Originally posted by kegs
Pollsters asked more than 9,000 Americans about three commonly held canards: that the United States had hard evidence Saddam Hussein had been working closely with al-Qaida; that weapons of mass destruction had been found in Iraq; and that world public opinion was in favor of the U.S.-led war.
There was evidence prior to the invasion that al Qaeda had met with Iraqis prior to 9/11 and that Zarqawi travelled to and from Iraq at will. There are certainly questions about the extent of collaboration between Iraq and al Qaeda, but that such a link existed is hard to deny. Even if FOX News viewers hold the view that there was a direct link between the two, it has not been proven that no such link existed, just as it has not been proven that a Saddam had links to the planning of the attack.
www.weeklystandard.com...
abcnews.go.com...
Weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq. We have not found large stockpiles or evidence that any were made after 1991.
Why are we having such difficulty in finding weapons or in reaching a confident conclusion that they do not exist or that they once existed but have been removed? Our search efforts are being hindered by six principal factors:
From birth all of Iraq's WMD activities were highly compartmentalized within a regime that ruled and kept its secrets through fear and terror and with deception and denial built into each program;
Deliberate dispersal and destruction of material and documentation related to weapons programs began pre-conflict and ran trans-to-post conflict;
Post-OIF looting destroyed or dispersed important and easily collectable material and forensic evidence concerning Iraq's WMD program. As the report covers in detail, significant elements of this looting were carried out in a systematic and deliberate manner, with the clear aim of concealing pre-OIF activities of Saddam's regime;
Some WMD personnel crossed borders in the pre/trans conflict period and may have taken evidence and even weapons-related materials with them;
Any actual WMD weapons or material is likely to be small in relation to the total conventional armaments footprint and difficult to near impossible to identify with normal search procedures. It is important to keep in mind that even the bulkiest materials we are searching for, in the quantities we would expect to find, can be concealed in spaces not much larger than a two car garage;
The environment in Iraq remains far from permissive for our activities, with many Iraqis that we talk to reporting threats and overt acts of intimidation and our own personnel being the subject of threats and attacks. In September alone we have had three attacks on ISG facilities or teams: The ISG base in Irbil was bombed and four staff injured, two very seriously; a two person team had their vehicle blocked by gunmen and only escaped by firing back through their own windshield; and on Wednesday, 24 September, the ISG Headquarters in Baghdad again was subject to mortar attack.
We have discovered dozens of WMD-related program activities and significant amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the United Nations during the inspections that began in late 2002. The discovery of these deliberate concealment efforts have come about both through the admissions of Iraqi scientists and officials concerning information they deliberately withheld and through physical evidence of equipment and activities that ISG has discovered that should have been declared to the UN. Let me just give you a few examples of these concealment efforts, some of which I will elaborate on later:
www.cia.gov...
www.cia.gov...
www.gwu.edu...
Sarin, Mustard Gas Discovered Separately in Iraq
Monday, May 17, 2004
BAGHDAD, Iraq — A roadside bomb containing sarin nerve agent (search) recently exploded near a U.S. military convoy, the U.S. military said Monday.
Bush administration officials told Fox News that mustard gas (search) was also recently discovered.
Two people were treated for "minor exposure" after the sarin incident but no serious injuries were reported. Soldiers transporting the shell for inspection suffered symptoms consistent with low-level chemical exposure, which is what led to the discovery, a U.S. official told Fox News.
www.foxnews.com...
As far as support for the war is concerned, I can't find any reliable information on this, now.
Quoting from the article in question:
Fox News Senior Vice President John Moody retorted that the study only asked people about "their impressions, not what they knew to be true."
I'm not sure what point he thought he was making, but it was lost on me.
I'll tell you what point he was making. He was saying that respondents were synthesizing the news with their own gut reactions to the situation and were reporting that instead of what the evidence concretely states, which is what the questionnaire asked for.
Let us bear in mind who wrote this article and also the fact that it is personal opinion. And that it was written nearly a year ago.
Commentary: Misleading America
By Shaun Waterman
UPI Homeland and National Security Editor
Published 10/20/2003 12:41 PM
But let us consider the last paragraph of the article that supports one of FOX's other mottoes, "We report; you decide."
The bottom line? Maybe Fox isn't to blame for misleading their viewers after all. Perhaps they are simply reporting less critically than other networks the highly misleading statements of the country's leaders.
Frankly, I think the person who wrote this article is ignorant.
