As if news reports that clarly contradict the SOTU assertions wasn't enough, here are some more annotaded footnotes of which you can ignore and call it a partisan ploy. As for unconfirmed allegations? You mean troops inspecting the Ansar Al-Islam camp wasn't good enough for you? Call me silly but I think U.S. special forces carry more weight than you just saying something to the contrary and trying to convcince me you're impartial.

quote:
The International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N.-chartered nuclear watchdog, reported in a Jan. 8 preliminary assessment that the tubes were "not directly suitable" for uranium enrichment but were "consistent" with making ordinary artillery rockets-a finding that meshed with Iraq's official explanation for the tubes.
Again, in order to make your explanations work, I have to ignore experts who are there and go on the say so of yourself and the Administration. One of which has reason to lead me to think something other than what the AEA says.

It was on your say so that I was to beleive that everything else in the SOTU apart from the 16 words was justification enough to go to war. I present FACTS from credible news reports as well as from admittedly partisan sites that do a good job documenting and countering in their own right with sources and statements that contradict every last thing Bush declared as fact and you get mad. Again, to side with you is to go on faith and beleive everyone is out to "get Bush" while ingnoring news reports. To bring them up is because I take 'glee' in attacking Bush. To defend him after reports to the contrary surface is because someone has to defend the 'unfair' partisan attacks.

Bush made these statements in the SOTU adress. My last post had numerous sites of legitamite news sources that debunked those statements. If that isn't good enough for you, oh well. You're the one who brought up that the sOTU adress had MANY justifications for war. Most if not all which have fallen through as new justifications are concocted and old ones are debunked. Are we going to debate endlessly about the defenition of spin?

quote:
I, too want to know at any time if my government (Democrat or Republican) has acted unjustly, and would accept the proof of that with anger and sadness.
In contrast to that, your absolute glee at urinating on the integrity of the Bush administration really rubs me the wrong way.
I highly doubt you really want this. Rather the fact that I don't nod my head and say "uh..ok" is what rubs you the wrong way. Alternative perspectives? What good would that do? The time for alternatives was before we attacked Iraq. Now we're stuck there for better or worse. And even if we are there regardless, that doesn't make asking why that is so any less neccessary.

But just continue to call EVIDENCE, "allegation" thus quickly discrediting it. I'll just continue to respectfully disagree loudly and proudly.

And allegation has been raining down on Republican Administrations for the past 20 years??? I thought we'd established that Iran/Contra was illegal and unconstitutional. Thank god you didn't say 30 years! I was going to ask if you think breaking into the oppositions headquarters in order to influence an election was all rumour too.

I'm going to post this because far from being partisans, this article concerns a lawsuit brought forth trying to establish a link between Iraq and Al queda. To your credit, the judge did find that Beasley had "shown, albeit barely ... that Iraq provided material support to bin Laden and al-Qaida". The article does however present the other side as well.


quote:
the al-Qaida terrorist network, a nexus that combines classic terrorist organizations and modern methods of murder. Iraq today harbors a deadly terrorist network headed by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi an associate and collaborator of Usama bin Laden and his al-Qaida lieutenants. 5

On February 5, 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell stood before the UN and laid out, in very precise language, the reasons the United States felt the Security Council should back an invasion of Iraq to oust Saddam Hussein. One reason quickly gobbled up and endorsed by the American public, was that Saddam Hussein stood behind the September 11 attacks. Hussein became viewed as responsible for the deaths of 3,044, more so than even the elusive and uncapturable bin Laden.

Using Colin Powell’s words as evidence and his Power Point presentation as fact, Philadelphia attorneys from the Beasley Law Firm sued bin Laden and Hussein in absentia for nearly $104 million. 6 Never mind that the UN rejected Colin Powell’s evidence before Beasley’s case was ever brought before a judge.

Remarking in his May 7, 2003 decision, Judge Harold Baer stated the attorneys "have shown, albeit barely ... that Iraq provided material support to bin Laden and al-Qaida." 6

The suit was brought on behalf of the families of September 11 victims George Eric Smith, 38 (an analyst for SunGard Asset Management), and Timothy Soulas, 35 (a senior managing director and partner at Cantor Fitzgerald Securities).10 The Beasley Law Firm used three key pieces of evidence to sway the judge in the case. Evidence the judge himself concluded, “contained multiple layers of hearsay." 8

The first evidence provided came from reports that 9-11 hijacker, Mohammad Atta supposedly met Iraqi Consul Al-Ani in Prague April 8, 2001. In this meeting, Mohammad Atta received money from the Consul as well as a vial of anthrax for the attacks. 2

Both the FBI and the CIA deny that Mohammad Atta ever left the United States in April, 2001. The US government was able to track Atta’s movements using his phones and credit card records. The records all show Atta in the United States during the time he was reported to be in Prague. 2

The Beasley Law Firm used former CIA Director James Woolsey as a specialist in their case. On the stand he countered his agency’s posistion, “I think what we’re talking about is car rental records,” as proof the Prague rental records existed. Currently, Woolsey, a supporting member of the Project for a New American Century, is waiting for Bush to appoint him as information ministry in Iraq9, two biases that throw further doubt on his expertise. Judge Baer went on record stating there “remains some dispute about whether this meeting actually occurred.” 8

Rumsfeld, once a strong supporter of the Muhammad Atta/Prague link, admitted to journalist Robert Novak May 13, 2002, that he was no longer sure of the connection. Even the Prague government, who had Al-Ani under surveillance, has officially stated the meeting didn’t happen. 2



The second link in the chain used to bind al-Queda and Iraq is the evidence Colin Powell supplied to the United Nations February 5, 2003. In his presentation, Powell states that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, infamous ricin specialist and known associate of bin Laden, helped Kurdish terrorist organization Ansar al-Islam set up camps. These camps were located in “northern Kurdish areas outside Saddam Hussein's controlled Iraq.”5

In his argument to the UN, Powell contradicts himself. How could Hussein be giving support to a terrorist organization founded by the Kurds, a group of people he’s worked to exterminate with the Anfal campaigns, and located in an area he has no control over? Mr. Powell’s answer for this incongruity? “Baghdad has an agent in the most senior levels of the radical organization Ansar al-Islam that controls this corner of Iraq. In 2000, this agent offered al-Qaida safe haven in the region.” 5

Yet, “Two of the highest-ranking leaders of Al Qaeda in American custody have told the C.I.A. in separate interrogations that the terrorist organization did not work jointly with the Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein.” This information wasn’t something that came out after our March 19, 2003 attack on Hussein. It was known a year ago when the al Qaida suspects were interrogated by the CIA. 7

Granted the words of two terrorists should be taken with a grain of salt; after all, they could be protecting Hussein. Even bin Laden’s pre September 11, 2001 statement; that Iraq's ruling Ba'athist party ran contrary to his own religion and was an 'apostate regime,' could be a smoke screen set up to lead us away from the truth. 1

When Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (the ricin specialist) traveled to Iraq in May, 2002 US intelligence officials were adamant there was no evidence that al- Zarqawi was in contact with Saddam's government or indeed that Saddam even knew he was there. 1

So what about the contradictory words of Powel himself? U.S. News & World Report reported that as Mr. Powell rehearsed the case, he became so frustrated by the dubious intelligence about Saddam that he tossed several pages into the air and declared, "I'm not reading this. This is bullshit!"11

All of this was reported in April of 2003. The lawsuit was not ruled on by Judge Baer until May 7, 2003. But because the finding of ricin and botulinum topped headlines, while the actual findings are still unknown, it is easy to see how the information was manipulated to win $104 million from a country where one out of four children born live weighs less than five pounds, promising short lives, illness and impaired development.



The third piece of evidence used by Beasley came from defectors descriptions of the two terrorist training camps in Iraq. The first; detail of Ansar al-Islam could easily have been provided by the United States since the camp operated in the so-called no-fly zone, protected by U.S. and British warplanes.

But what about Salman Pak? According to the Beasley Law Firm, Salman Pak, a known bio-weapons production facility also house the shell of a commercial airplane used for terrorist training. Attorney Jim Beasley asks, “What's an airliner doing within a highly secure bioweapons facility that has no runways? In fact, there are multiple eyewitnesses who have stated that non-Iraqi Islamic fundamentalists from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the Gulf States were brought to Salman Pak to learn the “art” of hijacking in groups of 4-5 men.”14

But as a former C.I.A. station chief was quick to point out, “That’s Hollywood rinky-dink stuff. They train in basements. You don’t need a real airplane to practice hijacking. The 9/11 terrorists went to gyms. But to take one back you have to practice on the real thing.”4

The Salman Pak airplane is interesting because the Defense Intelligence Agency leaked a statement from a defector claiming he had trained with al Queda terrorists in the late nineteen-nineties at Salman Pak. The defector purported that the Iraqis received instructions in the use of chemical and biological weapons from these al-Queda terrorists. When C.I.A. agents visited the defector with their own interpreter, they got a shock, “He says, ‘No, that’s not what I said, I worked at a fedayeen camp; it wasn’t Al Queda.’ He never saw any chemical or biological training.” Diligent in their work, the C.I.A. sent out a correction to the defector’s statement. This one remained confidential. 4

No one looked closely at the ‘evidence’ during the trial. Why should we? Saddam Hussein is evil, he needed to be removed from Iraq twelve years ago. Even if the whole war turns out to be built upon a sandy, unstable foundation of lies, the Iraqi people are better off without him. Even if he didn’t give material aid to al-Queda, we all know he cheered when the twin towers fell. So let’s take the fortune that built him palaces away from him and give it to the victims of September 11.

Professor of International Law and CBS News Analyst Pamela Falk said, “There may be payments in this because of the Iraqi money, but it really puts the Bush administration in a position where they have to decide where the assets that are already in the United States, if they go to the victims, or go back to the Iraq people.”6

And there is the crux of the matter. Push aside the fact that the al-Queda/Iraqi link is tenuous at best. The Administration wants to concentrate on the welfare of the Iraqi people instead of explaining the disappearance of 25,000 liters of anthrax, 38,000 liters of botulinum toxin, 500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent, 30,000 munitions capable of delivering chemical agents and the design for a nuclear weapon Bush claimed Hussein had in his State of the Union Address (1-28-03).

Concern for the Iraqi people. Bush claims he has freed them and now wants to place Iraq’s oil wealth into their hands. So what about the $104 million they owe two of our dead citizens? How many children should we starve and under-medicate so we are satisfied that somebody other than our own elected government officials pay for the September 11 tragedy?

Really though, when you think about it, $104 million isn’t a lot of money. We took $74.7 billion from the one-paycheck-away-from-homelessness working class in this country to fund the invasion.

One trillion, now that’s a lot of money. It is also the amount of the civil lawsuit filed by Kreindler and Kreindler L.L.P. against a laundry list of offenders, including the country of Iraq, considered accountable for the September 11 deaths.3 The evidence against Iraq will be much of the same that Beasley used in his victory.6

Will the future judge of this case reach a conclusion similar to that of Judge Baer who ended the trial stating, that Beasley had "shown, albeit barely ... that Iraq provided material support to bin Laden and al-Qaida" or will it topple from the weight of self contradiction?



SOURCES



1. War - Was It Worth It? al-Queda & terrorism: By David Pratt, Foreign Editor Sunday Herald - 25 May 2003 http://www.sundayherald.com/print34114
2. Mohammed Atta in Prague FAQ By Richard M. Smith of www.ComputerBytesMan.com Updated June 19, 2002 (Original version June 16, 2002) http://www.computerbytesman.com/911/praguefaq.htm
3. Kriendler & Kreindler LLP Recent Developments September 11 attacks http://www.kreindler.com/newsleft.htm
4. Selective Intelligence By Seymour M. Hersh New Yorker May 12, 2003 http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/unmovic/2003/0512selective.htm
5. Remarks to the United Nations Security Council Secretary Colin L. Powell
New York City February 5, 2003 http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2003/17300.htm
6. Court Rules: Al Qaida, Iraq Linked NEW YORK, May 7, 2003 http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/05/08/uttm/main552868.shtml
7. Captives Deny Queda Worked With Baghdad June 9, 2003 By JAMES RISEN http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/09/international/worldspecial/09INTE.html?ex=1056183901&ei=1&en=ddbdc84815f12e4e
8. Hon. HAROLD BAER, JR., District Judge: US District Court Southern District of New Yorkhttp://216.239.53.100/search?q=cache:CGYcnM3xtycJ:www.montanalawweek.net/Headnotes/Smith%2520v.%2520Iraq%2520(5-7-03).pdf+mohammad+atta+car+rental+records+prague&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

9. James Woolsey The Pentagon's man in Iraq - The Nation http://www.guardian.co.uk/gall/0,8542,934195,00.html

10. September 11 families win £65 million in damages http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_778040.html?menu=news.waronterrorism

11. Bomb and Switch By Maureen Dowd The New York Times Wednesday 04 June 2003 http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/060503I.shtml
12.Fake Iraq documents 'embarrassing' for U.S. From David Ensor CNN Washington Bureau Friday, March 14, 2003 Posted: 10:43 PM EST (0343 GMT)
Friday, March 14, 2003 Posted: 10:43 PM EST (0343 GMT)
http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/03/14/sprj.irq.documents/

13. No 'Smoking Gun' By Jim Sciutto ABC News Sunday 30 March 2003 http://www.truthout.org/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi?archive=3&num=320

14. The Beasley Law Firm http://www.tortlaw.com/sitedata/docs/JBJ%20personal.htm

http://www.interactorg.com/al_queda_link.htm