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Bush, officials made 935 false statements on Iraq
by Obi-Akpere | January 23, 2008 at 12:14 pm | 640 views | 8 comments
A study by two nonprofit journalism organizations found that President Bush and top administration officials issued hundreds of false statements about the national security threat from Iraq in the two years following the 2001 terrorist attacks. The study concluded that the statements "were part of an orchestrated campaign that effectively galvanized public opinion and, in the process, led the nation to war under decidedly false pretenses."The study was posted Tuesday on the Web site of the Center for Public Integrity, which worked with the Fund for Independence in Journalism.
White House spokesman Scott Stanzel did not comment on the merits of the study Tuesday night but reiterated the administration's position that the world community viewed Iraq's leader, Saddam Hussein, as a threat.
"The actions taken in 2003 were based on the collective judgment of intelligence agencies around the world," Stanzel said.
The study counted 935 false statements in the two-year period. It found that in speeches, briefings, interviews and other venues, Bush and administration officials stated unequivocally on at least 532 occasions that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or was trying to produce or obtain them or had links to al-Qaida or both.
"It is now beyond dispute that Iraq did not possess any weapons of mass destruction or have meaningful ties to al-Qaida," according to Charles Lewis and Mark Reading-Smith of the Fund for Independence in Journalism staff members, writing an overview of the study. "In short, the Bush administration led the nation to war on the basis of erroneous information that it methodically propagated and that culminated in military action against Iraq on March 19, 2003."
Named in the study along with Bush were top officials of the administration during the period studied: Vice President Dick Cheney, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Colin Powell, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and White House press secretaries Ari Fleischer and Scott McClellan.
Bush led with 259 false statements, 231 about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and 28 about Iraq's links to al-Qaida, the study fo
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January 23, 2008 at 12:14 pm by Obi-Akpere, 640 views, 8 comments
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Comments (8)
at 12:19 on January 23rd, 2008
The Bush haters will have their fun with absurdities like this.
at 13:35 on January 23rd, 2008
Since the burden of proof was on Saddam, not on the U.S. or the U.N., the accuracy of the study is certainly in question.
"It is now beyond dispute that Iraq did not possess any weapons of mass destruction or have meaningful ties to al-Qaida."
That in and of itself is a lie. Both issues are still being disputed.
- reply
Alarmedat 14:36 on January 23rd, 2008
Obi-Akpere, I like this story. It's good stuff.
at 15:34 on January 23rd, 2008
It's unbelievable how blind americans are. Bush familiy's business is oil. Bush respect for life is null. I don't judge them though.. they watch all government managed media. They are not free, they live a dictatorship they can't recognize. Do you want a fact sheet? http://it.geocities.com/ronchetti_marco/Tizianoterzani-Lettersagainstthewar.pdf
at 17:48 on January 23rd, 2008
First, your country, Argentina, has a lower ranking in the Reporters Without Borders Index than does the United States. This index measures the amount of freedom journalists have in a certain country. If we're blind because our journalists are controlled doesn't that make you blind and deaf because your journalists have even less freedom? Just going by the facts.
Second, while it is true that the Bush family makes money off of oil it is also true that the Kennedys make a lot of money off of oil as well. Robert Kennedy Jr., the environmentalist Kennedy, gets monthly checks from the proceeds his family gets from their oil ownings. Does this mean we can also blame the Kennedys somehow? They "profited" just as much from the Iraq War as did the Bush family.
Lastly, that "fact sheet" isn't really a fact sheet, is it? It's a book written by a man who could not find a publisher in America so he published the book online.
I understand it is seductive to believe that people who disagree with you do so because they are being lied to or are just ignorant; unfortunately, that is usually not the case in America and other places where the press is free.
at 08:31 on January 24th, 2008
Hello BigT,
First, thanks for replying.
My english is not the best, but I will try to reply to you as accurately as I can.
About the RWB index. It's good to mention that fact doesn't make americans less blind, wich was what I've said. We can talk about my country as much as you want, and that wouldn't change anything.
A better reply would have been that the CNN informed about the massacres on Iraqis soldiers properly - although that's impossible because it didn't happen.
Ok, let's say the people of my country is less informed than americans. That doesn't mean we would ever support a war that fires against innocent people buying the 'terrorist threat' myth blindly; unless we wouldn't know what's actually happening there.
We can't be so unhuman to support an invasion like that one, labeling the thousands of dead civilians as 'collateral damage' and the hundreds of U.S. soldiers bodies 'war heroes'.
The Pentagon has refused to count Iraqi civilian casualties, and organizations trying to assess the number of Iraqi dead have said that the number may be unknowable. The Red Cross has stopped counting the wounded because the casualties were too high.
About the Bush family: profit from war? long lasting invassions that cost billions wich could be invested in Education or Health? (again, you can come against my country and that wouldn't change anything).
I just can't argue about this point.
About beeing ignorant. Clearly you didn't read the book, just mentioned what one can easily find surffing the Web or googling.
I want to be clear about something - It's not my intention to offend you, although my words may sound though. If I did, I apologize. I think that the best would be to do a research about the facts that matter to both of us and get something possitive from this accusation bombing :)
Saludos!
at 15:49 on January 23rd, 2008
Hello Obi-Akpere,
I'd like to have flagged your story, but there's no reporting there. I'd like to see you put a little of yourself into the reports you cut and paste here.
What do you think about the false statements?
What do you think about them being made available in document form?
Is the document productive to the people, or destructive?
Please add your own thoughts and comments with the great stories you bring to us. :) That's reporting.
I'll keep an eye on this story to see if it can be flagged later. ;)
~ Swan
at 19:59 on January 23rd, 2008
Bush haters want everyone to forget that the Clinton Administration formerly adopted a policy of regime change in Iraq. Practically every top offical in the Clinton Administration said Saddam had WMD, as did all the main intelligence agencies throughout the world. Bush's policy has proven enormously successful in defeating Al Qaeda and preventing the mass killing of any more innocent American civilians. You guys can keep trying to lie about Bush, and we will continue to set the record straight.
http://www.nowpublic.com/opinions/incredible-success-bush-doctrine