redblueamerica.com

"There has been some debate over how "imminent" a threat Iraq poses. I do believe that Iraq poses an imminent threat, but I also believe that after September 11, that question is increasingly outdated. It is in the nature of these weapons, and the way they are targeted against civilian populations, that documented capability and demonstrated intent may be the only warning we get."

and "To insist on further evidence could put some of our fellow Americans at risk. Can we afford to take that chance? We cannot!"

from article entitled 'Jay Rockefeller, Not Serious'
http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TW...

Also note the the excerpts about the Protect America Act. And this is the buffoon heading up the Senate Intelligence Committee!

If you read Iran's newspaper and the domestic economy section, it doesn't seem to me they want any kind of war.
They are building houses for their citizens, golf courses, hotels for tourism, improving transportion, and of course dealing with OIL .
AHMAHADAJAD is posturing---boasting to his own people showing his toughness when he threatend to blow Israel off the map.
THere is serious hate going on --but
I seriously doubt that IRAN wants to look like bombed out IRAQ next door and have their people displaced and disoriented.

big mistake! You should substitute the word 'plutocrat' for 'radical liberal' in this case. Both parties have their share. They always blow the direction of the best current opportunities. Even Mercy knows this. But he is proud of his man, in this case, nonetheless.

There is no shortage ever of Rockefellers in American politics for how line now?

John D. 'Jay' Rockefeller IV

Yep, Change is Coming to America. Happy Days Are Here Again.

Dear Mersey, it seems we must continuously bicker about biased opinionated statement that you publish as fact. The theater of a press release you quoted from was the stated opinion of a radical liberal senator who hates Bush as much or more than you do. Let me say, before I refute your brash statements that I to believe many mistakes were made form a national policy perspective concerning the war in Iraq.
The actual committee conclusions concerning pre-war intelligence. These are the official record and can be found, with much more information, from the report itself.
Phase II: Public Statements;
Conclusion I:
“Statements by the President, Vice President, Secretary of State and National Security Advisor regarding a possible Iraqi nuclear weapons program were generally substantiated by intelligence community estimates, but did not convey the substantial disagreements that existed in the community,”
It has been argued by the Administration that if they were going to error, it had to be on the side of caution and save American lives. This is also the same intelligence viewed by Congress and the 77 decisions made exactly like the President’s.
Conclusion II:
“Statements in the major speeches analyzed, as well additional statements, regarding Iraq’s possession of biological agent, weapons, production capability and use of mobile biological laboratories were substantiated by intelligence information.”
Conclusion III:
“Statements in the major speeches analyzed as well as additional statements regarding Iraq’s possession of chemical weapons were substantiated by intelligence information.”
Conclusion V:
“Statements by the President, Vice President, Secretary of State and the Secretary of Defense regarding Iraq’s possession of weapons of mass destruction were generally substantiated by intelligence information, though many statements made regarding ongoing production prior to late2002 reflect a higher level of certainty than the intelligence judgments’ themselves.”
Again here, Congress saw the same information viewed by the Administration. President Bush was confident but hated by the democratic left in Congress. They didn’t take is word for it. Saddam was a bad man and we all, or most, believed the worst of him.
Senator Rockefellers biased opinion withstanding, the actual agreed statements by the committed conclude that pre-war intelligence was indeed what we based a fundamentally sound decision of war.
PS…Phase II: DOD Policy Office:
Conclusion I:
“The committee found that no U.S. government officials involved in these meetings conducted any illegal, unauthorized or inappropriate activities.”

the rest of the story
http://intelligence.senate.gov/press/rec...

Thursday, June 5, 2008

WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Senator Kit Bond, Vice Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, today admonished Democrats for playing politics with the final reports on prewar Iraq intelligence to score election-year points.

“It is ironic that the Democrats would knowingly distort and misrepresent the Committee’s findings and the intelligence in an effort to prove that the Administration distorted and mischaracterized the intelligence,” said Bond.

Today, the final sections of the Phase II report on prewar intelligence were released by the Senate Intelligence Committee. Bond pointed out that the partisan report not only violates the Committee’s nonpartisan principles but also rejects the conclusions unanimously reached in previous reports.

In July 2004, the Senate Intelligence Committee’s Iraq report, adopted by a unanimous vote, makes clear that flawed intelligence – not Administration deception – was the basis for policy maker’s statements and decisions. The report released today completely ignores this key finding.

Bond also called attention to the Democrats’ hypocrisy in excluding any of their own statements in this final report. Democrats in the Senate examined the same intelligence as the Bush Administration, and they too characterized Iraq as a growing and dangerous threat to the United States. Bond pointed to the public record, which is replete with examples of statements by Democrat Senators making the same characterizations regarding Iraq’s Weapons of Mass Destruction and links to terrorism.

Key problems with the report include:

The minority was entirely cut out of the process and that the report was written solely by Democratic staffers – For example, Republican amendments, including those of the Vice Chairman, were not even given a vote;
The Democratic staff who authored the report twisted policy makers’ statements and cherry picked intelligence in order to reach their misleading conclusions, often leaving out pertinent intelligence;
The report does not review any statements of Democrats, only Republican administration officials;
The Democratic staff did not seek to interview those whom they accuse;
The Rome report violates the Democrats’ own criteria for the Phase II report and should have been excluded.
Bond stressed that this type of partisan gamesmanship is beneath the Senate Intelligence Committee and takes away from the important national security issues the Committee should be focused on. Congress has failed to pass a terrorist surveillance bill, or intelligence authorization act, both of which are critical to improving the intelligence community. These failures are a result of injecting partisan politics into the Committee’s oversight responsibilities, emphasized Bond. With this final Phase II report now complete, Bond concluded that it is critical the Senate Intelligence attempts to move forward in a nonpartisan manner.