Rather than deal with the issue at hand — his staggeringly poor performance — Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld chose to suggest Tuesday that critics of the Iraq war and Bush administration are ignorant of history and morally confused. "Any kind of moral and intellectual confusion about who and what is right or wrong can severely weaken the ability of free societies to persevere," Rumsfeld said at the American Legion’s national convention in Salt Lake City. In truth, many Americans can see clearly now that Iraq was not the "epicenter" of the war on terrorism, to use Rumsfeld’s word, until the United States invaded and occupied it. That makes Rumsfeld the confused one.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
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35 Comments
When in serious deep poopie,and all else fails,PLAY THE NAZI CARD.
Addressing several thousand veterans at the American Legion’s national convention, Rumsfeld recited what he called the lessons of history, including the failed efforts to appease the Adolf Hitler regime in the 1930s.
“I recount this history because once again we face the same kind of challenges in efforts to confront the rising threat of a new type of fascism” he said.
Rummy needs to realize that he has created more anti-Americanism than he can possibly defeat using the tactics he has used. He has turned our allies world-wide against us.
More smoke and mirrors to shift from the essential point that we should not be in Iraq for any reason, and since we are, there never was enough personnel to do the job. The personnel shortages have and will cause needless death and injury for all parties.
We’re trying to establish a democracy in a country that still has tribal and deep religious divisions from way back.The premises are crap , and the conclusion is bogus- truly a house of cards built upon sand with New Orleans type leavies!And still Rumsfeld spins his BS!
What gster sez
If it weren’t so tragic it would be amusing watching RumNamara try to spin things.
Ooooh, low blow to Robert Strange.
They even LOOK alike!
Cloning perhaps?
Rummy will have the Army leave Iraq when he’s ready to go into Iran.
That’s what they’re positioned to do.
The rest is talk, talk, talk.
The only fascism America is threatened from stems from Bush and this Administration. Fool me once…
Rumsfeld is in need of serious professional help. He reminds me of Nero fiddling while Rome burned.
Check out lie number 9 on this list from Alternet:
LIE #1: “The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program … Iraq has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment needed for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons.” — President Bush, Oct. 7, 2002, in Cincinnati.
FACT: This story, leaked to and breathlessly reported by Judith Miller in the New York Times, has turned out to be complete baloney. Department of Energy officials, who monitor nuclear plants, say the tubes could not be used for enriching uranium. One intelligence analyst, who was part of the tubes investigation, angrily told The New Republic: “You had senior American officials like Condoleezza Rice saying the only use of this aluminum really is uranium centrifuges. She said that on television. And that’s just a lie.”
LIE #2: “The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” — President Bush, Jan.28, 2003, in the State of the Union address.
FACT: This whopper was based on a document that the White House already knew to be a forgery thanks to the CIA. Sold to Italian intelligence by some hustler, the document carried the signature of an official who had been out of office for 10 years and referenced a constitution that was no longer in effect. The ex-ambassador who the CIA sent to check out the story is pissed: “They knew the Niger story was a flat-out lie,” he told the New Republic, anonymously. “They [the White House] were unpersuasive about aluminum tubes and added this to make their case more strongly.”
LIE #3: “We believe [Saddam] has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.” — Vice President Cheney on March 16, 2003 on “Meet the Press.”
FACT: There was and is absolutely zero basis for this statement. CIA reports up through 2002 showed no evidence of an Iraqi nuclear weapons program.
LIE #4: “[The CIA possesses] solid reporting of senior-level contacts between Iraq and al-Qaeda going back a decade.” — CIA Director George Tenet in a written statement released Oct. 7, 2002 and echoed in that evening’s speech by President Bush.
FACT: Intelligence agencies knew of tentative contacts between Saddam and al-Qaeda in the early ’90s, but found no proof of a continuing relationship. In other words, by tweaking language, Tenet and Bush spun the intelligence180 degrees to say exactly the opposite of what it suggested.
LIE #5: “We’ve learned that Iraq has trained al-Qaeda members in bomb-making and poisons and deadly gases … Alliance with terrorists could allow the Iraqi regime to attack America without leaving any fingerprints.” — President Bush, Oct. 7.
FACT: No evidence of this has ever been leaked or produced. Colin Powell told the U.N. this alleged training took place in a camp in northern Iraq. To his great embarrassment, the area he indicated was later revealed to be outside Iraq’s control and patrolled by Allied war planes.
LIE #6: “We have 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. We are concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles] for missions targeting the United States.” — President Bush, Oct. 7.
FACT: Said drones can’t fly more than 300 miles, and Iraq is 6,000 miles from the U.S. coastline. Furthermore, Iraq’s drone-building program wasn’t much more advanced than your average model plane enthusiast. And isn’t a “manned aerial vehicle” just a scary way to say “plane”?
LIE #7: “We have seen intelligence over many months that they have chemical and biological weapons, and that they have dispersed them and that they’re weaponized and that, in one case at least, the command and control arrangements have been established.” — President Bush, Feb. 8, 2003, in a national radio address.
FACT: Despite a massive nationwide search by U.S. and British forces, there are no signs, traces or examples of chemical weapons being deployed in the field, or anywhere else during the war.
LIE #8: “Our conservative estimate is that Iraq today has a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agent. That is enough to fill 16,000 battlefield rockets.” — Secretary of State Colin Powell, Feb. 5 2003, in remarks to the UN Security Council.
FACT: Putting aside the glaring fact that not one drop of this massive stockpile has been found, as previously reported on AlterNet the United States’ own intelligence reports show that these stocks — if they existed — were well past their use-by date and therefore useless as weapon fodder.
LIE #9: “We know where [Iraq's WMD] are. They’re in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south, and north somewhat.” — Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, March 30, 2003, in statements to the press.
FACT: Needless to say, no such weapons were found, not to the east, west, south or north, somewhat or otherwise.
LIE #10: “Yes, we found a biological laboratory in Iraq which the UN prohibited.” — President Bush in remarks in Poland, published internationally June 1, 2003.
FACT: This was reference to the discovery of two modified truck trailers that the CIA claimed were potential mobile biological weapons lab. But British and American experts — including the State Department’s intelligence wing in a report released this week — have since declared this to be untrue. According to the British, and much to Prime Minister Tony Blair’s embarrassment, the trailers are actually exactly what Iraq said they were; facilities to fill weather balloons, sold to them by the British themselves.
So, months after the war, we are once again where we started — with plenty of rhetoric and absolutely no proof of this “grave danger” for which O.J. Smith died. The Bush administration is now scrambling to place the blame for its lies on faulty intelligence, when in fact the intelligence was fine; it was their abuse of it that was “faulty.”
Rather than apologize for leading us to a preemptive war based on impossibly faulty or shamelessly distorted “intelligence” or offering his resignation, our sly madman in the White House is starting to sound more like that other O.J. Like the man who cheerfully played golf while promising to pursue “the real killers,” Bush is now vowing to search for “the true extent of Saddam Hussein’s weapons programs, no matter how long it takes.”
On the terrible day of the 9/11 attacks, five hours after a hijacked plane slammed into the Pentagon, retired Gen. Wesley Clark received a strange call from someone (he didn’t name names) representing the White House position: “I was on CNN, and I got a call at my home saying, ‘You got to say this is connected. This is state-sponsored terrorism. This has to be connected to Saddam Hussein,’” Clark told Meet the Press anchor Tim Russert. “I said, ‘But — I’m willing to say it, but what’s your evidence?’ And I never got any evidence.’”
And neither did we.
http://www.alternet.org/story/16274/
I am sure that Iraq’s WMD will be found around the same time that o.j simpson tracks down the “real” killer of his skank wife.
V.L.R.B!!
Karr confessed to killing Mrs. OJ.
Good Chuckle off of this one.
http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c228/fiero128/erirdbno.jpg
Yes I had a good chuckle at that one Joe.
Anybody remember the Nightline Town Hall “Iraq: Why Now?” way back on March 4, 2003?
Listen to McCain lie his ass off:
TED KOPPEL
(Off Camera) Senator McCain, let me just come to you. How, I mean, what would it cost to keep a couple of hundred thousand troops there and keep the pressure on?
SENATOR JOHN MCCAIN
I would guess about a couple billion dollars a day. The fact is, we’ve had to, call up reservists. We’re not going to keep all those thousands and thousands of reservists on active duty. We’re not going to keep our guard people permanently there. We are certainly, certainly not going to keep troops indefinitely in Arab countries. Everybody knows that.
“Everybody knows that” except for Bush and Rumsfeld and Cheney and Rove etc. etc. etc.
Bush has already said that troops will be there as long as he is President.
The Republican Creed:
Jesus loves you, and shares your hatred of homosexuals, stem cell abusers and Hillary Clinton.
Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush’s daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him, and a bad guy when Bush needed a “we can’t find Bin Laden” diversion.
Trade with Cuba is wrong because the country is Communist, but trade with China and Vietnam is vital to a spirit of international harmony.
The United States should get out of the United Nations, and our highest national priority is enforcing U.N. resolutions against Iraq.
A woman can’t be trusted with decisions about her own body, but multi-national corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind without regulation.
The best way to improve military morale is to praise the troops in speeches, while slashing veterans’ benefits and combat pay.
If condoms are kept out of schools, adolescents won’t have sex.
A good way to fight terrorism is to belittle our long-time allies, then demand their cooperation and money.
Providing health care to all Iraqis is sound policy, but providinghealth care to all Americans is socialism.
HMOs and insurance companies have the best interests of the public at heart.
Global warming and tobacco’s link to cancer are junk science, butcreationism should be taught in schools.
A president lying about an extramarital affair is an impeachable offense, but a president lying to enlist support for a war in which thousands die is solid defense policy.
Government should limit itself to the powers named in theConstitution, which include banning gay marriages and censoring the Internet.
The public has a right to know about Hillary’s cattle trades, butGeorge Bush’s driving record is none of our business.
Being a drug addict is a moral failing and a crime, unless you’re a conservative radio host. Then it’s an illness and you need our prayers for your recovery.
What Bill Clinton did in the 1960s is of vital national interest, buy what Bush did in the ’80s is irrelevant.
Just more of the Republican lie machine to get us checked into the roach motel that is the mid-East.
Wow, great post, JM!
I stand in awe, sir, and that’s no kidding . . .
JM- That’s very good!!!
JM – so true.
This will be a pivotal point in history! *Thumbs Up!*
I was watching the local evening news when they had a piece about the first female space tourist. Her name is Anousheh Ansari an Iranian born woman who grew up in the United States. Educated as an engineer and became a entreprenuer and founded a very succesful Telecommunication company and became a very wealthy multi-millionaire. When she goes into space and into the International Space Station, she will be sporting both an American Flag and an Iranian Flag patches.
This had me thinking. Here you have an Iranian woman, educated, very successful and living her ultimate dream to go into space. This has to be a very big thing in Iran (if it isn’t censored by the government). Can you image what this event will do to the Iranian Street? I think this will have a profound positive impact for change. Way much more than what Bush is doing. I was telling the spouse when we were watching this that I think this will be a pivotal point in our history books. I think she will liberate women in Iran and change Iran.
Whatdayouthink?
http://www.happynews.com/news/8302006/iranian-born-woman-space-history.htm
Interesting post JM. Just throw so much unfounded silly crap at the computer screen, that the people you insult realize they don’t have the time or energy to respond to the silliness.
I suppose that we could all do that but no one would be able to keep track of anything. Could I suggest one or two misrepresentations at a time?
Gee- I guess we know who gets to define silly, don’t we?
The Sillyster!!
Perhaps Joe – I hope her trip can counteract all of the damage Bush has deliberately done. However I doubt that tokanism will do that much.
I think we would accomplish much more if we carried out policies that showed the US as a friend to the people in the Middle east rather than their enemies. Perhaps we could start by picking up all those unexploded cluster bombs we provided to be strewn all over southern Lebanon. Those munitions that we sent to be used there are killing Lebanese today.
I disagree we can be friends with radical islamic people. That is liking asking a leftist Democrat to be friends with Ann Coulter. It isn’t going to happen.
Aww whatsamatter Outie?
You cannot refute a single thing JM posted? Not even one?
And so you go to the tired lame arguement. “There is so much there to refute I won’t even try.”
Pick one thing JM posted Outie just one and refute it.
OR
Admit that JM is right and address the problems on your side of the aisle!
Years ago I heard a saying, “ If you think you are the only one that is sane in the world. It is a good indication of your own insanity”. Rumsfield statement reminded me of that saying, with the growing number of those that believe that we were lied into the invasion, that Iraq was a real mistake and the course being taken is a disaster. Perhaps Rumsfield should understand something my dad said, if one person tell you that you stink. They may just not like you, if an entire class tell you that you stink it maybe time to think about taking a bath!
But then Rumsfield thinks he is the only one that is sane.
Nazi appeasers? I’m wondering if he’s meaning George Prescott Bush who made millions off Jewish slave labor and contracts with Nazi Germany?
Joe – I was NOT referring to “friends with radical islamic people” and you know that. I was referring to being friends with FORMER friends like Saniora. Rather than being “liking asking a leftist Democrat to be friends with Ann Coulter” it is more like asking a moderate Democrat to be friends with a moderate Republican.
Actually Joe, Bill Maher and Ann Coulter are good friends.
Wow, I didn’t know Bill was into trans-sexuals!Kinky!
“The obscure we see eventually. The completely obvious, it seems, takes longer.
We cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home.
We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. When the loyal opposition dies, I think the soul of America dies with it.
The speed of communications is wondrous to behold. It is also true that speed can multiply the distribution of information that we know to be untrue.”
Edward R. Murrow
To bring this thread back to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld for a moment. When I did a Rumsfeld search a few minutes ago, I noticed some writer accused Mr. Rumsfeld of making more mistakes, in fact more big mistakes, than anyone else.
Of course, that might be true because Donald Rumsfeld has been called on to do more continuous decision-making for many years (twice as Secretary of Defense) without break.
Rumsfeld’s life reminds me of Franklin Roosevelt who, AFTER being struck and crippled by polio, was called on to govern the State of New York. This followed by election as President of the United States FOUR TERMS before dying in office in 1944. During that time, Roosevelt fought and conquered dust storms, the Great Depression, and Hitler/Musselini and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
By rights, Roosevelt should have spent his life as a member of the landed gentry playing polo in upstate New York but destiny prevailed.
The same with Donald Rumsfeld. He has probably shouldered more horrible decision-making than any man in government or elsewhere. But he’s on a whirling ferris wheel and most likely only death will let him off.