Ritter HAS been back to Iraq. He is producing a film about Iraq in which the Iraqi government has given him access to top officials for interviews. It seems as though he is all buddy buddy with Saddam. If we go to war with Iraq I hope we make Ritter forfeit his citizenship and boot his sorry turncoat ass out. Then we could say this to him... For the record I don't REALLY want him to die...I saw the emoticon and thought it was funny...but Ritter does anger me greatly.
Achebe...that's it. You are no longer my friend. How dare you betray my emails. You have lost all trust and friendship that I may have ever had for you. And rimbaud...Terry is a point guard, do you need someone to make a yellow highlight marker on the boxscores for you?
Attacking Nuclear sites and using nuclear weapons are 2 completely different things. I just thought I'd clarify that
So attacking a nuclear site is "going too far" because of the fallout but detonating a nuclear device would not be?
Is that a rhetorical question? I have no idea why you are posing that question to me...have you read any of my posts?
As you and Cohen point out, Ritter is full of it...I saw him yesterday morning on the Today show arguing quite vehemently that anyone who thinks Saddam has WMD is just crazy and clearly knows nothing about the situation. My first thought was, "thou doth protest too much." My second thought was, "how the hell would you know?" He hasn't been there for 4 years, as I understand it. Then this morning they had on Ritter's supervisor when he was a weapons inspector...i've heard the guy's name before, but i'm drawing a blank right now, but i think it's Richard Bruce.....he's from australia...he said Ritter is lying...he speaks out of both sides of his mouth, he says. He says just before the last inspectors were kicked out it was Ritter who was saying so loudly that Saddam DID have WMD...so Bruce says he Ritter either lied to him when he was in Iraq or he's lying now. He says there is no doubt that Saddam has WMD...he says the UN should set down a forceful mandate, and if it's not met, the UN should take military action. Katie Couric asked what he thought about the US going it alone...he said it wouldn't be his first choice but that he assumed the US would have to if the UN didn't. Curiously, Ritter HAS been in Iraq recently...but not in the guise of a weapons' inspector...he was speaking to their parliament recently....hmmmmmm...
I saw Ritter on CNBC last night. He was very impressive. Unlike the chickhawks, Bush, Cheney, Tom Dely etc. who will not fight or send their kids to fight. Rittter is a 12 year veteran of the marine corp and has actually spent 7 years hunting for weapons. Ashleigh Banifield tried everything to intimidate him. Even asked him if he was afraid for his safety in the US etc. Claiming she had 100's of e-mail against him. A true patriot who stands up for his civil liberties and his duty to avoid having Americans, both civilians and soldiers killed because of domestic political considerations. He seemed genuinely upset that his job as a weapon inspector was undermined by US attempts to use UN inspectors as spies to assist in toppling Sadam, making it hard for them to do their work of looking for weapons of mass destruction. Good to hear from someone with actual experience on the ground with no domenstic political gains as their agenda.
You responded to my earlier comment - to which I responded...all based on your initial comment of terrorists using nukes a soon as they get them and none of us being alive. My point is that even the terrorists seem to shy away from anything nuclear. Just my one tiny point.
wow...i know i'm gonna regret this... but how do you explain the inconsistencies in his comments on the existence of WMD in Iraq?? (waiting to be told i'm just an ignorant white, upper-middle class, Christian, Houstonian)
As you and Cohen point out, Ritter is full of it...I saw him yesterday morning on the Today show arguing quite vehemently that anyone who thinks Saddam has WMD is just crazy and clearly knows nothing about the situation. Two considerations (I got this from the founder of STRATFOR, Dr. George Friedman): (1) If Saddam *did* have WMD, the worst the thing the US could do is announce to the world that we're going to attack them many months down the road. That gives him time to deploy and ready those weapons, especially chem & bio if we plan a ground invasion. If he did have WMD, we would already have hit Iraq very very hard and by surprise. (2) Saddam is a power-crazy man, but very smart and oriented towards keeping control. Unlike Al-Queda, he's not going to use WMD (or give them to terrorists) because he knows that would be the end of him and his regime. However, if he believes his time has come anyway (US invading preemptively), he has no reason not to use them, and he's more likely to distribute them to terrorists to get revenge after he's out of power. I'm not sure I agree completely, but the arguments made perfect sense. Keep in mind this seems to be a very pro-military / pro-defense organization.
one more thing... Ritter says the United States used the UN weapons inspections as a way to spy on Iraq...that was the claim of Saddam throughout the years the inspectors were there. my thoughts on that: 1. if it's true, shame on the american government, because they've ruined any ability to police this guy 2. ritter just says it...provides no evidence to back it up...nobody from the UN backs him up...he and saddam are the only ones i've EVER heard make this allegation. 3. if ritter is lying or making this up (and his stories have changed significantly regarding his time in Iraq recently) he should be shamed publicly...these are VERY serious charges he's making against the US govt...and they damage the credibility of the UN weapons inspectors in general, which could put us at all at risk.
I will post the entire transcript from the Jim Lehrer hour in 1998 since some may have intentionally avoided reading it so they don't have to challenge their concept that Ritter is a true patriot . You can make your own assessment on Ritter's credibility. Again, his statements from 1998 are totally inconsistent with his statements today.
Well there is some other support behind the idea of spying. Ritter has totally flip flopped on what happened in Iraq. Though he's not really buddy buddy with Saddam as someone claimed. I saw him yesterday, say that he wished Saddam was dead. Anyway, back to the idea of spying. details.http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/americas/184764.stm
they were SUPPOSED to provide information on the weapons programme, Franchise...that was their job... Saddam, and now Ritter, claimed we were sizing up targets specifically...the argument used is that information was used by the Clinton administration when they targetted Saddam with cruise missiles back in 1999 (i think it was 99..maybe 2000??). again...if you're going to make those claims, you better realize how serious the consequences are.
My understanding was that the weapons inspectors report to the UN security counsel and not to individual countries. I'm not saying that they were definitely spying, but that does bear some further investigation. If the UN was on a tour or something of U.S. military facilities, and then we heard that members of that UN group were reporting back to Iraq on what they found, we would want that investigated as possible spying.
understood...again...if the US abused this process to spy, then shame on us!!! we have caused a great deal of harm and put our own citizens at risk, if that's the case, because we have made saddam have good reason to want to keep us out, whether he has or does not have WMD... but Ritter just floats that out there sort of carelessly...and given his other comments which are so drastically different and for which he's being called on the carpet for by guys like Richard Bruce, it is all pretty suspect, in my opinion. eventually the little boy who cried wolf found out that no one came to his aid when a real wolf came lurking by.
Originally posted by FranchiseBlade My understanding was that the weapons inspectors report to the UN security counsel and not to individual countries. I'm not saying that they were definitely spying, but that does bear some further investigation. Why? They were supposed to be gathering information. What difference does it make if it was reported through the UN, or directly to countries? If the UN was on a tour or something of U.S. military facilities, and then we heard that members of that UN group were reporting back to Iraq on what they found, we would want that investigated as possible spying. What?! That's analagous to Iraq? Iraq invaded another country and showed no hesitation using WMD on civilians and Iranian soldiers. They AGREED to the ceasefire terms. Sometimes one's bias' really shine, eh FB?
Headline: "Out of Work Weapons Inspector Will Be Your Friend For Cash." I made a G today But you made it in a sleazy way Selling crack to the kids But I gotta get paid That's the way it is (tupac - Changes) Ritter ...met Iraqi-born American businessman Shakir Alkafajii, who had heard Ritter attack U.S. policy toward Iraq....Alkafajii, who is accompanying Ritter as a "translator and cultural adviser," secured the travel visas for the crew and agreed to put up a $400,000 line of credit to finance the documentary.
Because one is doing their job, and the other might be spying. I think the idea behind the UN taking action is that it's the world acting to ensure it's own peace. If people acting on behalf of the world as whole, then start sending information to individual countries, it casts doubt on the legitimacy of the UN. The UN isn't supposed to be working for the interests of just one country or a few countries, but for all of it's members. If the UN was on a tour or something of U.S. military facilities, and then we heard that members of that UN group were reporting back to Iraq on what they found, we would want that investigated as possible spying. I agree that the arms inspectors should be let back in to Iraq. I've been one of the people who supported sending them into Iraq with Armed UN soldiers as an escort. And I've said that if the inspectors are blocked, or fired upon, or any harm attempted toward them, then a full scale UN invasion should take place. I also liked what Bush told the UN yesterday about them enforcing their resolutions. I think that's exactly what the UN needs to do. Now, as far as my analogy goes. I know it's a bad analgy. It really wasn't bias. I just couldn't think of a reason why UN arms Inspectors would have access to U.S. military facilities. But say the UN wanted to take an inventory of it's members military, and the resolution was passed.(I know that would be a stupid resolution, but that isn't the point.) Then the inspectors started giving information about our military to other countries, including some we aren't friendly with. That would definitely bear investigating. The point really is if inspectors start acting in the interest of other individual countries instead of for the reason and authoritative body that sent them in, it comprimises the integrity of the original mission. I don't quote Ritter for any of my arguments, because I'll be the first to admit he isn't credible. The guy just did a complete 180 degree turn. Sorry if my first post came off as me having a strong bias. It might still seem like I do, but hopefully it's at least somewhat cleared up. As far as spying, I haven't really seen any conclusive evidence that the arms inspectors were spying. I'm not trying to claim that. I'm just saying that given they were sharing information with certain individual countries could give the appearance of impropriety, even if it wasn't actually wrong. I guess I was arguing that someone who claimed the arms inspectors were spying might not be right, but they also weren't totally out of left field.
