Can't Wait to See How They Spin This One

[42nd-delay]

From a CNN interview ith Pat Robertson:


Pat Robertson, an ardent Bush supporter, said he had that conversation with the president in Nashville, Tennessee, before the March 2003 invasion U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. He described Bush in the meeting as "the most self-assured man I've ever met in my life."

"You remember Mark Twain said, 'He looks like a contented Christian with four aces.' I mean he was just sitting there like, 'I'm on top of the world,' " Robertson said on the CNN show, "Paula Zahn Now."

"And I warned him about this war. I had deep misgivings about this war, deep misgivings. And I was trying to say, 'Mr. President, you had better prepare the American people for casualties.' "

Robertson said the president then told him, "Oh, no, we're not going to have any casualties."


Unbelievable. Every day we receive more evidence on how ineptly and naively this war has been carried out. How out of it can Bush be?

As for the spin, I'm thinking either a retraction from Robertson is forthcoming, or the White House will just deny it and sell Robertson down the river. But I don't see any reason for Robertson to lie about this, so any explanation will be weak.

Rest of the story (http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/10/19/robertson.bush.iraq/)

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"42nd-delay is the only person who's making sense." - Ron, 3-12-02

[ChickenHawk]

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[Furtherman]

If Bush wins.... I will feel so sorry for us, and yes, even the rest of the world. Realistically, he probably will. He had no experience, no clue, no damn right to be elected in the first place. The only thing that is certain of him is his name.

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...with thanks to JustJon

[A.J.]

"I mean, the Lord told me it was going to be A, a disaster, and B, messy," Robertson said.

Hey, those war plans were secret! The Lord shouldn't have been talking about them!

the White House will just deny it and sell Robertson down the river.

If the White House is going to sell anybody down the river, then why not Tommy Franks? After all it was he who submitted that war plan for Bush's approval. You have to assume he was confident that we had enough troops, supplies, etc. to win the war and keep the peace. I know Bush is Commander in Chief but why isn't anyone blaming Franks?

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[Yerdaddy]

If the White House is going to sell anybody down the river, then why not Tommy Franks? After all it was he who submitted that war plan for Bush's approval. You have to assume he was confident that we had enough troops, supplies, etc. to win the war and keep the peace. I know Bush is Commander in Chief but why isn't anyone blaming Franks?

It's been the opinion of most retired generals, including many of those involved, and most of the rest of the intelligence and military community that the reason we didn't have enough troops on the ground and didn't anticipate the insurgency is because of Rumsfeld's ideas about "transforming the military" to smaller and lighter forces and his idea that Iraq would prove his doctrine's correctness. Add to that the administration's pension for firing and forcably retiring those who don't stick to the talking points, (see Gen. Shinseki who told Congress we would need "several hundred thousand troops" to secure Iraq, and Gen. White who is quoted here), and shuffling around generals to utilize the "yes" men, (see Franks). Also the fact that the core of the administration's national security team are from a small group of ideologues who have isolated themselves from the rest of the policy community so they can concoct these grand strategies for transforming US policy into a hegemonic dominance, and have shunned collaberation and broader communication with non-like-minded groups and people and so had become so deluded and self-assured that they honestly thought they were right and thus had no contingency plans, and have resisted adapting for fear of admitting mistakes and accepting responsibility for them. (I know this sounds totally conspiratorial and "The Nation"-ish, but honestly, this view has become totally mainstream, in the objective foreign policy community. See Anthony Cordesman at CSIS, Gen. Anthony Zinni, celebrated neo-con Kenneth Pollock, and numerous anonymous [for obvious reasons] interviews by high-ranking military and intelligence insiders.)

So it's not so much Bush, (he would have accepted "Plan 9 From Outer Space" if Rumsfeld offered it to him), or so much the military bureaucracy that is responsible, but the military's civilian leadership that Bush brought with him that have and are fucking up in Iraq and our foreign policy as a whole.

Mr. Rumsfeld had started to question whether the military still needed the Army's First Cavalry Division, a 17,500-member force that was slated to follow the lead invasion force into Iraq. He and General Franks discussed the issue repeatedly.

"Rumsfeld just ground Franks down," said Mr. White, the former Army secretary who was fired after policy disputes with Mr. Rumsfeld. "If you grind away at the military guys long enough, they will finally say, 'Screw it, I'll do the best I can with what I have.' The nature of Rumsfeld is that you just get tired of arguing with him."

A Canceled Deployment

General Franks insisted that he had not faced pressure on the First Cavalry issue. "It was Rumsfeld's idea," he said, referring to the cancellation of the deployment. "Rumsfeld did not beat me into submission. Initially, I did not want to truncate the force flow, but as it looked like we were likely to get greater international participation, I concluded that it was O.K. to stop the flow."

General Franks also said he accepted the suggestion only after his field commanders agreed that the division was not needed. But a former staff officer to General McKiernan said the land war commander had wanted the unit to be deployed and was disappointed that he had to do without the additional division. The deployment of the division was canceled on April 21.

<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/19/international/19war.html?ei=5094&en=a9cce3b11a8114c4&hp=&ex=1098244800&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print&position=" target="_blank">'CATASTROPHIC SUCCESS'</a>

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Fuck it from behind.

This message was edited by Yerdaddy on 10-20-04 @ 3:48 PM

[walking joint]

i need a dictionary to read Yerdaddy's post...i didn't finish reading the post, but with all those big words it must be good.

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[Se7en]

While I believe Bush should receive criticism for the handling of the Iraq War, I do have to say this: If you're going to take the word of Pat Robertson, who is rivaling Jerry Falwell these days in terms of who's the biggest religious wackjob, then you're really just getting desperate.

I believe the war was mishandled, but I'm sincerely doubting that Bush actually said those words. If Robertson told me it was raining outside, I'd have to stick my head out of a window to check for sure.

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[Furtherman]

If you're going to take the word of Pat Robertson, who is rivaling Jerry Falwell these days in terms of who's the biggest religious wackjob


George W fits in perfect with them.

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...with thanks to JustJon

[42nd-delay]

If you're going to take the word of Pat Robertson, who is rivaling Jerry Falwell these days in terms of who's the biggest religious wackjob, then you're really just getting desperate.


I'm certainly no Robertson fan, but as an ardent Bush supporter, what motivation would he have to lie in this case?

I don't think he's so out there that he doesn't know what he's saying.

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"42nd-delay is the only person who's making sense." - Ron, 3-12-02

[Freakshow]

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my preferred method of spin

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[cherrynoid]

I don't think he's so out there that he doesn't know what he's saying.


This IS the guy who claims he talked God into turning two hurricanes away from his Virginia Beach, VA headquarters. He sent one of them, Hurricane Gloria in '85, Northeast, and it ended up ravaging Long Island. (Sorry, New Yorkers.)

If anything, Robertson's a bigger whackjob than Falwell. Though I admit it's a close race.


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[TheMojoPin]

Yeah, but the point isn't whether he's nuts or not...the former is a given. It's just a bit odd that such a stringent ultra-conservative/religious right-er would come out and say such a thing. As it's been pointed out a lot these days, the Neo-con wing of the Republican party and the American religious right go hand in hand with EVERYTHING these days.

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