Posted 3:28 AM by Steve
The following facts are undisputed and among the evidence presented to the 9/11 commission:
1985: The mastermind behind the hijacking of the Achille Lauro cruise ship, Abu Abbas, was harbored and welcomed by the Iraqi regime.
1988: More than 5,000 Kurdish men, women and children are massacred in the village of Halabja by Saddam Hussein’s forces using weapons of mass destruction.
1992: Iraqi intelligence documents list Osama Bin Laden as an Iraqi intelligence asset.
1993: A non aggression pact between Iraq and al-Qaeda is formed. The rift between secular and Islamic extremists in the Middle East has all but disappeared.
1994: Deputy Director of Iraqi intelligence confirms that Osama Bin Laden requested arms and training from Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi regime.
1995: Abu Hajer al Iraqi, a senior al-Qaeda leader, met with Iraqi intelligence officials.
1996: A phone call between al-Qaeda-supported Sudanese military officials and the head of Iraq’s chemical weapons program was intercepted by the NSA.
1997:Abu Abdallah al Iraqi, a member of al-Qaeda, went to Iraq to help in obtaining weapons of mass destruction.
1998: The Clinton administration’s justice department indicted Iraq for providing “assistance” to al-Qaeda’s weapons development program.
1999: A senior Clinton administration counter terrorism official said that the U.S. government was “sure” Iraq had supported al-Qaeda chemical weapons programs in 1999.
2000: September 11th hijacker Khalid al Mihdhar was photographed with an Iraqi intelligence agent in Kuala Lumpur en route to a meeting at which the terrorist attacks of the USS Cole and the World Trade Center were planned and discussed.
2001: Satellite images show al-Qaeda members traveling to a compound in Iraq, a compound financed in part, by the Iraqi regime.
September 11th, 2001: The World Trade Centers in Manhattan, in the heart of New York City become ground zero for the worst terror attacks in American history. Attacks were carried out by members of al-Qaeda.
2002: Senior al Qaeda member, Abu Musab al Zarqawi, operated openly in Baghdad and received medical attention with the knowledge and approval of Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq.
2003: Prior to the war in Iraq, it was suspected that Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq harbored and supported Abdul Rahman Yasin, the Iraqi weapons expert who mixed the chemicals for the 1993 World Trade Center attack. This was confirmed in documents found in postwar Iraq.


Let me ask you, the reader, a question. With all this information, would you conclude that Iraq and al-Qaeda were connected?


Until recently, the belief that Iraq and al-Qaeda had connections was not a partisan matter. President Clinton was among the most vocal critics of Saddam Hussein’s regime saying in 1998 that , “outlaw nations and an unholy axis of terrorists, drug traffickers, and organized international criminals” would be “more lethal if we allow them to build arsenals of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and the missiles to deliver them.” He went on to say that “there is no more clear example of this threat than Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.” President Clinton also reiterated the Iraqi regime’s role with in the botched attempt to assassinate President Bush while he was visiting Kuwait.

FLIP FLOPS:
The most egregious flip-flop was that of counter terrorism official Richard Clarke. Yes, this same man who said that the U.S. government was “sure” Iraq had supported al-Qaeda chemical weapons programs in 1999, later said, in 2004, “There’s absolutely no evidence that Iraq was supporting al-Qaeda, ever.” This bold-faced lie is all the more stunning considering that Mr. Clarke isn’t refuting the veracity of the intelligence he is denying it’s very existence!
Al Gore: During the 1992 Presidential campaign, Gore attacked the first Bush administration for disregarding Saddam Hussein‘s “brutal terrorism” and of ignoring Saddam’s “murderous ambitions”. Gore went on to make over a dozen specific references to Iraq-sponsored terrorism while citing a RAND corporation study that concluded that “an estimated 1,400 terrorists were operating openly out of Iraq.”
Again, in 1992, Gore said that Saddam Hussein was a “major danger to the region and to U.S. interests.” and that he was “seeking technologies for weapons of mass destruction” in addition to offering “state payments to terrorists.”
Now, comically, Gore rails against the Bush administration saying that “The evidence now shows clearly that Saddam did not want to work with Osama Bin Laden at all, much less give him weapons of mass destruction.”
A notorious Democrat flip-flopper, Wesley Clark said “Certainly there’s a connection between Iraq and al-Qaeda.” in 2002. Then as a candidate for President, Clark stated, “there is no connection on that.”
John Kerry, who voted to authorize the war in Iraq now says that the war in Iraq has made us “less safe” saying the “global war on terrorism has actually been set back.” So… WHY did you vote for it Mr. Kerry?
Senator Hillary Clinton said during a speech on the senate floor that Saddam Hussein has given “aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al-Qaeda members.”
Later, Sen. Clinton would criticize the war in Iraq and question President Bush’s veracity in a speech on the senate floor demanding to know “what the president knew and when he knew it.”

Posted 3:26 AM by Steve
We hear a lot of anger and unsubstantiated accusations at the Democratic National Convention these days. This should surprise no one. After the so-called “Republican Revolution” during Bill Clinton’s presidency, the bold leadership of Newt Gingrich and his “Contract with America”, Clinton’s impeachment and the controversy surrounding the election of 2000, the Democrats have reason to be on edge. The Democrat party as we know it is ceasing to exist.
It’s base has evolved away from what the Democrats used to stand for. It has dividing into two separate and quite different sects. One side represented by people like Joe Lieberman, Zell Miller, and Harold Ford Jr. understand and agree with some if not all of the modern progressive political wisdom, such as the logic of supply-side economics, the idea that empowering the individual is better than growing the government. These folks are also among the slight majority of Americans who concur with the President on issues like the War on Terror.
The other side is represented by a far-left minority. People like Al Gore, Hillary Clinton, Tom Daschle, Barbara Boxer, Patty Murray and, of course, the host of leftist celebrities like Al Franken, Micheal Moore and Susan Sarandon, et al. These people have steered the Democrat Party into extremist waters. Many of their policies are closer to Green party and represent the “neo-hippie” socialistic, secular humanist agenda.
These extreme Democrats are still extremely bitter about what they view as a “right-wing” attack on their idol, President Clinton. They are also nervous about the rise of talk-radio, cable news and the internet as alternative sources for news and information. The elite New York media and the left’s stranglehold on information is slowly disintegrating. Many are also still in denial about the last election. Their modus operandi is to make the most absurd claims about the Bush administration, in the hopes that they can obscure the facts: Bush has presided over a solid, growing economy (despite a recession and the terrorist attacks of 9/11) and Bush’s policies have led to important victories in the Middle East in Iraq and Afghanistan. The unfortunate fact is that absurd claims make good copy.
I suppose the media can only report so much good economic news. Important, strategic military victories quickly bore a public with a miniscule attention span. The vast improvement in human rights conditions in Iraq and Afghanistan made maybe a few DAYS of headlines? Contrast that to the weeks and months the media spent fussing over Abu-Graib. The news, like any other commodity, is market-driven and new lows in content are a fact of life. Without absurd claims, there is no controversy. Without controversy, there is no story. Without a story there is no drama. Without drama there is no race.
We hear from the extremists that the War in Iraq was a “mistake”, based on lies or false intelligence. Some even claim the whole thing was planned. Others that the terrorist attacks of 9/11 were allowed by the Bush administration in order to justify some vengeful attack against Saddam Hussein. They claim the war was an outright deception on the part of “war-hungry right-wingers” who intend to establish some new Roman Empire for the 21st century.
Think for a moment about the plausibility of these claims. First, a preponderance of the evidence, and even the 9/11 commission’s conclusions, show a connection between Saddam’s regime and al-Qaeda. President Bush made very clear in his speech after the 9/11 attacks that we would make no differentiation between terrorists and the regimes that support them. Bush received bipartisan support for his speech.
State sponsorship of terrorism includes refuge, weapons, training, logistical support and intelligence. We have definitive proof that BOTH Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq and the Taliban in Afghanistan provided al-Qaeda with ALL of these things.

Secondly, let’s assume for the moment that the leftists are right and Bush intended all along was to create an “American Empire” what good would it really do him? Even with re-election, President Bush could only hope to “rule” his new empire for a total of 8 years. Or do the extremist Bush haters propose that Bush had some diabolical scheme to subvert the constitution and declare himself “American Emperor”? The world domination argument seems to be one only a child would concoct or believe.
By allowing these leftists to control the debate, the facts about the connections between Iraq, and al-Qaeda are censored. The improved conditions in Iraq and Afghanistan are ignored in favor of sensationalist journalism. Ironically, the Bush administration is simultaneously portrayed as relentless, clever, calculating, and power-hungry while being inept, obtuse and myopic. It reminds one of the old Saturday Night Live skit in which President Reagan (portrayed by Phil Hartman) is a kindly, old dotard in the public eye and a ruthless, intelligent manipulator behind closed doors.
It’s a recurring leftist fantasy: The dumb, conservative politician who is actually ambitious and diabolical.