The public needs to be clued in on the ACTUAL reasons for the war

[AngryYoungMan]

Right now Bush is vulnerable because the press is finally pursuing damaging stories.

I don't know what took them so long, but I accept Josh Marshall's argument that the 10-point poll drop in a week showed beltway types that their theories about public indifference to the WMD issue were incorrect.

The problem is that blame keeps getting shifted from Bush/Cheney to Tenet and Clinton. The public may turn on Bush for being wrong about the WMD, but I'm afraid they'll just see him as "wrong" (guilty of a miscalulation or a misinterpretation of evidence) than as "deceitful" or "willfully lying."

Even if the public sees the war as phony, that won't help them see the truth until they are shown why we REALLY went to war. That's a complex series of arguments involving Saudi Arabia, Halliburton, Caspian Sea Pipeline that nobody in the mainstream press has even gone near.

When one of us (or Viggo Mortensen on Charlie Rose) wears a t-shirt that says, "No blood for oil," people aren't saying "he's wrong" so much as they're saying, "Huh? What oil?"

If you rob a bank, people won't catch you unless they understand that there's money in that bank and that you took it. The "spoils" of war are still invisible to most Americans.

[junker]

1. I think you are inc orrec t in an assumption.

It would appear that the legs given to the presumed defunct NAT Guard issue is likely transference. That is, the public who cannot prove either way about Iraq War, merely respond to opinions, can get behind proof of lying. Even lying about stuff 30 years ago. If there is evidence that can be used to support their gut feeling that Bush is a liar by inclination/habit, then they will be able to 'apply' that gut feeling to the War. Their problem is that they were 'good citizens' and believed their president in a time of war and now find their kids at risk in Iraq War. WIth lives lost. So they do not, repeat -actively do not, want to believe the evidence about Iraq.

So given the situation, Bush skates as the 'good citizen' just like in Viet Nam does not want to self-admit that they supported a wrong thing like a bullshit war.

So to approach this and to overcome this natural reluctance of the people to believe ill of their previous positions, one must

Keep hammering the Bush Credibility Issue whenever, and whereever.
Basically the sub-text to everything said about Bush is that
He LIED about no-child left behind...so did he lie about Iraq?
He LIED about his TANG service...so did he lie about Iraq?
He Lied....you get the idea..

Now one need not ever, ever use the word 'lied' to get the point across, but the point must be that he lied. Not that he made a bad or incompetent decision. Unless one were to want to fight him on the 'bush stupidity factor'

[fleetus]

2. Good point.

The thing that has stood out in my mind is the articles I read pre-war about why (the real reasons) Bushco wanted to go to war (aka $$$). I was worried that this over-riding reason would be hidden under many other less significant "bonus" reasons to go to war. Slight WMD threat, possible terrorist links, etc. But the incredible thing is that the administration had to LIE about their "bonus" reasons too! As they are crumbing, you would think people would be pointing at the elephant in the room still standing among the pile of rubble. The one reason for going to war that still makes sense, and still stands, is the massive amounts of money being funneled from the public sector into the private sector to (step 1) level a country and (step 2) rebuild it! With all the other reasons vaporizing, it's just even _more_ obvious now.

Honestly, I think the media is afraid to mention it because it is so embarrassing to the country. It is also, in my opinion, an extremely criminal act, and so anyone ultra credible in the mass publics eye who accuses the administration of it better stand by for one massive counter-attack.

[cosmicdot]

3. to support 20th century fuel habits thru out-of-vogue geopolitics

oil?


destroy to rebuild w/gov't contracts (sort of a Republican WPA)


military base?