If our policy is to use drones to kill our enemies, why the Iraq War?

[Vinnie From Indy]

Why did we not simply blow the shit out of Saddam and his sons? Oh yeah, there was all that money that could be sucked out of the treasury by the MIC. I guess the estimated 1,000,000. dead were just a cost of doing business.

[Kahuna]

1. You already know the answer to that. Also, bush wanted to run

his reelection as a wartime president. He did just that and it worked.

[frazzled]

2. Our side said the "war on terror" should be a targeted police action ...

not a war. We said it should be based on intelligence and targeted actions. John Kerry said that, and many others. Now we're turning to that method, and everyone is complaining.

As for Iraq, the answer is that it had nothing to do with terrorism or enemies. It was just wrong.

[treestar]

5. Exactly!

During the Bush Administration, we just got war in general. Republicans didn't want to target the actual terrorists, just have a war.

[treestar]

3. That's one of the differences between Rs and Ds

I remember the right saying Clinton could have killed OBL, but didn't because there were women and children in the compound. Of course after 911, everything "changed."

But then you have to keep in mind that Bush did not do it this way. He wanted a war in general. Not just targeting the actual perpetrators. That was our problem with Bush.

[Major Nikon]

4. Because god told Shrub to invade Iraq

[phaseolus]

6. We all read the news

That naive American Exceptionalism fantasy, mostly. If Ronnie could single-handedly bring down the Evil Empire with a speech, turning the entire region into a friendly laissez-faire capitalist haven was gonna be a cakewalk. And Saddam tried to kill mah daiddy.

and, yeah, the money -- http://www.google.com//finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chdv=1&chvs=maximized&chdeh=0&chfdeh=0&chdet=1214596800000&chddm=647496&chls=IntervalBasedLine&q=NYSE:HAL&ntsp=0

[HysteryDiagnosis]

7. Rummy said there weren't enough targets in Afghanistan.... so we got Iraq. I hope when

the universe decides to deal with us it isn't too awful bad.

[Tesha]

8. Because that wouldn't have destroyed enough of our existing stock of weapons to make...

...the Military-Industrial Complex wealthy (through the sales of replacement weaponry).

Tesha