The lost art of critical thinking: WMDs

Amazing just how often the media and protestors complained that one of the justifications for going to war with Iraq – their development of chemical and nuclear weapons – was a lie.

Yet, people are either forgetting or unaware of the consensus in our government and intelligence community that Saddam Hussein either had chemical, biological and/or nuclear weapons or was developing them.

Iraq’s programs and intentions were fairly well known and, in fact, they had used them in the past against the Kurds. It’s not difficult to find scores of quotes and reports from Democrat lawmakers and intelligence community members discussing the reality and threat of Hussein’s programs.

When the United States took the war to Iraq after 9/11, we gave Hussein plenty of warning that we would be invading if he did not allow weapons inspectors back in the country or show some evidence of giving up WMD programs. The war appeared inevitable, and during that time, I never heard anyone ask a question that I mulled throughout: “With that much warning, why wouldn’t he simply move the program and it’s weapons out of the country?”

And that brings us to today. Today, even the New York Times acknowledges the obvious: evidence of chemical and biological weapons were found, and our intelligence community – the one that served both Clinton and Bush – were right all along.

Given 15 months warning, why wouldn’t Hussein move what he could? What’s amazing to me is how many people complained and took to the streets in protest without ever considering the very real possibility and likelihood that they were there all along.

But it was never about logic and facts. It was about making George Bush look bad. And now, as many have predicted, history is being a bit kinder and gentler to his presidency, even if his own administration was not.

Last fall, it was revealed that Karl Rove knew that WMD evidence was found, but he chose to suppress the information because he didn’t think that would help President Bush.

(Sigh) Yet another member of the worst marketing department in the history of the earth: the Republican Party. The media and the public is pouncing, like a shark to blood, on the idea that the President lied, and you don’t want to discuss the facts of the situation because… it’ll vindicate him? But that’s a different post…

So here we are now, in 2015, and the leaders of Iran routinely declare their intent to wipe Israel off the face of the earth. And when the leader of Israel shows up to speak at our nation’s capital, many Democrat leaders boycotted the speech by effectively putting their hands over their ears and yelling “la la la la la” by not attending.

Besides being extremely rude to an ally, it also shows a close-mindedness to the serious threat Israel and America faces to their existence. I find it fascinating that a country that’s working on a nuclear program actually declares its hatred for your country and its desire to destroy you and you don’t take it seriously.

And then we make fun of, or walk out on, Benjamin Netanyahu for taking this threat seriously and dealing with it proactively.

Assuming you’re not afraid of what you might hear, this is what Netanyahu had to say when he visited America:

The thing about listening, even when you think you’re not going to agree, is that you either affirm your own opinion, or maybe you consider the new evidence or point of view and refine your position. Both, in the end, are good things.

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