Study: Bush, Other Officials Issued Hundreds of False Statements Before Iraq Invasion

Originally posted by mythatsabigprobe

If it was funded by Soros I'm sure you'll have the evidence, but so far you're the only one saying it.

Oops, nope, it turns out that 3thEye had already posted about it, and I didn't take the time to fully read his post. Sorry bout that. Thanks for the info 3thEye. I wasn't sure I'd heard correctly.

That would change the facts how though?

It looks like WuTang already started to provide ideas on that too. I should have taken the time to read the thread better. Sorry.

Thanks bigprobe for your helpful post.

[edit on 1/24/08 by makeitso]

Clearly the United States is in need of terminating the Republican Party and the Democratic Party's "contract" with the nation.

I hope US Americans will vote "No" against the Republicans and Democrats, and instead vote Libertarian, Green, Constitution or another third party.

You in the USA need an electoral revolution that throws out the Republicans and Democrats at the federal level and within each U.S. State, commonwealth, and territory.

Did anyone here mention that these non-profit groups that did this study were funded by George Soros?

What the AP forgets to mention is that the "two nonprofit journalism organizations" can hardly be imagined to be impartial. The Center for Public Integrity (CPI) is funded by well-known leftist, George Soros, as well as the Streisand Foundation, the Ford Foundation, and the Los Angeles Times Foundation -- all of which are exclusively leftist in political philosophy. Even more ridiculously, the second of these "non-profit journalism organizations" shares most of its board members with the first. So, the Fund for Independence in Journalism can hardly be considered a separate entity from the CPI.
source

Shocking that a George Soros funded group would find fault with George Bush.

Wait, this just in. A non-profit group (funded by McDonalds) has found that burgers are actually good for you. And another non-profit group (funded by the tobacco industry) has found that smoking makes you look cooler than you acutally are.

I can't wait to see the results on Iraq that come out from the non-profit group funded by Halliburton. This is anything but honest journalism.

EDIT: I see mythatsabigprobe already mentioned this. Glad to see everyone is still looking into this "story".

[edit on 24-1-2008 by dbates]

reply to post by dbates


I guess the big picture isn't important these days. Did you really need George Soros, or any other group for that matter, to tell you that this administration is full of it?

I think a better analogy would be McDonalds blocks all groups from investigating the contents of the food. So Subway, instead of looking at the food, does an investigation of it's customers weight. Sure, Subway has something to gain, but they are just telling us what we already knew anyway. People that eat McDonalds regularly, without regular exercise, are fatties.

The point of the analogy is we can't get any real facts. It's all classified, national security related, or something is under investigation so it can't be revealed... the list goes on. But we don't need it. It's hiding in plain sight.

Look, if you want to lie to yourself, that's fine. Keep eating 5000 calories at each meal and keep letting politicians lie to you without caring. If the day comes where someone you are close to goes to Iraq and dies, keep saying it was for a just cause. Hey, you don't need to know why they died. It was for America!

[Too far off topic for my own good ]

[edit on 24-1-2008 by Mindless]

Well, you know the old saying about lies, damn lies and statistics - except in this case the stats point to even more lies.

Todays politicians don't seem to have reconciled themselves to the fact that we are living in the age of info, and that they WILL get found out - on a much larger scale than even 10 years ago.

But can you blame a politician for doing what politicians do?
I mean if a dog pee's on a lamp post it's not being a vandal, it's just being a dog.

So should we really get upset when politicians lie? After all, it seems to be in their nature.

That said, I DO still get cheesed off, and will doubtless continue to do so for as long as politicians lie.

reply to post by makeitso


If it had been funded by rupurt murdoch wouldn't it be saying that bush minor told the truth 100% of the time?

If it was funded by Soros, just because he is opposed to bush does that automatically mean its a lie?

Hardly... bush minor's lies are so transparent and childish my dog doesn't even believe him... am I suggesting my dog is smarter than some who post here.... most definately.

reply to post by grover


They have jaded views. One of them compared him doing the data gathering to McDonalds doing a study on itself.

How jaded is that? That only holds water if someone from inside the Bush Administration - or related to it - did the study.

In all reality, the comparison that dbates was looking for - when in relation to McDonalds - is if a group for heathly living did a study on McDonalds.

That doesn't help his view though, because those groups are the main people who do those studies. He needed a faulty analogy to explain his faulty view. This explains why he used an analogy that made no sense.

The analogy is extreme to point out the problem. I just think in the interest of full disclosure it should be noted where the money comes from for this study. I never stated that the findings were 100% false or that no one did in fact lie. I just have a hard time believing that it's a complete story given the background.

Originally posted by dbates
I just think in the interest of full disclosure it should be noted where the money comes from for this study. I never stated that the findings were 100% false or that no one did in fact lie. I just have a hard time believing that it's a complete story given the background.

Jeez guys, sure hate for this to get derailed like so many others into a discussion of sources. I've used rawstory for years and not had too much problems, and I'm not the only ATS member to do so.

So is this it? Are we calling "foul" on rawstory from now on? Are we confined to using CNN and Fox from now on? I mean jeez, I thought a critical feature of ATS was the fact that we are an ALTERNATIVE news source. That means OUTSIDE the mainstream.

Well dbates, if we were to pursue funding sources on all alternative and MSM sources, what do you think we'd find? Conflicts of interest all over the place. Hell, I just recently posted a story from JudicialWatch.org, and got bitched at over that, too. So I want to know what even is the point of bringing stories here to discuss, if everyone's going to argue sources. To a degree, maybe yes. But rawstory?

I have tried to address this problem in the past at ATS, and the general consensus was that it is best to argue the message and not the source. This happens so much that it seems some kind of site policy on "acceptable" sources might be in order. I have suggested before that that we develop up a list and have the membership vote on it. No go. So how do you propose to fix this "source" problem?

reply to post by TrueAmerican


I think that dbates was referring to the groups who conducted the study rather than the source of the news.
I mentioned in an earlier post that I had seen this on several news sites - the original story came from AP.

Personally, I think it's a good thing to question the motives of ANY study - isn't that how we deny ignorance?

Originally posted by budski
I think that dbates was referring to the groups who conducted the study rather than the source of the news.

Yes, exactly. If it's not clear I didn't have any issue with the news source.

Originally posted by budski
I mentioned in an earlier post that I had seen this on several news sites - the original story came from AP.

Well I was just about to bring another story here last night from rawstory, and this time I did go and check the link that rawstory used for AP. And guess what? It wasn't there. No story. *Poof* gone. So I didn't do it.

Personally, I think it's a good thing to question the motives of ANY study - isn't that how we deny ignorance?

Well yes, and no. I don't know, there's a fine line there. If I had to list the criteria by which I judge information it would go something like this, in order of importance:

1. Content
2. Cross-verification from other sources
3. Likelihood given other circumstances that are occurring
4. The source itself- truthfulness, reputation, consistency, accuracy
5. Motive

But that's just my list, and I really did not spend a whole lot of time thinking about it... Everyone else's list may be different, and I realize that.

But still, the tendency to stoop to arguing sources when the information is not palatable, especially when the source has been a long term, trusted supplier of information- is something that we could use less of around here. That's all I'm saying. Because it makes it very frustrating to continue.

edit to add: I just saw the above posts. Ahh, no. Questioning the motives of the groups funding the study is:

1) not necessarily indicative of what results the study will produce. If that were the case, we should not trust any study from anywhere.

2) the same as questioning the motives of the news source publishing the study. Because now you are saying that the news source is aligning themselves with the motives of the funding sources, which is absurd, because of point 1.

I am sorry, but I am going to have to disagree. But it's nice to be able to so with respectable company.

[edit on 24-1-2008 by TrueAmerican]

I agree. You should question studies. I don't agree with discrediting studies just by mentioning the source.

I don't care who conducted it, discredit the results or move on. It's disheartening to watch good threads get derailed on nonissues such as this.

It's irrelevant who funded the study. Is there anything in the contents that you have found a problem with? If not, then there's nothing to discuss.

Edited to add:

I see True American beat me to it. Glad to see someone agrees with me.

Posting the source and nothing else as evidence to fraud is circumstantial and superficial. Certainly included in any "Strawman Arguments 101" book.

[edit on 24-1-2008 by Sublime620]

[edit on 24-1-2008 by Sublime620]

read my edit above please you guys...

If we have to speak in analogies, here's mine.

In 2002 George Bush's administration claimed 935 times that Iraq was a threat to the United States.
Cost to the Nation: 3500+ Combat Deaths, 800+ Billion Dollars, 55,000+ Iraqi Deaths, 1,000,000+ Iraqi refugees, The Middle East in Turmoil.

In 2008 George Soros's organization tallied up the lies.
Cost to the Nation: Nothing.

Speaking up for the truth: Priceless

reply to post by TrueAmerican


I agree up to a point - but what if a study concluded that war was good?
Would it not be right and proper to question the motives of the study?
And if it was right to question those motives, why not question all motives for study's?
It doesn't make the study any less relevant or valuable, but it may give an insight into what they were trying to achieve and why.

An extreme analogy, I know, but it makes my point

reply to post by budski


Sure you would. However, you couldn't just say this study is neo-conservative.

You could say: "This study is neo-conservative and also here's some errors I've found within it".

That is a productive statement. A biased statement, but productive. The above statements about who funded this study are not productive, because as stated before, they are only using superficial arguments.

Strawmans at their best.

So now that my research debunking this "report" is 3 pages deep, you all suddenly begin to discuss the authenticity of this report? LOOK AT THE REPORT PEOPLE. Look at their flawed methodology (which they don't even adhere to in the first place). This report is clearly produced by a left wing think tank. The outcome of this research had been clearly predetermined, long before one piece of rhetoric was ever analyzed. Instead of having petty partisan arguments about the ethics of this war (it's not like there aren't millions of other threads out there for you to do that), lets try to focus on the topic of this thread, which is the report: Iraq: The War Card. Did anyone actually try to read the report? Did anyone even read the article about the report?

PLEASE STAY ON TOPIC
I was so excited to have a discussion about the strategies and data involved in political rhetoric. I am severely disappointed that all I can participate in (which I refuse to) is a bunch of mud slinging that has little to do with the topic on hand.

I would say as a general rule of thumb that you should take at least 45 minutes to look through this "study" before contributing to this thread, or else you're just another fish out of water.

EDIT: Thank you makeitso for actually reading the thread, and indeed if you do what I did and look at their data, they selectively choose bits and pieces to emphasize their point (BUNK SCIENCE).

EDIT 2: I also just wanted to point out the immense irony in lying about your methods of data collection for a study analyzing lies in rhetoric. Is it right to lie in order to exaggerate the lies of another?

The more I read through this "study" the more I see one giant piece of political rhetoric, and the less I see a "study" anyways, so maybe I should analyze how many times they lie? More or less frequently than they claim those 8 officials did? (that one was for you Sublime

, frequency is key!)

[edit on 24-1-2008 by WuTang]

reply to post by budski

Now, you're thinking the same way I did when I initially saw this report. The usual skeptical crowd that frowns on these reports was missing and in it's place was what looked mostly like "O boy! Bush lied". Comments about the funding seemed to be discarded. If this is a honest report without an agenda then I'm on board 100%. I'm just not so sure.