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T_i_B Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-28-03 02:20 AM
Original message
Bush & Blair: A tale of two liars
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1007046,00.html

Were politics on either side of the Atlantic burdened with such notions as shame, integrity or even results, both British prime minister Tony Blair and American president George Bush would be struggling for their political survival. Both lied to their electorates in order to prosecute an illegal war against the will of the international community. Neither has a clue how to rebuild the country they have just destroyed - other than with more force, which is resulting in greater loss of life on both sides. Both have now defended their dogged pursuit of this course on the grounds that even if they were wrong about the pretext for doing it they were right to do it anyway.

But they both went into this guns blazing, flying around the world like Top Gun on E, telling anyone who would listen that they were in charge and there would be hell to pay. Now their case has been shot down in flames. They were both in it together. But at present, while one is clearly wounded, the other is fighting for his political life.

The fact that Blair, who was elected with one of the largest parliamentary majorities in British history, is in such deep trouble while Bush, who was selected by judges with a minority of the popular vote, has emerged little more than scathed, is sadly not a measure of the higher standards of honesty and probity to which we hold our politicians in Britain. It is rather a testament to Blair's political and personal follies and Bush's relative acuity.

One reason Bush has disappointed so few is because he promised so little. Bombing Iraq did fit into the doctrine of the pre-emptive strike and regime change which he had already embraced. Without weapons of mass destruction it is more difficult to explain precisely how Saddam was a threat. But by its nature pre-emption does not demand proof, only supposition and strength. Bush said he would be happy to go to war without the UN if necessary, and security council negotiations served a purpose so long as they fit in with his military timetable. He never claimed he wanted to re-order the world but said his priority was to protect American interests.
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Cronus Protagonist Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-28-03 02:29 AM
Response to Original message
1. Funny you should post that - here's an illustration to go with it :)
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Rocinante Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-28-03 02:34 AM
Response to Reply #1
2. That
nose reminds me of W.C.Fields, except I respect Fields.
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Jack Rabbit Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-28-03 08:31 AM
Response to Original message
3. Thanks, TiB

Moreover, when it comes to foreign policy, Bush embodies a pervasive American mindset. Like much of the rest of the country, before September 11, he was a mixture of ignorant and indifferent to the rest of the world. Now, like many here, he is afraid of it and prepared to lash out at those he perceives as his enemy.

It might be worth observing that, in the words of Mark Crispen Miller, Bush is proud of his ignornace. That is what is most frightening.
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Catholic Sensation Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jul-28-03 10:23 AM
Response to Original message
4. two things
1. It is plainly obvious that the President lost any control over the administration he may have had. The constant flow of lies reeks of Cock Cheney's influence, with a little Rummsfeld bullshit to give the misleading info some extra spice.

2. Not relevant to the story per se, but the Guardian is going to be publishing a magazine in America too according to this guy on This Week (I believe). The "liberal" media keeps moving to the left.
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T_i_B Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-03 06:19 AM
Response to Reply #4
5. I think it went on with $hrubya's approval
It is plainly obvious that the President lost any control over the administration he may have had. The constant flow of lies reeks of Cock Cheney's influence, with a little Rummsfeld bullshit to give the misleading info some extra spice.

I disagree, I think that whatever went on was at the very least with the tacit approval of the resident select.

To that end I think that it was very fortunate for Bush to have Blair producing the Iraq dossiers that have been shown to be worthless lies. Blair did a great deal of Bush's WMD lying for him. Blair used more phoney intelligence to justify his stance than Bush did.

That said it still boggles the mind that Bush is not in the level of shit that Blair is. Even if Bush did not need to make the same level of hollow promises that Blair did he should still be getting well and truly roasted for lying to the American people in the critical issue of peace and war.

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priller Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-03 09:58 AM
Response to Reply #5
6. I think the different press coverage makes a big difference
The Beeb was on Blair's case from the beginning, constantly questioning and examining his claims, giving air to the skepticism that many people had about the whole Iraq misadventure.

In the US, however, the press coverage of Bush ranged from fawning to worshipful. It was just an endless stream of Bush the strong, Bush the leader, Bush the popular, Bush the ass-kicker, etc, etc, ad nauseum. Since most people in the US don't bother to inform themselves about current events, they just semi-consciously register the uniformly positive coverage and think, "Ooh, Bush is doing a good job". You've noticed that now the phony uranium claims have filled the news, Bush's approval ratings have taken a dive. If the press coverage here had been anything like Britain's all along, Bush would probably be in similar hot water.
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0007 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-03 12:00 PM
Response to Original message
7. They do have matching tails
and long dripping noses.
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PGPIRATE Donating Member (3 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-03 01:01 PM
Response to Reply #7
8. More American Than Many Democrats
More American Than Many Democrats

"There is a myth that though we love freedom, others don't; that our
attachment to freedom is a product of our culture; that freedom, democracy, human rights, the rule of law are American values or Western values; that Afghan women were content under the lash of the Taliban; that Saddam was somehow beloved by his people; that Milosevic was Serbia's savior. Anywhere, any time ordinary people are given the chance to choose, the choice is the same: freedom, not tyranny; democracy, not dictatorship; the rule of law, not the rule of the secret police."

- British Prime Minister Tony Blair in an address to Congress last week
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T_i_B Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jul-30-03 12:31 PM
Response to Reply #8
9. Jeez, I never knew America was now an ideology
But that is the way it seems to be, and I hate to tell you this but Western Values are based on consent and cannot be indocrinated with any degree of success at gunpoint without the consent of the people of whichever country they are being praticed in.

P.S Western values still don't justify lying thorugh your back teeth in order to start an unjustifiable war.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1007741,00.html

The United States is no longer just a nation. It is now a religion. Its soldiers have entered Iraq to liberate its people not only from their dictator, their oil and their sovereignty, but also from their darkness. As George Bush told his troops on the day he announced victory: "Wherever you go, you carry a message of hope - a message that is ancient and ever new. In the words of the prophet Isaiah, 'To the captives, "come out," and to those in darkness, "be free".'"

So American soldiers are no longer merely terrestrial combatants; they have become missionaries. They are no longer simply killing enemies; they are casting out demons. The people who reconstructed the faces of Uday and Qusay Hussein carelessly forgot to restore the pair of little horns on each brow, but the understanding that these were opponents from a different realm was transmitted nonetheless. Like all those who send missionaries abroad, the high priests of America cannot conceive that the infidels might resist through their own free will; if they refuse to convert, it is the work of the devil, in his current guise as the former dictator of Iraq.

So those who question George Bush's foreign policy are no longer merely critics; they are blasphemers, or "anti-Americans". Those foreign states which seek to change this policy are wasting their time: you can negotiate with politicians; you cannot negotiate with priests. The US has a divine mission, as Bush suggested in January: "to defend ... the hopes of all mankind", and woe betide those who hope for something other than the American way of life.

The dangers of national divinity scarcely require explanation. Japan went to war in the 1930s convinced, like George Bush, that it possessed a heaven-sent mission to "liberate" Asia and extend the realm of its divine imperium. It would, the fascist theoretician Kita Ikki predicted: "light the darkness of the entire world". Those who seek to drag heaven down to earth are destined only to engineer a hell.
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gulliver Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jul-30-03 01:45 PM
Response to Original message
10. Blair is Bush's firewall.
If Blair goes, Bush will follow.

Bush and Blair just did round-up of the usual suspects. That's desperation. It just hasn't sunk in with Americans yet. They just wanted someone attacked and trusted Bush not to lie about who to attack. We Americans haven't figured it out yet, but sooner or later we are going to look hard at Iraq and wonder if what we bought is the same thing we were sold.
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connors Donating Member (111 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Jul-30-03 09:55 PM
Response to Original message
11. He is in bed with the Saudi bagman for bin laden.
He’s in bed with bin laden and he is trying to suppress the Sept. 11 Congressional report 28 pages dealing with his complicity. Wasn’t this dunce’s claim that he “would return honor and dignity to the White House”? The only way that will happen is when he goes. Unfortunately, too many weak and defenseless Iraq1s will die, and too many of our fine soldiers will have to suffer in this horrible occupation.
 
In the run-up to the Iraq War we were frequently told that 43’s team had “secret information” but because “sources and methods” could not be exposed, the information could not be shared.  That was just another lie, as “sources and methods” certainly could be exposed when 43 had a fit of pique.
 
Two senior Bush administration officials blew the cover of a US intelligence officer working covertly in a field of vital importance to national security. Under the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982, it is a crime for anyone who has access to classified information to disclose intentionally information identifying a covert agent. Members of both parties indicated a congressional investigation is likely in this matter.
 
Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), vice chairman of the intelligence panel said a probe is probably necessary and accused the White House of strong-arm tactics aimed at those who question their policies. "To go after him is one thing, but to go after his wife is another thing," he said. Both are reprehensible.
 
He has to take the responsibility for his administration’s evil destruction of a covert agent’s networks-—a euphemism for people’s lives, that 43’s team has destroyed.
 
The Sept. 11 attacks were preventable, a Congressional report released on July 24th 2003 says. The report redacted 28 pages relating to Saudi Arabia.
 
How he plays around with “sources and methods”. To cover-up his connection with Saudi Arabia Bush said that "declassification of that part of a 900-page document would reveal sources and methods that would make it harder for us to win the war on terror."
 
He won’t let us see this even though Saudi officials sought the release of the still-classified section of the report, which was denounced today by the Saudi foreign minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal, as an "outrage" that "wrongly and morbidly" accused Saudi Arabia of complicity in the attacks.
 
Invoking the provisions of a seldom-used Senate resolution, Bob Graham said he asked the chairman of the Intelligence Committee, Senator Pat Roberts, Republican of Kansas, and the top Democrat on the committee, Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, to start a process that permits the declassification of information if the Senate voted to release it — even over the objections of the administration.
 
I’d hate to be anyone in the U.S. who had any relations with Saudi Arabians. Guess who has such a relationship, not only with peripheral Saudis but with one who is bin laden’s brother in law, as well as bagman?
 
In the January 31, 2003 article, “Global Eye -- Kean Insight” by Chris Floyd, he wrote about retired New Jersey Governor Thomas Kean and 43 sharing an unsavory business partner. Floyd, quoting another source, wrote, “Fortune Magazine reports this week that both Kean and Bush share an unusually well-placed business partner: one  Khalid bin Mahfouz -- perhaps better known as "Osama bin Laden's bagman" or even "Osama bin Laden's brother-in-law." He continues that, “Kean is a director of Amerada Hess, an oil giant married up to Saudi Arabia's Delta Oil in a venture to pump  black gold in Azerbaijan. (The partnership is naturally incorporated in a secretive offshore "tax haven". One of those cut-outs was Mahfouz factotum James Bath, a partner in Dubya's early oil venture, Arbusto, who has admitted serving as a pass-through for secret Saudi money. It is easy to keep connecting the dots when you see that years later, when Bush's maladroit business skills were about to sink another of his companies, Harken Energy, the firm was saved by a $25 million investment from a Swiss bank -- a subsidiary of the Bank of Credit and Commerce International, partly owned by the beneficent Mahfouz. The U.S. Senate labeled BCCI as, "one of the largest criminal enterprises in history". It doesn’t end there as Floyd concludes that, “Somehow we doubt that worthy Kean will poke very hard at the nexus of intersections between his own business partner, Mahfouz, and the bin Ladens, the Bushes, the Saudi royals, Saddam, the CIA and BCCI.” 43 rewards flunkies who have passed him money through, an impossible to estimate, number of money laundering schemes. That is why he named Kean as Kissinger's 9-11 Investigation replacement. 43’s motives are always disreputable, so how can we trust this Iraq 2 to be anything other than a money making bonanza for 43 and his soul-mates.
 
It is mind boggling but you see that 43 hasn’t taken responsibility for his sixteen words, although he takes all of the credit for the Iraq War, which he has told the doting public he has won. The sad thing is that we have our young men and women, as well as Iraqi defenseless citizens, collateral damage, dying there daily in the terrible Iraqi occupation. This sequel to “Shock and Awe” for all the world doesn’t look like a victory. The fool’s swore that they had to protect “sources and methods”, but when they became enraged at Wilson for being honest, they ignored that and blew the cover of a US intelligence officer working covertly, Wilson’s wife. The Congressional report Sept. 11 had 28 redacted pages about Saudi Arabia’s link to bin Laden’s terrorists. 43’s team doesn’t want this information released even though all of the interested parties want the public to have access to it. WHY? He is too tightly involved with Saudi Arabian’s, including Osama bin Laden's brother-in-law. His team has control of the 9-11 Investigation, with 43’s business partner Thomas Kean being named as its head.
B. Connors
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