Let's Set the Record Straight

Recently I got into a conversation (if you could call it that) with someone who was relentlessly spewing his "we just went to Iraq for the oil, Bush lied, yada, yada, yada" rhetoric. I wasn't able to even have a civil conversation with him because he was so emotional about the whole thing that he refused to even reason with me. So I decided to look back over the facts leading up to the war.

First, we need to make a distinction between the War in Iraq and the War on Terror. The War in Iraq was about regime change. If you recall, that didn't take very long as we marched to the gates of Baghdad in about 3 weeks. That war ended soon after that when President Bush landed on the aircraft carrier and announced victory in Iraq. What we see know in Iraq is the War on Terror, two different, but similar things. But I'm going to deal with them seperately.


War in Iraq

The first thing you always hear is that we went to Iraq for the oil. Look, I don't think that is true, but I have no way of proving it one way or the other. However, I can compare the price of oil and gas from the time we went to Iraq and the price of oil now. In 2003, the average price for a barrel of oil was around $32 and the average price for a gallon of gas was around $1.50. So far in 2008 the average for oil is up around $100/barrel and $3.65/gallon for gas, and we've seen it as high as $140/barrel and $4.05/gal. Now technically OPEC sets the price on a barrel of oil, so if we went into Iraq and took all the oil I wouldn't expect that to have any effect on oil prices. However, if we took the oil, we'd no longer have to pay that huge $100/barrel price so technically our gas prices should come down. Since gas prices have sky rocketed with the price of oil I'm fairly certain we didn't go in and take Iraq's oil.

Next, what about the accusation that we went into Iraq on faulty intelligence information? This is red herring because we had the same intelligence information as countries like Great Britain and Germany. So let's assume for a moment that the intelligence was bad. If that's the case then how is that President Bush's fault? He's not the operative out in the field collecting that data. The President had to make a decision based on the intelligence he did have which was the same intelligence given to Congress. In 2003, H.J. Res 114 passed the House 296-133 and the Senate 77-23, essentially authorizing the War in Iraq. So Republicans and Democrats alike saw the same intelligence as the President and overwhelming decided to go to war.

Despite the intelligence information, there was one other reason we went into Iraq that never gets discussed. Like all the teethless resolutions that were passed by the United Nations. Like the last one, UN Resolution 1441. In all, Saddam Hussein was given hundreds of different resolutions from the UN, 19 specifically to disarm and to allow inspectors in to see his nuclear, chemical and biological weapons facilities. He continually thumbed his nose at the UN (not surprisingly since they did nothing the previous 18 times). 1441 was unanimously (15-0) passed, so to say we "unilaterally" went into Iraq is pretty much hogwash.

Unfortunately that's all I have time to write today... I'll keep updating this as I have time.

GW = The Dark Knight

A friend sent me an article comparing President Bush to Batman. I laughed of course and dismissed it immediately. However, after reading the article I have to say that I agree with a lot of what the author had to say. The jist being that "doing the right thing is not always easy, and you may even be despised for doing it." He also touches on why movies like The Dark Knight, in which the hero takes a stand against terrorism and injustice and stands for what is right do so well in the box office. Meanwhile liberal movies about the war on terror always flop at the box office. Anyway, I thought this article was worthy of posting:

• What Bush and Batman Have In Common

Coverage Bias?

This seems like a moot point to me, but a raucous is being made, so I thought I'd add a link to this. Apparently some people think MSNBC is giving a little too much coverage to B. Hussein Obama's Middle East Tour.

• NBC Defends Obama Coverage

The Piece the NYT Wouldn't Publish

This is the rebuttal that John "my friends" McCain tried to submit to the New York Times. NYT Op-Ed editor David Shipley gave some lame excuse which basically amounted to "we don't agree with what he believes so we aren't going to print it." And they wonder why no one reads their paper anymore.

In January 2007, when General David Petraeus took command in Iraq, he called the situation “hard” but not “hopeless.” Today, 18 months later, violence has fallen by up to 80% to the lowest levels in four years, and Sunni and Shiite terrorists are reeling from a string of defeats. The situation now is full of hope, but considerable hard work remains to consolidate our fragile gains.

Progress has been due primarily to an increase in the number of troops and a change in their strategy. I was an early advocate of the surge at a time when it had few supporters in Washington. Senator Barack Obama was an equally vocal opponent. "I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there,” he said on January 10, 2007. “In fact, I think it will do the reverse."

Now Senator Obama has been forced to acknowledge that “our troops have performed brilliantly in lowering the level of violence.” But he still denies that any political progress has resulted.

Perhaps he is unaware that the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad has recently certified that, as one news article put it, “Iraq has met all but three of 18 original benchmarks set by Congress last year to measure security, political and economic progress.” Even more heartening has been progress that’s not measured by the benchmarks. More than 90,000 Iraqis, many of them Sunnis who once fought against the government, have signed up as Sons of Iraq to fight against the terrorists. Nor do they measure Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki’s new-found willingness to crack down on Shiite extremists in Basra and Sadr City—actions that have done much to dispel suspicions of sectarianism.

The success of the surge has not changed Senator Obama’s determination to pull out all of our combat troops. All that has changed is his rationale. In a New York Times op-ed and a speech this week, he offered his “plan for Iraq” in advance of his first “fact finding” trip to that country in more than three years. It consisted of the same old proposal to pull all of our troops out within 16 months. In 2007 he wanted to withdraw because he thought the war was lost. If we had taken his advice, it would have been. Now he wants to withdraw because he thinks Iraqis no longer need our assistance.

To make this point, he mangles the evidence. He makes it sound as if Prime Minister Maliki has endorsed the Obama timetable, when all he has said is that he would like a plan for the eventual withdrawal of U.S. troops at some unspecified point in the future.

Senator Obama is also misleading on the Iraqi military's readiness. The Iraqi Army will be equipped and trained by the middle of next year, but this does not, as Senator Obama suggests, mean that they will then be ready to secure their country without a good deal of help. The Iraqi Air Force, for one, still lags behind, and no modern army can operate without air cover. The Iraqis are also still learning how to conduct planning, logistics, command and control, communications, and other complicated functions needed to support frontline troops.

No one favors a permanent U.S. presence, as Senator Obama charges. A partial withdrawal has already occurred with the departure of five “surge” brigades, and more withdrawals can take place as the security situation improves. As we draw down in Iraq, we can beef up our presence on other battlefields, such as Afghanistan, without fear of leaving a failed state behind. I have said that I expect to welcome home most of our troops from Iraq by the end of my first term in office, in 2013.

But I have also said that any draw-downs must be based on a realistic assessment of conditions on the ground, not on an artificial timetable crafted for domestic political reasons. This is the crux of my disagreement with Senator Obama.

Senator Obama has said that he would consult our commanders on the ground and Iraqi leaders, but he did no such thing before releasing his “plan for Iraq.” Perhaps that’s because he doesn’t want to hear what they have to say. During the course of eight visits to Iraq, I have heard many times from our troops what Major General Jeffrey Hammond, commander of coalition forces in Baghdad, recently said: that leaving based on a timetable would be “very dangerous.”

The danger is that extremists supported by Al Qaeda and Iran could stage a comeback, as they have in the past when we’ve had too few troops in Iraq. Senator Obama seems to have learned nothing from recent history. I find it ironic that he is emulating the worst mistake of the Bush administration by waving the “Mission Accomplished” banner prematurely.

I am also dismayed that he never talks about winning the war—only of ending it. But if we don’t win the war, our enemies will. A triumph for the terrorists would be a disaster for us. That is something I will not allow to happen as president. Instead I will continue implementing a proven counterinsurgency strategy not only in Iraq but also in Afghanistan with the goal of creating stable, secure, self-sustaining democratic allies.

How Would You Like Your Embryo, Fresh or On Ice?

As I was walking to the ice machine today at work I passed by one of the TV monitors which have CNN news constantly running. As I walked passed the monitor Dr. Sanjay Gupta was discussing a new study that just came out saying that IVF actually produces healthier babies than the good old fashioned way of making babies. Here's the video, and here's the Reuters press release.

But it got me to thinking. It reminds me a lot of the movie Gattaca, where making babies the way God intended is no longer acceptable. Embryos have to be "scrubbed" and cleaned in the laboratory before they are implanted in the woman so that the child has all the characteristics approved by the government. Laugh if you want, but this study is the first step in us moving to a Gattaca like world. We are already being told what kind of cars we are supposed to drive (SUV's are out, scooters are in) and what kind of light bulbs to install, why would they stop there. Its all a slippery slope and it seems to me we are getting closer and closer every day.



The Trailer

Global Warming Made Me Murder

Okay, I haven't killed anyone... yet. But at the rate we are going in this country I have no doubt that we will have a murderer blame global warming on his killing spree. Here is the latest malady caused by GWB (and that's not short for George W Bush, its Global Warming Bullpoop)

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=5374174&page=1


And in case you forgot all the other problems, you can find all 400 of them here in the GWB goodie bag:

http://amishpundit.blogspot.com/2008/01/global-warming-goodie-bag.html

Global Warming Destroys More than Glaciers

Found this article today. A 17 year old kid was admitted to psychiatric ward in Australia because he had apocolyptic visions of the future due to "global warming". Its just sad the Al Gore's of the world have destroyed this poor kids life. Hopefully there is still time to talk some sense into the kid. The article goes on to discuss the Australian Prime Minister's plan for cutting emissions and how they will cost billions of dollars, but in reality will have absolutely no effect on total world emissions.

Indeed, so fast are the world's emissions growing -- by 3.1 per cent a year thanks mostly to these two giants -- that the 20 per cent cuts Rudd demands of Australians by 2020 would be swallowed up in just 28 days. That's how little our multi-billions of dollars in sacrifices will matter.

I also like the discussion on why India and China have no plans on cutting their emissions in the future.

Said Ma Kai, head of China's powerful State Council: "China does not commit to any quantified emissions-reduction commitments . . . our efforts to fight climate change must not come at the expense of economic growth."

The plan's authors, the Prime Minister's Council on Climate Change, said India would rather save its people from poverty than global warming, and would not cut growth to cut gases.

Global Warming = Mass Flooding

I'm starting to think I could make it a full time job reading over Reuters and AP stories and poking holes in there logic. Its beyond absurd what these people print and call news. I've enjoyed doing this lately, so let me once again break down the "news".

Midwest floods show signs of global warming
Tue Jul 1, 2008 8:56pm BST

By Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent
WASHINGTON
(Reuters) - Floods like those that inundated the U.S. Midwest are supposed to occur once every 500 years but this is the second since 1993, suggesting flawed forecasts that do not take global warming into account, conservation experts said on Tuesday.

Two floods, 15 years apart does not suggest anything Ms Zabarenko. Apparently the environmental/green folks are under some delusion that the earth is one big systematic machine. "Well if someone says that we only are supposed to get a flood every 500 years and we get one every decade, it must be global warming!" Look folks, the earth isn't a computer program that cycles with pinpoint accuracy. From a 500 year vantage point there "may" be some semblence of order, but statistically speaking there is no way to decipher any weather trends from 15 years of data.

"Although no single weather event can be attributed to global warming, it's critical to understand that a warming climate is supplying the very conditions that fuel these kinds of weather events," said Amanda Staudt, a climate scientist with the National Wildlife Federation.

This is what I love about these people. They refute their own arguments. In this article it only took until we got to the first sentence of the second paragraph. She admits that "no single weather event can be attributed to global warming..." But wait, in her opening sentences she just said that global warming was responsible for the flooding. So what it is?

Good stuff I tell you. The sad thing is that there are people that read this stuff and actually believe it. If you want to read te rest of this article, you can find it here:

http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSN0127972720080701?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews&rpc=22&sp=true