Not surprised are we?

This was inevitable.

There alwats were and still are WMD's in Iraq or stored next door in Iran or Syria. It is only a matter of where they are and how much time will it take to find them. There will be more to come.
Daniel

Here you go Kate...

http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewNation.asp?Page=/Nation/archive/200606/NAT20060621e.html

You may want to change the link so that it doesn't screw up your template.

Take care...

500 rounds eh? Woo.

Always remembering that just ONE of those things is more than enough to poison a subway system. Sarin doesn't clean up well. Kinda oily, sticks to things.

Then there's the permanent case of dead that a whole bunch of people would catch if Jihad Boy lit it off at rush hour. "Degraded" is a relative term, in this case meaning "not quite as horrifically deadly as it could be."

Good thing jihadis are a bunch of goofs. We can't expect that good fortune to last though.

I don't care what the evidence shows. BUSH LIED! BWAAHAHAHAHAHAH! RARRRGH! I'M AN ANGRY LEFTOID! WHERE'S MY GRANOLA BAR?

Wonder how long it will be till the far left finds the "evidence" that the shells were plants by Bush & co.

About time these were recovered/proven!!

Jazz - you took the drivil right off the pens and yaps of the MSM. It should take them about two days to try to 'spin' this...they will though, must be horrible to be so predictable.

Actually, the WMD were known to be there all along, but Karl Rove instisted that they be kept a secret, so that the DNC and KOS kids would make fools of themselves my crying "no WMD", then be snuffed, when WMD were found. That Karl is a crafty fellow.

There ~ enough spin for you?

Below is one of the summary statements of the Iraq Survey Group's final report. You can feel vindicated if you are desperate to be so, however, I think it shows how effective the UN inspectors and blockade were more than anything.

'While a small number of old, abandoned chemical munitions have been discovered, ISG judges that Iraq unilaterally destroyed its undeclared chemical weapons stockpile in 1991. There are no credible indications that Baghdad resumed production of chemical munitions thereafter, a policy ISG attributes to Baghdad’s desire to see sanctions lifted, or rendered ineffectual, or its fear of force against it should WMD be discovered."

If you want to read it all here is the url

http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/report/2004/isg-final-report/isg-final-report_vol3_cw_key-findings.htm

The UN had it right in 1991 and if anyone is vindicated here it is the UN. Saddam was made impotent. His viagra(so to speak) would have been the end of the embargo. But that wouldn't have happened anytime soon after 9/11. This report merely underlines how imprudent Bush was.

Steve d, prepare to be flung with cow dung, but well done anyway.

Looks to me like he's already rolling in it.

"The UN had it right in 1991 and if anyone is vindicated here it is the UN. Saddam was made impotent."

So they kept sending in Hans Blix for the next decade and a half?

Mississauga Matt
You have to read it. It says that Saddam didn't make any WMD after the first Gulf War. That is why what little was found was degraded.

Are you that unbelievably naive and downright stupid, after all the information we have on the perversity and incompetence of the UN sanctions, to come in here and post that this vindicates the UN? You're insane...

calgarian

Easy for you to say, you have no knowledge whatsoever. For this to true Bush would have had to cover up information that would vindicate his going into Iraq. The whole thing is absurd.
We have a desperate Republican party who are grasping at straws to get re-elected. It is pathetic. It is even more pathetic that people would find this credible.
If this had any, I mean any, truth or credibility Bush would hold a press conference and then give half a dozen speeches on the issue. If you were sitting on evidence that would vindicate you would you sit on it?? I don't think so.

Missing the point as usual Stevie. 500 rounds of gas filled artillery shells, that's more than 50 gallons right there.

How many gallons of sarin needed to poison the NY subway Stevie? More than 50? Fatal dose is measured in milligrams, you do the math.

Steve, what I read was your post. And you wrote that the U.N. was right back in '91.

Still stickin' with that?

Also as Captain Ed points out, Blix's Dicks MISSED this if it was Gulf War I vintage. This stash was supposed to have been turned in/destroyed by Saddam.

Meanwhile, Saddam Hussein al-Majid al-Tikriti is on a hunger strike along with seven co-defendants.

Three defence lawyers have been killed since the trial opened 3 months ago.

Former US secretary of justice Ramsay Clark, a member of Saddam's defense team, is incommunicado. Clark was appointed Attorney-General by Democratic President LBJ in 1967.

The noose tightens on the necks of Saddam and his henchmen.

The countdown to execution has begun.

Mississauga Matt
The report says that he has made no WMD after the first Gulf War. Anything that was found was pre-Gulf War 1. That is why it is so degraded.
What he did have was chemical labs ready to go but no precursors were found. Again, he was waiting for the embargo to end to restart his WMD program. There is no way they would have let him restart after 9/11 that is certain.

Steee-eeeve, you're duckin' and dancin', but let's keep to the issue.

You wrote that the U.N. was right back in '91. You still stickin' to that?

I was well known that the paper trail on the shells was messy and not everything was necesssarily accounted for, but there was no worry as the contents of these weapons were degraded a long time ago. They never found what happened with all of the anthrax either, but it would have been degraded over ten years ago, so why worry?

Today, these shells would be far more dangerous if they were simply conventional weapons.

This latest affair is nothing more than disinformation by Santorum.

Steve d. has it correct up top. These materials were already known. All weapons inspectors, Ritter/Blix/Kay, were in their respective times and still remain of the opinion that there was no threat as nothing had been manufactured since the first Gulf War, and that the active materials would just be completely degraded.

Nothing here but more Bushit spin, folks. Move on, or look foolish.

Funny that it didn't make it onto the front page in the washington times or anywhere else for that in the world.

Electiona coming up and the GOP needs all the help they can get.

Too bad sarin doesn't have much of a shelf life.

f the stuff didn't work 2 years ago how can it now?

steve d: I'm not well briefed on this issue, but even if they go back to Gulf-1, weren't they supposed to be destroyed and hasn't Saddam lied in claiming they were?

Still and all, I don't have a very warm feeling that this is going to do anything to dislodge the Bush Lied People Died crowd (if anything can).

Saw a bumper sticker once reading SIERRA CLUB KISS MY AXE

I've lost count. Is this the 10th or 11th time the WMD wolf has been cried since the invasion?

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me ten times and I must be a conservative.

Or you could say "F%ck the Jews" and be a left-wing twat.

Oh, you already did, and you are.

I see the loons are out in full force tonight!
I guess 500 WMD's, give or take a few is a rather insignificant number of armaments. Now perhaps if they had found several thousand, then maybe Steve and his pals might be impressed.
It seems to me that if Sadaam was in compliance as the UN figures, then one WMD would be too many and more than enough to prove the case against the dictators regime.
These lefty socialists hate President Bush so much that it won't matter what is said or what is found, it will not change their pre-defined notions.
Facts are that there were and probably still are WMD's in Iraq which contravene the UN sanctions against Sadaam and his regime which gives legitimacy to the invasion and overthrow of a dictatorial tyrant.
If Steve and his echo chamber had their way, the UN elite would still be syphoning billions off the oil for food scam and Sadaam and his sons would still be committing genocide while pulling women off the streets to be raped and murdered.
Whether you choose to accept it, it was the right thing to overthrow the tyrant and make an effort to bring democracy to the middle east. Will it succeed? Only time will tell.
Daniel

"Again, he was waiting for the embargo to end to restart his WMD program. Posted by: steve d. "

Well, duh, yes, he would have re-started his WMD program the very day- not the day after- we turned our backs on him. Steve d is so thick he doesn't recognize a white flag even as he's raising it.

Has anyone seen any information as to whether or not the shells containing Sarin were stored in a binary form as separate precursors (Methylphosphonyl Difluoride and Isopropyl Amine) or were they premixed? If they were stored in a binary form, from my limited understanding (researching on the net (Google is my friend) and NBCD courses in the military) they would have a much longer shelf-life. They would have a much shorter shelf-life if they were premixed.

Google "M687" for info on a model of artillery shell that stores the weapon as a binary form. When stored in this fashion the munition is much more stable and when the munition is fired the precursors mix midair to produce Sarin gas.

Sarin is pretty nasty stuff, just one artillery shell filled with it would cause quite a few deaths and permanent injuries. Not the easiest stuff to clean up either as a previous poster has mentioned.

Talk like this should help to bring the price of gas up to 3 bucks a litre real quick.

These are the shells they found a long time ago,buried like saddam said the weapons inspecters knew they were duds, why else would the ONLY PLACE to find this headline is at FOX lol.

Remember the insurgents fired one at the US they mix in flight didn't work. lol

Defense Department says 'Whachoo talkin bout Ricky?'

"Fox News’ Jim Angle contacted the Defense Department who quickly disavowed Santorum and Hoekstra’s claims. A Defense Department official told Angle flatly that the munitions hyped by Santorum and Hoekstra are “not the WMD’s for which this country went to war.”"

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/21/dod-disavows-santorum/

When will you rubes learn?

Just came from Cspan and the US doesn't mention it funny, they do a lot of talking about Iraq, right now its pulling out before things get worse.

It is remarkable how a discredited rumour - started on a pathologically unreliable show like Hannity & Colmes and fanned by Rove &c in prep for the Nov elections - can get some unbelievably gullible bloggers going.

You don't have to be a leftie to be skeptical. Look at the comments President Bush and Donald Rumsfeld themselves have made: there was no WMD in Iraq.

President Bush appointed the Robb-Silberman Commission in 2004 to tell him why the intelligence was so wrong.

There is just no end to the strangeness of this blog. Just when you think the author is turning it around, bang ....

Why?

This story has legs on a conservative blog because it is taken at face value. When a "true believer(in this case a conservative ideologue) you accept without question anything that reinforces your belief system.

The Republicans know this and even though most would see right through this in a minute the Republicans aren't targeting us they are aiming at the true believers, their base. People like Rick Santorum are losing their ideological base and they must have them to have even the faintest hope in the November elections. So this one was for them. I would say they pretty much bought it just like Santorum et al thought they would. The trouble is, they are going to have to come up with a lot more between now and then so hold on to your sides this is going to be funny..a little sad too..but mostly funny. Santorum will be casting about using every shiny lure in his pail to engage his base.

Why,

given that the UN was in the process of accounting for stockpiles of WMD's prior to the breakdown with Saddam, and that they couldn't account for them all prior to the start of the war, I'm wondering:

What do you think happened to them?

Also wondering, why would you think, after the sanctions were eventually lifted, that Saddam wouldn't simply make new stocks of Sarin, Nerve Gas and continue his attempts at nukes, assuming they were destroyed prior to the war?

Oh and one more question, if a notorious killer stabbed one of his neighbors with a knife, ran into his house and refused to come out with his hands up, and the cops went in to get him,

would you think the killer isn't dangerous if the cops couldn't find the knife in the house?

Just wondering.

1) Guest Author - Kate's away this week. Don't blame her for this post.
2) Steve, Rube, Sam, MarkF, Why - If the shells are so degraded, would you care to go into a room and open one? What am I saying? Of course you'll say "Sure". After all, this is the internet and you're all "Progs".

Steve d.; Robert; et al: I am stunned by the fact that you are minimizing the possibility that any amount of WMD were found. We have very little to go on, so the whole thing may be a cheap political stunt, but your off handed dismissal is actually disturbing.

One.... that is one, functioning chemical or nerve munition which was stored properly could have devastating consequences were it deployed in confined space where there are lots of people. None of this is a matter for mocking.

For the supposed "champions of humanrights and compassion" you people are really sick. Your overall motivation is clearly to prove Bush/Hitler wrong at all costs, and the entire right for that matter... the facts as they unfold, no matter how sobering, don't even slow you folks down for a second. Anyone jumping to any conclusions at this point, no matter what they are, is a very desparate person and doesn't even care to wait to see how things pan out.

Talk to the Kurds about how harmless a few nerve gas shells are.

I wouldn't even bother with the trolls. One believes that we should be "negotiating" with the Taliban (saw it on another blog) and the other one believes there is no truth to anything ever because it's all about public opinion for power (the parties he supports do this, so everyone must).

My fellow righties...you just don't get it do you?..They could have found a nuclear warhead ready for launch and the hardcore lefties here wouldn't care a bit.Bush is evil,consevatism is evil and not a f*cking thing you can dream up to say is going to enlighten them!Their hatred of the right has become a warm blanket and they fully intend to stay wrapped in it,even if it means aiding our enemies...Disgraceful!!

God you people are stupid. You'll believe anything, won't you?

uh, bush is a frat boy who lucked in having daddy in the white house. the big oil boys spotted him whilst working hand in hand with george herbert walker and decided in light of this 2 term limit thingy they would put everything in place for dubya the squawking parrot to assume the mantle asap. or more precisely, the pseudo-mantle. where is the real power? the name rumsfeld ring a bell?

dubya is ooooonly smart enough to remember the script. and then scoot off on another vacation where he learns his lines for the next round of hysteria and platitudes.

wanna know what the dubya white house runs like? read 'state of war' by James Risen. look up 'merlin' in the index. thats the part where dubya's gang handed over complete but deliberately flawed blueprints for a nuke to the iranians hoping they would build the dud and give up.

didnt count of the russian supposed-embittered renegade nuke scientist go-between opening the envelope, quickly spotting the planted flaw and coyly advising his iranian contact that 'if they needed further technical assistance he was available . . . etc'

so, where exactly are all the WMDs in the world and who arrange to have them exist?

it just goes on and on.

the americans havent had a respectable conscientious decent president since Harry S Truman. who will be remembered when we have moved out to the stars as a man of his word.

WMDs bullshyt. its ALL about the oil.

umm, Lanny: taliban? oh. those'd be the dudes welcomed with open arms by the BUSHISTS *prior* to 9/11 in relation to things such as their past successes with the russian invading infidels (armed by the americans) and other such labyrithian links.

it all has to do with oil.

'see farenheit 9/11'. mr moore co-oped the video of the TALIBAN personnel being feted and hosted by the republicans.

etc etc. it just goes on and on . . .

your previous posting in its entirety :

I wouldn't even bother with the trolls. One believes that we should be "negotiating" with the Taliban (saw it on another blog) and the other one believes there is no truth to anything ever because it's all about public opinion for power (the parties he supports do this, so everyone must).

Posted by: Lanny at June 22, 2006 12:39 AM

Homeless vets, from Vietnam to Iraq

Whats waiting for you when you get home, we'll feed ya over there, but coming home means Homeless for some. Poormans Draft

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article7691.htm

Nasty Troll infestation you have here...

Wow - I am constantly amazed by the drivel the left continuely spouts to keep up the Liberal/Democrat talking points - Iraq is about oil/Bush I & II are evil/9-11 was a conspiracy/the WMD were an imaginary reason to invade Iraq - etc. etc. etc.

Then Steved has the audacity to say "you accept without question anything that reinforces your belief system." and Robert J tries to let us all know that he must be "left" by putting his various degrees behind his name???? "Robert J BA BSc"

Weird trolls!

This is a complete NON news story. The ammunition found dates back to before GW1. It has been reported from time to time that small numbers of chemical weapons have been found in weapons dumps and destroyed. In general their state of deterioration meant that they could not realistically be deployed. If you think Saddam was the only nutbar with sarin, or if you think sarin is difficult to make, you're in for a rude surprise.

I bet the leftist deniers will say something like :

"This is a complete NON news story. The ammunition found dates back to before GW1. It has been reported from time to time that small numbers of chemical weapons have been found in weapons dumps and destroyed. In general their state of deterioration meant that they could not realistically be deployed".

...oh, somebody already has :-)

Robert of the Many Titles,

If you are relying on Michael Moore as a source, your various degrees have obviously not served you well.

LOL Wimpy and Kanadien Kyle... Good ones, I needed the laughs! Now lets get back to real news stories Canadian media and trolls know and love like the Liberal leadership convention.... sheeeesh!

WHO CARES?

Nothing new here. The ISG said in 2004:

"ISG assesses that Iraq and Coalition Forces will continue to discover small numbers of degraded chemical weapons, which the former Regime mislaid or improperly destroyed prior to 1991. ISG believes the bulk of these weapons were likely abandoned, forgotten and lost during the Iran-Iraq war because tens of thousands of CW munitions were forward deployed along frequently and rapidly shifting battlefronts..."

http://www.cia.gov/cia/reports/iraq_wmd_2004/addenda.pdf

Neutralsam sums up the entirety of the left when presented with information that doesn't fit their agenda:

"WHO CARES?"

Clearly, not the left.

Not that it surprises me.

R:

"God you people are stupid. You'll believe anything, won't you?"

You must be referring to all of those lefties who've been watching too many Michael Moore movies and surfing for info on the Daily Kos.

If you're talking about these rusty old WMD's that were supposed to already be destroyed, maybe this story is true, maybe it isn't. I'd like to know why your world view makes you so 100% sure that it's us who are stupid for believing that Saddam could have WMD (after having used them and obstructing the UN at every turn) and not you for denying even the possibility. But of course since facts don't matter to a lefty, anything that contradicts the Daily Kos is "stupid" cause you say so. If facts or an alternate possibility are presented, they must be lies cause you don't want to hear you may be wrong. If someone says something you don't like, they're obviously doing something illegal cause you don't want people sayings stuff you don't like and what else is the definition of illegal? And of course if something happens to contradict what you don't want you'd be "stupid" to believe it cause you're right and the facts are wrong. Bloody hell how do you lefties learn anything at all?

Thanks, BruceR - It looks like you've hit the nail right on the head. Folks, if we go "gaga" over every tidbit that turns up that looks like it might support our position, it doesn't lend our position much creedence, especially when it turns out that the item was barely noteworthy, much less newsworthy.

The sissy lefties love to crow "It's all about OIL". Could any of you Michael Moore worshipping pussies please tell me where I can gas up my SUV with "Saddam 92 Octane Hi-Test"? Will the gas bar at Safeway be bringing it in soon? I've been waiting quite some time now. After all, the tanker ships must have been departing Iraq for several years now, huh? All that free oil must have necessitated an extra shift at the refineries in New Orleans....huh?...what's that? Oh right - Bush/Rove/Cheney created the hurricane that wiped out the refineries in Louisiana.
Hmmm..must dig deeper....Bush Lied! Yeah, that's it.

Cowards like steved and mclelland would rather bend, lube and spread for radical islam and somehow claim 'moral superiority', 'nuance' and the need for 'dialogue' with the enemy than to blow these #uckers even further back into the stone age.

So it's safe to assume that you've had your missus/'life partner'/drag queen/mate fitted for a new burka and you've signed up for conversational arabic at the local community college? Burn any Israel flags lately? Donated and awaiting charitable receipt to the Kadr family defense fund? Search on Google for Cindy Sheehan/Shrillary Clinton photos for those quiet times when you're home alone?

Bunch of gutless navel-gazing girlie men.

NBC, MSNBC and FOX news all debunk the story, noting pentagon officials who said "the munitions are are the same kind of ordnance the U.S. military has been gathering up in Iraq for the past several years, and 'not the WMD we were looking for when we went in this time.'"

I think it was Debris Trail who pointed out to me that the problem with the MSM was its tendency to jump all over a story, then when it's debunked to not make a similar effort to be sure that everyone knows its debunked.

Of course, recently on SDA we have seen the Iran is going to make Jews wear badges story, and now this. Does SDA have an obligation, as we think the MSM does, to give everyone an update in a place of equal prominence as the original annoucement?

I'm not here to get into whether Saddam was a threat, the war jusified, or Iran a bad place. Those issues are all dependent upon whether or not we can first agree on standards of argumentation like "are these 500 degraded shells the reason Saddam needed to be stopped?" The answer, from the pentagon no less, is no.

Regards,

That was for the liberal convention.

But I noticed you'll fall for anything.
I bet you still believe that Bush is sane too.

Still grasping at straws I see.

But the Iraqis will be calling for the withdrawal and if the US doesn't then the world will see. Some of the willing might say the hell with the aid the US sends their countries so they'll stay.

The first three years of vietnam only 1800 died.

Since China and Russia are now backing Iran that'll give North Korea the balls to fire their missile.

Watch as the cost of liviing will really start rising this year. You haven't seen hurtin yet. Wait till your paying over half your wages to Income Taxes. Gotta keep making them bombs and bullets.

I knew it! I knew it! I knew it!

Believing that Saddam Hussein DIDN'T have WMD was a bigger stretch than knowing he did--but where?

Robert McClelland said: "I've lost count. Is this the 10th or 11th time the WMD wolf has been cried since the invasion?

"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me ten times and I must be a conservative."

Well, Mr. McClelland, you were fooled on Stephen Taylor's blog last week, when you called him a liar because he said that the CBC didn't air any CPC leadership debates. You insisted that CPC leadership hopefuls' debates were shown on Politics. You were demanding a mea culpa from him.

You were proven wrong, in well-documented posts by stephen taylor and eastern capitalist, so where is your apology to stephen taylor?

Lie once, shame on you. Lie twice, you should say you're sorry. Lie ten times and you must be a liberal.

When it comes to WMD. I really don't care. I think Bush made a mistake empathizing this aspect of the war at the time. I have no doubt they existed. Just the degree of how many where stocked.

I remember if few others do it seems. That during the first Gulf war. Saddam gave up 400 air craft fighters to Iran, for "safe keeping". As well as many tanks & other equipment.

Think about this for a while. Saddam had just finished a war with Iran for seven to eight years. It was so bitter the Iranians used there own children as mine sweepers. Gas was used on villages. The death toll was horrendous.

After all this , after the coalition forces won. Iran gave them back to Saddam with his other war material. Think deep & hard on this fact folks.

It's entirely possible that bin Laden is hiding out in Iran and/or Syria as opposed to Pakistan/Afghani border area.

Iran/Iraq once hard enemies could conceivably now cooperate against allies. Iranian president's letter certainly opens several areas for dialogue between East and West in interest of shutting down any nuclear exchange.

ALL WORLD LEADERS ADVISED TO SIT AT U.N. SECURITY COUNCIL TO DISCUSS ISSUES FACE TO FACE WITH IRANIAN PRESIDENT CONTENT OF LETTER. EVENT TO BE BROADCAST WORLDWIDE. ARAB COUNTRIES TO CONFIRM ISRAEL's 'RIGHT TO EXIST' IN SIGNED TREATY.

ANY NUCLEAR EXCHANGE ON ANY SOVEREIGN SOIL is a lose-lose situation globally and for all sovereign states.

Canada's foreign affairs department could lead this initiative as former peace-keeper respected on world stage.

Warwick
The point is that Bush, Cheney, Rice, Powell, Rumsfeld and other Bush mouthpieces insisted that America was in IMMANENT danger. This was an emergency. Bush couldn't wait for inspection.
They said the 'bomb' was almost ready.
They said they knew where these WMD were.
So 70% of Americans believed them and the war was on. Suddenly, nothing is where they thought it was. Not only that it was nowhere to be found.
If Saddam was ready to use it how could it so suddenly be invisible. If Saddam had it ready to go. Why can't anyone find it? You can't have rockets on the launchpad or stockpiles of shells with WMD in them set and ready to deliver one day and invisible the next. If there was any credibility left it expired when Bush's own inspector came back and said there are none.
So these degraded stocks they found in 2003 were clearly not in any shape to use. That is why Bush didn't trot out the report and wave it around and say he is vindicated.

Warwick -
Since you asked, my "world view" is basically to believe things are true because the preponderance of credible evidence suggests that it is true. I never believed Saddam had WMDs because those who were in a position to know would not confirm it. UN inspectors on the ground prior to 1998 knew there were no viable weapons left. Blix's inspectors in 2002-2003 also could not confirm the presence of any such weapons, although they did find that Iraq's El Samud missles had an effective range of 15km more than they were allowed, and so those missles were destroyed. By the way, both these inspection efforts were cut short by armed agression ordered by American presidents.

I also know that the US oversold the threat about what remnants of Saddam's 1991 arsenal the UN had not been able to account for. For example, the small amount of Anthrax that Saddam couldn't account for ceased to be viable after about 1993 (weaponized Anthrax has a shelf life). The estimates on Saddam's stockpiles of chlorine gas was based on Iraq's total countrywide use of chlorine, which was assumed to be 100% eamarked for the production of chemical weapons, when in fact the chlorine was being used for water purification, just like it is here in Saskatchewan. By the logic of the Bush administration, Don Atchison should be removed from office by military attack because Saskatoon has stockpiles of chlorine.

A huge stockpile of chemicals was discovered near Basra early in the 03 war to much fanfare on Fox News. They turned out to be agricultural chemicals. Colin Powell's "mobile chemical weapons labs" were actually mobile hydrogen generators for gassing up weather balloons. The deserts in Iraq have a lot of dud artillary shells that sometimes turn up as IEDs and one of these once contained traces of chemical weapons agents -- all these false alarms were touted by the wingnuts to be the "smoking gun", and all were quickly debunked by empirical evidence.

The US Defense Department itself has declared the recent announcement as non-news and in no way indicative of the "smoking gun" that the war mongers are so fervently hoping to find. Bush's own handpicked inspectors sent in after the war declared that there was never an immanet threat by Iraq WMDs. Didn't you notice that the earth-shaking announcement didn't come from Bush or Rumsfeld or Rasputin -- I mean, Cheney? If this were really the "smoking gun" wouldn't these guys be jumping up and down saying "See! See! We were right!"

Now consider the source of the latest "revelations" of Iraqi WMDs: Senator Rick Sanitorium (R Pennsylvania) is a radical right wingnut who is in serious jeopardy in losing his seat because he is a corrupt wacko (his wife once miscarried and the two of them brought the fetus home for their other kids to play with). He rose to "prominence" during the Terri Schaivo debacle, which was the beginning of the Republican's precipitous decline in the polls. Now, as then, he is using a right wing fairy tale to get his name in the papers and cynically activate gullible right wing magical thinkers, because those are the only sentient beings who will cast a vote for him at this point.

These, my friend, are what we call facts. They are what guide a rational worldview, not wishes or conjecture. That is also why you people are stupid, because you'll believe anything.

More re story above: Saddam on hunger strike.

Does Saddam have a sewer?

Review by well-known food critic: Baghdad Bob.

The chef is good. The menu superb. The ambience is intimate, clean, cozy. One caveat: Goat was old. Rating overall: Superb Five Stars ***** ...-

Saddam ends hunger strike after missing one meal
Posted by RWR8189
On 06/23/2006 3:35:55 AM PDT · 15 replies · 163+ views

Reuters ^ | June 23, 2006
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Saddam Hussein ended a brief hunger strike after missing just one meal in his U.S.-run prison, a U.S. military spokesman said on Friday. The former Iraqi leader had refused lunch on Thursday in protest at the killing of one of his lawyers by gunmen, but the spokesman said he ate his evening meal. Former Saddam aides being held in the same prison had refused to eat three meals since Wednesday evening but ended their fast with the ex-president. "They all took their dinner meal," the spokesman told Reuters. Saddam is on trial for crimes against humanity for...
freerepublic focus/f-news/1654201/posts

R about Rick Santorum, a "corrupt whacko," because "his his wife once miscarried and the two of them brought the fetus home for their other kids to play with."

I highly doubt that Rick Santorum brought the fetus home for his "kids to play with." Many couples today, when they miscarry a child, do take the fetus from the hospital and have a burial ceremony for their baby, in a church or a funeral home. They name the baby and commit him/her to God's care. By ritualizing their painful loss and by involving other family members, they are able to better move forward within the context of family and community support for the little life, and the dreams they had for this child, that they have lost.

Nothing whacko about that.

See above reference to Ramsay Clark. Mad Fiddler spells: "Ramsey". Ramsay? Ramsey? What's in a name, Saddam? ...-

The Mad Fiddler said...

Reuters is reporting (6/22/2006 12:47:31 am) that gunmen in police uniforms murdered a third lawyer from Saddam Hussein’s defense team. The question naturally arises “Who benefits from this sort of intimidation and liquidation of his defenders?”

Some answers leap to mind: (1) former Ba’athist supporters of Saddam, hoping to spring him somehow, (2) groups who want Saddam dead and buried, and (3) Iran, who want Iraq stirred up and chaotic.

To me, the inability of Saddam’s defense team to maintain their own personal security is as much an index of the general state of things as any of the other miserable deaths.

And I have to ask, if they get Ramsey, do we forgive them all the other misdeeds?
belmont club

Sh*t... was that Sad's last meal? ...

Wretchard at Belmont Club said:

Personally I think Saddam has just heard the trapdoor grate under him on the gallows. In Iran there will probably be lights burning in the all the ministries.

The only capitals some leftard can type are reserved for his-ownself.
The left brings nothing, but a promise of more lies, death and suffering.

R:
Well, R, you sure are well informed! Wow. You knew that Iraq had no WMD's. How convenient! All the same you don't mind if I call bullshit on you do you?
The UN inspectors did not say they "knew" there were no WMD's. They said they didn't find any but also said that Saddam wasn't cooperating and was deliberately misleading the inspectors. That is an entirely different thing than and absence. We do know that Saddam had lots of WMD's he didn't account for. What happened to them the inspectors never found out. They couldn't confirm anything. They can't say that they were destroyed, can't say they weren't destroyed. Seems like YOU are the only one who has any certainty. That makes YOU the one stupid enough to believe anything.
Blix may not have found evidence of WMD's but it is a logical fallacy to say that absence of proof is proof of absence. There have been plenty of accounts of WMD's being moved to Syria. Could those Iraqis have lied about there accounts? Certainly. But given the Oil-for-Food scandal and Blix's known anti-war stance, it's equally probable he was lying. Certainly Annan, Chirac and all the other corrupt leaders were. You state that Iraq had no WMD. Not probably didn't. You say definitively they didn't. You can't possibly know that. If you think you know that you are a fool.
So, here is Blix in his own words:
"The recent inspection find in the private home of a scientist of a box of some 3,000 pages of documents, much of it relating to the laser enrichment of uranium support a concern that has long existed that documents might be distributed to the homes of private individuals. ...we cannot help but think that the case might not be isolated and that such placements of documents is deliberate to make discovery difficult and to seek to shield documents by placing them in private homes."

"I have mentioned the issue of anthrax to the Council on previous occasions and I come back to it as it is an important one.

Iraq has declared that it produced about 8,500 litres of this biological warfare agent, which it states it unilaterally destroyed in the summer of 1991. Iraq has provided little evidence for this production and no convincing evidence for its destruction.

There are strong indications that Iraq produced more anthrax than it declared, and that at least some of this was retained after the declared destruction date. It might still exist. Either it should be found and be destroyed under UNMOVIC supervision or else convincing evidence should be produced to show that it was, indeed, destroyed in 1991."

Dr. Hans Blix, Chief UN Weapons Inspector
Addressing the UN Security Council
January 27, 2003

Your account then is just plain crap. Total fabrication. Your story is false. Oh, how stupid you must be to believe your idiocy, eh?
How about this then?
CNN: How did Hussein intend to use the weapon, once it was completed?

HAMZA: Saddam has a whole range of weapons of mass destruction, nuclear, biological and chemical. According to German intelligence estimates, we expect him to have three nuclear weapons by 2005. So, the window will close by 2005, and we expect him then to be a lot more aggressive with his neighbours and encouraging terrorism, and using biological weapons. Now he's using them through surrogates like al Qaeda, but we expect he'll use them more aggressively then.

Dr. Khidhir Hamza, former Iraqi Nuclear Scientist for 20 years
Interviewed on CNN
October 22, 2001

Was he lying? Maybe. There is certainly no evidence. Of course, there is no evidence against either. Funny thing about stuff you hide, people have a hard time finding it!
Ok, how about the other leaders then? How sure were that there were no WMD's and/or Saddam was no threat?

Paul Martin:
“The fact is that there is now, we know well, a proliferation of nuclear weapons, and that many weapons that Saddam Huseein had, we don’t know where they are…. [T]errorists have access to all of them,” the Canadian premier warned.
Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, 17 December: "Saddam Hussein has brought this crisis on himself."
German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, 17 December: "[The attacks are] the consequence of the obstinate refusal of Saddam Hussein to cooperate with UN weapons inspectors."
Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi, 17 December: "It is deeply regrettable that Iraq failed to cooperate with UNSCOM, which has brought the situation to this pass."
Denmark:
"The international community has demanded for 12 years that Saddam Hussein give up his weapons of mass destruction, but Saddam Hussein has not co-operated.
"It is unacceptable to make a mockery of the international community's authority."
[Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen]

"We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction."
Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002.

"I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force — if necessary — to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security."
Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9, 2002.

Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Manuel Durao Barroso, October 2003: "When [former President Bill] Clinton was here recently he told me was absolutely convinced, given his years in the White House and the access to privileged information which he had, that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction until the end of the Saddam regime."
French President Jacques Chirac, February 2003: "There is a problem – the probable possession of weapons of mass destruction by an uncontrollable country, Iraq. The international community is right ... in having decided Iraq should be disarmed."
Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, September 2002: "There's no question that Saddam Hussein is a threat to the United States and to our allies." Dean, February 2003: "I agree with President Bush – he has said that Saddam Hussein is evil. And he is. [Hussein] is a vicious dictator and a documented deceiver. He has invaded his neighbours, used chemical arms, and failed to account for all the chemical and biological weapons he had before the Gulf War. He has murdered dissidents and refused to comply with his obligations under U.N. Security Council Resolutions. And he has tried to build a nuclear bomb. Anyone who believes in the importance of limiting the spread of weapons of mass killing, the value of democracy and the centrality of human rights must agree that Saddam Hussein is a menace. The world would be a better place if he were in a different place other than the seat of power in Baghdad or any other country." Dean, March 2003: "[Iraq] is automatically an imminent threat to the countries that surround it because of the possession of these weapons."
Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., December 1998: "Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology, which is a threat to countries in the region, and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process."
Sen. John Rockefeller, D-W.Va., ranking minority Intelligence Committee member, October 2002: "There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years."

Oh, and for the record, Zyclon B is the chemical used to murder the Jews in WWII. It was designed to be used as an agricultural pesticide. Do you know the concept of hiding WMD's under "Dual Use" technologies? That doesn't mean that every commercial chemical is poison gas but just because a chemical has a commercial use doesn't make it benign either. It's very easy to make Cyanide gas from ordinary chemicals...

In other words, you provide the typical lefty versions of "facts." Opinions you believe in so assume MUST be 100% true. Fool.

Blix, ElBaradei: U.S. ignored evidence against WMDs

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The United Nations' top two weapons experts said Sunday that the invasion of Iraq a year ago was not justified by the evidence in hand at the time.

"I think it's clear that in March, when the invasion took place, the evidence that had been brought forward was rapidly falling apart," Hans Blix, who oversaw the agency's investigation into whether Iraq had chemical and biological weapons, said on CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer."

Blix described the evidence Secretary of State Colin Powell presented to the U.N. Security Council in February 2003 as "shaky," and said he related his opinion to U.S. officials, including national security adviser Condoleezza Rice.

"I think they chose to ignore us," Blix said.

Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, spoke to CNN from IAEA headquarters in Vienna, Austria.

ElBaradei said he had been "pretty convinced" that Iraq had not resumed its nuclear weapons program, which the IAEA dismantled in 1997.

Seems like both US weapons weapons inspectors at the time didn't agree with the White House.

Hans Blix conducted 731 inspections between November 2002 and March 2003.

Both Blix and ElBaradei have contradicted themselves so many times as to sound like JFKerry. There credibility is zero.

Cite, please, Warwick. If you can.

To understand the approach of the IAEA’s inspection over the past two months, it is important first to recall what was accomplished during our inspections from 1991 to 1998, in fulfilment of our Security Council mandate to eliminate Iraq’s nuclear weapons programme. In September 1991, the IAEA seized documents in Iraq that demonstrated the extent of its nuclear weapons programme. By the end of 1992, we had largely destroyed, removed or rendered harmless all Iraqi facilities and equipment relevant to nuclear weapons production. We confiscated Iraq’s nuclear-weapons-usable material — high enriched uranium and plutonium — and by early 1994 we had removed it from the country. By December 1998 — when the inspections were brought to a halt with a military strike imminent — we were confident that we had not missed any significant component of Iraq’s nuclear programme.

While we did not claim absolute certainty, our conclusion at that time was that we had neutralized Iraq’s nuclear weapons programme and that there were no indications that Iraq retained any physical capability to produce weapon usable nuclear material.

During the intervening four years of our absence from Iraq, we continued our analytical work to the best of our ability, using satellite imagery and other information.

So after taking all Iraq had they kept watch on Iraqis through satilites to make sure they didn't rebuild.

Thanks, Warwick, for your post of 12:11 p.m. today. Most informative and sensible.

SIERRA CLUB KISS MY AXE

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