<p>I found this to be an interesting juxtaposition of thought:</p>
<p>First mathmom states: “Only because they were lied to.”</p>
<p>And then Liz follows with “… they stand by their convictions no matter what anyone says, even when presented with indisputable facts.”</p>
<p>While Liz’s statement clearly was directed at Bush supporters, it could just as easily have been directed at those like Mathmom who steadfastly cling to the Democratic talking point that was created to absolve those who voted for the war … the were “lied to”. They cling to this view despite no evidence to support this theory and in fact investigations which show this not to be true. They stubbornly resist logical thought processes which would/should ask: “Did the Clinton administration also lie to them? Did other nation’s intelligence communities also lie? Why was Al Gore (who presumably saw all of the classified information while in the Clinton administration) so adamant in singling out Iraq as a country that need to be dealt with as part of the war on terror?”</p>
<p>Mathmom, claiming in retrospect you (meaning the Democrats) were lied to implies a far more powerful Administration than we actually have, or ever had. It also implies an international conspiracy amazing in it’s scope. I liken this to stories of how FDR orchestrated the attack on Pearl Harbor to push the U.S. into WWII. I don’t believe it for a second. No one’s that smart - or skillful.</p>
<p>Do you think most Democrats also believe in space aliens visiting and wreaking all sorts of mischief, too? It’s about the same level of credibility. Frankly, it’s wacko-speak, and I’m trying to be polite. Now, along the same lines we have professors claiming Bush orchestrated the 9/11 attacks. Guess he’s got all those terrorists on the Bush big-oil, Halliburton payroll, too? How’s he pay them, Halliburton stock options wired to secret Swiss accounts? What’s their motivation, money? It just does not work. </p>
<p>For someone supposedly so dumb and inept, he’s better at orchestrating international conspiracies, wherein no one never, ever leaks or speaks out or gets mad and let’s the cat out of the bag, than Machiavelli. Even in Soviet Russia or Nazi Germany or Pol Pot’s Cambodia there were always leaks, even though thousands were regularly tortured, then executed for leaking even if they leaked or not. Their families, too, were executed just because they were related to the supposed leaker.</p>
<p>If this is true, why is it that the only one caught stealing classified documents related to U.S. terrorism policy from the Archives was a Clinton Administration Democrat? Maybe he’s on the Bush payroll, too?</p>
<p>Hey, maybe it was an honest lie. I don’t know. The jury is still out on that. The fact is the weapons inspectors hadn’t found anything up to that point and we chose to not believe them. I don’t know why, but there’s a lot of evidence that Bush and friends were interested in Iraq long before 9/11.</p>
<p>A ‘lie’ means an intentional effort to deceive. There’s no such thing as an ‘honest lie’.</p>
<p>One can believe in something that turns out to be false, but that’s not a lie.</p>
<p>No - that’s not liberal fuzzy logic. That is a clear effort to cause damage for political purposes. They know it’s not true, but they say it to hurt the other side.</p>
<p>“It also implies an international conspiracy amazing in it’s scope.”</p>
<p>Why do you think that? Colin Powell got up before the entire world, with maps, “recreations”, and photographs, and lied so baldly before the United Nations that semi-amateur reporters in Kurdistan uncovered the lies within 48 hours (Powell showed a picture of a so-called “chemical weapons depot” that was in fact a Kurdish leaders’ headquarters in territory not controlled by Saddam Hussein). Why an “international conspiracy”? All the intelligence led back to a single, corrupted source, and then they made it up as they went along.</p>
<p>Let’s be clear: the Dems WANTED to believe it. Like the Republicans, they didn’t ask the hard questions; they were led around by the nose; they got caught up in the jingoist frenzy; they didn’t want to be caught “on the wrong side” in the (ah-hem) ‘war on terror’. They were (for the most part) moral cowards, politically inept, and were too busy covering their butts to actually try to figure out what kind of lies they were being fed.</p>
<p>There wasn’t any need for an international conspiracy, when all that was necessary was within 50 feet of the Oval Office.</p>
<p>The Democrats may have wanted to believe it, but then so did a lot of Republicans. Both bought off on it. Second-guessing them, all of them, now has not borne fruit, except to say that our intelligence was weak - supposedly. </p>
<p>Then again, it could still be proved right, too. Mathmom has that part correct.</p>
<p>I know…you think I was a Reagan hater, but you are actually wrong on this one.</p>
<p>I was a political neophyte in 1987 (young, too ;)) and was still voting as my Republican family members recommended, so guess who voted for Reagan??? Yup. </p>
<p>Remember that old saw that liberals grow up to be conservative? Um…nope.</p>
<p>Thanks for answering. Your position sounds reasonable in retrospect.</p>
<p>However, it seems to me, that the majority of liberals in the 1980’s felt that the Reagan administrations dealings with the USSR were a disaster that would likely lead to mutually assured destruction. That the USSR was perhaps being more reasonable than the USA in this period of turmoil. That the threat of “Star Wars” was a fool hearty adventure and threat that made the US into preemptive unilateralists, rather than a threat that brought the Politburo to its knees (as it did, according to Gorbachev). </p>
<p>That Iran-Contra was a threat to democracy that ruined our system of government and should have brought down the entire administration. That the liberal media like NPR and PBS preempted their normal programming to carry the hearings live and in color as officials were drug before congress. That the left was salivating as it turns out, sadly salivating. </p>
<p>That is, about like the Left, now.</p>
<p>This is what I have read. Is this how you remember it?</p>
<p>If so, in what way does it differ from the liberal reaction to the current administration and to the President?</p>
<p>This always makes me laugh… is this part of the script for Bush haters?</p>
<p>Remember interest rates at 18%?
Runaway inflation?
The worst economy to date in the post WWII era?
A foreign policy that allowed the overthrow of the Shah, marxists to take over Nicaragua, and emboldened the USSR to invade Afghanistan?</p>
<p>The complete and utter humiliation of the US as our embassy was taken over and our people were taken hostage… the response… a botched rescue effort in the dessert by a few helicopters.</p>
<p>I remember Dan Ackroyd on SNL doing his Carter imitation and saying “Inflation isn’t so bad… wouldn’t you like to smoke a $200 cigar? I know I would”</p>
<p>Like I said, history will judge, but this one’s not close.</p>
<p>You are saying you were not a leftist…liberal…Democrat…whatever, in 1987?</p>
<p>If so, it would make sense that you were not so knee-jerk then. Openminded in your youth? To have at least tasted is better than to have never known the sweetness. I’m happy for you.</p>
<p>O cursed spite,
That ever you were born to be left…not right</p>
<p>Rumsfeld, Rice, McNamara, even Kissinger engender a sense among many that they are particularly astute, because of their affect. Industry and academia are filled with Rumsfelds. They sound erudite, but what are they saying?</p>
<p>I have been there. In the exalted halls of the academy where demeanor reigns supreme, but lives are not lost in the academy. Our children die on the battlefield. Read Feynman and listen to Groucho Marx. It is not the demeanor or the uniform; it is the substance.</p>
<p>I thought I saw through them all, but trusted Colin Powell. He was on the fence. He could have resigned, but went along. His son was appointed head of the FCC.</p>
<p>Where are the Eliot Richardson’s, who placed principle above personal gain,
for those old enough to remember?</p>
<p>“Let’s be clear: the Dems WANTED to believe it. Like the Republicans, they didn’t ask the hard questions; they were led around by the nose; they got caught up in the jingoist frenzy; they didn’t want to be caught “on the wrong side” in the (ah-hem) ‘war on terror’. They were (for the most part) moral cowards, politically inept, and were too busy covering their butts to actually try to figure out what kind of lies they were being fed.”</p>
<p>I think they also thought the war would be like the first Iraq war. They perceived that they lost the elections because they’d been burned for anti-war votes in the past. I agree, Democrats weren’t asking hard questions. Fact is though, they could all have voted against it and we’d still be there.</p>
This brings me to post one of the best things about GWB: he is NOT Al Gore or John Kerry who have proven time and time again that they place politics far ahead of principles. They have become so predictable that if I were to go live in a monastary, far removed from any news sources for a year or two and then return and with the aid of nothing more than reading a few headlines and looking at the latest polling data, I could predict with almost 100% accuracy which side of the fence they chose to be on … that day.</p>