"that is not the issue. complaining about it over and over again doesn't change anything. "

So... addressing whether or not it is the government's job to bankroll private medical research isn't the issue on a blog titled: "Time to Approve Federal Funding of Stem Cell Research"? Wow, I must have really misinterpreted the content. To me, in a democracy, what the government does and doesn't fund would most certainly be an issue.

It's easy to say that if you don't fund this you can't have the CDC, but then knee-jerk comparisons are easy... they're knee-jerk after all. That doesn't fly when it comes from the right in terms of corporate bailouts, etc., but then we pick and choose, right? There's a supreme difference between things like the FDA and the CDC, and writing out checks to people who will patent the discoveries and then sell our investment back to us under threat of death...

"saddam was not a threat, and we knew it. playing little rhetoric games and this crap will never change that reality."

Somalia wasn't a threat. Neither was Rwanda. Neither was Afghanistan. Neither is Darfur now. Odd how we pick and choose when we are, and were, wrong not to act.

Somalia wasn't a threat. Neither was Rwanda. Neither was Afghanistan. Neither is Darfur now. Odd how we pick and choose when we are, and were, wrong not to act.

yeah it is odd...but that's America!

Can you really just leave it at that, Sconn1? We have to decide, don't we? People are demanding we step in in Darfur. Do you think we are somehow threatened by them?

Okay "23" senators thought that way...what about the other 77 that didn't?

some of them voted for it, before they voted against it

Paladin 77

There were countries in 2002 that posed a far greater potential danger to this Country then Iraq. The decision to invade Iraq was not because they were the greatest threat and only Bush knows for sure why from the beginning of his administration, PRIOR to 9/11, he was fixated on Iraq and Saddam. However to assert that Iraq was the greatest threat or even greatest potential threat is just NOT TRUE. Iran and North Korea were far more dangerous then Iraq in 2002. The truth is Bush and Cheney hyped the danger from Saddam FAR beyond the actual threat and ignored countries that were far more dangerous. In addition our invasion of a Moslem Country has generated many new enemies willing to attack us in the future.

NOTHING Bush told us about this war has been true. All the warnings that said do not invade Iraq have proven correct. This may be one of the most serious foreign policy errors we have EVER made! What we have done may well destabilize the region and we may not have scene the worst consequence of our invasion of Iraq.

Can you really just leave it at that, Sconn1?

Sure he can, in fact he must. Were he to say more he would have to stop ignoring the facts and acknowledge them. If he acknowledges them he might have to admit he is so far off the mark that reality is on a differnt world.

saddam was not a threat, and we knew it. playing little rhetoric games and this crap will never change that reality.

That is your opinion and you are welcome to it. However it "is" documented that Saddam had contact with AQ and said publicly that he would sell them weapons including bio and chem. And whether or not "you'll" admit it, AQ could deliver that to the US in the form of attack. In my book that makes him "just" as dangerous as AQ.

However it "is" documented that Saddam had contact with AQ and said publicly that he would sell them weapons including bio and chem.

where is that documented?

baker...and i said "that's america" because on any issue, there are many differing opinions. and sometimes it seems people have some strange justifications for their reasonings. of course, what is strange to one, is perfectly logical to another, and vice versa...but i wasn't making any judgement on that, just saying that opinions vary and that's the way it is. and how we act to each given situation varies. that's what happens with a diverse population of over 300 million where people can express their views freely. and sometimes we get ourselves into bad messes, and sometimes it all works out. it might of been a terse and crass way to express that, but that's all i was saying.

drmiler

My opinion has been confirmed by events on the ground. The ease with which we defeated Saddam and the fact there was no WMD!

My opinion has been confirmed by events on the ground.

match point!

My opinion has been confirmed by events on the ground.

But you haven't been on the ground col, you get your information from NYT headlines.  People here have shown you a whole different view, but as usual, you ignore it.

match point!

Match "nothing"!

And SConn, you want documented? Start with this one.

Link


Or this:

Link


Or even this one. Beyond that....do your own google searchs.


Link

IslandDog

PROOF Saddam was no danger:

It took us about two months to destroy Saddam's military

There was NO WMD.

Saddam had no Air Force.



The fact remains Bush invaded a third rate country while ignoring Iran who is moving forward with their nuclear program and North Korea who has tested nuclear weapons since we invaded Iraq. Afghanistan is getting worse by the day and Ben Laden is still free.

All that we were told about the Iraq war was wrong. The cost, duration and how we would be accepted by the Iraqi people. Every warning Bush was given about the dangers of invading Iraq have proven to be correct. Bush also ignored the military planning and advice as to the numbers of troops needed to establish and maintain control of the sectarian violence after Saddam was removed from power. This war is a mistake from every possible aspect.

Saddam had no Air Force.

Bullshit! If that's the case then what were those MIG's they discovered buried in the sand at Taqqadum air field west of Baghdad?

What military search teams eventually found at al Taqqadum, in July 2003, were remnants of the Iraqi Air Force as pictured above: a reported 30 to 40 planes, including several MiG-25 and Su-25 ground attack jets, buried more than 10 feet beneath tons of soil and covered with camouflage netting. According to the Pentagon, at least one of the MiG-25s was found because searchers spotted its twin tail fins protruding from the sand. Some of the planes had been wrapped in plastic sheeting to protect their electronics and machinery from the sand (and some had had their wings removed), but others were interred with little or no protection from the sand or the elements. The recovery teams had to use large earth-moving equipment to uncover the aircraft.

Link

Short History of MiG-25 in service with the Iraqi Air Force, since 1980 Iraq ordered MiG-25 (ASCC-code "Foxbat") from the USSR in 1979, in a large acquizition package including some 240 aircraft and helicopters. The Soviets conditioned the delivery of Foxbats on stationing up to 18.000 of their "advisors" in Iraq (at the time the whole IrAF was only 24.000 strong), and the 24 MiG-25s that were to be deployed in Iraq had also to be defended and escorted by a squadron each of Soviet-flown MiG-21MFs and MiG-23MLs. This whole Soviet "delegation" started arriving in Iraq in late spring 1980, and had all of its MiG-25s, MiG-21s, and MiG-23s initially based at the newly built Shoibiyah AB, some 40km south-west from Basrah, in southern Iraq. When Iraq invaded Iran, on 22 September 1980, the Soviet contingent was only slightly decreased, although Moscow officially declared neutrality in this war - while simultaneously trying to establish better relations with Tehran. The result was that the Soviets "advisors" at Shoibiyah AB were to become directly involved in the war against Iran on the Iraqi side - and this right from the start of the fighting. Already on the afternoon of 22 September, only two hours after the first wave of Iraqi air strikes against Iran, the IRIAF flew first attacks against Shoibiyah AB, hitting it very hard by a four-ship of F-4E Phantom IIs, that caused considerable damage. On the following day another strike was flown, damaging the airfield sufficiently to force the whole Soviet contingent to be evacuated to H-3/al-Wallid AB, in western Iraq. For the rest of 1980 "Iraqi" MiG-25s did not participate in the war: actually, by the end of the year only four were put under the Iraqi control, while all the others remained in Soviet hands. This was to change only painfully slow though 1981 and 1982: not before the summer 1982 were Iraqi Foxbats to start flying more intensive combat sorties. Their initial operations, however, ended with a swift loss of four examples to the Iranian F-14s, in September, November, and December of the same year. Another MiG-25PD(export) is known to have been shot down by F-14s and F-5s, in 1983, while another - flown by the Iraqi top "ace" of the Iraq-Iran War, Lt.Col. Mohammad "Sky Falcon" Rayyan - was shot down by gunfire from an IRIAF F-5E while underway at Mach 1 and 29.000ft, in July 1986.

Hey col....care to try again?

and nobody thought 19 men with box cutters were a danger either....