Oliver North warned of Osama bin Laden during Iran-Contra hearings

[AllieB]

Have you heard this urban legend? Believe it or not, I just received it in my email box. For the 100th time. It appears that the right wing are so freaked out about Abramoff, spying, and all their other failures that they are dragging out old canards.

From Snopes:
Claim: During the 1987 Iran-Contra hearings, Oliver North warned Congress that Osama bin Laden was "the most evil person alive" and that "an assassin team be formed to eliminate him and his men from the face of the earth."

FALSE!!!

http://www.snopes.com/rumors/north.asp

I not only copied everyone on her distribution list, but everyone on the forwarded message distribution list! We're talking 100 people. :evilgrin:

My reply:

Hi Uncle Joe,

How are you? I hope you're enjoying the weather. It hasn't been so bad up here yet, but we aren't even half way through winter.

FYI, this Ollie North email is an 'urban legend'. There is a great non-partisan website called snopes.com which thoroughly debunks this scenario. Snopes.com is a great resource when you are sent these kind of chain emails that prey upon your fears and baser instincts. I have included the link below.

Notice that you don't see any links to Ollie North's testimony, because it NEVER happened. If it doesn't have a verifiable link, it isn't true. Blaming Clinton for bin Laden is like blaming FDR for Vietnam. However, the August 6, 2001 White House memo entitled 'Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the United States', illustrated that the Bush administration was more concerned with tax cuts and finding reasons to attack Iraq than protecting Americans. This was revealed by the 9-11 Commission and many other non-partisan sources. If we're so much safer, how come we heard from our old nemesis Osama just today?

As the article points out, there are way too many historical inconsistencies for this to be true.

XXOO Allie




What do you think? Am I a bad niece? To be fair, my older sister put me up to it! :o

[MnFats]

1. no, no. inform him. be a good neice. don't mock or taunt...

...but this bullshit goes around and around and every time it fits, however vaguely, the politics of the moment, it's dragged around again.
It really pisses me off.....

I got one the other day....that old chestnut about Captain Kangaroo saving Lee Marvin's life on Iwo Jima. you could look it up, as Yogi Berra used to say.

[AllieB]

2. I thought I was being nice

:-(

I actually cut and pasted the whole entry into snopes so he didn't have to click on the link. I know my yahoo account will now be bombarded by his RW friends. Both my parents, who are Dems, will probably think I was being disrespectful.

[CanuckAmok]

5. Yeah, I ca discredit that one, right now: Lee Marvin is dead.

Nice work, "Captain" Kangaroo.

Officers... meh.

[MnFats]

13. He wasn't during WWII and did serve in the Marines...

...but Bob Keeshan, who played Capt. Kangaroo didn't save his life.
...Keeshan, too, WAS an ex-marine.

[Tiggeroshii]

3. I got this from my grandma and replied, but not as nicely.

I just said that it's not true and it has been debunked by every nonpartisan source you can think of including the Senate Research committees

[CanuckAmok]

4. It doesn't matter...

I hate to be an armchair cynic, but the problem with Bushites is that as soon as you discredit their wacky finger-pointing conspiracies, they say the source (no matter how non-partisan and/or credible) is a "tool of the LIEberal media".

There's no winning with any sort of reason.

That's why I choose to beat them about the heads with a shovel.

[AllieB]

6. Rational thought and critical thinking are non-existent

I'm not a violent sort, and I'm not usually so confrontational. I just choose to throw facts at them. Eventually, one or two may sink in. :-)

[AlGore-08.com]

14. You can try including a link to this debunking article from Townhall.com

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/lindachavez/2002/01/22/162203.html

IMNSHO, it has the best chance of getting Conservatives to believe it.

Or explain that Oliver North debunked it, and his debunking is available to read on the Snopes.com site. (It's part of the article at the link you provided.)

If the version you receive claims Gore was the Senator interviewing Oliver North, it's even easier to prove the email is bogus, because North was questioned by the Committee Council (John Nields), not a Senator. And Gore wasn't a member of the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition. (So even if a Senator had questioned North, it couldn't have been Gore.)

[AllieB]

17. It was late and I didn't think of that

but I will do this next time!

[Octafish]

7. Abu Nidal threatened Ollie the Traitor.

Nidal threatened, so the story goes, the nutjob and his family.

The story was used during Iran-Contra to deflect attention away from the facts that North had moved millions into Switzerland from the Caymans and had diverted some of the funds for personal use. One of his purchases we know about is a very expensive security fence around his house.

Ask Ollie about drugs.

[SoCalDem]

8. Bzzzzt.. It was Abu Nidal...not bin Laden

the rightwingers know it's safe to spread these nonsense talking points because rightwingers will gladly spread lies, and have no capability or curiosity to check the veracity of the "urgent email"..:)

[Catrina]

9. Besides, Osama was working for Reagan in the eighties!! Can't rightwingers

get anything right?

[KC21304]

10. When I reply TO ALL in these situations I always

point out that it takes a very hatefull person to make up something like this knowing it will be sent around the world. Of course we know Republicans are sooo good at it.

[TahitiNut]

11. I say something similar, and then I add ...

"Don't you think folks who'd blame a former administration for major security failures like 9-11 could make their case without peddling such transparent hoaxes?"

[alfredo]

12. I ask them why do Republicans lie to their own people?

I then direct them to the snopes site and tell them to type "Hillary" in the search field and read the entries to see how many are true.

[Swamp Rat]

15. AND, why aren't their children in Iraq fighting for America?

Indeed, why are republicans at home right now?

Why isn't EVERY SINGLE ONE of them volunteering for war?

[alfredo]

16. Well, unlike those lower class people,

their lives are important, they have a future. :sarcasm: