All of us knew it but couldn't prove it. Now we can prove it. Newly declassified documents published at the National Security Archive prove beyond all reasonable doubt that the Bush administration planned to topple Saddam Hussein and invade Iraq as early as January, 2001, and were making strategic plans and resource allocations as early as November, 2001.

January 30, 2001 – Bush administration principals (agency heads) meet for the
first time and discuss the Middle East, including Bush’s intention to disengage from the Israel-Palestine peace process and “How Iraq is destabilizing the region.” Bush directs Rumsfeld and JCS chairman Hugh Shelton to examine military options for Iraq; CIA director George Tenet is directed to improve intelligence on the country. Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill and counterterrorism coordinator Richard Clarke are both struck by the emphasis on confronting Iraq, an aim consistent with Rumsfeld’s hiring of Wolfowitz and later Feith, well known for their bellicosity on the issue, for high-level Pentagon
positions. (Source: EBB/Franks Timeline (PDF))

When did we invade Afghanistan? Oh, that's right...it was October 7, 2001.

Walking through these documents makes it clear that the Bush Administration -- from Day One -- intended to invade Iraq at some point in their reign of terror. Here is a memo (PDF) dated January 23, 2001 outlining the "Origins of the Iraq Regime Change Policy". This was requested by Vice President-elect Dick Cheney before taking office, presumably as a way to justify policy formation around aggressive US efforts for "regime change" in Iraq.

This memo (PDF) written on November 27, 2001 should send cold chills up and down your spine. It is a list of talking points from Rumsfeld to Franks about how to handle a run-up to a full-scale Iraq invasion. November 27th, 51 days after Afghanistan was invaded. And check this talking point:

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The Foxheads -- with Megyn Kelly leading the torchlight parade on her (ahem) morning "news" show -- were all worked up over another quote pulled out of the files of Imam Fiesal Abdul Rauf, the man behind the so-called "Ground Zero mosque":

"We tend to forget, in the West, that the United States has more Muslim blood on its hands than Al Qaeda has on its hands of innocent non-Muslims," said Imam Fiesal Abdul Rauf, speaking at the Bob Hawke Prime Ministerial Center during a question and answer session dedicated to what sponsors say was a dialogue to improve relations between America and the Muslim world.

"You may remember that the U.S.-led sanctions against Iraq led to the death of over half a million Iraqi children. This has been documented by the United Nations," said Rauf, who called himself a spokesman for Islam.

Now, one may or may not quibble with Rauf's example -- namely, the prewar sanctions against Iraq that Saddam indeed used as an excuse for letting his people starve.

But there's no doubt that we have innocent Iraqi blood on our hands. At last count, the toll stood between 97,000-106,000 civilians killed in Iraq because we visited war on their country. In 2009 alone -- a year in which the toll decreased -- there were 4,644 civilian deaths recorded. So much for comparisons to the 3,000 killed on 9/11.

I'm a little surprised there's any question about this at all. But then in Fox-land, America under Bush did nothing but good and kind things around the world.

democracyarsenal.org

The editorial “Off Course in Iraq," published in the New York Times on July 20 was particularly disheartening. After being disillusioned about the invasion of Iraq and U.S. failures at efforts to reconstruct and bring peace to the country, I thought that at least my efforts working with Iraqi women in the new political system may prove to be a one bright spot in the otherwise dark and dangerous days of the post-Saddam era.

It seems now that even the hollow justification for the intervention in Iraq—to free people from the tyranny of Saddam Hussein, and in particular the women of Iraq—is just an excuse reminiscent of invading because of the Saddam’s nuclear arsenal. In question is the insertion of sharia law into the new constitution. Although there are supposed to be separate provisions depending on your religion, women would be stripped of their right to choose their own husbands, inherit property on the same basis as men and seek court protection if their husbands tire of them and decide to declare them divorced.

Wingnuttery Hall of Fame (So Far)   Sadly, No!

There've been tons of great suggestions for the Wingnuttery Hall of Fame so far. Let's take a look at the highlights...Continue reading "Wingnuttery Hall of Fame (So Far)"

well sir I believe THAT would be crossing the line into the realm of improbability        Fafblog!

Oh, this can't be true!

Spying on you at the library, indefinite detainment, torture, preventive wars on the wrong country, oh sure I can see that. ButRead on...

White House Turns Tables on Former American POWs

By David G. Savage, Times Staff Writer

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On Face the Nation today, Dick Cheney said that he chooses Rush Limbaugh over Colin Powell when it comes to the debate about the future of the GOP.

"If I had to choose in terms of being a Republican, I'd choose Rush Limbaugh," Cheney said when asked about whose vision of the GOP he'd side with. "My impression was that Colin was no longer a Republican."

"I don't think the Republican Party ought to move far to the left," Cheney said. "The suggestion our Democratic friends always make is, 'Well, if you Republicans were just more like Democrats, you'd win elections.' Well, I don't buy that."

I'm glad Dick Cheney continues to put his face out there as a spokesmen for the "new" GOP and as a torture apologist, but this brief part of the show demonstrates that Cheney is more impressed with a peddler of GOP propaganda and entertainment than he is defending one of his own and a man who sold the Iraq war to the American people.

Cheney always got into it with Powell over foreign policy so it's not a shock that he would be outspoken against him either.

Powell wanted to stay the course that took the diplomatic route as BushCo. went after Iraq, but when Bush told him we were going to war he signed on without giving his honest opinion. Many people forget that Colin Powell didn't even want to go to the UN for a resolution when they all decided to go to war with Iraq, but since Blair told Bush to get UN approval, he was forced to give a presentation they hoped would swing the country and the world against Saddam. And that presentation has tarnished his record more than anything. It's very fitting. Woodward's book Plan of Attack, reveals all this in detail. And as Digby and Bob Somerby have written, we have to be careful how Colin Powell is described because he's had his hand in a lot of very bad things.

Colin Powell is not only not a war hero, he's actually implicated in war crimes from two different wars --- as one of the "White House Principals" who watched the CIA act out torture techniques for their approval and as one of the men who tried to cover up My Lai. (He was involved in Iran-Contra too.) And that's not even taking into account his pivotal role in energetically selling the Iraq war with bogus intelligence. Certainly, the man cannot be separated from Dick Cheney on that issue.

He was one of the most powerful people in the Bush administration and he failed time after time to step up and use his vast personal popularity to stop them or slow them down. He is, in fact, the worst chickensh*t of the bunch since he had a separate power center and a special authority as an ex-general. Cheney may have been the chief architect, but Powell was the chief salesman and cover artist.

DownWithTyranny!: McCain's latest stunt backfires...badly. Some observers believe the real motive for the Psychogeezer's latest gimmick is to keep Sarah Palin from spending another moment of unscripted time in public. But count on McCain - if he shows up for the debate - to try and work his surge-centric attack on Obama's judgment into every answer, no matter what the question. Some of us remember a time when McCain always called for withdrawal of troops.

Bob Geiger:Bush asleep while Iraqi fraud funnels millions to al-Qaeda

David E's Fablog: Albert Brooks explains it all for you

The Satirical Political Report: Cheney asserts a link between Saddam and Mortgages of Mass Destruction

LAist: Michael Moore is giving away his new movie

OFF THE BEATEN PATH: Minnesota Independent, Youtude, Women's Lens, Just a Moment of Miscellany,

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Bill Moyers looks at the quandary we find ourselves in Musharraf's Pakistan vis à vis stability in the Middle East that has eerie parallels to our schizophrenic relationship with Saddam Hussein in Iraq:

Musharref and Saddam Hussein, our friend only twenty years ago, were cut from the same cloth...so once again America's support of a dictator has backfired. Musharraff now says elections will be held by February and he'll quit the army...but he'll still be the man in power so we face a quandary: back a dictator against his own people in the name of a failed strategy to fight terrorists...or back the people and risk democracy. The U.S. invaded Iraq saying democracy was just around the corner. but more than four years of war produced chaos, not democracy.

And proof positive that information is the great democratizer, even though Musharraf silenced the news media, pictures of the rebellion (would that our own lawyers and judges feel as strongly here about the flagrant violations of the law) make their way worldwide via the Internet.

You can watch the entire program and more here.

Steve Clemons of The Washington Note and the NY Sun's Eli Lake debate where the U.S. policy on Pakistan went wrong.

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CBS:

After six years, the liberation of Afghanistan has become a triumph without victory. The fighting is the greatest it has been since the beginning of the war and more civilians are dying. In fact, 60 Minutes was surprised to hear this: while the enemy has killed hundreds of civilians this year, a similar number of civilians have been killed by American forces. With relatively few troops there, the U.S. and NATO rely on air power. The number of civilians killed in air strikes has doubled.

60 Minutes wondered whether civilian deaths are undermining the effort to win the Afghan people.

You think? This is the part that stood out:

"There's this macabre kind of calculus that the military goes through on every air strike, where they try to figure out how many dead civilians is dead bad guy worth," says Marc Garlasco, who knows the calculus of civilian casualties as well as anyone.[..]

"Our number was 30. So, for example, Saddam Hussein. If you're gonna kill up to 29 people in a strike against Saddam Hussein, that's not a problem," Garlasco explains. "But once you hit that number 30, we actually had to go to either President Bush, or Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld."

Garlasco says, before the invasion of Iraq, he recommended 50 air strikes aimed at high-value targets -- Iraqi officials.

But he says none of the targets on the list were actually killed. Instead, he says, "a couple of hundred civilians at least" were killed.

The full video and transcripts are available on CBS's website.

The danger of having "intellectually incurious" people in charge of foreign policy...

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When asked by a reporter how long he thought the American people would be willing to wait for Bush to force the Iraqi government to reach benchmark goals, Bush veered bizarrely into a claim that Saddam was responsible for the deaths of the "Mandelas".

Part of the reason why there is not this instant democracy in Iraq is because people are still recovering from Saddam Hussein's brutal rule. I thought an interesting comment was made when somebody said to me, I heard somebody say, where's Mandela? Well, Mandela is dead, because Saddam Hussein killed all the Mandelas. He was a brutal tyrant that divided people up and split families, and people are recovering from this. So there's a psychological recovery that is taking place. And it's hard work for them. And I understand it's hard work for them. Having said that, I'm not going the give them a pass when it comes to the central government's reconciliation efforts.

Um, WTF??? Not only is Nelson Mandela very much alive, but he's also been very vocally critical of the Bush Adminstration:

"What I am condemning is that one power, with a president who has no foresight, who cannot think properly, is now wanting to plunge the world into a holocaust."[..]

"If there is a country that has committed unspeakable atrocities in the world, it is the United States of America. They don't care."

Maybe it was a bit of strange projection on the part of Bush to want another critic gone...something others in this administration have some experience with as well.

UPDATE: Obviously not everyone understands mangled metaphors: After Bush remark, Mandela Foundation issues statement that former President is still alive.