| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"Fred Stone" |
| Date: |
06 Feb 2007 07:33:26 PM |
| Object: |
John Edwards exposes "Bush Lied" as a lie. |
http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/009103.php
Shifting Blame
It has been amusing to see Democrats in Congress attempt to explain away
their votes for the war in Iraq over the past year. Most of them have
settled on the excuse that the Bush administration deceived them in
October 2002 into authorizing military force based on the exact same
intelligence that moved them to declare official American policy of
regime change in 1998. The Democrats won a majority in the midterms by
stoking Bush Derangement Syndrome, but for 2008 they face a daunting
task -- winning elections without using the retiring George Bush as a
bogeyman.
John Edwards has found a solution by shifting blame yet again, and in
the process exposing the "Bush lied" meme as a hypocritical dodge. In
his Sunday appearance on Meet the Press, Edwards attempted to excuse his
vote on the AUMF by blaming Clinton administration officials for
confirming the intel coming from the Bush administration (via McQ at
QandO, emphases mine):
MR. RUSSERT: “ A grave threat to America,” do you still believe
that?
SEN. EDWARDS: No.
MR. RUSSERT: Why were you so wrong?
SEN. EDWARDS: For the same reason a lot of people were wrong. You
know, we—the intelligence information that we got was wrong. I mean,
tragically wrong. On top of that I’d—beyond that, I went back to former
Clinton administration officials who gave me sort of independent
information about what they believed about what was happening with
Saddam’s weapon—weapons programs. They were also wrong. And, based on
that, I made the wrong judgment. ...
MR. RUSSERT: But it seems as if, as a member of the intelligence
committee, you just got it dead wrong, and that you even ignored some
caveats and ignored people who were urging caution.
SEN. EDWARDS: Well, I, I, I would—first of all, I don’t want to
defend this. Let me be really clear about this. I think anybody who
wants to be president of the United States has got to be honest and
open, be willing to admit when they’ve done things wrong. One of the
things, unfortunately, that’s happened in Iraq is we’ve had a president
who was completely unmoving, wouldn’t change course, wouldn’t take any
responsibility or admit that he’d made any mistakes. And I think
America, in fact the world has paid a huge price for that. So I accept
my responsibility. I’m not defending what I did. Because what happened
was the information that we got on the intelligence committee was, was
relatively consistent with what I was getting from former Clinton
administration officials. I told you a few minutes ago I was concerned
about giving this president the authority, and I turned out to be wrong
about that.
Edwards, having discovered that George Bush cannot run for a third term,
needs to find another excuse for his vote to invade Iraq, a vote which
his progressive base abhors. He can't just explain it away by saying he
was too stupid to see past the web of Bush lies -- after all, he sat on
the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and had access to the
classified information that formed the basis of Bush's case for military
action. At the time, he was one of the more vocal Democratic supporters
of action.
So now he's blaming members of the Clinton administration for lying to
him as well. That's certainly convenient. After all, Hillary Clinton is
his biggest competitor for the nomination, and shifting blame to her
husband for the Iraq war would suit his needs perfectly. He can now
argue that he was no sap -- he checked on the information and got the
same answer from the previous Democratic administration.
However, this opens up a completely new problem for Edwards and the rest
of the Democrats. They have claimed for at least the last two years that
Bush Lied (TM), that the entire basis of the war was based on his
deceptions about the intelligence. Their campaigns have created an
impetus for impeachment in some Democratic circles based on this
supposed set of lies. Now John Edwards, years later, claims that Clinton
administration officials gave him essentially the same analysis about
WMD in Iraq -- exposing the Democrats as liars and smear artists
themselves.
All of this results from the lack of political courage by Democrats in
Congress. They voted for the war based on the same intelligence that
fueled American policy well before George Bush took office. When that
intel turned out to be incorrect, or at least out of date, they panicked
and tried to shove all the responsibility off onto the Bush
administration, calling him and ***** Cheney liars and whipping up anti-
war sentiment to cover for their own responsibility in the decision to
go to war. In the process, they have made it almost impossible for the
White House to exercise any flexibility in the war strategy to ensure a
positive outcome from the removal of Saddam Hussein.
Edwards has proven himself to be a craven, whiny opportunist. He's also
exposed many of his colleagues as having similar character flaws.
--
Fred Stone
aa# 1369
"You could take every dime spent by every government and NGO and eco-
group to investigate "climate change" and spend it on Internet porn
instead, and it wouldn't make the slightest difference to what the
climate will be in 2050.
However, it would make a dramatic difference to the lifestyle of the
"climate change" jet set...." -Mark Steyn
.
|
|
| User: "Fester" |
|
| Title: Re: John Edwards exposes "Bush Lied" as a lie. |
07 Feb 2007 05:25:54 AM |
|
|
"Fred Stone" <fstone69@earthling.com> wrote in message
news:Xns98CFD12EE33CDfreddybear@194.177.96.26...
http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/009103.php
Shifting Blame
It has been amusing to see Democrats in Congress attempt to explain away
their votes for the war in Iraq over the past year. Most of them have
settled on the excuse that the Bush administration deceived them in
October 2002 into authorizing military force based on the exact same
intelligence that moved them to declare official American policy of
regime change in 1998. The Democrats won a majority in the midterms by
stoking Bush Derangement Syndrome, but for 2008 they face a daunting
task -- winning elections without using the retiring George Bush as a
bogeyman.
John Edwards has found a solution by shifting blame yet again, and in
the process exposing the "Bush lied" meme as a hypocritical dodge. In
his Sunday appearance on Meet the Press, Edwards attempted to excuse his
vote on the AUMF by blaming Clinton administration officials for
confirming the intel coming from the Bush administration (via McQ at
QandO, emphases mine):
MR. RUSSERT: " A grave threat to America," do you still believe
that?
SEN. EDWARDS: No.
MR. RUSSERT: Why were you so wrong?
SEN. EDWARDS: For the same reason a lot of people were wrong. You
know, we-the intelligence information that we got was wrong. I mean,
tragically wrong. On top of that I'd-beyond that, I went back to former
Clinton administration officials who gave me sort of independent
information about what they believed about what was happening with
Saddam's weapon-weapons programs. They were also wrong. And, based on
that, I made the wrong judgment. ...
MR. RUSSERT: But it seems as if, as a member of the intelligence
committee, you just got it dead wrong, and that you even ignored some
caveats and ignored people who were urging caution.
SEN. EDWARDS: Well, I, I, I would-first of all, I don't want to
defend this. Let me be really clear about this. I think anybody who
wants to be president of the United States has got to be honest and
open, be willing to admit when they've done things wrong. One of the
things, unfortunately, that's happened in Iraq is we've had a president
who was completely unmoving, wouldn't change course, wouldn't take any
responsibility or admit that he'd made any mistakes. And I think
America, in fact the world has paid a huge price for that. So I accept
my responsibility. I'm not defending what I did. Because what happened
was the information that we got on the intelligence committee was, was
relatively consistent with what I was getting from former Clinton
administration officials. I told you a few minutes ago I was concerned
about giving this president the authority, and I turned out to be wrong
about that.
Edwards, having discovered that George Bush cannot run for a third term,
needs to find another excuse for his vote to invade Iraq, a vote which
his progressive base abhors. He can't just explain it away by saying he
was too stupid to see past the web of Bush lies -- after all, he sat on
the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and had access to the
classified information that formed the basis of Bush's case for military
action. At the time, he was one of the more vocal Democratic supporters
of action.
So now he's blaming members of the Clinton administration for lying to
him as well. That's certainly convenient. After all, Hillary Clinton is
his biggest competitor for the nomination, and shifting blame to her
husband for the Iraq war would suit his needs perfectly. He can now
argue that he was no sap -- he checked on the information and got the
same answer from the previous Democratic administration.
However, this opens up a completely new problem for Edwards and the rest
of the Democrats. They have claimed for at least the last two years that
Bush Lied (TM), that the entire basis of the war was based on his
deceptions about the intelligence. Their campaigns have created an
impetus for impeachment in some Democratic circles based on this
supposed set of lies. Now John Edwards, years later, claims that Clinton
administration officials gave him essentially the same analysis about
WMD in Iraq -- exposing the Democrats as liars and smear artists
themselves.
All of this results from the lack of political courage by Democrats in
Congress. They voted for the war based on the same intelligence that
fueled American policy well before George Bush took office. When that
intel turned out to be incorrect, or at least out of date, they panicked
and tried to shove all the responsibility off onto the Bush
administration, calling him and ***** Cheney liars and whipping up anti-
war sentiment to cover for their own responsibility in the decision to
go to war. In the process, they have made it almost impossible for the
White House to exercise any flexibility in the war strategy to ensure a
positive outcome from the removal of Saddam Hussein.
Edwards has proven himself to be a craven, whiny opportunist. He's also
exposed many of his colleagues as having similar character flaws.
This is news?
.
|
|
|
| User: "Fred Stone" |
|
| Title: Re: John Edwards exposes "Bush Lied" as a lie. |
07 Feb 2007 07:16:08 AM |
|
|
"Fester" <not@home.com> wrote in
news:45c9b742$0$4887$4c368faf@roadrunner.com:
<...>
All of this results from the lack of political courage by Democrats
in Congress. They voted for the war based on the same intelligence
that fueled American policy well before George Bush took office. When
that intel turned out to be incorrect, or at least out of date, they
panicked and tried to shove all the responsibility off onto the Bush
administration, calling him and ***** Cheney liars and whipping up
anti- war sentiment to cover for their own responsibility in the
decision to go to war. In the process, they have made it almost
impossible for the White House to exercise any flexibility in the war
strategy to ensure a positive outcome from the removal of Saddam
Hussein.
Edwards has proven himself to be a craven, whiny opportunist. He's
also exposed many of his colleagues as having similar character
flaws.
This is news?
Well....no. Oh, and speaking of not news, that "Survey of Climate
Scientists" by the "Union of Concerned Scientists" is even more bogus
than the usual MSM survey.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2007/02/bad_research_horrendou
s_report.html
Bad Research, Worse Reporting on Global Warming
By Dennis Byrne
In trying to prove that the Bush administration is throttling research
into global warming, the Union of Concerned Scientists rolled out some
breathtakingly bad science.
The group unveiled a supposedly scientific survey of more than 1,600
federal climate scientists as evidence that the administration was
engaged in "wide-ranging political interference in research related to
global warming."
"The new evidence shows that political interference in climate science
is no longer a series of isolated incidents but a system-wide
epidemic," Dr. Francesca Grifo, Director of the UCS Scientific Integrity
Program, said in a press release. "Tailoring scientific fact for
political purposes has become a problem across many federal science
agencies."
Grifo obviously doesn't' appreciate the irony when he trots out a poll
that is so flawed that it is manifest evidence of exaggeration,
incompetence or dishonesty on his group's part.
You don't have to be a social scientist to understand that the survey
was deceptive, for example, when it lumped into the same category
scientists who said they actually experienced the alleged tampering and
scientists who simply "perceived" that it happened to someone else. For
example, the group's press release said "Forty-three percent of
respondents reported they had perceived or personally experienced
changes or edits during review of their work that changed the meaning of
their scientific findings." But turn to the study's appendix, and you'll
find that only 15 percent of the respondents said that they had actually
experienced such interference.
Other examples abound: 43 percent perceived or experienced "fear of
retaliation for openly expressing concerns about climate change outside
my agency." Actually, only 14 percent personally harbored such a fear;
the other 29 percent apparently thought they saw it in others. Notice,
the question didn't ask how many actually experienced retaliation,
instead of just fearing it.
When the survey finally got around to asking how many scientists
actually received "requests by officials for scientists to provide
incomplete, inaccurate, or misleading information to the public," only
12 scientists (4 percent of respondents) did. Let's see, 12 out of the
1,630 scientists who received the survey amounts an underwhelming 0.7
percent. Hardly the kind of statistic that supports the claim of a
"wide-spread epidemic" of interference.
Explaining the problem in more detail was the Statistical Assessment
Service (STATS), a non-partisan a watchdog at George Mason University
that tries to correct misinformation in the media springing from bad
science, politics or ignorance.
STATS said that by lumping together scientists who actually experienced
interference with those who only perceived it, the survey "creates a
statistical phenomenon that artificially inflates the impression of a
hostile work environment. Consider an agency that contains 10
scientists. One tells the other nine that he has encountered
interference. When they are surveyed, all ten report that they have
'perceived in others and/or personally experienced' interference. So one
act of interference is counted as ten acts that are 'perceived' or
'experienced'; ten percent of the scientists have been interfered with,
but 100 percent report 'perceiving in others and' or personally'
experiencing interference. If the agency contains 100 scientists, the
interference experienced by one becomes 'perceived' interference by the
other 99, and so forth."
The survey's "most obvious problem" STATS said, was the low response
rate of 17 percent. "This means we don't know the views and experiences
of the other 83 percent...Any professional survey researcher...will tell
you that a 17 percent response rate is inadequate to draw conclusions
about the group being surveyed, in the absence of other information
demonstrating that the sample is representative." STATS quotes Harris
Poll chairman Humphrey Taylor as saying a small response rate is more
damaging than a small sample, noting that many peer-reviewed academic
journals will not accept papers relying on samples smaller than 50
percent.
The survey also may be infected with a "selection bias," meaning that
"the scientists who took the time and effort to fill out and return the
questionnaire might be precisely those most upset about perceived
interference."
STATS also refers to "a great deal of social science evidence" that such
perceptions often are wrong. "The tendency to believe that others will
be influenced by forces to which we ourselves are immune (e.g., by
misleading advertising or partisan rhetoric) is so common that
sociologists have a name for it--the 'third person effect.'"
"Finally," STATS said, "the researchers assume that all these responses
refer to officials' efforts to alter certain kinds of findings about
global warming. But that is not specified in the questionnaire." For
example, a scientist could find a change in working conditions without
it having anything to do with global warming.
The original research was bad enough, but the reporting of it was
horrendous. No telling where NBC's Andrea Mitchell got the figure that
"nearly half [the scientists] were pressured to eliminate the words'
climate change' or 'global warming,' but it clearly wasn't from the
survey, which said no such thing. Not to be outdone in the patently
wrong department, the New York Times reported that 60 percent of the
scientists "personally experienced" interference. ABC's Jake Tapper
said, "scientists say their work on global warming has been watered down
and twisted by the White House..." even though such hyperbole is not a
conclusion warranted by the survey.
Naturally, editorial writers, egged on by faulty science and faulty
reporting, raised the usual alarms, such as the Minneapolis Star
Tribune's "Bush's blatant abuse of climate scientists."
One explanation for such appalling journalism is the industry's
willingness to be spoon-fed by the likes of Rep. Henry Waxman (D-
Calif.), who gladly sanctified the bad science by giving it a platform
on his Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. "It appears there
may have been an orchestrated campaign to mislead the public about
climate change," Waxman said.
And if anything makes Bush look bad, some in the media will show up.
Like NBC's Brian Williams, for example, who intoned on his nightly
newscast: "The question in Washington was this: did the Bush
administration...try to cook the books on the topic of global warming?"
Of course, scientists ought not be pressured or made to change their
research to suit a political or ideological agenda. I wouldn't be
surprised if someone, somewhere down the line tried, but I also don't
buy the whining by some scientists about how delays in the "release of
websites, press releases, reports, or other science-based materials"
demonstrated some sort of conspiracy to shut them up. What do they
think, that they're not working in a government bureaucracy?
I'm not surprised, but I can't excuse, how the Union of Concerned
Scientists, the inexhaustibly liberal and self-appointed guardians of
scientific purity, can try to corrupt science for its own ends. But I
never can get over how so many of my media colleagues allow themselves
to be so easily manipulated by junk science.
--
Fred Stone
aa# 1369
"You could take every dime spent by every government and NGO and
eco-group to investigate "climate change" and spend it on Internet porn
instead, and it wouldn't make the slightest difference to what the
climate will be in 2050.
However, it would make a dramatic difference to the lifestyle of the
"climate change" jet set...." -Mark Steyn
.
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