Discussion: Former Bush Press Secretary Forgets The Year U.S. Invaded Iraq

TPM Article Topics
21

Yep, around 1991.

4 Likes
22

What a surprise. A press secretary who doesn’t know what he is talking about

23

I too am surprised when i read it was really 2003.

Invading Iraq seemed to be the very next thing on the agenda on September 12, 2001

4 Likes
24

Exactly. The start of war (“When was that anyway??”) means so little when no child, relative or close friend had to put his/her life on the line. And those 100,00 Iraqis? - meh . .

1 Like
25

Should have just stolen cattle feed instead. They let you off for that you know.

26

It was—and before that, really.

They just waited for theatrical effect.

1 Like
27

I remember it well since I hit the streets with a couple thousand of my close friends in protest just days later.

2 Likes
28

Oh, come on. The war process was well underway in 2002 and he was inside the building, living it. This is a trivial error.

1 Like
29

No, Ari. 2002 was the year that the GOP re-took the Senate, giving Cheney permission to ignore deficits. “Reagan proved that deficits don’t matter. This is our due.”
The war started the next year and wasn’t expected to last more than 3 months and was expected to pay for itself with the liberated oil revenue.

4 Likes
30

He can’t be expected to remember that. He had a lot to do after being replaced by the bubblehead Dana Perino.

31

Trying to keep up with all those lies is bound to cause confusion. Poor Ari.

3 Likes
32

So true! I was at a conference in November 2002. Ended up at a table with business professors from some Texas university (I don’t remember which one). One guy at the table was a big shot in National Guard and had been called up so would not be teaching in the Spring semester. He said the war was on. When I countered that Bush said he had not decided, he laughed and said “We’re going to take his oil.” In fact, numerous times throughout the evening he said, “We’re going to take his oil.” On the walk back to our hotel, my wife and I would burst out “We’re going to take his oil” and laugh. Not laughing that the dead folks we knew were coming but at the jackass business professor who was so “happy” he was going to war.

4 Likes
33

Yeah, that old will they/won’t they thing worked so well on Friends, why wouldn’t it work if foreign policy?

34

bush boys broke it and they blame Obama for not fixing it. jsfox says it so succinctly.

1 Like
35

So he is arguing that his former boss fucked up in not getting Iraq to agree to permanent occupation and that is the course of action we should have taken in Iraq?

4 Likes
36

If the success were, indeed, successes and they were lost and abandoned, that’s due to the free state of Iraq, not for any lack of effort on the part of the US. This stabbed-in-the-back crap went out of fashion with the Nazis.

37

Let me see, if I recall correctly, it was the Year of Our Sith Lord Cheney 2003…

5 Likes
38

Ari Fleischer, a member of PNAC.

4 Likes
39

Ari, haven’t you forgotten…mission accomplished?

If the mission was accomplished, why is what’s happening there now, President Obama’s fault?

Even old mc warmonger says, “we won”!

So, if “we won”, what is your argument for keeping our troops on the ground there?

40

The new meme and soon-to-be article of faith: Bush and Dave “All in Paula” Petraeus won Iraq, but then Obama lost it!

5 Likes