"The point was that a hell of a lot of people and organizations drew the same conclusions about Saddam that Bush did.


So what?


Clinton did, in fact, launch a military attack on Iraq based on these conclusions, an attack directed specifically at facilities for WMD, although he did not overthrow Saddam. Estimated Iraqi deaths from these attacks vary. A military report is here. An Iraqi report can be found here. There were no U.S. casualties."

So he didn't invade. Okay, your point being?

This is a Mommy They Did it Too argument. I have no problem saying where Clinton was wrong (Somalia being another instance). If he did indeed do this because of concerns over WMD, I would consider it wrong(*). Clinton being wrong does not make your argument for you, it in fact is a non-sequiter.

It seems you missed the point here. Bu...Bu...Bu... Mommy arguments all the way to this point.

"The line of bullshit the Left has been trying to sell in recent months is that only the Bush administration was stupid enough to think Saddam was a threat, and that EVERYBODY else back then knew there were no WMDs or terror links."

Look up strawman. Thats not their argument. Their argument, my argument is that Saddam was not a threat, and Saddam had no provable nuclear program and no provable ties to Al Qaeda and no provable plans or actions ongoing or planned to harm the US. Most every attempt to show such prior to the war was roundly disproven, and that disproof was ignored by the administration.

If this is such an un-grokable absurd argument, please, by all means: show me the negation of that argument? Show me the Al-Qaeda ties, the active Nuke program, the plans to transfer WMD into the hands of terrorists, the plans to attack the US?

Funny, but despite all your yapping about how blindingly urgent it was to invade Iraq, you never have shown ANY of those. I'm still waiting, Tom.

"Most of your second paragraph is crap. The assumption made by most nations and the U.N. was that Saddam was not cooperating, and did have something to hide that could present a danger. The only argument was whether to go to war over it, or pursue the U.N. inspection and enforcement route*. Hell, I was there, same as you."

Okay, lets grant my second paragraph as being crap. Your entire spiel here, dressed as a dismissal of the paragraph you point to, has no bearing on anything I said there. Plenty of people accepted that he had WMD, as I said- I did not reject that possibility before the war at all. Neither did the UN. The issue of threat was, is and has always been the issue at hand.

As we said when I was young: 'Well Duh!'

""He did it too" is not an excuse for a behavior. But it's worth pointing out the rank hypocrisy when the ones who "did it too" are up on their high horse throwing shit at Bush for "doing it.""

A point well taken, and why I admired Dean and hated Kerry from the start.

"In other words, Bush's actions have to stand on their own. But people who advocated going to war--and DID go to war--to eliminate Saddam as a WMD threat, and who are now pointing an indignant finger at Bush, should probably sit down and shut the &%#@ up."

Which (a) does not include me, Tom and (b) does not make it right that we went to war.

Davin L.

(*)My memory of the event is that it was payback for throwing the inspectors out in '98 and for firing on our planes patrolling the no-fly zone. Your firtst link is broken, and I can't find a Clinton quote saying one way or the other.