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To be profitable isn't very difficult, to be #1 is where the rub is.
The one who dies with the most toys has made sure things will suck for the rest of us.

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Prior to the war, the governments of the United States and the United Kingdom claimed that Iraq's alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) posed a threat to their security and that of their coalition/regional allies.

Prior to the attack, the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) found no evidence of WMD.

After investigation following the invasion, the U.S.-led Iraq Survey Group concluded that Iraq had ended its nuclear, chemical and biological programs in 1991 and had no active programs at the time of the invasion.[56] Although some degraded remnants of misplaced or abandoned chemical weapons from before 1991 were found, they were not the weapons which had been one of the main arguments for the invasion.

Some U.S. officials also accused Iraqi President Saddam Hussein of harboring and supporting al-Qaeda,[58] but no evidence of a meaningful connection was ever found.[59][60]

On 20 March[66] the U.S.-led coalition conducted a surprise[67] military invasion of Iraq without declaring war.[68] The invasion led to an occupation and the eventual capture of President Hussein, who was later tried in an Iraqi court of law and executed by the new Iraqi government.

In June 2008, U.S. Department of Defense officials claimed security and economic indicators began to show signs of improvement in what they hailed as significant and fragile gains.[71] Iraq was fifth on the 2008 Failed States Index,[72] and sixth on the 2009 list.Wiki

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The question of whether the Bush Administration manipulated or exaggerated the threat and evidence of Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction capabilities or attempted to create a tie between Sadaam Hussein and the al Qaeda terrorists who carried out the September 11, 2001 attacks would eventually become a major point of criticism and controversy for the President.[5]

...the U.S. dropped the bid for UN approval and began to prepare for war; Benjamin Ferencz, a former chief prosecutor of the Nuremberg Trials argued that for these actions Bush, with his Administration, could be prosecuted for war crimes.[8] Kofi Annan, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, as well as leaders of several nations made similar statements, implying that the attack constitutes a war crime.[9]

In order to comply with the 2002 Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution by Congress, on March 18, 2003, President Bush certified to Congress that he had "determined that acting pursuant to the Constitution and Public Law 107-243 is consistent with the United States and other countries continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001."[10]

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Reasons for Iraq War: Planning before 9/11

By 1997, Bush Senior and a group of like-minded neoconservatives had formed PNAC, a neocon think tank whose primary mission was the Iraq War. You can still see (12/2011) their 1998 letter to Clinton advocating the Iraq war. On 9/11/2001 they found the excuse. Dick Cheney had brought eight fellow neocons into key positions in the Bush administration, and they were ready to go. Bush himself was eager to show up his father, who he felt had squandered his Gulf-War political capital.

Cheney's Iraq-War clique all belonged to PNAC or IASPS. IASPS advocated regime change to increase Israeli security, while PNAC focused on our Middle East allies but named only Israel. Although the public evidence from these groups indicates that helping Israel was by far the most important reason for the war, Cheney's oil industry connections and a very explicit statement by Kissinger, as well as common sense, indicate that oil must have also been a central concern.

Reasons the Iraq War was planned before 9 / 11

It would likely not have happened without 9/11, but the neocons were pushing hard for four years before al Qaeda struck.

1992: Wolfowitz, in Defense Department, plans for the Iraq war and pre-emptive strikes. Plan leaked to NY Times and then quashed.

1996: Report from IASPS, a "Jerusalem-based" lobbying group delivers "Clean Break" report from future Cheney/Rumsfeld staff to Israeli Prime Minister. It advocates Iraq War.

1998: Newly formed PNAC sends letter from Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Perle, Abrams, etc. to Clinton advocating Iraqi "regime change."

Up to 9/11: Cheney says leaving Saddam in power after Gulf war was a mistake. PNAC begins planning specifics, such as "shock and awe" tactic.LOTS of backup, copies of reports and details at http://zfacts.com/p/775.html]
Then there's the 9/11 Commission itself:

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The Sept. 11 commission reported yesterday that it has found no "collaborative relationship" between Iraq and al Qaeda, challenging one of the Bush administration's main justifications for the war in Iraq.

The report of the commission's staff, based on its access to all relevant classified information, said that there had been contacts between Iraq and al Qaeda but no cooperation. In yesterday's hearing of the panel, formally known as the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, a senior FBI official and a senior CIA analyst concurred with the finding.

The staff report said that bin Laden "explored possible cooperation with Iraq" while in Sudan through 1996, but that "Iraq apparently never responded" to a bin Laden request for help in 1994. The commission cited reports of contacts between Iraq and al Qaeda after bin Laden went to Afghanistan in 1996, adding, "but they do not appear to have resulted in a collaborative relationship. We have no credible evidence that Iraq and al Qaeda cooperated on attacks against the United States."Much more, including quotes of Bush and Cheney lies about a connection, at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A47812-2004Jun16.html]
As to those responsible for 9/11 itself,

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Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden appeared in a new message aired on an Arabic TV station Friday night, claiming direct responsibility for the 2001 attacks against the United States. http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2004/10/29/binladen_message041029.h
tml]
America invaded Afghanistan first, in an effort to go after al qaeda, which was responsible for 9/11. We left that war and concentrated on Iraq, which had no ties to al qaeda, bin laden or 9/11.

The problem for Rap is that we're all still young enough that we WENT THROUGH 9/11 and all that followed, AND all that has been proven about the lies that has us invade Iraq ILLEGALLY AND WITHOUT DECLARING WAR. He can go on living in his fantasy world as long as he wants, but until and unless everyone alive then and now dies and propaganda denies the truth, we all know what actually happened.

I did not lie, and if he had half a brain and wasn't brainwashed by FauxNews, Rap would know it as everyone else does. But he'd rather hug the bullshit close to his chest, lest he come to (gasp!) QUESTION his overlords.



Tit for tat got us where we are today. If we want to be grownups, we need to resist the ugliness. If we each did, this would be a better reflection on Firefly and a more welcome place. I will try.

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He will, of course, deny it and further call me a liar

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Former Colin Powell Chief of Staff Lawrence Wilkerson said Wednesday that President George W. Bush wasn’t interested in bringing Osama bin Laden to justice.

“I don’t think they really wanted to get bin Laden,” Wilkerson said.

“You could be very cynical and say he didn’t want to get him because once they got him the war was over and that left all the political advantage gone,” he added. “Or you could say that they knew that it was almost an impossibility to get him given what they had done to the intelligence and other aspects of the government that you needed to get him. They just about ruined it.” http://www.rawstory.com/rawreplay/2011/05/former-colin-powell-chief-of
-staff -bush-didnt-want-to-get-bin-laden/

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as his administration showed in 2005, Bush would not.

That year, it was his Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld who cancelled the U.S. special forces operation designed to "snatch and grab" Ayman Al Zawahiri and other senior Al Qaeda leaders. The story, following July 2006 revelations that the CIA had previously disbanded its Bin Laden unit, gives lie to one of the central tenets of the so-called Bush Doctrine: No safe havens for terrorists. As The New York Times reported in July 2007, Rumsfeld ran roughshod over then CIA Director Porter Goss, scuttling the mission at the last moment even as the U.S. forces were boarding planes for the assault:

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But the mission was called off after Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the defense secretary, rejected an 11th-hour appeal by Porter J. Goss, then the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, officials said. Members of a Navy Seals unit in parachute gear had already boarded C-130 cargo planes in Afghanistan when the mission was canceled, said a former senior intelligence official involved in the planning.

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Questioned about his silence regarding Bin Laden in the months following the failure to capture the Al Qaeda chieftain in Tora Bora, a nonchalant Bush on March 13, 2002 downplayed his significance:

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"So I don't know where he is. You know, I just don't spend that much time on him, Kelly, to be honest with you ... I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him."

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[ more at http://crooksandliars.com/jon-perr/republicans-wouldnt-shouldnt-couldn
t-get-bin-laden#three]
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The one conspiracy that was not delved into - maybe because it seems pretty clear cut and is not a conspiracy at all or maybe because it is just a small part of a larger conspiracy - is the one in which the Pentagon ordered American troops to stand down when they had Osama bin Laden cornered in Tora Bora in December of 2001, just weeks after 9/11 (Bush Jr would later famously announce that he didn't care about bin Laden and wasnt interested in going after him). Which brought to mind a program that BBC aired in November of 2001, just days before the incident in Tora Bora, where Jeremy Vine revealed an FBI document in which US agents were told to "back off" from investigating the Bin Laden family. (Transcript at http://911review.org/Wget/www.vanshardware.com/news/2001/november/0111
28_BBC_Carlyle.htm]) More at http://generation-add.blogspot.com/2012/04/why-didnt-bush-go-after-bin
-laden.html

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Go back to fantasy land.

Hobbit's Leaf was a pipe tobacco...you already know that, you're a Tolkeinophile.

Enough, already, I'm through with this silliness. Everyone knows Rap's view and how they'd have to be pried from his cold, dead hands. I don't care enough to try and be the one who'd do it. Enjoy.


Tit for tat got us where we are today. If we want to be grownups, we need to resist the ugliness. If we each did, this would be a better reflection on Firefly and a more welcome place. I will try.