I did a little search on the topics you listed this article...seems like I got a few hits from a few interesting sights the first four hits returned were from the following web sights:

http://www.commondreams.org
http://peaceandjustice.org
http://michaelmoore.com
http://www.airamericaradio.com

coincidence, I think not.

and now for a little counter ballance

"European Union vs. America

June 25, 2004

According to a recent report by two economists at Sweden’s Timbro Institute, the quality of life in Europe is pretty bad. France, Italy, Great Britain and Germany have lower per capita GDP than all but four of the states in the United States. In fact, if the European Union were a state in the United States, it would be among the poorest, on a par with Arkansas, Mississippi or West Virginia.

It is true that most Europeans work less than Americans. It is also true that they have less to show for it. The average house in Europe is about half the size of the average American home. In fact, the average European home is smaller than the homes of Americans who live in poverty.

Speaking of poverty, the percentage of poor people in the U.S. has diminished over the past several decades. For example in 1959, 22 percent of all Americans lived below the poverty line. Today, it’s 12 percent.

Conditions also have steadily improved for minorities. In 1959, 55 percent of African Americans lived in poverty. Today, it’s 24 percent. Not great, but better.

But what is poverty in America? The Swedish authors surveyed poor Americans to get a picture of how they live. They found that 45 percent of poor Americans own their own homes, 73 percent own a car, 97 percent own a color television, and more than half own two or more color TVs. Two out of three poor households in American have cable or satellite TV and one in four has a wide screen television. As the authors remarked, “It is better to be poor in a rich country than in a poor one.”

How does this compare to Europe? According to authors, at least 40 percent of all European households would be considered poverty-stricken in America.

So, what does this tell us? It tells us that despite all our problems, we’re on the right track. Conditions are better here than in most of the rest of the world, and they’re getting better for the poorest among us.

The study confirms that high taxes and burdensome regulations strangle initiative and economic growth. When that happens, it is the individual who suffers. Italy, France, Germany and Spain all have unemployment rates 50 percent to 100 percent higher than the U.S., and many of the jobs in those countries and other EU members are actually public-sector jobs that “produce” nothing.

Europeans may have an easier time at work, but shorter work hours, longer vacations and great benefits don’t matter if you don’t have a job."

http://www.awb.org/cgi-bin/...

The real truth behind these types of articles, is to give the impresion that America is going down the drain without a paddle. How can Democrats regain power, if the economy is good, the war goes well in iraq, or people decide not to take eveything the media and their witless pawns "spew" forth, and do a little investigating on their own?

I suggest http://usinfo.state.gov/pro...

and what happened to all the talk about outsourcing?
http://www.financialexpress...

It's clear that those who have issues with the current administration, those who lost their power and are losing more influence every year, are on a mission. Their mission, even though unemployment is down, even though our economy took a big hit on 9/11 and has rebounded remarkebly, even though more and more money is poured into education and social causes every year, is to paint a bleak and tragic picture as to the direction america is heading. Our children are stupid, could this have anything to do with the heavy LIBERAL teachers unions? Our grown ups are lazy, well, atleast they can pry their butts out of bed long enough to get to their cars, you ever notice the amount of people driving around at all hours of the day and most of the night? thats an awful lot of people that are going somewhere to do something, or perhaps they are just driving all day, if this was so they would be missing their soap operas to look at the bleak image of americas reality. It's simple the same strategy the LIBERALS and DEMOCRATS and The MEDIA have used over and over again, if something is pushed in your face long enough you're going to believe it, if enough people say the sky is green, eventualy people start seeing a green sky. Watch, over the next four years as the word from the left paints a darker and darker picture of America in an attempt to regain power, even if the cost is our own prosperity, sometimes you get what you wish for and by saying something for long enough even if it is based very little on reality, you can make that "reality" come true.

Mondo, again, you never cease to veer from the expected…

First, the citations given are all from compiled statistics and other sources that may have been aggregated by whoever and whenever. They're numbers that, while arn't 100% absolute, but still a hell of lot more objective than "chamber of commerce" puff pieces that mask serious issues and economic dysfunction.

Here are some other facts:

* Private employment is DOWN since President Bush took office. Jobs have been added, but government jobs (especially PR jobs that tout administrative goals) are on the rise, private industry jobs are going down. It's a fact, look it up.

* Science and engineering enrollments are way down, and a big reason is outsourcing that drives down wages for engineers and computer scientists. Outsourcing has driven down wages and nearly wrecked a career field for many Americans.

Instead, you prefer to paint another emotional argument, playing the "everybody wants a free lunch" card, and back your emotional rant with globalist propagandists, on the payroll of right wing think tanks.

Most importantly, you failed to address the points and what's being done to remedy the problems, other than a widescale effort to privatize everything. Because that's worked so well with healthcare, where we pay double per capita and rank behind 30+ other countries on a variety of measures, including life expectancy and infant mortality, where we even trail communist Cuba.

I knew that would cause a stir. *LOL* be careful when you stare into the abyss for the abyss aslo stares into you.

"So, what does this tell us? It tells us that despite all our problems, we’re on the right track. Conditions are better here than in most of the rest of the world, and they’re getting better for the poorest among us."

The problem with the whole "faith based" vs. "reality based" argument is that those who claim to be "reality"
based simply have "faith" that what they assume to be reality is reality. What we know about the world today
is very different from what we knew about the world, say 20 years ago. Scientific explanations are constantly
changing to conform to our "new" understandings of "reality" that surrounds us. It is funny that many accepted scinetific theories are not accepted by ALL scientist, though they may be considered fact if the majority of scientists come to the same conclusions. Such as the once scientific fact that the earth was the center of the universe and the sun rotated around the earth. Albert Einstein once said: "Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the universe." Never a truer word was said.

Here we list the 10 biggest cock-ups of all time. It is a highly subjective hall of shame. But it covers the full range of academic disciplines - showing that all academics are capable of making big mistakes. Sometimes they are unintentional, sometimes not.

The famous biologist, Stephen Jay Gould, has argued that scientists can delude themselves - so keen are they to uncover a new discovery. Sometimes blunders can be highly fortuitous - showed most dramatically by the discovery of penicillin from an exposed petri dish.

But they all show that even our brightest brains - even Einstein - can get it horribly wrong. "There is not the slightest indication that energy will ever be obtainable from the atom," the great scientist said just before the atomic age was born.

· Brain power: Scientists at the Institute for Animal Health in Edinburgh secured a £200,000 government grant to find out whether BSE has jumped the "species barrier" from cows into sheep. An inquiry is now under way after it was found that scientists had been mistakenly testing cattle brains instead of sheep brains for five years.

· Scientific Watergate: The US National Institutes of Health investigatory panel found the immunologist Thereza Imanishi-Kari had fabricated data in a 1986 research paper authored with the Nobel prize winner David Baltimore. The findings claimed in the paper promised a breakthrough for genetic modification of the immune system.

· Mein bumph: Oxbridge historian Hugh Trevor-Roper authenticated the Hitler Diaries, unveiled as an exclusive by the German-based Stern magazine. The diaries were later exposed as a hoax.

· Cold Fusion: In 1989 chemists Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischman, of the University of Utah, claimed to have solved the world's energy problems by discovering cold fusion. However, no-one has since been able to replicate their findings of nuclear fusion in heavy water.

· Hubble Space Telescope: Nasa scientists launched the Hubble telescope to create a lens 10 to 20 times more powerful than those based on earth. A gross design error in the main mirror was discovered immediately after launch in April 1990. Hundreds of millions of pounds were needed for the astronaut repair of the mirror.

· N-rays: A French physicist, René Blondlot, claimed to have discovered a new type of radiation, shortly after Roentgen had discovered X-rays. American physicist Robert Wood, however, revealed that N-rays were little more than a delusion. Wood removed the prism from the N-ray detection device, without which the machine couldn't work. Yet, Blondlot's assistant still claimed he found N-rays.

· Academic standards: Cyril Burt, the 1960s guru of British psychology, produced research into the intelligence of identical twins which, among other findings, led to the assertions that academic standards were falling. Years later the statistics were found to be "too perfect" and it was discovered the twins - and even the researcher alleged to have carried out the work - never existed.

· Piltdown man: In 1913 an ape's jaw with a canine tooth worn down like a human's was uncovered at a site near Piltdown. British paleoanthropologists came to accept the idea that the fossil remains belonged to a single creature who had a human cranium and an ape's jaw - offering the missing link between apes and humans in the evolutionary chain. In 1953, Piltdown 'man' was exposed as a forgery. The skull was modern and the teeth on the ape's jaw had been filed down.

· Alchemy: - Sir Isaac Newton - the scientist who single-handedly created the foundations of modern day physics had a little known obsession with alchemy, and was convinced for much of his life that he would be able to change base metals into gold. Such a discovery would have helped with his later job as master of the mint, but never materialised.

· Flat Earth: - even though Christopher Columbus gave flat earth theorists a reason to think twice, there are still flat earth societies where people propose (and prove) elaborate explanations for why the world actually is shaped like a pancake.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/b...

http://newton.physics.wwu.e...

http://www.copernican-serie...

http://www.parssky.net/memb...

Twenty percent of Americans think the sun orbits the earth. Seventeen percent believe the earth revolves around the sun once a day

WHEREVER HUMANS ARE INVOLVED MISTAKES WILL HAPPEN, YET WHERE GOD IS INVOLVED ALL THINGS SERVE HIS PURPOSE, THERE IS NO SECOND GUESSING THE LOVE OR GRACE GIVEN BY THE SUPREME CREATOR, WE ARE FLAWED AND REBELIOUSE, YET EVEN GOD SAW VALUE IN OUR SOMETIMES VILE SELVES TO GIVE US A WAY TO SALVATION.
WE ARE, BY OUR VERY NATURES, FLAWED AND IMPERFECT, ANYHTING THAT IS BORN OF MAN IS SUBJECT TO ERROR. HAVE FAITH IN MAN AND YOU WILL ALWAYS BE LET DOWN, BUT WITH GOD THERE IS PERFECTION AND COMPLETENESS.

How do we know anything historically? There is no "scientific" proof that Lincoln was the president. We cannot recreate him in a laboratory or bring him back to life. We cannot reproduce the experiment. We cannot calculate an equation that tells us that he was. But we can assert with a high degree of probability that Lincoln was indeed our president and was assassinated in 1865. We do this by appealing to historical evidence. Many people saw Lincoln. We have some of his writings and even his picture, not to mention his likeness on our pennies. But none of this "proves", in a scientific sense, that Lincoln ever lived or was the president.

The kind of evidence used in historical research is the same kind as that used in a court of law. In a courtroom case certain kinds of evidences are appealed to in order to determine what exactly happened, eyewitnesses are questioned, motives are examined, and physical evidence is scrutinized such as fingerprints or journal writings.

It is the same kind of evidence that we appeal to in order to establish Christ's life, death, and resurrection. Granted, the evidence is not as great as that for Lincoln, nor as recent. But it is better evidence than we have that Plato ever lived, or Homer, or many historical figures that we take for granted.

Often people are uncertain about the existence of Christ, but few scholars would disagree that a man named Jesus lived roughly between 2 BC and about 33 AD. History documents that this man was not a myth but a real person and the historical evidence for this is excellent. For instance, the Roman historian Tacitus, writing in about 115 A.D., records the events surrounding Emperor Nero in July of A.D. 64. After the fire that destroyed much of Rome, Nero was blamed for being responsible:

Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus [Christ], from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilate, and a most mischievous superstition [Christ's resurrection] thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their center and become popular.

In about 112 A.D. the Roman governor of what is now northern Turkey wrote to Emperor Trajan regarding the Christians in his district:

"I was never present at any trial of Christians; therefore I do not know what are the customary penalties or investigations, and what limits are observed. . . whether those who recant should be pardoned. . . whether the name itself, even if innocent of crime, should be punished, or only the crimes attaching to that name. . . . Meanwhile, this is the course that I have adopted in the case of those brought before me as Christians. I ask them if they are Christians. If they admit it I repeat the question a second and a third time, threatening capital punishment; if they persist I sentence them to death. For I do not doubt that, whatever kind of crime it may be to which they have confessed, their pertinacity and inflexible obstinacy should certainly be punished. . . the very fact of my dealing with the question led to a wider spread of the charge, and a great variety of cases were brought before me. An anonymous pamphlet was issued, containing many names. All who denied that they were or had been Christians I considered should be discharged, because they called upon the gods at my dictation and did reverence. . .and especially because they cursed Christ, a thing which it is said, genuine Christians cannot be induced to do." (Bettenson, p. 3)

These passages indicate that Christianity was wide spread in the Roman empire within 80 years of Christ's death. Again, these are eyewitness accounts, not historians looking back years later.

The popular historian Will Durant, himself not a Christian, wrote concerning Christ's historical validity, "The denial of that existence seems never to have occurred even to the bitterest gentile or Jewish opponents of nascent Christianity" (Durant, The Story of Civilization, vol. 3, p. 555). And again, "That a few simple men should in one generation have invented so powerful and appealing a personality, so lofty an ethic and so inspiring a vision of human brotherhood, would be a miracle far more incredible than any recorded in the Gospels" (Ibid., p. 557).

It is a substantial thing that an historian who spends his life considering historical facts should affirm the reality of Christ's existence as well as the rapid growth of the early movement.

The Jewish historian Josephus,writing for the Roman government in the 70's A.D. records some incidental things regarding Christ and the church. He confirms that John the Baptist died at the hand of Herod (this same incident is recorded in the gospels) as well as the death of, "The brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James. . . he delivered them to be stoned" (Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, Book XVIII, ch. V, p. 20; Book XX, ch. IX, p. 140 ). Again we have sources external to the Bible that demonstrate the historical reliability of the text. Josephus, who was probably alive during the time of Christ, is attesting to the reality of his existence. What this also tells us is that within 40 years of Christ's death, the knowledge of who he was was widespread enough that Josephus could reference him and expect his readers to know exactly who he was talking about.

Christians stake their entire faith on the resurrection of Christ because it is only through this event that forgiveness can come. The gospels and the historical evidence bear out this claim that Jesus rose from the dead. The question is what will you do with the evidence? It has been God's practice to give evidence to those who are willing to respond. Christ appeared to his disciples because they were willing to believe when given enough evidence. He will not give evidence to those who refuse to believe.

And after eight days again His disciples were inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors having been shut, and stood in their midst, and said, "Peace be with you." Then He said to Thomas, "Reach here your finger, and see My hands; and reach here your hand, and put it into my side; and be not unbelieving, but believing." Thomas answered and said to Him, "My Lord and my God!" (Jn 20:26-28)

Thomas was willing to accept the evidence he saw. The question is, how much evidence will it take for us. As Christ states in the very next verse, "Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed."

There is much more evidence for the truth of Christ's message than is presented here. This is only a brief sketch of some of the historical evidence. There is also the evidence of fulfilled prophecy from the Old Testament, as well as other kinds. The point is that the evidence exists. If the evidence is weak and unconvincing, then we can throw Christianity out and look elsewhere. But if it is true, the message of Jesus Christ applies to us. And we must be willing to submit to it, regardless of what it says about us.

God demands humility from us. If he is indeed our Maker, we cannot approach Him with an attitude that is arrogant and demanding. We must approach Him on His terms. Christ spelled out those terms: mankind is in rebellion toward God and in need of forgiveness. This is exactly what Christ came to offer. "Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life (Jn 5:24). And also, "I came that they might have life, and might have it abundantly" (Jn 10:10).

“I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well” (Psalm 139:14).

The human body is one of the most intricate pieces of machinery that science has ever seen, one that most of us take for granted most of the time–that is, until our heart begins to malfunction or something goes wrong. Then we realize the importance of our health. The human body is made up of some three trillion cells which reproduce themselves every seven years. We say that a person dies of heart failure, or cancer, or what have you. While that is true, it is technically untrue, for you begin dying from the moment you draw your first breath at birth. Eventually the process of reproduction in the cells begins to slow and culminates in an organ that refuses to function properly. In the case of cancer, the cells of the body refuse to relate normally, and thus death comes.

The Bible declares that man is fearfully and wonderfully made. But I wonder if the psalmist David realized how wonderful the human body actually is. Take, for instance, your human brain. There are a total of about 20 billion cells in the brain give or take a few. This tiny, three pound organ is far more complex than anything science has ever produced. Though it is often compared to a computer, scientists say the brain is much more versatile and complex than any computer ever invented.

If a laboratory tried to duplicate the brain at the low cost of five cents per cell, it would cost over a billion billion! Multiplied by the world’s population that is more money than all the governments of the world possess. And all of this is contained in the gray matter just under your hat, so do not be guilty of saying that if someone's brain were the equivalent size of a piece of dynamite, they could not blow their hat off on a windy day. Do not be sure.

The human heart and nervous system are no less complex.

Who is responsible for the intricacies of the human body? Is it chance, or God? The evidence says that man was not created by chance, but rather that the versatility and complexity of the human body demand a Creator. For almost thirty-five centuries the Bible has declared straightforwardly that man was created by the direct act of God. It further says that man is the highest of God's creation, endowed with a human soul that lives forever. It is this that accounts for man's spiritual sensitivity and desire to know and worship God.

It is interesting that anthropologists have never discovered a culture or group of people who have not had some concept of an eternal being, or God. True, their picture of God may have been vastly different from the God of the Bible, yet within the heart of man is the desire to worship a creator. Who put that instinct within man's breast? Eventually you must face the question was creation of God, or chance?

If one acknowledges the fact of God's existence, the next step is to discover how God has revealed Himself to man. That quest can only lead to a book and a person. The book is the world's best loved and solid textbook on living the Holy Bible. The person is the leading character in the drama of the Bible Jesus Christ. Chance never answers the question, "Who, what, why," but the Bible does. It gives you answers to the three greatest questions of life: Who am I? Where did I come from? And where do I go after I die? Read it and discover God's plan for your life.

“Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:32).

Can you really trust the press to give you the full story? “No!” says Barbara Reynolds, Inquiry editor of U.S.A. TODAY. This newspaperwoman says that the press consistently whitewashes stories and gives them a secular spin, leaving out references to spiritual topics. She charges that, repeatedly, references to prayer meetings, references to God and Jesus Christ in the speeches of world leaders and statesmen have deliberately been edited out by newspapers such as The LondonTimes, the New York Times, The Washington Post and Newsweek.

She writes, “Eastern European activists have a lot to tell us about how God rescues people from the depths of personal and political hell, but somehow, much of the press has decided the public has no right to know this.”

References to God, Jesus, the Christian Spirit, being “born again” and so forth are systematically eliminated from print as though there was an unspoken conspiracy not to acknowledge or print statements invoking the spiritual natures of people, by the major news services which feed newspapers and magazines. Question: Why the bias against Christianity when there is none against reporting smut or the moral failures of Christians?

Lyn Cryderman, news editor of Christianity Today, says, “Some journalists are biased against all matters of faith and, no doubt, the Christian faith. A lot of them don’t understand religion, so it becomes easier to ignore it.” William Adler, a spokesman for the New York Times, explained that editing is not a science, [quote] “just a matter of fitting the copy into the newshole.” So not quoting references to the part that God has played in the affairs of life and our world is simply due to the fact that there is not enough time or space to do the whole story. Right!

The untold story is the part that God plays in the affairs of humankind, often setting one government aside and raising up another which is just. Whether or not democracy should be the norm for every country isn’t the issue, but fair and just reporting should also acknowledge how faith in God has driven much of what has taken place since 1991, usually an unreported, unacknowledged segment of history.

When a secular press chooses to edit out references to God and Christianity, it should be no great surprise, as the world has never been a friend to grace. But let the secular press own up to the fact that they are biased, giving us only the news they chose to give us and slanting it in such a way that references to God and Christian faith often appear to be characteristic of weak, rather quaint individuals who have not yet fully joined the twenty first century.

The recent demonstrations in Kiev, Ukraine are typical. Almost totally absent from the secular press was the story of religious interest, the Bibles that were distributed, the thousands of people who met together and prayed together, who read religious literature, and who demonstrated peacefully, expectantly, and confidently that God would give direction to their country.

The real story behind the story is how God has answered the prayers of His people no matter where they are, who are tired of religious oppression and want to chart their own destiny under God, who want the right to chose their own form of government and their own leaders. Let us not forget it, either.

AM I A SOLDIER OF THE CROSS?
Isaac Watts

Am I a soldier of the cross,
A follower of the Lamb,
And shall I fear to own His cause,
Or blush to speak His Name?

Must I be carried to the skies
On flowery beds of ease,
While others fought to win the prize,
And sailed through bloody seas?

Are there no foes for me to face?
Must I not stem the flood?
Is this vile world a friend to grace,
To help me on to God?

Sure I must fight if I would reign;
Increase my courage, Lord.
I’ll bear the toil, endure the pain,
Supported by Thy Word.

Thy saints in all this glorious war
Shall conquer, though they die;
They see the triumph from afar,
By faith’s discerning eye

When that illustrious day shall rise,
And all Thy armies shine
In robes of victory through skies,
The glory shall be Thine.

“Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong.” 1 Corinthians 16:13

from neal boortz

THE TRUTH ABOUT THE IRAQI WMD

An interesting bit of truth is slowly leaking out into the mainstream media with little fanfare, and it's the news that Saddam Hussein's stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction may have been looted or moved from the country during the war. Remember...prior to to John Kerry's defeat last November, there were no weapons of mass destruction. Suddenly...we're finding out where they might have gone. How's that for media bias?

The first major news organization to suck it up is none other than the New York Times- http://www.nytimes.com/2005... . That leftist bird cage liner reported yesterday that when the U.S. invaded Iraq, Saddam not only possessed stockpiles of WMD, but it was moved to a neighboring state before Coalition forces could get there. For how many months have people been saying this? Looks like a nice plate of crow is going to be served to the Bush-bashing left.

The paper quoted Sami al-Araji, Iraq's deputy minister of industry as saying "It appeared that a highly organized operation had pinpointed specific plants in search of valuable equipment, some of which could be used for both military and civilian applications, and carted the machinery away." He also says it was a very sophisticated operation. So how much will we hear about this? Did the Russians help? Is this why Putin was so dead-set against the war?

The mainstream media reads, relies on and regurgitates much of what they read in the New York Times on a daily basis. Since this story will be perceived as being good for George Bush, expect it to be buried. But make no mistake: Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, possessed the capability to produce nuclear weapons and would have sold or used them.

Thank God he was stopped.

Mondo, you need to work on that *reading comprehension* deal. The cited article did not state that "Saddam possessed stockpiles of WMD" but that weapons facilities were looted (and on a much grander scale than had been previously reported) and that some of these in the exact words of the NYT article "looters systematically dismantled and removed tons of machinery from Saddam Hussein's most important weapons installations, including some with high-precision equipment capable of making parts for nuclear arms". That is NOT WMD, just speculation on missing items that MIGHT have conceivably been for constructing nuclear arms. But if you read on into the article, most of that stuff was from the 80s, not exactly cutting edge weaponry.

The bigger story is that this imbecile administration (a) justified an illegal/immoral invasion on a sovereign nation that threatened the U.S. not on the notion of pre-emption because of WMD but then (b) carelessly disregarded the weapons and munitions stations where such things may have existed. If the Bush administration truly thought there existed WMD, why weren't these facilities locked down ASAP instead of leaving the goods for the looters?

And you sink in my respect every post, this time singing the praises of Boortz, the blowhard who bloviates about how you don't have to read the news cause he's going to do your thinking for you. What a melding of small minds…

So I guess now were are going to break down our semantics of what WMD is. The left is great at it! What 'is" is. Mondo, even if they found yellow cake uranium (Saddam really WAS going after in spite of Joe Wilson's lies) they would still say that is not WMDs! As far as I am concerned if he had the capabilities of making them (like Bush has always said) then THANK GOD he was stopped! Besides I always thought the left stood by the "there was NEVER ANY WMDS at all, Bush just made it up to get all their oil" Now all of sudden low and behold they lightly whisper "well he did have the capabilities" uh ok..? But the left doesn't seem to care unless it is their own child, sister, husband, or a large quantity of trees that gets blown to smithereens.

And as for Rush saying he will do the thinking for you, it is a joke, when will the left get a sense of humor? I guess when you are always in crisis mode and wringing your hands there is no time for laughter.

"From Neal boortz"
Not my article not my words, but the words of fellow libertarian Neal Boortz, nationally syndicated radio talk show host.

Question, if there were stockpiles and they were moved, are you at all concerned with who moved them and where they went?

The "imbecile administration" has done allot more for America and the World than someone who cries about it ever will do, its easy to sit back and complain when your choices don't affect millions of lives, let's give you responsibility for our great nation and see how well you do. I dare to say that Bush is far more intelligent than you will give him credit for; he beat the pants off your genius Kerry!!!

"And you sink in my respect every post"
I do not care for respect of other people that is not any concern of mine at all; I am more concerned with truth.

"What a melding of small minds…"
One could say the same for LIBERALS like you.

I think more for myself than I ever did as a Liberal or Democrat, the MOB mind that they adhere to fits that description more, anyone can see that.

Again, neither of you addressed the fact that (a) the adminstration justified an immoral/illegal invasion of a sovereign nation that threatened (and did not initiate hostilities) on the basis of existence of WMD (which still has proven to be false) BUT THEN FAILED TO SECURE THE FACILITIES WHERE SUCH THINGS MAY HAVE EXISTED.

Good Lord. The hubris is thick here…

WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

http://www.frontpagemag.com...

"Jordan recently seized 20 tons of chemicals trucked in by confessed al-Qaeda members who brought the stuff in from Syria. The chemicals included VX, Sarin and 70 others. But the media seems curiously incurious about whether one could reasonably trace this stuff back to Iraq. Had the terrorists released a "toxic cloud," Jordanian officials say 80,000 would have died!"

"John Loftus: There's a lot of reason to think (the source of the chemicals) might be Iraq. We captured Iraqi members of al-Qaeda, who've been trained in Iraq, planned for the mission in Iraq, and now they're in Jordan with nerve gas. That's not the kind of thing you buy in a grocery store. You have to have obtained it from someplace."

"They're selling it to al-Qaeda is one supposition. We know the Sudanese government demanded that the Syrian government empty its warehouse in Khartoum where they've been hiding illegal missiles along with components of Weapons of Mass Destruction. But there's no doubt these guys confessed on Jordanian television that they received the training for this mission in Iraq. . . And from the description it appears this is the form of nerve gas known as VX. It's very rare, and very tough to manufacture . . . one of the most destructive chemical mass-production weapons that you can use. . . They wanted to build three clouds, a mile across, of toxic gas. A whole witch's brew of nasty chemicals that were going to go into this poison cloud, and this would have gone over shopping malls, hospitals . . . ."

same article:

"You said that the Russians told Saddam, "There is going to be an invasion. Get rid of your chemical and biological weapons."
Sure. It would only bring the United Nations down on their heads if they were shown to really have Weapons of Mass Destruction. It's not generally known, but the CIA has found 41 different material breaches where Saddam did have a weapons of mass destruction program of various types. It was completely illegal. But no one could find the stockpiles. And the liberal press seems to be focusing on that.
"

same article:

"It's embarrassing to the (press). They've staked their reputations that this stuff wasn't there. And now all of a sudden we have al Qaeda agents from Iraq showing up with Weapons of Mass Destruction."

http://www.newsmax.com/arch...

"According to a former top Bush administration official, Russian special forces teams moved weapons of mass destruction out of Iraq to Syria.

"I am absolutely sure that Russian Spetsnatz units moved WMD out of Iraq before the war," stated John Shaw, the former deputy undersecretary for international technology security."

"According to Shaw, Russian units hid Saddam's arsenal inside Syria and in Lebanon's Bekka valley.

"While in Iraq I uncovered detailed information that Spetsnatz units shredded records and moved all WMD and specified advanced munitions out of Iraq to Syria and Lebanon," stated Shaw during an exclusive interview."

""I received information from several sources naming the exact Russian units, what they took and where they took both WMD materials and conventional explosives. Moscow made a 2001 agreement with Saddam Hussein to clear up all Russian involvement in WMD systems in Iraq," stated Shaw."

"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line."
President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998
"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program."
President Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998.
"Iraq is a long way from [here], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face."
Madeline Albright, Feb 18, 1998.
"He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983."
Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb, 18,1998.
"[W]e urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs."
Letter to President Clinton, signed by Sens. Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, John Kerry, and others Oct. 9, 1998
"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process."
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998.
"Hussein has ... chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies."
Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999.
"There is no doubt that ... Saddam Hussein has reinvigorated his weapons programs. Reports indicate that biological, chemical and nuclear programs continue apace and may be back to pre-Gulf War status. In addition, Saddam continues to redefine delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of a licit missile program to develop longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies."
Letter to President Bush, Signed by Joe Lieberman (D-CT), John McCain (Rino-AZ) and others, Dec. 5, 2001
"We begin with the common belief that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and stability of the region. He has ignored the mandated of the United Nations and is building weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them."
Sen. Carl Levin (D, MI), Sept. 19, 2002.
"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.
"We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction."
Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002.
"The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capabilities. Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons..."
Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 2002.

"I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force-- if necessary-- to disarm Saddam Hussein because I b elieve that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security."
Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9, 2002.
"There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years ... We also should remember we have always underestimated the progress Saddam has made in development of weapons of mass destruction."
Sen. Jay Rockerfeller (D, WV), Oct 10, 2002.
"He has systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years, every significant UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and destroy his chemical and biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to do"
Rep. Henry Waxman (D, CA), Oct. 10, 2002.
"In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weap ons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members ... It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons."
Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), Oct 10, 2002.
"We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has, and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for the production and storage of weapons of mass destruction."
Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), Dec. 8, 2002.
"[W]ithout question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime ... He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation ... And now he is miscalculating America's response to his contin ued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction ... So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real ..."
Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Jan. 23. 2003.

from the bottom of my heart, and those democrats who knew saddam had weapons of mass destruction, but never did anything meaningful about them but make empty threats.
{8^P

something is thick around here.....or rather someone.

http://www.worldthreats.com...

"Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Robert Goldberg cited former U.N. weapons inspector Richard Spertzel, who stated that Moscow supplied Baghdad with fermentation equipment to produce biotoxins.

According to Spertzel, the Russians on the U.N. inspection team in Iraq were "paranoid" about his efforts to uncover smallpox production.

Goldberg noted that no country has "done more to rebuild" Saddam's chemical and biological weapons programs or "been more aggressive in helping hide the truth" than Russia."

"According to the book "Russian Military Power," published in 1982, "It is known that the Soviets maintain stocks of CW (chemical weapons) agents." The two primary Russian chemical weapons in the 1982 Soviet inventory were the nerve agent "VX" and "blistering agents - developments of mustard gas used so effectively in World War I.""

"Iraq did most of its WMD killing using Russian-made MiG and Sukhoi aircraft equipped with chemical sprayers. In addition, Saddam used French-made artillery and helicopters to dump gas on Iranian troops and Iraqi Kurds.

Iraq obtained Russian delivery systems and the same inventory of Russian-made chemical weapons at the same time. Iraqi SU-22 Fitter attack jets were armed with Warsaw Pact-designed bombs filled with chemical weapons. Iraq used these Russian jet fighters to drop chemical weapons on Iranian troops during the Iran-Iraq war.

Iraq tried to use these SU-22 jets during the 1991 Gulf War, but they were detected and destroyed on the ground before they could launch a deadly chemical attack.

Other Russian weapons found with chemical weapons include the FROG-7 missile, 122 mm rockets, 152 mm artillery and the M-1937 82 mm mortars. All the Iraqi artillery missiles, rockets, shells and mortar rounds filled with chemical weapons are of Russian design."

There were essentially five main reasons for the United States to use military force in Iraq:

1. to rid a sworn enemy of his WMD programs

2. to respond to the Iraqi dictator's funding and harboring of terrorists

3. to enforce the terms of a cease fire and 14 years of related UN resolutions

4. to prevent further human suffering and exhume the mass graves

5. to promote freedom and democracy in the Middle East

Iraqi WMDs

Highlights: thus far we have found
1. chemical and biological weapon systems plans and equipment

2. reference strains of biological weapons agents

3. new research on brucella and congo-crimean hemorrhagic fever, and continuing work on ricin and aflatoxin

4. a biological weapons lab

5. prohibited long-range missiles suitable for delivering WMDs

6. documents showing Saddam tried to obtain long-range ballistic missiles from North Korea

7. 10 or 12 sarin and mustard gas shells have been found in various locations in Iraq

8. gas centrifuge elements for enriching uranium, parts of a nuclear weapons program, buried in the back yard of Mahdi Obeidi, a nuclear scientist. Obeidi also gave up nuclear development documents and said there were other pieces of the puzzle hidden elsewhere.

9. a barrel of enriched uranium found near Mosul

10. Iraq was 3 years from a building a nuclear weapon, according to top nuclear scientists quoted by CNN

11. French, British and American intelligence that an Iraqi delegation approached Niger to purchase uranium. That contact was verified by former ambassador Joe Wilson, whose criticism of the administration is contradicted by the 9/11 commission report.

12. an Iraqi artillery shell filled with sarin gas, a drop of which will kill you

13. in October 2003, Kuwaiti security forces intercepted Iraqis attempting to smuggle $60 million worth of chemical weapons and biological warheads to an unnamed European country

14. on January 16, 2003, UN weapons inspectors discovered 11 rocket warheads designed to deliver chemical weapons in a bunker 75 miles south of Baghdad.

15. Chief Weapons Inspector David Kay reported "dozens of WMD-related program activities and significant amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the United Nations during the inspections that began in late 2002," including vials of live botulinum bacteria that were found hidden at the home of an Iraqi scientist. Botulinum is the single most poisonous substance known to mankind.

16. Kay's final report reveals Iraq's attempt to "revive its efforts to develop nuclear weapons in 2000 and 2001," and that "Baghdad was actively working to produce a biological weapon using the poison ricin."

17. Kay successor Charles Duelfer reported on March 30, 2004: "Iraq did have facilities suitable for the production of biological and chemical agents needed for weapons. It had plans to improve and expand and even build new facilities." Iraq was also working up to March 2003 to construct new facilities for the large-scale production of dual-use chemicals.

18. "the CIA has found 41 different material breaches where Saddam did have a weapons of mass destruction program" - former Justice Dept prosecutor John Loftus

19. "we know from some of the interrogations of former Iraqi officials that a lot of material went to Syria before the war, including some components of Saddam's WMD" - David Kay, who also told the Associated Press that satellites showed "a lot of traffic" from Iraq to Syria

20. a Syrian journalist who defected to Paris in January has named three sites in Syria where Iraqi WMDs are buried, based on contacts of his in Syrian Intelligence. Israeli intelligence has confirmed his account

21. An Iraqi scientist told American weapons experts that Iraq had secretly sent unconventional weapons and technology to Syria just before the war, according to the New York Times

22. Jordan recently seized 20 tons of chemicals trucked in by confessed al Qaeda members who brought the stuff in from Syria. The chemicals included VX, Sarin and 70 others

23. Following reports that Syria was secretly transporting WMD material to Sudan, Sudanese President Omar Bashir responded, ordering that Syria remove its Scud C and Scud D medium-range ballistic missiles as well as components for chemical weapons stored in warehouses in Khartoum. A U.S. official confirmed the Syrian missile shipments to Sudan but said the U.S. intelligence community has not determined that WMD systems were included

Terrorist ties

Highlights of ties to Al Qaida and terrorist activities known thus far:
1. papers found in Iraqi intelligence headquarters documented the beginnings of Saddam's relationship with al-Qaida. Iraq offered to pay all travel and hotel expenses for a top aide to Osama bin Laden visited Iraq in 1998, bearing a message from bin Laden. The aide stayed in Iraq for a week, after which Iraq intelligence officers sent a message back to bin Laden concerning "the future of our relationship."

2. According to Czech intelligence, 9/11 suspect Mohammed Atta met with Iraqi intelligence agents in Prague

3. In his address to the United Nations on February 5, 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell named Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi's presence in Iraq as evidence of a "sinister nexus between Iraq and the al Qaeda terrorist network." Zarqawi was in Iraq before the war began and is currently leading the terrorists efforts against coalition forces there.

4. in December 2003, US forces operating in the Sunni Triangle discovered an Iraqi weapons cache accompanied by Al Qaida literature and videotapes, according to CNN

5. in January 2004, a senior Al Qaida operative Hassan Ghul was captured, as was Husam al Yemeni, who is also a terrorist with ties to Al Qaida

6. Abu Nidal was a known terrorist who was harbored by Saddam Hussein and was responsible for the deaths of several American citizens. Iraq's coalition government claims it has uncovered documentary proof that Mohammed Atta was trained by Nidal in Baghdad, in the summer of 2001.

7. The Defense Department has a memo detailing over 50 contacts between senior officials in Iraq and Osama bin Laden's followers going back to the 1980s

8. There are U.S. satellite photos confirming the existence of a Boeing 707 fuselage in Salam Pak, Iraq, that was used as a hijacking classroom.

9. In February 2004, U.S. troops arrested seven militants believed linked to Al Qaeda in the Iraqi city of Baqouba.

10. Ramzi Yousef, an Iraqi, was the architect of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. He arrived in America on an Iraqi passport.

11. Abu Abbas, a known terrorist involved in a hijacking that resulted in the murder of an American, was found in Baghdad on April 14, 2003.

12. September 11 hijackers Nawaz al-Hamzi and Khalid al-Midhar met Iraqi VIP airport greeter Ahmad Hikmat Shakir in Malaysia, on January 5, 2000, where he is said to have escorted them to a 9/11 planning summit with other al Qaida members.

13. Khala Khadar al-Salahat was a top deputy to Abu Nidal and also a resident of Baghdad before he surrendered to US Marines in April 2003.

14. Iraqi diplomat Hisham al Hussein was in contact with leaders of Abu Sayyaf, a terrorist group allied with Al Qaida and responsible for the deaths of at least three US citizens, including U.S. soldier Mark Wayne Jackson.

15. Uday Hussein's newspaper, Babylon Daily, published a "List of honor" that included the following passage: "Abid Al-Karim Muhamed Aswod, intelligence officer responsible for the coordination of activities with the Osama bin Laden group at the Iraqi embassy in Pakistan." That document was discovered by Carter-appointed US federal appeals judge Gilbert S. Merritt.

16. Iraqi ambassador Farouk Hijazi admitted to meeting with senior al Qaeda leaders at Saddam's behest in 1994.

17. An Iraqi intelligence memo dated February 19, 1998, said the agency would pay "all the travel and hotel expenses inside Iraq to gain the knowledge of the message from bin Laden and to convey to his envoy an oral message from us to bin Laden, the Saudi opposition leader, about the future of our relationship with him, and to achieve a direct meeting with him."

18. U.S. District Court judge Harold Baer found Iraq partially responsible for the 9/11 attacks, a ruling that was upheld by the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals last October

I believe that adresses "the fact that (a) the adminstration justified an immoral/illegal invasion of a sovereign nation that threatened (and did not initiate hostilities) on the basis of existence of WMD (which still has proven to be false) BUT THEN FAILED TO SECURE THE FACILITIES WHERE SUCH THINGS MAY HAVE EXISTED."

"immoral/illegal invasion of a sovereign nation" = "to enforce the terms of a cease fire and 14 years of related UN resolutions"

"on the basis of existence of WMD (which still has proven to be false) BUT THEN FAILED TO SECURE THE FACILITIES WHERE SUCH THINGS MAY HAVE EXISTED"

in one statement you say they didnt exist and then that they may have, which is it?

Mondo, you continue to spam the comments here, but STILL have FAILED to address the questions posed.

My statement is not about me - it is a question on how idiotic could it be to (a) justify an invasion of a country that threatened the U.S. not on the basis of WMD (and that was the justification offered by Bush), but then (b) fail to secure the facilities where such weapons may have been existed.

And those closest to the story, meaning the weapons inspectors, natives NOT ON THE NEOCON PAYROLL, have all testified that there were no WMD and no imminent capacity to produce those.

And many of the items you posted were phony news sensationalist news plants. Bottom line, is even the administration backed off claims of WMD, preferring instead to let Kool-Aid drinkers like you spew false propaganda.

Good day sir, and please refrain from spamming the comments if you're just making the same point over and over.

"Bottom line, is even the administration backed off claims of WMD"

This is false, they stopped searching for the WMD's because it was revealed that the items had been moved. If you know something has been moved there is no longer a need to search for it. Some people have stated that Saddam wanted to mislead the world into believeing he had those weapons. This however is only speculation.

"And those closest to the story, meaning the weapons inspectors, natives NOT ON THE NEOCON PAYROLL, have all testified that there were no WMD and no imminent capacity to produce those"

.Chief Weapons Inspector David Kay reported "dozens of WMD-related program activities and significant amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the United Nations during the inspections that began in late 2002," including vials of live botulinum bacteria that were found hidden at the home of an Iraqi scientist. Botulinum is the single most poisonous substance known to mankind.

.Kay successor Charles Duelfer reported on March 30, 2004: "Iraq did have facilities suitable for the production of biological and chemical agents needed for weapons. It had plans to improve and expand and even build new facilities." Iraq was also working up to March 2003 to construct new facilities for the large-scale production of dual-use chemicals.

.Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Robert Goldberg cited former U.N. weapons inspector Richard Spertzel, who stated that Moscow supplied Baghdad with fermentation equipment to produce biotoxins.

http://www.foxnews.com/stor...

http://www.foxnews.com/stor...

http://www.worldthreats.com...

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WOR...

http://www.spacewar.com/200...

https://ssl.capwiz.com/usat...

http://www.cia.gov/cia/repo...

http://www.cia.gov/cia/repo...

http://www.iiss.org/news-mo...

http://www.newsmax.com/arch...

http://www.news24.com/News2...

http://www.fas.org/nuke/gui...

http://www.state.gov/www/re...

http://www.cabinetoffice.go...

as emeril would say:

BAM!

"{1:7} The fear of the LORD [is] the beginning of
knowledge: [but] fools despise wisdom and instruction.
{1:8} My son, hear the instruction of thy father, and forsake
not the law of thy mother: {1:9} For they [shall be] an
ornament of grace unto thy head, and chains about thy neck."

"He [is in] the way of life
that keepeth instruction: but he that refuseth reproof erreth.
{10:18} He that hideth hatred [with] lying lips, and he that
uttereth a slander, [is] a fool. {10:19} In the multitude of
words there wanteth not sin: but he that refraineth his lips
[is] wise. {10:20} The tongue of the just [is as] choice
silver: the heart of the wicked [is] little worth. {10:21} The
lips of the righteous feed many: but fools die for want of
wisdom. {10:22} The blessing of the LORD, it maketh rich,
and he addeth no sorrow with it."

"None
calleth for justice, nor [any] pleadeth for truth: they trust in
vanity, and speak lies; they conceive mischief, and bring
forth iniquity."

Mondo, sarin gas is not WMD, it's WWI era technology, dangerous on the battlefield (though just as deadly to both sides).

Again, you need to dust off the library card and do some reading, and stop regurgitating the propaganda masters and PR flacks.

"sarin gas is not WMD"?????

are you serious?????

http://cfrterrorism.org/wea...

"What is sarin?
One of the world’s most dangerous chemical warfare agents. Sarin is an extremely toxic substance that disrupts the nervous system, overstimulating muscles and vital organs. It can be inhaled as a gas or absorbed through the skin. In high doses, sarin suffocates its victims by paralyzing the muscles around their lungs. One hundred milligrams of sarin—about one drop—can kill the average person in a few minutes if he or she’s not given an antidote. Experts say sarin is more than 500 times as toxic as cyanide. "

"Did Iraq ever use sarin?
Yes. Iraq began producing sarin in 1984 and admitted to possessing 790 tons of it in 1995. Saddam Hussein used sarin on the Kurds in northern Iraq during a 1987-88 campaign known as the Anfal. The worst attack occurred in March 1988 in the Kurdish village of Halabja; a combination of chemical agents including sarin, mustard gas, and possibly VX killed as many as 5,000 people and left 65,000 others facing severe skin and respiratory diseases, abnormal rates of cancer and birth defects, and a devastated environment. Experts say Saddam Hussein also launched about 280 smaller-scale chemical attacks against the Kurds."

http://english.aljazeera.ne...

Just how many people have to be killed by something before you consider it MASS destruction? The atomic bomb is a World War II era weapon (not much as old as WWI but in the grand scheme just as ancient), would you consider it a WMD?

you need to check out the cdc's info page
http://www.bt.cdc.gov/agent...

which clearly states "Sarin is a human-made chemical warfare agent classified as a nerve agent."

see also:

http://www.hazmatforhealthc... "B-NICE is the acronym used for identifying five categories of terrorist weapons of mass destruction: 1. Biological 2. Nuclear 3.Incendiary 4.Chemical 5.Explosives"

by this official definition even explosives are considered WMDs, I wonder if there are any explosives in IRAQ? A stick of TNT in the right hands in the right place can be used for MASS destruction!

It seems someones "reality" is not really reality.

"dangerous on the battlefield (though just as deadly to both sides)." as if any battlefield weapon can be programmed only to hurt one side and spare another, funny thing is ALL weapons are equally as dangerous to both sides conventional or not, thus the number of friendly fire accidents.

http://www.foxnews.com/stor...

"Sarin, Mustard Gas Discovered Separately in Iraq"

http://www.foxnews.com/stor...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id...

http://www.washingtonpost.c...
"July 01, 2004
More Chemical Weapons Found in Iraq
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, appearing on the Roger Hedgecock radio program yesterday, made the following statement:

Right now you have the Iraqi Survey Group, which is a multinational group that’s out there reviewing documentation and looking at suspect WMD sites. I was with the Polish minister of defense this weekend in Istanbul, Turkey at the NATO Summit. And in the course of that, he pointed out that his troops in Iraq had recently come across – I’ve forgotten the number, but something like 16 or 17 – warheads that contained sarin and mustard gas."

"A couple of weeks ago, Charles Duelfer, the head of the ISG, said that between 10 and 12 Sarin and Mustard Gas shells had been found."

"April 26, 2004

Sudan has ordered the removal of Syrian missiles and weapons of mass destruction out of the African country.

Arab diplomatic and Sudanese government sources said the regime of Sudanese President Omar Bashir has ordered that Syria remove its Scud C and Scud D medium-range ballistic missiles as well as components for chemical weapons stored in warehouses in Khartoum. The sources said the Sudanese demand was issued after the Defense Ministry and Interior Ministry confirmed a report published earlier this month that Syria has been secretly flying Scud-class missiles and WMD components to Khartoum."

Wonder where Syria acquired those Scuds and "WMD components"???? Hmmmmmmmmmmm?

http://www.cnn.com/2003/WOR...

"KARBALA, Iraq (CNN) -- U.S. troops have found 11 mobile laboratories buried south of Baghdad that are capable of biological and chemical uses, a U.S. general said Monday. "

http://www.cnn.com/2003/WOR...

"BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- As U.N. weapons inspections in Iraq entered a new level Thursday, one team discovered empty chemical warheads and international officials began talking tougher about Iraq's responsibility to be more forthcoming about its disarmament efforts in order to avoid a possible military confrontation. "

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publ...
"4.Some WMD personnel crossed borders in the pre/trans conflict period and may have taken evidence and even weapons-related materials with them;
5. Any actual WMD weapons or material is likely to be small in relation to the total conventional armaments footprint and difficult to near impossible to identify with normal search procedures. It is important to keep in mind that even the bulkiest materials we are searching for, in the quantities we would expect to find, can be concealed in spaces not much larger than a two car garage;"

"Despite evidence of Saddam's continued ambition to acquire nuclear weapons, to date we have not uncovered evidence that Iraq undertook significant post-1998 steps to actually build nuclear weapons or produce fissile material. However, Iraq did take steps to preserve some technological capability from the pre-1991 nuclear weapons program.

-According to documents and testimony of Iraqi scientists, some of the key technical groups from the pre-1991 nuclear weapons program remained largely intact, performing work on nuclear-relevant dual-use technologies within the Military Industrial Commission (MIC). Some scientists from the pre-1991 nuclear weapons program have told ISG that they believed that these working groups were preserved in order to allow a reconstitution of the nuclear weapons program, but none of the scientists could produce official orders or plans to support their belief.
-In some cases, these groups performed work which could help preserve the science base and core skills that would be needed for any future fissile material production or nuclear weapons development.
-Several scientists - at the direction of senior Iraqi government officials - preserved documents and equipment from their pre-1991 nuclear weapon-related research and did not reveal this to the UN/IAEA. One Iraqi scientist recently stated in an interview with ISG that it was a "common understanding" among the scientists that material was being preserved for reconstitution of nuclear weapons-related work. "

"The ISG has also identified a large volume of material and testimony by cooperating Iraq officials on Iraq's effort to illicitly procure parts and foreign assistance for its missile program. These include:

-Significant level of assistance from a foreign company and its network of affiliates in supplying and supporting the development of production capabilities for solid rocket propellant and dual-use chemicals.
-Entities from another foreign country were involved in supplying guidance and control systems for use in the Al-Fat'h (Ababil-100). The contract was incomplete by the time of OIF due to technical problems with the few systems delivered and a financial dispute.
-A group of foreign experts operating in a private capacity were helping to develop Iraq's liquid propellant ballistic missile RDT&E and production infrastructure. They worked in Baghdad for about three months in late 1998 and subsequently continued work on the project from abroad. An actual contract valued at $10 million for machinery and equipment was signed in June 2001, initially for 18 months, but later extended. This cooperation continued right up until the war.
-A different group of foreign experts traveled to Iraq in 1999 to conduct a technical review that resulted in what became the Al Samoud 2 design, and a contract was signed in 2001 for the provision of rigs, fixtures and control equipment for the redesigned missile.
-Detainees and cooperative sources have described the role of a foreign expert in negotiations on the development of Iraq's liquid and solid propellant production infrastructure. This could have had applications in existing and planned longer range systems, although it is reported that nothing had actually been implemented before OIF."

http://www.torontosun.com/C...

Chemical weapons, which are not WMD, are blistering, choking, or toxic agents. Mustard gas possessed by Iraq, Libya, Syria, Egypt and other nations is World War I technology. Horrible as they are, these are strictly battlefield weapons, requiring large, clumsy holding tanks, and depend on favourable winds. Winston Churchill authorized using poison gas against "primitive tribesmen" - Kurds in Iraq and Afghans - when he was British home secretary. Benito Mussolini's Italy used mustard gas in Ethiopia and Libya.

Choking gas, like chlorine, is also a tactical battlefield agent. French troops without gas masks defending a 4-km front at Verdun in 1916 were hit by 60,000 chlorine gas shells, yet held their lines. So did Canadian troops in Flanders, also without masks, who heroically fought off superior German forces.

World War II vintage

Nerve gases, like Sarin and VX, are World War II vintage. Though deadly, they, too, are tactical agents designed for area denial and neutralizing high value targets. Using nerve gas requires specialized vehicles or aircraft with highly complex dispensing systems. Gas is dependent on temperature, humidity and wind. The Soviets tried various nerve agents in Afghanistan, but found them ineffective and dangerous to their own troops.

Nerve agents would be extremely lethal if released by terrorists in a large building, mall or airport but, again, they are weapons of localized destruction, not mass destruction. In 1995, a Japanese cult released nerve gas in Tokyo's subway, killing 12 people.

Nerve gas was not used during WW II because of its unreliability and lack of wide area lethality. Many gases are unstable and have limited shelf lives. Iraq and Iran used poison gas during the 1980-88 Gulf War - killing or maiming many soldiers but achieving no strategic breakthroughs.

OOOOOOOOOOOO THE TORONTO SUN GREAT SOURCE OF UNBIASED INFO THERE! SURE TRUMPS MY CDC CIA CNN FOXNEWS MSNBC HAZMATFORHEALTHCARE ALJAZERA FAS WORLDTHREATS STATE DEPARTMENT CABANETOFFICE USATODAY, ALL KNOWN CONSERVATIVE/REPUBLICAN BIASED SOURCES....GREAT JOB, CONVINCED ME.

AGAIN FROM THE CDC "CENTER FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION"

"B-NICE is the acronym used for identifying five categories of terrorist weapons of mass destruction: 1. Biological 2. Nuclear 3.Incendiary 4.Chemical 5.Explosives"

NOTE THE PHRASE "categories of terrorist weapons of mass destruction" IN THE HANDS OF TERRORISTS SARIN IS A WMD, ON 9/11 4 COMMERCIAL JETS FILLED WITH AMERICANS AND FUEL BECAME WMDS, IN THE HANDS OF TERRORISTS THESE ARE WMDS.

THANK GOD WE HAVE LEADERS IN PLACE NOW WHO KNOW WHAT KIND OF THREAT WE FACE AND HAVE THE GUTS TO DEAL WITH THAT THREAT RATHER THAN TREAT IT AS A LAW ENFORCEMENT ISSUE AND ARGUE OVER THE DEFINITION OF "WMDS" AND FOR THAT MATTER WHAT "IS" IS.

ALSO FROM THE CDC
http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/tf...

"What are nerve agents GA, GB, GD, and VX?
Nerve agents GA (tabun), GB (sarin), GD (soman), and VX are manufactured compounds. The G-type agents are clear, colorless, tasteless liquids miscible in water and most organic solvents. GB is odorless and is the most volatile nerve agent. GA has a slightly fruity odor, and GD has a slight camphor-like odor. VX is a clear, amber-colored odorless, oily liquid. It is miscible with water and dissolves in all solvents. VX is the least volatile nerve agent.

Most of the nerve agents were originally produced in a search for insecticides, but because of their toxicity, they were evaluated for military use. Nerve agents have been used in wars and by terrorists. They are known to be stored by several nations, including the United States."

AND FROM YOUR OWN TORONTO ARTICLE

"Three types of unconventional arms are called WMD: nuclear, chemical and biological."

CDC

"Sarin is a human-made chemical warfare agent classified as a nerve agent."

TALK ABOUT SEMANTICS AND MINUTIA

and today despite the Terrorists and their Liberal allies wishes otherwise (I say this because both groups want IRAQ to be a failure), Iraq moves forward to becoming a free and democratic nation:

"BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq's first freely elected parliament in half a century began its opening session Wednesday after a series of explosions targeted the gathering. The opening marked a major milestone on the road to a new Iraqi government after the fall of Saddam Hussein.

The parliament's 275 members, elected during Jan. 30 elections, convened in an auditorium amid tight security in the heavily guarded Green Zone with U.S. helicopter gunships hovering overhead.

Minutes before the assembly convened, more than half a dozen explosions detonated near where lawmakers gathered. The assembly area was not evacuated and it did not appear to have been struck.

The meeting began with a reading of verses from the Quran. Speeches from members of the interim government and political party leaders were to be followed with a swearing-in ceremony for parliament members.

To prevent suicide car bomb attacks against Iraq's new lawmakers, authorities stepped up security around the heavily fortified Green Zone. Two bridges leading to the zone were shut down Tuesday, and roadblocks were erected on other streets leading to the area."

May GOD be with those brave Iraqis.

"{2:1} I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications,
prayers, intercessions, [and] giving of thanks, be made for
all men; {2:2} For kings, and [for] all that are in authority;
that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness
and honesty. {2:3} For this [is] good and acceptable in the
sight of God our Saviour; {2:4} Who will have all men to
be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth."

I'll say no more than (a) sarin gas is not considered to be WMD by any objective viewing including the Bush adminstration that has even admitted there were no WMD and that, instead, chosen to reframe the illegal/immoral invasion of a sovereign nation that threatened the U.S. not with a Stalin-esque "liberation" theme.

If you'd like to read what IRAQIS think (and not those expatriates on the neocon payroll), here's some reading:

http://riverbendblog.blogsp...

Of course, I'm betting that instead of enlightening yourself, you prefer to keep ingesting the Kool-Aid.

"enlightening yourself"

MY FRIEND, IT IS A FOOL WHO INGESTS VENOM AND HOPES TO BE MADE WHOLE, UNTIL ONE DRINKS OF THE HEALING WATERS OF TRUTH THEY SHALL NEVER TRULY BE FULFILLED. DWELL IN DARKNESS AS YOU WISH, YOU HAVE SHOWN YOUR TRUE SELF, NO MATTER HOW YOU SAY OTHERWISE, YOU ARE FAR FROM ENLIGHTENING OR ENLIGHTENED.
VERY NICE LIBERAL WEB PAGE THERE, HERE'S ANOTHER LIBERAL WEB PAGE THAT MAY BE "ENLIGHTENING" TO SOME OF THOSE HEAVY BURDENED LIBERALS OUT THERE.

http://www.masturbateforpea...

HERE READ THIS "ENLIGHTEN" THYSELF:

http://www.opinionjournal.c...

"Well, finally we have some evidence of where the truth may lie. Working with Zogby International survey researchers, The American Enterprise magazine has conducted the first scientific poll of the Iraqi public. Given the state of the country, this was not easy. Security problems delayed our intrepid fieldworkers several times. We labored at careful translations, regional samplings and survey methods to make sure our results would accurately reflect the views of Iraq's multifarious, long-suffering people. We consulted Eastern European pollsters about the best way to elicit honest answers from those conditioned to repress their true sentiments."

"• Iraqis are optimistic. Seven out of 10 say they expect their country and their personal lives will be better five years from now. On both fronts, 32% say things will become much better.
• The toughest part of reconstructing their nation, Iraqis say by 3 to 1, will be politics, not economics. They are nervous about democracy. Asked which is closer to their own view--"Democracy can work well in Iraq," or "Democracy is a Western way of doing things"--five out of 10 said democracy is Western and won't work in Iraq. One in 10 wasn't sure. And four out of 10 said democracy can work in Iraq. There were interesting divergences. Sunnis were negative on democracy by more than 2 to 1; but, critically, the majority Shiites were as likely to say democracy would work for Iraqis as not. People age 18-29 are much more rosy about democracy than other Iraqis, and women are significantly more positive than men.

• Asked to name one country they would most like Iraq to model its new government on from five possibilities--neighboring, Baathist Syria; neighbor and Islamic monarchy Saudi Arabia; neighbor and Islamist republic Iran; Arab lodestar Egypt; or the U.S.--the most popular model by far was the U.S. The U.S. was preferred as a model by 37% of Iraqis selecting from those five--more than Syria, Iran and Egypt put together. Saudi Arabia was in second place at 28%. Again, there were important demographic splits. Younger adults are especially favorable toward the U.S., and Shiites are more admiring than Sunnis. Interestingly, Iraqi Shiites, coreligionists with Iranians, do not admire Iran's Islamist government; the U.S. is six times as popular with them as a model for governance.

• Our interviewers inquired whether Iraq should have an Islamic government, or instead let all people practice their own religion. Only 33% want an Islamic government; a solid 60% say no. A vital detail: Shiites (whom Western reporters frequently portray as self-flagellating maniacs) are least receptive to the idea of an Islamic government, saying no by 66% to 27%. It is only among the minority Sunnis that there is interest in a religious state, and they are split evenly on the question.

• Perhaps the strongest indication that an Islamic government won't be part of Iraq's future: The nation is thoroughly secularized. We asked how often our respondents had attended the Friday prayer over the previous month. Fully 43% said "never." It's time to scratch "Khomeini II" from the list of morbid fears.

• You can also cross out "Osama II": 57% of Iraqis with an opinion have an unfavorable view of Osama bin Laden, with 41% of those saying it is a very unfavorable view. (Women are especially down on him.) Except in the Sunni triangle (where the limited support that exists for bin Laden is heavily concentrated), negative views of the al Qaeda supremo are actually quite lopsided in all parts of the country. And those opinions were collected before Iraqi police announced it was al Qaeda members who killed worshipers with a truck bomb in Najaf.

• And you can write off the possibility of a Baath revival. We asked "Should Baath Party leaders who committed crimes in the past be punished, or should past actions be put behind us?" A thoroughly unforgiving Iraqi public stated by 74% to 18% that Saddam's henchmen should be punished."

ACTUAL POLL RESULTS:
http://www.taemag.com/issue...

AND FOR AN INSIDE LOOK AT ISLAMIC IRAQIS OPINIONS:
http://www.islamonline.net/...

THIS GUY IS A SUNNI SO WE UNDERSTAND THAT HE IS ANTI-AMERICAN, YET EVEN HE SAYS THAT IRAQ IS HEADED IN A POSITIVE DIRECTION, DESPITE HIS ANTI-AMERICAN VIEW.

It is what "is" is all over again. See now the liberals have been bitching, for what two years, about how "Bush Lied" and all that BS, and now they will start with the," _________ (fill in the blank0 is not a WMD defense!" They always change the terms when faced with the truth! That is so friggin typical! LAMO!

yup, the old Move the goal posts play! Its funny when the blind try to tell you what color the sky is. I FEEL VERY ENLIGHTENED.

WE ALL KNOW that sarin is a deadly chemical/biological weapon and that's not the only type of WMD found in IRAQ, WE ALL KNOW the world is better off without Saddam and his thugs. WE ALL KNOW that the democrats WHINED for years about how dangerous the IRAQ threat was. WE ALL KNOW that Iraq is on the road to a better future(much to the chagrin of the Radical Islamic JIHAD movements, the Liberal Bush-Haters, The Democratic party, France, Germany, Russia, and the U.N., ALL OF WHOM PROFITED IN ONE WAY OR ANOTHER FROM SADDAM STAYING IN POWER.

Saddam's $2m offer to WMD inspector:

http://www.news.telegraph.c...

Evidence of WMD plotting found in Iraq:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/...
03/08/01/ixportaltop.html
http://cranialcavity.net/wo...

"According to a former top Bush administration official, Russian special forces teams moved weapons of mass destruction out of Iraq to Syria. “I am absolutely sure that Russian Spetsnatz units moved WMDs out of Iraq before the war,” stated John Shaw, the former deputy undersecretary for international technology security. According to Shaw, Russian units hid Saddam’s arsenal inside Syria and in Lebanon’s Bekka valley [GP Editor: Bekka Valley is located near the Syrian border and that’s the location where the Syrian troops will be re-deploying to following their withdrawal from most of Lebanon].

“While in Iraq I uncovered detailed information that Spetsnatz units shredded records and moved all WMD and specified advanced munitions out of Iraq to Syria and Lebanon,” stated Shaw during an exclusive interview. “I received information from several sources naming the exact Russian units, what they took and where they took both WMD materials and conventional explosives. Moscow made a 2001 agreement with Saddam Hussein to clear up all Russian involvement in WMD systems in Iraq,” stated Shaw."

http://www.globalpolitician...

"Russia May Have Helped Move Iraqi WMDs"

HERE'S AN INTERESTING STORY:

http://www.townhall.com/col...

"Liberals -- wrong, wrong and wrong again
Larry Elder
March 17, 2005

Thirty-five percent of Americans, according to a 2004 Pew Research survey, call themselves conservative, while only 22 percent call themselves liberal (43 percent call themselves moderate) -- a 3 percent increase in conservatives since 1992. There is a reason for this -- liberals keep getting it wrong"

"The war in Iraq: "Week after week after week after week," said Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., in October 2003, "we were told lie after lie after lie after lie." Kennedy called Iraq a "quagmire," predicting it will turn into "Bush's Vietnam." Now what?

Eight million Iraqis voted in their election over seven weeks ago. Protesters in Lebanon demanded the withdrawal of Syrian troops and agents. Egypt committed to, and Saudi Arabia conducted, elections, however flawed. Elections in the Palestinian territories produced a new leader who -- at least for now -- speaks of a peaceful two-state solution. So what does Sen. Kennedy say now?

"This Week's" George Stephanopoulos asked Kennedy whether President Bush deserves credit for democratic developments in the Middle East. Kennedy replied, "Absolutely, absolutely, and I think . . . what's taken place in a number of those countries is enormously constructive. It's a reflection the president has been involved." Well, well. Oh, sure, Kennedy talked about the number of Americans killed every day in Iraq, and that we need to figure out a way of withdrawing U.S. troops, but nothing about "quagmire.""

"Ronald Reagan's tax cuts: Critics claimed the Reagan tax cuts would stunt economic growth, while triggering inflation and higher interest rates. Inflation fell from 12.5 percent in 1980 to 3.9 percent in 1984, interest rates declined, and economic growth went from minus 0.2 percent in 1980 to plus 7.3 percent in 1984."
"Race-based preferences:"
"Strategic Defense Initiative:"
"Welfare reform:"
"Charity:"
"Minimum wage: "

"Of the major domestic and national security issues of the last several decades, liberals consistently got it wrong, wrong and wrong again!"