Clipmarks | merrie's 'al qaeda' clips

Saddam was right and Bush was Wrong

Sat, 30 Dec 2006 18:27:29 GMT

clipped by: debbyski

Think about it. It was the Bush administration and not Saddam that turned out to be lying about WMDs. As we all know now, there weren't any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Amazingly enough, it was Saddam who was telling the truth from the very beginning. Bush was the one who lied to the whole world.

George Bush repeatedly told us that Saddam was lying, that Iraq had WMDs, and that Iraq under Saddam was a "threat to the whole world." So, here we are, years later. What have we learned to be the truth?

The search for WMDs turned up nothing. Nada. Zip. Zilch.

Everything Hussein said about the weapons has turned out to be true. Everything Bush said about the weapons has turned out to be false.

The non-existent weapons of mass destruction weren't the only falsehood. There were the phony uranium purchases, lies about Al-Qaeda training camps in Iraq, mobile weapons labs, and drones that were going to attack the East Coast of the US.

So, when confronted with the charge that he lied about the reasons to go to war with Iraq, President Bush simply went into spin mode and said, "The defense of freedom is always worth it."

Was it worth it to the thousands of Americans who have been wounded or killed?

Was it worth it to the countless Iraqi men, women and children who have died?

Was it worth it to their families?

The reality of the situation is that the US Government - from Bush Sr., to Bill Clinton, to G.W - decided on its own that Saddam should no longer be the president of Iraq. This is the very thing that the Constitution and International Law were designed to prevent.

America was never threatened by Saddam Hussein. Iraq had absolutely no capability to attack the United States, and never was there indicated a desire to do so.

We're living in sad times, indeed, times when you can trust what Saddam Hussein says more than your own government.

Tags: bush, sadaam, war, lies

Powell spills it about Bush / Iraq

Sun, 08 Jul 2007 17:40:43 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan
clipper's remarks: Al-Qaeda, Powell asserted, was only 10% of the problem in Iraq and Nouri al-Maliki, its prime minister, lacked the political will to establish an effective government. After a promising start to the surge at the beginning of the year, 453 unidentified corpses were found on the streets of Baghdad last month, 41% more than the 321 bodies found in January, according to unofficial Iraqi health ministry statistics.

Clip Source: www.timesonline.co.uk

THE former American secretary of state Colin Powell has revealed that he spent 2½ hours vainly trying to persuade President George W Bush not to invade Iraq and believes today’s conflict cannot be resolved by US forces.

“I tried to avoid this war,” Powell said at the Aspen Ideas Festival in Colorado. “I took him through the consequences of going into an Arab country and becoming the occupiers.

Powell has become increasingly outspoken about the level of violence in Iraq, which he believes is in a state of civil war. “The civil war will ultimately be resolved by a test of arms,” he said. “It’s not going to be pretty to watch, but I don’t know any way to avoid it. It is happening now.”

He added: “It is not a civil war that can be put down or solved by the armed forces of the United States.” All the military could do, Powell suggested, was put “a heavier lid on this pot of boiling sectarian stew”

Shi’ites will ultimately prevail

they are determined not to be ruled again by the Sunnis

Tags: iran, iraq, war, terror, bush, powell, cheney, politics, election, islam

FBI: Waterboarding did NOT produce useful results

Tue, 18 Dec 2007 13:38:16 GMT

clipped by: jklugman

Clip Source: www.washingtonpost.com

Coleman, a 31-year FBI veteran, joined other former law enforcement colleagues in expressing skepticism about Abu Zubaida's importance. Abu Zubaida, he said in an interview, was a "safehouse keeper" with mental problems who claimed to know more about al-Qaeda and its inner workings than he really did.

Looking at other evidence, including a serious head injury that Abu Zubaida had suffered years earlier, Coleman and others at the FBI believed that he had severe mental problems that called his credibility into question. "They all knew he was crazy, and they knew he was always on the damn phone," Coleman said, referring to al-Qaeda operatives. "You think they're going to tell him anything?"

But, Coleman and other law enforcement officials said, CIA officials concluded to the contrary that Abu Zubaida was a major player, and they saw any lack of information as evidence that he was resisting interrogation. Much of the threat information provided by Abu Zubaida, Coleman said, "was crap."

Tags: fbi, cia, torture, waterboarding, abu zubaida, abu zubayda

Barack Obama on Iraq - 2002

Tue, 06 Feb 2007 18:14:33 GMT

clipped by: jmk432
clipper's remarks: I love this quote! And it was in 2002!

Clip Source: en.wikisource.org

Barack Obama's Iraq Speech

Delivered on 26 October 2002.

That’s what I’m opposed to. A dumb war. A rash war. A war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics.

Now let me be clear – I suffer no illusions about Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal man. A ruthless man. A man who butchers his own people to secure his own power. He has repeatedly defied UN resolutions, thwarted UN inspection teams, developed chemical and biological weapons, and coveted nuclear capacity.

He’s a bad guy. The world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without him.

But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military a fraction of its former strength, and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history.

I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the middle east, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of al-Qaeda.

I am not opposed to all wars. I’m opposed to dumb wars.

Tags: barack, obama, iraq

World War III Cancelled

Tue, 04 Dec 2007 16:35:32 GMT

clipped by: Elisabeth Eaves
clipper's remarks: So it turns out that Iran stopped developing nuclear weapons in 2003, according to the new National Intelligence Estimate. It's easy to distrust the U.S. intelligence community, which not only made mistakes on Al-Qaeda and Iraq, but also told us in 2005 that Tehran was determined to build nukes. But there's at least one thing we can all be relieved about today: Imminent open warfare between the U.S. and Iran is almost certainly off the table.

Clip Source: www.slate.com

If there was ever a possibility that President George W. Bush would drop bombs on Iran, the chances have now shrunk to nearly zero.

In one of the most dramatic National Intelligence Estimates ever, the 16 agencies of the U.S. intelligence community concluded today "with high confidence" that Iran "halted its nuclear weapons" four years ago, in the fall of 2003.

The NIE, which was released this afternoon, also judges "with moderate confidence" that Iran won't be "technically capable" of producing enough materials for an atom bomb—much less the bomb itself—until 2010-15 or possibly later.

Tags: iran, nuclear weapons, intelligence

Bush Admin Leak Severed a Link to Al-Qaeda's Secrets

Wed, 10 Oct 2007 04:39:56 GMT

clipped by: BobbyDelray

Clip Source: www.washingtonpost.com

A small private intelligence company that monitors Islamic terrorist groups obtained a new Osama bin Laden video ahead of its official release last month, and around 10 a.m. on Sept. 7, it notified the Bush administration of its secret acquisition. It gave two senior officials access on the condition that the officials not reveal they had it until the al-Qaeda release.

Within 20 minutes, a range of intelligence agencies had begun downloading it from the company's Web site. By midafternoon that day, the video and a transcript of its audio track had been leaked from within the Bush administration to cable television news and broadcast worldwide.

The founder of the company, the SITE Intelligence Group, says this premature disclosure tipped al-Qaeda to a security breach and destroyed a years-long surveillance operation that the company has used to intercept and pass along secret messages, videos and advance warnings of suicide bombings from the terrorist group's communications network.

Tags: osama, bin, laden, bush, administration, site, intelligence, group, al-qaeda

Slightly more important than Paris Hilton...

Fri, 08 Jun 2007 22:06:14 GMT

clipped by: egoldstein
clipper's remarks: I wouldn't want the news stations to stop covering the most important news of the day, but i'm thinking that in the long run this will actually have a greater effect on the world than Paris Hilton.

Clip Source: www.cnn.com

BUHRUZ, Iraq (CNN) -- U.S. forces have begun arming nationalist guerrillas and former Saddam Hussein loyalists -- and coordinating tactics -- in a marriage of convenience against al Qaeda radicals in one of Iraq's most violent provinces, senior U.S. commanders tell CNN.

This new alliance, a result of the deepening divisions among Iraqi insurgent factions, was on display earlier this week at a highway intersection in the town of Tahrir. There, a group of some 15 insurgents publicly chanted: "Death to al Qaeda."

Tags: news, iraq, al qaeda

9/11 Is Over

Sun, 30 Sep 2007 15:00:53 GMT

clipped by: debbyski
clipper's remarks: "We can’t afford to keep being this stupid! We have got to get our groove back. We need a president who will unite us around a common purpose, not a common enemy. Al Qaeda is about 9/11. We are about 9/12, we are about the Fourth of July — which is why I hope that anyone who runs on the 9/11 platform gets trounced."

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Not long ago, the satirical newspaper The Onion ran a fake news story that began like this:

“At a well-attended rally in front of his new ground zero headquarters Monday, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani officially announced his plan to run for president of 9/11. ‘My fellow citizens of 9/11, today I will make you a promise,’ said Giuliani during his 18-minute announcement speech in front of a charred and torn American flag. ‘As president of 9/11, I will usher in a bold new 9/11 for all.’ If elected, Giuliani would inherit the duties of current 9/11 President George W. Bush, including making grim facial expressions, seeing the world’s conflicts in terms of good and evil, and carrying a bullhorn at all state functions.”

What does that mean?

honor, and weep for, all those murdered on that day. But our reaction to 9/11 — mine included — has knocked America completely out of balance, and it is time to get things right again.

Tags: fear, exploitation, by, our, government

We Are At War!...and don't you forget it!....clipable

Thu, 25 Jan 2007 08:11:39 GMT

clipped by: schreibe
clipper's remarks: A summation of Bush's "State Of The Union" address that gives a well thought out critique of the deeper meaning of his words and statements. One thing that I didn't notice was his refusal to use the word "Democratic" instead of "Democrat"...may sound trivial, but this is exactly how this administration operates.

Clip Source: www.consortiumnews.com

Bush's War on the Republic

From the beginning of the “war on terror,” George W. Bush has lied to the American people about the goals, motivation and even the identity of the enemy – a propaganda exercise that continued through his 2007 State of the Union Address and that is sounding the death knell for the Republic.

Since 2001, rather than focusing on the al-Qaeda Sunni fundamentalist terrorists behind the 9/11 attacks, Bush has expanded the conflict exponentially – tossing in unrelated enemies such as Iraq’s secular dictator Saddam Hussein, Shiite-led Iran, Syria and Islamic militants opposed to Israel, like Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza.

In effect, Bush has transformed what began as a definable military objective – the defeat of “terrorist groups with global reach” – into an endless war against what he regards as evil, a conflict so vague that it is claiming as collateral damage America’s “unalienable rights” and the Founders’ checks and balances on the powers of the Executive.

In Bush’s State of the Union speech on Jan. 23, there could be heard a requiem for the Republic.

“The evil that inspired and rejoiced in 9/11 is still at work in the world. And so long as that’s the case, America is still a nation at war,” Bush told Congress.

But that “evil” will always be “at work in the world,” so America will always be “a nation at war” and thus, under Bush’s theories of unlimited Commander-in-Chief powers, the American Republic will be banished permanently.

Bluntly put, Bush and his neoconservative legal advisers don't believe in the “unalienable rights” guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, including ones as fundamental as the habeas corpus right to a fair trial and protections against warrantless searches and seizures. [See, for instance, Consortiumnews.com's "Gonzales Questions Habeas Corpus."]

Tags: bush, politics, war

10 Appaling Lies

Mon, 08 Jan 2007 19:31:39 GMT

clipped by: debbyski
clipper's remarks: Bears repeating.

Clip Source: www.alternet.org

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."

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.

LIE #3: "We believe [Saddam] has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons." -- Vice President Cheney on March 16, 2003 on "Meet the Press."

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.

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.

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."

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.

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.

Tags: war, iraq, lies

Gore Derangement Syndrome

Mon, 15 Oct 2007 11:10:25 GMT

clipped by: schreibe

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Gore Derangement Syndrome

What is it about Mr. Gore that drives right-wingers insane?

Partly it’s a reaction to what happened in 2000, when the American people chose Mr. Gore but his opponent somehow ended up in the White House. Both the personality cult the right tried to build around President Bush and the often hysterical denigration of Mr. Gore were, I believe, largely motivated by the desire to expunge the stain of illegitimacy from the Bush administration.

And now that Mr. Bush has proved himself utterly the wrong man for the job — to be, in fact, the best president Al Qaeda’s recruiters could have hoped for — the symptoms of Gore derangement syndrome have grown even more extreme.

The worst thing about Mr. Gore, from the conservative point of view, is that he keeps being right.

He’s taken everything they could throw at him, and emerged more respected, and more credible, than ever. And it drives them crazy.

Tags: bush, politics, gore

Bush baloney on Al Qaeda disputed by Pentagon

Tue, 18 Mar 2008 21:17:29 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: "The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda, because there WAS a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda." GWB, 2004

Clip Source: rawstory.com

You may recall that on June 17, 2004, President Bush said, "The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda, because there was a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda."

And three days earlier, Vice President Cheney, speaking of Saddam, said, "He had long established ties with al Qaeda."

Last week, the Pentagon completed a study that found that there was no cooperation between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda.

Tags: iraq, bush, war, politics

Re-Thinking The War

Wed, 09 May 2007 17:58:26 GMT

clipped by: Kore7
clipper's remarks: Here's looking forward to a time when clips on America's reputation are more fitting for the nation we aspire to be.

When the next major terrorist attack comes, the question will simply be how much liberty Americans have left. That is a victory al Qaeda could not have achieved by force of arms. It is something they have achieved with our witting and conscious help.

Clip Source: andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com

This is why the Iraq war, so far, must be seen as a huge al Qaeda propaganda victory. Their narrative is that Muslims are under siege by an evil, imperialist, infidel army that tortures and abuses Muslims at will. Before Iraq, this was an absurdity. After Iraq, less so. Iraq has helped sustain al Qaeda's narrative with imagery and violence that will always stain the image of America in the Middle East. Yes, the paranoia of the Arab street would have invented such atrocities even if they didn't exist. But they did exist and continue to exist. The images of Abu Ghraib did not shock Iraqis used to far worse horrors under Saddam. But they did help educate Arabs and Muslims across the world into believing the very worst about U.S. intentions. Because this war is a war of ideas and ideals, this matters a huge amount. Our one massive advantage - that we are a free and decent civilization - has been fatally blurred.

Tags: america, us, war, iraq, al qaeda, abu ghraib, liberty, torture, foreign policy, terrorism

Extracted line by line from Hell by pro bono Attorneys

Wed, 17 Oct 2007 18:19:39 GMT

clipped by: righthand
clipper's remarks: "Osama Abu Kabir is a Jordanian water truck driver who worked for the municipality of Greater Amman. After joining an Islamic missionary organization called Jama'at al-Tablighi, he traveled to Afghanistan, where he was detained by anti-Taliban forces and handed over to the US military. One of the justifications offered for his continued detention is that he was captured wearing a Casio digital watch, a brand supposedly favored by members of Al Qaeda because some models may be used as bomb detonators. Kabir remains at Guantánamo.

IS IT TRUE?

Is it true that the grass grows up again after the rain?
Is it true that the flowers will rise up in the spring?
Is it true that birds will migrate home again?
Is it true that the salmon swim back up their stream?
It is true. This is true. These are all miracles.
But is it true that one day we'll leave Guantánamo Bay?
Is it true that one day we'll go back to our homes?
I sail in my dreams, I am dreaming of homes.
To be with my children

Clip Source: www.boston.com

Poems from Guantánamo

Sami al Haj, a Sudanese national, was a journalist covering the conflict in Afghanistan for the television station al-Jazeera when, in 2001, he was taken into custody and stripped of his passport and press card.

Handed over to US forces in January 2002, he was tortured at both Bagram air base and Kandahar

When I heard pigeons cooing in the trees,
Hot tears covered my face.
When the lark chirped, my thoughts composed
A message for my son.
Mohammad, I am afflicted.
In my despair, I have no one but Allah for comfort.
The oppressors are playing with me,
As they move freely about the world.
They ask me to spy on my countrymen,
Claiming it would be a good deed.
They offer me money and land,
And freedom to go where I please.
Their temptations seize my attention
Like lightning in the sky.
But their gift is an evil snake,
Carry hypocrisy in its mouth like venom.
They have monuments to liberty
And freedom of opinion, which is well and good.
But I explained to them that
Archite

Tags: poems, guantanamo

Does Bush understand who we're fighting?

Fri, 26 Jan 2007 02:12:01 GMT

clipped by: enbar
clipper's remarks: Comments on the State of the Union address, in which Bush lumped together all sorts of groups and events that have no connection to one another as "the enemy." Reflects this administration's dangerously superficial understanding of what's going on in the world and an overriding reluctance to think critically about what causes violence.

Clip Source: www.washingtonpost.com

President's Portrayal of 'The Enemy' Often Flawed

By Glenn Kessler

In his State of the Union address last night, President Bush presented an arguably misleading and often flawed description of "the enemy" that the United States faces overseas, lumping together disparate groups with opposing ideologies to suggest that they have a single-minded focus in attacking the United States.

Under Bush's rubric, a country such as Iran -- which enjoys diplomatic representation and billions of dollars in trade with major European countries -- is lumped together with al-Qaeda, the terrorist group responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. "The Shia and Sunni extremists are different faces of the same totalitarian threat," Bush said, referring to the different branches of the Muslim religion.

At one point, Bush catalogued what he described as advances in the quest for freedom in the Middle East during 2005 -- such as the departure of Syrian troops from Lebanon and elections in Iraq. Then, Bush asserted, "a thinking enemy watched all of these scenes, adjusted their tactics and in 2006 they struck back." But his description of the actions of "the enemy" tried to tie together a series of diplomatic and military setbacks that had virtually no connection to one another, from an attack on a Sunni mosque in Iraq to the assassination of Maronite Lebanese political figure.

In fact, many of the countries that Bush considers "moderate" -- such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia -- are autocratic dictatorships rated among the worst of the "not free" nations by the nonpartisan Freedom House. Their Freedom House ratings are virtually indistinguishable from Cuba, Belarus and Burma, which Bush last night listed as nations in desperate need of freedom.

Tags: news, bushies, u.s.-news, gwot, war, religion, islam, politics