Lie by Lie

[_JS]

JS, I can hardly imagine anyone who thinks it does not matter, to have a president tell us lies in order to lead us into a war.
That matters to me, and I await your explanation of why it does not matter to you.

But the point Lanya is what matters now. Honestly, worse than whether or not one thought he was lying was probably the video he made where he was jokingly looking for weapons of mass destruction.

To me that was akin to joking about murdering Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the Germans invading Poland, or September 11th. Lying or not, that showed a truly and remarkably belittling side of the President that no matter the circumstances was very inhuman.

The problem is that we have a situation that needs to be dealt with now. Arguing the history of how we got into this hornet's nest is all well and good, but it isn't going to make the situation any better.

Look at it this way, President Clinton was told a long and horrible history of conflict, deceit, and atrocities in the Balkans - but instead he and his administration along with NATO took the initiative to work out a solution in Bosnia and Kosovo. It wasn't perfect, but it was a damned sight better than standing back and arguing about the history of the conflict and allowing it to continue. 

[Lanya]

I think we can actually concentrate on the two topics at once.
Of course it matters whether he was lying, in the same way it matters in law if you  have the poisoned tree, the fruit is also poisoned.
We as a free country  cannot say "Eh, what's done is done, so he lied, so what?"  You don't keep a democracy that way. 


Same thing here.   Strip away any niceties about "oh he was trying to bring democracy and freedom to the Middle East" or any of the other 37 (I'm guessing) rationales.

He wanted a war (in Iraq). He got a war. Had the photo ops. Won the re-election.  Booyah, now what?

  Every bit of time that is spent rationalizing why we were right to go in is time that could be better spent planning a swift exit strategy. It is horribly dangerous there now and is getting worse.  Of course it matters what we do now.

I guess I see it this way....As long as people thought it was a noble effort gone bad, they'll keep throwing men into the meat grinder.  That will not do.    That is why the WHY of going to war must be understood and honestly spoken aloud.