemical arsenal available, the military units best prepared to use it were already more or less combat ineffective anyway.
I, and a few others, have said for years, that Hussein's best interests were to have no weapons, dick with inspections; so he could play both David, to our Goliath, and be able to play the victim when he was forced to show he had none (See, I told you they were gone, but you refused to believe me, and made my people suffer). Only problem was this adminstration wasn't willing to let that be an option.
And what would have been in it for us if we had?
Wolfowitz as much as said so, in a Vanity Fair interview, where he said the WMD were used to sell the war, because people wouldn't go for humanitarian reasons.
As for the cease fire violations... if those had been used as the justifications, I would have fewer complaints about the start (but since those were UN terms, and the UN wasn't on board, we tossed them away). The casus belli was the threat to the US, and there was no threat.
That's the biggest thing I don't understand about this war. Hussein had been long overdue a spanking--we should have invaded in 95 or 96 IMHO. There were ample reasons to attack. I will never understand why the Administration used as the primary pretext the hardest thing to verify and the easiest thing to hide.