Right Wing Talking Points

[SensibleCenterist]

I copied this off of fark, and it has to be seen to believed:

Right Wing "News"

I could use, however, a thorough debunking. Does anyone know if ther eis one around?

This wingnut piece is pretty well enough put together it will "convince" many right wingers just because it seems so factual. Even though it contains so many obvious factual falsehoods. It's like a Coulter or Hannity book.

[meti57b]

1. I agree. I can foresee that we are going to have to reply to this ....

I fully expect to see it on other message boards.

[valniel]

2. The question is not whether he lied, but did he commit perjury!

:nuke: The question is not whether he lied (he did), but did he commit perjury!
No WMD has been found, so he lied. But did he lie purposefully, i.e. perjure himself, that is the question!

[Maraya1969]

3. Number 1 is easy

The Downing Street Memo clearly states that the evidence was "fixed" to give a reason for going to war. The CIA reports, (that I still cannot find but saw once on the net) start with about a year before the invasion and they say there was no threat. About 4 months before the invasion they stated reporting there was some sort of threat and the threat got more "serious" month by month until the attack.

This is why John Kerry and all the Democrats said OK to the war. They were being fed fixed intelligence also. I got onto the Lars Larson talk show a couple weeks ago and I asked: "How come Michael Moore knew that there was no threat in Iraq and the President didn't?" He said a couple nasty things about Moore, not answering my question then broke for a commercial.

[rock]

4. Well let's just use some common logic

1) Did * say that Iraq had WMD? Yes.
2) Did Iraq have WMD? No.
3) Do I need draw the conclusion for you? No.

He may have been mislead (which I don't believe), but it's still on his shoulders when he said that Iraq had WMD.

[Vyan]

5. They are making the argument

that it wasn't Bush's lie, it was CURVEBALL's lie that was repeated by Bush, Rumsfeld, Rice and Powell - and the question that remains to this day is did they actively know it was a lie, or did they simply not care since faith in Saddam's WMDs is what they needed to reach their ultimate goals?

The rest can be debunked, simply go read his own sources and look at how he's cherry-picked convenient facts to prop up his excuses.

Vyan

[Maraya1969]

6. Number 2 -

What they say:


We estimate there were 98,000 extra deaths (95% CI 8000-194 000) during the post-war period.

Readers who are accustomed to perusing statistical documents know what the set of numbers in the parentheses means. For the other 99.9 percent of you, I'll spell it out in plain English—which, disturbingly, the study never does. It means that the authors are 95 percent confident that the war-caused deaths totaled some number between 8,000 and 194,000. (The number cited in plain language—98,000—is roughly at the halfway point in this absurdly vast range.)
This isn't an estimate. It's a dart board.


What the Lancet says:

The risk of death was estimated to be 2.5-fold (95% CI 1.6-4.2) higher after the invasion when compared with the preinvasion period.


The CONFIDENCE LEVEL IS 95%(PLUS or MINUUS 1.6 - 4.2) I'm not sure what the 8,000 to 194,000 figure mean yet.

The Lancet Summary:


Two-thirds of all violent deaths were reported in one cluster in the city of Falluja. If we exclude the Falluja data, the risk of death is 1.5-fold (1.1-2.3) higher after the invasion. We estimate that 98000 more deaths than expected (8000-194000) happened after the invasion outside of Falluja and far more if the outlier Falluja cluster is included. The major causes of death before the invasion were myocardial infarction, cerebrovascular accidents, and other chronic disorders whereas after the invasion violence was the primary cause of death. Violent deaths were widespread, reported in 15 of 33 clusters, and were mainly attributed to coalition forces. Most individuals reportedly killed by coalition forces were women and children. The risk of death from violence in the period after the invasion was 58 times higher (95% CI 8.1-419) than in the period before the war.
Interpretation

[Maraya1969]

7. Actually it COULD be a difference between 8,000 and 194,000 but

that means little if you are referring to a population that is in the millions.

Sorry for doing my calculations on the board here. I should figure it al out first but I am steaming mad. And maybe together we can figure it out.


I am positive The Lancet and the peer reviews are NOT LYING! The Lancet is one of the highest regarded medical journals in the world!

[Maraya1969]

8. Another inconsistency

They say:

The Downing Street memo proves there were WMD.

"For instance, what were the consequences, if Saddam used WMD on day one, or if Baghdad did not collapse and urban warfighting began? You said that Saddam could also use his WMD on Kuwait. Or on Israel, added the Defence Secretary."

But that sentece is part of the "fixing" That was part of, "What should we say?"

[Maraya1969]

9. Hey help debunk this and vote it up, I expect to get it in an email

shortly and I want to be able to respond quickly! And others are going to receive it also. We can't let this type of bullshit go around without setting it straight. I already sent an email to The Lancet and called them.

[Puzzler]

10. Carl Sagan...

... used to call these types of arguments "special pleading".


-P

[Maraya1969]

11. Geeze am I the only one looking these things up?

As for #6 – The US also has ties to terrorism because all the terrorists involved in 9/11 were living in the US. What does living in Baghdad have to do with ties to terrorism? I don’t know much about this Abu Nidal person but Christor Hitchens did interview him…..in 1975! At that time he was purported to be the leader of the PLO. His (Hitchens) one claim to fame I suppose. And Nidal was living in Baghdad at the time. He also says that he met the man before he “achieved celebrity and notoriety” but in his interview with Ron Reagan he says when he interviewed Nidal he was THEN the most wanted man in the world. Which he may have been but it wasn’t because of terrorism against the US.


"But I did feel a twinge of nostalgia. I met the man in Iraq in 1975, before he achieved celebrity and notoriety, and for years afterwards, as one of the few hacks to have interviewed him, I was guaranteed a moment of TV or a swathe of ink every time he mounted an atrocity"

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,780426,00.html


Ron Regan interview on Coast to Coast


CH: Excuse me. When I went to interview Abu Nidal, then the most wanted terrorist in the world, in Baghdad, he was operating out of an Iraqi government office. He was an arm of the Iraqi State, while being the most wanted man in the world. The same is true of the shelter and safe house offered by the Iraqi government, to the murderers of Leon Klinghoffer, and to Mr. Yassin, who mixed the chemicals for the World Trade Center bombing in 1993. How can you know so little about this, and be occupying a chair at the time that you do?