Wednesday, May 18, 2005

Galloway's Credibility

Galloway's rant yesterday in front of the committee investigating the oil for food program was to say the least, interesting. His statements read like an entry at the DU.
Galloway, an outspoken critic of the war in Iraq, called the Senate panel's investigation the "mother of all smokescreens" used to divert attention from the "pack of lies" that led to the 2003 invasion.
Does anyone else think perhaps Mr. Galloway protests just a little too much? Of course, vouchers for 20 Million barrels of oil and being found out can make one quite shrill.

Galloway, an outspoken critic of the war in Iraq, called the Senate panel's investigation the "mother of all smokescreens" used to divert attention from the "pack of lies" that led to the 2003 invasion.

"I told the world that Iraq, contrary to your claims, did not have weapons of mass destruction. I told the world, contrary to your claims, that Iraq had no connection to al Qaeda. I told the world, contrary to your claims, that Iraq had no connection to the atrocity on 9/11, 2001," he told Coleman.

"Senator, in everything I said about Iraq, I turned out to be right and you turned out to be wrong. And 100,000 people have paid with their lives -- 1,600 of them American soldiers sent to their deaths on a pack of lies, 15,000 of them wounded, many of them disabled forever, on a pack of lies."

He added, "Senator, this is the mother of all smokescreens. You are trying to divert attention from the crimes that you supported."
I'm going to guess that not all of the senators present supported the Iraq war, but that would be knit picking.

Though I must say that interesting bit of data on the civilian deaths is going to continue to live irrelevant of the further evidence that shows that the number of deaths was substantially less. An Article in the Times references a UN document which attributes only 24,000 deaths of civilians to the US led invasion and its aftermath. (I'm seeing arguments now that the number is irrelevant, which strikes me as odd since the same commenters are the ones which trumpeted the 100,000 victims number originally. That data was from the Lancet and is now very much in question, though very much out of the MSM.)

The information that the senate holds is obviously not 100% bullet proof. Though the documentation and testimony of the Iraqi officials appear to make a case stronger than Galloway made for his innocence. If that is the case that he made. From what I've read and seen, it looks more like he is using deflection on the topic making it appear that it is the US covering up and not him.

Being a politician, I'm not particularly surprised by Galloway's tactics. Though, I'd have given him more credence had he just answered the questions and not sat there bellowing conspiracy at the senators.

1 comment:

Granted said...

I didn't get to see much of him, but Fox had a clip on Brit Hume that included the Senator's response to the "I was right and you were wrong" quip. The Senator said, paraphrasing, "Well, since I voted against the war, you're wrong the facts, but..." and asked another question. From what I've seen & read, the evidence is pretty damning.