Gore won't give it up

Gore won't give it up

Either will you Faosso

 

Why should he give it up? The administration has repeatedly claimed that Iraq had ties to al Qaeda, even after all of the "evidence" has been thoroughly debunked by every legitimate intelligence agency AND the 9/11 commission.

A particularly egregious example was given on the Daily Show today (or yesterday) where Cheney was being interviewed and emphatically claimed that he NEVER said that the Atta meeting in Prague was substantiated. The next clip was Cheney saying (if my wife wasn't watching the TV, I would quote him) that the Atta meeting had been substantiated and that he believed it to be true.

When the administration gives up on its futile attempts to link Iraq to al Qaeda, I would expect the critics to quiet down about their exaggerated, mistaken, or fabricated "evidence."

 

I hope not. Because if we screams we all know that will mean he's crazy, and lost his mind. God forbid someone should scream after having our nation's principles being sold up the river by this administration.

 

Wait. I thought that the 9/11 commission has stated that there were no Iraqi ties to 9/11 (which is consistant with the adminsitration) but that there were/are ties to Al Queda.

The Democratic leader of the 9/11 commission has even come out to say that the Commission agrees with the administration with regards to ties between Iraq and Al Queda.

and

Safire: 9/11 Commission's Runaway Staff

This was also reported on Meet the Press on Sunday.

 

The 9/11 commission said there were contacts but no operational connection between Al-Qaeda and Saddam's Iraq.

 

Right, the 9-11 commission was in charge of investigating.... 9-11! While there *may* not be a connection between Iraq and 9-11, there is strong evidence that supports an Iraq-al Queda relationship. There is *overwhelming* evidence that Iraq was involved with terror organizations. Citing the 9-11 commission's findings as conclusive evidence that no relationship existed between Iraq and al Queda is ridiculous and intended to deceive. Nice try.

 

Actually there isn't strong evidence to support an operational relationship between Iraq and Al-Qaeda.

I wasn't the one that brought up the 9/11 commission. I was responding to it. Secondly the 9/11 commission asked for evidence of a relationship, and this recent piece of debunked people with different names is what was supplied.

 

I love it when Bush supporters go apesh*t when Al Gore or anyone else points out the truth about the Bush Administration.

 

Exactly. Having "contacts" is FAR different from what the administration has been claiming. AQ had and has far more "contacts" with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan than they EVER had with Iraq, so if that is the burden, we should have invaded THEM.

 

USA has/had contacts with OBL and al Qaeda. USA openly aided them in their terrorist aka "freedom fighter" agenda.
USA has WMDs, which they publicize for the world to know.
USA harbored the 9/11 terrorists leading up to their attack. USA even trained them to fly plains!!!
GWB must decide that a regime change is necessary in the USA and declare war.

 

it's useful to be reminded gore wasn't always an angry, punitive, liberal:

http://www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/980217/1998021741.html

Clinton rallies domestic support for strike at Iraq
Iraq, International, 2/17/1998

Even while insisting that the US is exhausting diplomatic efforts to find a peaceful solution to the current Iraqi crisis, US President Bill Clinton spoke at the Pentagon in an effort to drum up domestic support for possible US military strikes against Iraq.

Clinton said the US stands in opposition to the "reckless acts of outlaw nations" and an "unholy axis" of terrorists, drug dealers, and organized crime. While the US would greatly prefer a diplomatic solution to the crisis, Clinton reiterated that the US is ready to use force.

"There can be no dilution" of "the essence" of the UN resolutions, which call for unfettered access, Clinton said. He said that a solution must meet a "clear, immutable, reasonable, simple standard," which is the "free, full, unfettered access" to disputed "presidential sites" in Iraq, access the US has repeatedly called for. "We seek to finish the job" of the UN weapons inspectors, Clinton said.

Clinton admitted that the potential military strikes, which have met with widespread international opposition, would not destroy Iraq's capacity to create weapons of mass destruction, they would, "seriously reduce his [Saddam Hussein's] capacity to threaten his neighbors." Clinton said the strikes would leave Saddam Hussein "worse off" than he is now.

US Vice-President Al Gore said the US is "working around the clock to pursue a possible diplomatic solution to the crisis," but warned "When it comes to protecting our vital national interests, Americans will stand as one."

Clinton said Iraq had repeatedly submitted evaluations of its weapons that were refused by UNSCOM, including six declarations on biological weapons and four on nuclear weapons. He said that when Iraqi reports of weapons capacities were disproven, the Iraqis simply amended the old reports in light of the new evidence. Clinton also said that UNSCOM was effective, although the Iraqis tried to place "debilitating conditions" on their work.

Iraq has called UNSCOM's impartiality and professionalism into question and has proposed an offer -- which the US rejected -- that special teams be formulated by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to inspect the presidential sites for a period of two months. The teams could include UNSCOM members.

"Force can never be the first answer, but sometimes it's the only answer," Clinton said.

 

We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country." - Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002

"Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power." - Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002

 

When has anyone here ever argued that the Clinton administration didn't believe that there were WMD in Iraq?

 

That strike was a good idea, and according to Kaye it helped wipe out Saddam's WMD's. One great thing about that strike is that it wasn't a full scale invasion that led to the loss of thousands of lives. Excellent job by both Gore and Clinton on this issue.

 

And even though Gore believed the that there were WMD's he was smart enough not to advocate an invasion while we were still fighting Al-Qaeda in their strong hold of Afghanistan. He was wise enough to believe that all options should be pursued prior to an invasion. War should only be a last resort. He was also smart enough to advocate regime change.

All sound policy, even with the misinformation.

 

Your man crush with Al Gore and his left leaning cohorts has distracted you from something called the TRUTH. The truth is that the demoncrats must be very desperate if the best they can come up with is to have Al Gore preaching principles about anything really...

Sorry if that came off as harsh, I am just pissed about the whole TMac/SF3 trade nonsense going on

 

I have no mancrush with Al Gore. I didn't vote for him in the last election, nor did I vote for Clinton before that.

You are right the TRUTH is what we are after, and that is what is missing from Bush's info on Iraq.

Where is the truth in:
The Iraq buying Yellow cake story?

The Aluminum tubes for nuke story

The Iraq is 6 months from a nuke story

The subsequent lies about where Bush got the 6 mo. from Iraq information story.

The Czech meeting between Atta and an Iraqi official

Rumsfeld talking about knowing exactly where the WMD's were and pointing them out on the map.

This most recent junk claiming that a man with a different name was the same man who met with hijackers in Malaysia.

Even if you don't believe that the Bush or his administration intentionally lied in any of that then we should at least be able to admit there is no TRUTH in any of those things. Al Gore so far hasn't been the one witholding the TRUTH.

 

Will Gore's little lies be big turnoff for voters?
By Aubrey Immelman
Times columnist

"Liar! Liar!" proclaimed the New York Post's front-page headline the day after Democratic nominee Al Gore's first presidential debate against Republican contender George W. Bush.

But careful scrutiny of Gore's penchant for hyperbole and his tendency to garnish the truth with self-serving affectations permits a more nuanced perspective: Gore's embellishments are driven by a confluence of conscientious and introverted personality patterns that constitutes a recipe for haplessness in retail presidential politics.

Conscientious personalities typically are people of integrity — virtuous, hardworking, and loyal to a fault. Yet, ironically, they are prone to bouts of self-doubt over perceived shortcomings or failure to live up to self-imposed, exacting standards of perfection.

As Gore ponders in his environmental treatise, "Earth in the Balance": "A developing child in a dysfunctional family searches his parent's face for signals that he is whole and all is right with the world; when he finds no such approval, he begins to feel that something is wrong inside. And because he doubts his worth and authenticity, he begins controlling his inner experience — smothering spontaneity, masking emotion, diverting creativity into robotic routine, and distracting an awareness of all he is missing with an unconvincing replica of what he might have been."

In short, the conscientious character dreads disapproval, with a corresponding tendency to overvalue aspects of themselves that signify perfectionism, moral rectitude, and diligence. Few things give them greater satisfaction than
showcasing their virtues and convincing others that they are right. Perhaps unfairly, but not surprisingly, others regard such conduct as self-righteous, moralistic, overbearing, and condescending.

For example ...

Political commentator Tony Snow provides a striking account of this proclivity in Gore. When forest fires ravaged Florida in the summer of 1998, President Clinton dispatched Vice President Gore to commiserate with the victims.

"After surveying the carnage," writes Snow, "Gore stepped to a podium, and informed the throng that the tragedy served as a powerful reminder of what global warming could do to the planet. ... His artless lecture on global warming wasn't an isolated incident. ... [Gore] constantly instructs others on lifestyles, manners and habits. Indeed, fresh from his Florida trip, he showed up on the Mall in Washington, armed with a meat thermometer and a spatula. ... 'Don't let avoidable food-borne illness endanger life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,' he said."

While Gore's overconscientiousness adequately accounts for his compulsive need to flaunt perfection and erudition, it fails to fully account for his political ineptitude and lack of social graces.

Enter the strong introversive streak that permeates and colors Gore's conscientiousness. Deeply introverted personalities frequently fail to respond
appropriately to social cues, which gives rise to interpersonal awkwardness and difficulty in social communication.

They are restricted in the ability to perceive emotional meaning or express feelings in social settings. Their social communications sometimes are convoluted, obscure, and abstruse.

Simplify, please

In "Gore: A Political Life," biographer Bob Zelnick relates a particularly fascinating instance of this tendency in Gore. This is how the vice president explained to the Washington Post his decision to enter divinity school upon his return from Vietnam:

"I think a lot of people who have faith in this day and age try to find ways to reconcile their faith with what initially appear to be challenges to that faith. ... The best known are Galileo, which displaced the Earth as the center of the universe; Darwin, which places us in the animal kingdom; Freud, which displaced consciousness as the sole process of thought; Einstein, which destroyed the concept of solidity and matter. And today the existence of massive starvation and the prospect of nuclear holocaust side by side with the whole idea of progress and civilization makes one question where we are going. But the answer is within ourselves."

A simple "I felt a calling to the ministry" would have done.

But as Timothy Noah has written in U.S. News & World Report, there is a facet of the mind of "Albert the Brainiac" that obfuscates messages by "weighing down simple ideas with pretentious, often scientific allusions."

Highly introverted personalities rarely are introspective; as personality expert Theodore Millon explains, "the satisfactions to be found in self-evaluations are minimal" for individuals with a diminished capacity to experience deep emotions.

According to Millon, these personalities are hampered by a tendency to overlook, scatter, and coalesce the varied elements of their experience. Consequently, they may fail to differentiate events and discern their discriminable and distinctive aspects.

If this is the case, perhaps Gore really did believe that he had traveled to Texas with FEMA director James Lee Witt, or that he was serving in Congress when the Strategic Petroleum Reserve was established.

Gore's problem, then, may be less "fuzzy math" than fuzzy memory about events and faulty perception of his personal role in events. With respect to presidential leadership and public policy, this raises questions not of character, but of reality testing and judgment.

For better or for worse, Al Gore is no Bill Clinton. For Gore, stretching the truth reflects a compulsive drive for perfection and deficits in social intelligence, not perfidious dishonesty or a flaw of moral character.

Nonetheless, it raises disquieting questions about his common sense and insight, his ability to relate to the public, the Congress, and world leaders, and his capacity to perform crucial duties constitutionally entrusted to the president.

Beyond simply being a matter of credibility, Gore's long track record of factual flourishes boils down to a question of leadership. No leader is perfect. But the challenge for voters in the next two weeks is to determine the meaning and leadership implications of the vice president's tendency to exaggerate, and to resolve the difficult question of how much embellishment they can tolerate in a president.

http://www.csbsju.edu/uspp/Election/gore102200.htm