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[Culise]

So, did anyone else here watch Colin Powell's presentation to the UN before the Iraq invasion back when it happened? As a clueless American, that presentation was very impressive. I didn't know anything about what Powell was talking about, of course. He sounded quite certain of the truth of what he was saying, although the UN was unmoved. I think a lot of us were angry that they were refusing to see the obvious intel but in restrospect, it was more that we weren't seeing clearly ourselves - we were still outraged over 9/11, and we were told that Saddam was sponsoring Al Qaida terrorists and developing WMD, and we had appeared to have completely routed the Taliban, so it's no surprise most of America was in favor of invading at the time. Colin Powell seemed like a good, honest, trustworthy person, right up until the Bush Administration stopped talking about WMD and started retroactively changing why we invaded. (And when they found degraded chemical weapons from before the Gulf War, hid it until they were out of office and couldn't anymore)

At some point post-invasion, during the insurgency, I read H. Norman Schwartzkopf's autobiography, where he predicted what would have happened if we had invaded and knocked off Saddam during the first Gulf War. His prediction was remarkably similar to what was happening then with the insurgency. It made me wonder why Rumsfeld was so certain of success, especially when this prediction was over a decade old and so accurate. Surely he had people who could have seen the same thing coming?

One wonders, given how debated the issue was in the 90s.  The odd thing is that the list of people who bought Schwartzkopf's theory includes a Bush as well: George Herbert Walker, AKA Dear Daddy.  Though it faded in the public eye in comparison to the tax hikes that ultimately cost him the election, there was criticism of Bush at the time that he should have gone in and kicked the whole edifice over, rather than abandoning the Kurds and Shia to their fates).  One wonders if part of Dubya's hang-up was to one-up the old man, and one of the jokes I heard around half a year after the invasion, just as the situation was really becoming clear, was that it was going to make for a very awkward Thanksgiving dinner in the White House. 

((The really odd thing is that this list of people who warned against an Iraq occupation apparently also includes Bush Senior's Secretary of Defense, who in 1992 said that they made the right decision "not getting bogged down in the problems of trying to take over and govern Iraq."  In fact, he also served on Bush Junior's administration...as Vice President.  Heavens know what turned Dick Cheney from the voice of moderation into one of the foremost warhawks behind Junior's adventure.))

[Shadowlord]

I thought the state department email system was supposed to be secure? But yeah, the republicans just keep endlessly trying to nail her on something when they aren't succeeding.

The unclassified one isn't even remotely. http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/10/politics/state-department-hack-worst-ever/index.html

((The really odd thing is that this list of people who warned against an Iraq occupation apparently also includes Bush Senior's Secretary of Defense, who in 1992 said that they made the right decision "not getting bogged down in the problems of trying to take over and govern Iraq."  In fact, he also served on Bush Junior's administration...as Vice President.))

Rumsfeld had claimed to have learned the lessons of Vietnam, too. :V

[Shadowlord]

[double post]

[mainiac]

Hell, the smart thing to do would have been to move everyone to accounts like that.

Government, man.  People jump over every single mistake so they have to stick to outdated obsolete systems until the new one has been triple checked and had time to go obsolete.  That's the only way to "save taxpayers money".

[RedKing]

So, did anyone else here watch Colin Powell's presentation to the UN before the Iraq invasion back when it happened? As a clueless American, that presentation was very impressive. I didn't know anything about what Powell was talking about, of course. He sounded quite certain of the truth of what he was saying, although the UN was unmoved. I think a lot of us were angry that they were refusing to see the obvious intel but in restrospect, it was more that we weren't seeing clearly ourselves - we were still outraged over 9/11, and we were told that Saddam was sponsoring Al Qaida terrorists and developing WMD, and we had appeared to have completely routed the Taliban, so it's no surprise most of America was in favor of invading at the time. Colin Powell seemed like a good, honest, trustworthy person, right up until the Bush Administration stopped talking about WMD and started retroactively changing why we invaded. (And when they found degraded chemical weapons from before the Gulf War, hid it until they were out of office and couldn't anymore)

Speak for yourself. I remember watching Powell's little PowerPoint dog-and-pony show at work. I remember thinking, "Am I the only one who thinks this is some pretty flimsy shit? Really? Some aluminum tubes and a couple of random dudes talking on the phone making vague comments that are completely unverified. Really?"

[scriver]

Wasn't Colin Powell the guy who quit in disappointment/upsetment over the administration's actions?

[lemon10]

Hell, the smart thing to do would have been to move everyone to accounts like that.

Government, man.  People jump over every single mistake so they have to stick to outdated obsolete systems until the new one has been triple checked and had time to go obsolete.  That's the only way to "save taxpayers money".

There is a good reason for having all emails stored with the goverment, it prevents officals from simply deleting or "losing" incriminating evidence if they broke the law. Not that its remotely the case here, and not that this isn't entirely designed to try to bring down hillary, but the law does make sense.

[SalmonGod]

So, did anyone else here watch Colin Powell's presentation to the UN before the Iraq invasion back when it happened? As a clueless American, that presentation was very impressive. I didn't know anything about what Powell was talking about, of course. He sounded quite certain of the truth of what he was saying, although the UN was unmoved. I think a lot of us were angry that they were refusing to see the obvious intel but in restrospect, it was more that we weren't seeing clearly ourselves - we were still outraged over 9/11, and we were told that Saddam was sponsoring Al Qaida terrorists and developing WMD, and we had appeared to have completely routed the Taliban, so it's no surprise most of America was in favor of invading at the time. Colin Powell seemed like a good, honest, trustworthy person, right up until the Bush Administration stopped talking about WMD and started retroactively changing why we invaded. (And when they found degraded chemical weapons from before the Gulf War, hid it until they were out of office and couldn't anymore)

Speak for yourself. I remember watching Powell's little PowerPoint dog-and-pony show at work. I remember thinking, "Am I the only one who thinks this is some pretty flimsy shit? Really? Some aluminum tubes and a couple of random dudes talking on the phone making vague comments that are completely unverified. Really?"

May seem like a weird comparison to make, but I was in high school when Columbine happened.  The backlash from that event had made a huge impression on me (where any child who was known as a social outcast was basically treated like a terrorist and schools started to move towards feeling like prisons), and it was still pretty fresh in my mind.  On the day of 9/11, it only took me until about mid-afternoon to start realizing that American culture was going to respond to this by assigning blame to a demographic and directing shitloads of hatred and aggression at them for years to come.  When most people were still acting pretty normal, shocked but not understanding what an influential day they were living in, I skipped out on my last couple classes and went home, because I was feeling too uncomfortable.  Not with the tragedy itself, but with what I knew was coming.  I just wasn't globally aware enough at that point to know that demographic was going to be Islam (or middle-easternness in general).  The connection between Islam and terrorism didn't exist in my mind at that point. 

I knew the war drums were bullshit from the very first beat.

[penguinofhonor]

The connection between Islam and terrorism didn't exist in a lot of people's minds at that point. Americans actually polled more favorably toward Islam after 9/11 than before, and it took a couple years for their opinions to become mostly negative.

[Shadowlord]

George W. Bush said that Muslims weren't our enemy, Al Qaida was, and the country was united after 9/11, and IIRC that lasted until the invasion (or bungling of the occupation of) Iraq.

Obama has said much the same thing, but doesn't have the country united behind him as the result of losing thousands of people to a terrorist attack within a year of taking office - and the media is more polarized now.

[Reelya]

What has MotherJones lied about?  Please dont define lie as "disagreed with my political views".

That reminds me about Media Matters. Who regularly get accused of "lying". Basically the entire site just reprints what FOX, Limbaugh etc. actually said and let's you make up your own mind about it.

And it was set up by David Brock, who used to be a right-wing conservative pundit, but actually realized he was a patsy for a bunch of corporate interests and jumped ship. I have a copy of his autobiography here, he basically explains how it works, they take a bunch of young conservative believers at college, set up fake right-wing college newspapers for them, and groom them to be the next generation of conservative talking heads. And they keep them in an echo chamber where they don't even know what normal standards of journalism even are. That's one of the reasons they have to inculcate that "lamestream media" consipracy theory stuff, to keep the conservative "media" believers in these fascist fringe publications from asking questions about their non-existent journalistic standards compared to reputable news outlets.

Brock talks about how he wrote articles and books which were political attack pieces on the Clintons in the 1990s, and later found out that the "facts" he was writing were all fabricated stuff he was being fed by his handlers. Basically, nobody shills the message like duped idiots do. That's why you have guys like Hannity.

[redwallzyl]

What has MotherJones lied about?  Please dont define lie as "disagreed with my political views".

That reminds me about Media Matters. Who regularly get accused of "lying". Basically the entire site just reprints what FOX, Limbaugh etc. actually said and let's you make up your own mind about it.

And it was set up by David Brock, who used to be a right-wing conservative pundit, but actually realized he was a patsy for a bunch of corporate interests and jumped ship. I have a copy of his autobiography here, he basically explains how it works, they take a bunch of young conservative believers at college, set up fake right-wing college newspapers for them, and groom them to be the next generation of conservative talking heads. And they keep them in an echo chamber where they don't even know what normal standards of journalism even are. That's one of the reasons they have to inculcate that "lamestream media" consipracy theory stuff, to keep the conservative "media" believers in these fascist fringe publications from asking questions about their non-existent journalistic standards compared to reputable news outlets.

Brock talks about how he wrote articles and books which were political attack pieces on the Clintons in the 1990s, and later found out that the "facts" he was writing were all fabricated stuff he was being fed by his handlers. Basically, nobody shills the message like duped idiots do. That's why you have guys like Hannity.

i would expect nothing less from faux news and tother propaganda "news" networks.

[Shazbot]

I'm really surprised radical Islam and terrorism wasn't connected in people's minds, in your opinions, since it was a Hollywood trope since the 80's and Clinton ineffectually sparred with OBL during his entire presidency.

[RedKing]

I guarantee you, most Americans had not even heard of Osama bin Laden or al-Qaeda prior to 9/11. Even Islamic terrorists were seen through the lens of 1970's and 80's paradigms, where they were viewed as nationalists like the PLO or Hamas or Hezbollah who happened to also be Islamic, not Islamic terrorists.

I think a lot of that began to change with the beheadings. The beheading of Nicholas Berg shocked the fuck out of a lot of people. It seemed so far beyond the pale. I mean, shoot a guy dead, yeah. But saw his fucking head off with a big knife while he's screaming and you're videotaping it for YouTube? Even Hollywood evil didn't go that far.

The Taliban we could still sorta look at as Afghani nationalists who happened to also be fundamentalists. But al-Qaeda was stateless. They were everywhere and nowhere. They weren't fighting for a particular chunk of land, they were waging global jihad. That was a new thing, and it scared the hell out of a lot of people because it suddenly meant potentially nowhere was safe. Americans weren't scared of the PLO or Hamas or Hezbollah because as long as you weren't planning on being in the Middle East, you probably weren't getting caught in the crossfire. It's the same logic that allowed a lot of Americans to sympathize with the IRA.

Hell, in some ways on the surface Daesh is a return to a simpler time when we could say "hey maybe these guys just want a chunk of land and will leave us alone if we give it to them, or at least stay out of their way". Even just a few weeks ago, Trump had stated during a debate that he didn't understand why we were hung up on ISIS and we should just let Putin deal with them. Then Paris, and now he's stopping just short of making American Muslims wear a crescent armband and report to the camps.

[SalmonGod]

I was 17 when 9/11 happened.  If I had been a little older, it may have been.  But I remember seeing Islamophobic sentiments popping up fairly quickly after 9/11.  It may have taken a couple years for it to become mainstream, but it was only a couple months before I started hearing occasional use of the term "towel-head".