Oh boy, I was hoping to stay out of this discussion, but since Wirt chose to resurrect a posting from before the war, I guess I have to answer the conclusions he seems to draw from my post.  Lest anyone imagine that I was in favor of invading Iraq, let me now state unequivocally I was not.  My sarcasm was directed at a previous post from Wirt in which he stated that there were no WMDs in Iraq.  At that time, none of us knew what was in Iraq, and Wirt claiming to have certain knowledge of that question struck me as a case of letting his political leanings interfere with his objectivity.  The fact that subsequent events seem to have at least partially confirmed his beliefs does not diminish the fact that he was representing opinion as fact.

Was George Bush lying to the people?  Again, we are talking about opinion.  In MY opinion, the answer is both yes and no.  I believe he really thought there were active WMD programs in Iraq.  I do not believe, however, that those alleged weapons programs were ever his real reason for invading Iraq, as I clearly stated to Wirt in an offline conversation at the time. 

John Clogg 

-----Original Message-----
From: Wirt Atmar [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: April 30, 2004 1:26 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: OT: Iraq WMD


With a total lack of class, I will repeat below again what I wrote a month
before the invasion of Iraq was launched. I consider the last paragraph to be
especially worth reading carefully:

======================================

From: John Clogg ([log in to unmask])
Subject: Re: OT: A powerful argument for war with Iraq
Newsgroups: comp.sys.hp.mpe
Date: 2003-02-25 13:46:52 PST


Wirt wrote:
>he has no active WMD programs

Please, Wirt, hurry to the UN and share with them your intelligence reports!
Clearly the intelligence services of the western countries have been lying
to their employers!  It's up to you and your personal intelligence agency to
set them straight!
<snip>

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