Reply #51: Huh???

[Seabiscuit]

"The fact that Dean opposed the invasion earlier than most is nothing but bragging rights now. That doesn't mean much when we have soldiers over there being killed."

nothing but bragging rights????

Shit, man, he stood on PRINCIPLE! The dems in Congress who voted for the IWR showed NO SPINE - only concern about how they'd appear - during a climate of fear stirred up by the neocons - to the folks who elected them. Why couldn't they have stood with Senator Byrd and delay the vote until after the October recesss and do some hard investigation into the phony intelligence the White House was feeding them about WMDs and ties to Al Queda? After all, all they were giving up with that vote was their most important and crucial power of all - the power to declare war! That was a betrayal of the people's trust of the highest order!

Throughout his campaign and during the debates Dean made it clear he never would have invaded Iraq given the poor credibility record of the Bush administration, the results of the UN weapons inspectors, and given the fraudulent nature of the nuclear yellow cake claim and the fraudulent nature of the supposed ties between Saddam and Bin Laden which had been exposed prior to the invasion. Saddam was effectively contained. He distinguished himself from Kerry on that issue. And it is the MOST IMPORTANT issue about Iraq. This war is a violation of the U.N. Charter, and therefore a violation of the U.S. Constitution, and therefore a WAR CRIME. And throughout this war the Bush administration has been committing war crimes and human rights violations (Abu Graib, etc., ad nauseum). THAT's the issue - Dean has always been right on this most important issue, and Kerry has always been dead wrong.

Just last summer, when Tim Russert gave Kerry a final last chance to stand on principle by asking him whether he'd still vote for the IWR with the benefit of hindsight knowing now that there were NO WMDs, NO Saddam/Al Queda ties, and NO imminent threat to the U.S., Kerry TOTALLY BLEW IT and said "Yes." This, from the same man who, in the prior poster's quote stated that the only reason he would approve going to war with Iraq was to disarm Saddam of WMDs. His position on Iraq has never made any sense whatsoever. Because he compromised principles which Howard Dean NEVER did.

In the end, the neo-cons pointed the spotlight on Kerry's painting himself into a corner on Iraq by declaring that Kerry's position was virtually indistinguishable from Bush's. And they were right: Kerry supported the war, and the occupation, even though all the reasons he based that support on were proven false; all Kerry was really saying is that he would have done a "better job" than Bush in executing the war - bringing in NATO allies (who rightly opposed the war, and would never have joined in) and doing a better job militarily (e.g. make sure the troops had the equipment they needed). Shit, man, how the hell does one do a "better job" of committing war crimes???

So Kerry offered the voters no real choice between the candidates on the Iraq war issue. That alone was probably enough to insure his defeat on Nov. 2.

And you attempt to trivialize this most important issue about the war as "nothing but bragging rights now"?

:wtf:

As a secondary issue, what does a newly elected President do who inherits an illegal war? Well, first, the prior President blew up their water and electrical systems and pretty well laid to waste their infrastructure upon which their survival depends creating massive unemployment, disease, and death. We as a country therefore owe it to them to help them rebuild what we destroyed. It was Howard Dean who first articulated a position on that issue. He called for approaching the U.N. and NATO, and not only giving them control of the constitutional and electoral process in Iraq, but also having them take over security with U.N. troops in exchange for our kicking Halliburton and other American war profiteering companies out of Iraq and letting the U.N. and NATO countries together with the Iraqis themselves handle the reconstruction contracts.

The other candidates you mention merely plagiarized Dean's position on this issue except they usually extended their estimate of the time it would take to accomplish the above. Dean's position wasn't counted in "years" - he emphasized that it should begin immediately and be completed ASAP.

Finally, you misrepresent Dean's and my position about Iraq when you mischaracterize our positions with the phrase: "if you support the continued occupation, like Dean does, it means you support the war."

That's utter nonsense. How you can look at yourself in the mirror while twisting Dean's and my position on Iraq into "support the continued occupation" and "you support the war" is beyond my comprehension.