7/21    If Bush could apologize -- and he won't of course -- he would say:
        Hey, look, my intelligence agencies told me that Iraq didn't destroy
        all their chemical (sarin, VX) and biological (anthrax) weapons, and
        Saddam could have given them to al Qaeda whenever he wanted.  The UN
        wanted to wait while Saddam stonewalled, and in this post-9/11 world,
        I wasn't going to wait any longer.  If al Qaeda got chemical weapons,
        or by god, a nuclear bomb, they would use them in a second to kill
        hundreds of thousands of Americans -- and by then, it would be too
        late to argue about what-ifs.  As for the battle in Iraq, Rummy told
        me we could roll them up, just like in Afghanistan and with my dad,
        and that part was true; his pal Wolfowitz said we could have in Iraq a
        beacon for democracy that would spread throughout and moderate the Arab
        world, and it sounded great -- well, we tried, and we're still trying.
        Finally, it turned out that Saddam didn't have any viable WMD
        programs, but I'm sure he wanted them, and the world is a safer place
        today without him in Iraq.  Why is it a safer place even though he
        didn't have WMDs?  Because we demonstrated how serious the U.S. would
        be when it came to playing games with chemical, biological, or nuclear
        weapons.  We showed that we would go it alone, to take a country down
        if we thought they threatened our way of life.  And we also learned
        our own limitations about postwar reconstruction.  Better now, than
        later, to have gone through all these things.
        [As for me, I'm voting against Bush, because (1) he pulled the war
        card too early, (2) he didn't have what it took to build a coalition,
        as much as Powell wanted to give him one, (3) I don't want a
        President who doesn't apologize over the first two points, because to
        me, that means he hasn't taken responsibility, and (4) I believe a
        smarter individual as President would have better understood just what
        intelligence we had, or would have better articulated this to the
        public -- that he wanted to take the country to war even when we
        weren't sure he had WMDs.  I really think Bush isn't smart enough to
        write his own speeches, or if he wanted to write and use one, his
        people wouldn't let him.]
        \_ Too bad he won't say it.
        \_ If you're going to troll you need to keep it shorter and on message.
           Try, try, try again padawan.
           \_ I'm serious.  Tell me which part doesn't sound like it matches
              Bush's thinking.  Note how I never said he lied or did it for
              the bin Laden oil connections or to make rich people richer.
              Excluding my opinion, I believe this is also exactly how
              Clinton saw it, too -- he supports Bush's call on Iraq, except he
              would have waited for Blix to finish.
        \_ what does phuqm have to say about htis? he's been long absent.
        \_ 1) Saddam was half a year away from a nuclear weapon in 1992, best
              intelligence suggested several years.  Exactly how many more
              resolutions beyond 21 (over 10 years) do you want?? Honestly,
              when would the UN security council say enough?  Never, because of
              the ties between  Russia, France, Germany, and Iraq, and the
              UN oil for food program.
           2) A coalition was unobtainable.  France, with economic and historical
           2) A coalition was unobtainable.France, with economic and historical
              ties, viewed Iraq as a client state.  Russia was owed billions
              by Saddam.  China was arming Iraq with state of (their) art
              weapons systems.  All three of them had ignored UN rulings and
              negotiated oil contracts provided the sanctions were lifted.
              Couple that with pay offs it is any wonder why these countries
              voted as they did???
           4) Bush articulated his vision lucidly, you just must not have been
              listening.  It is the presidents preeminent responsibility to
              protect the country.  It was a judgement call, one history
              will almost certainly vindicate.
           Lastly your interpretation of history and international politics is
           naive.  We have been at war with Islam since the fall of the Shah.
           Each time the attacks have increased in scale and sophistication.
           Ignoring the problem would likely have resulted in a few nuclear
           weapons detonated in American cities.
           \_ No one suggested the problem should be ignored.  The issue is
              that Bush's approach to problem is fundamentally wrong and is
              making things worse, not better.