United Nations

BBC America, which is quickly going downhill (they used to air interesting British comedies and dramas…now it’s turned into the sci-fi british channel that, for some reason only God knows, airs Dancing With the Stars (it was utter crap on ABC, why air it on BBC America?!) is now airing the terrible news program, Newsnight. Jeremy Paxman is the host from what I can tell, and he seems to be a British version of the joke that is Krazy Keith Olbermann. He’s out of his mind crazy, makes utterly no sense, and can’t tell a complete truth to save his life.

I found his interview with John Bolton on youtube, and it gives you a great idea of what a wanker this guy is.

I just want to cover a few items from the interview.

He is clearly anti-war when it comes to Iraq. His idea of a better world would be one where Saddam Hussein (the butcher of Baghdad) was still a thriving despotic regime, murdering his own people at will.

No other explanation makes sense, as he complains to Bolton:

Paxman starts out with a short intro/biographical piece on Bolton where he narrates and says “he had no time for mulinational negotiations” in regards to Iraq. This is crap with a capital C. The Gulf War ended in 1991. Forces invaded again in 2003. That’s 12 years. 12 years spent at the UN Security Council passing a dozen resolutions…a dozen resolutions that were almost completely ignored by the Iraqi regime. The no-fly zones were put into place, and they were violated on a nearly daily basis. Anyone who claims there were no mutli-national negotiations on Iraq and the Hussein regime is either crazy, dishonest, or completely ignorant of all truth. I doubt Paxman is either crazy or ignorant of ALL truth, so we’re left with dishonest.

So, there were negotiations, and the US and allied nations agreed that we couldn’t wait for the UN to hold another 12 years of meetings or issue another dozen resolutions on the situation. There had to come a time to stop pussyfooting around and finally act.

Paxman then states his opinion that Iraq is in terrible shape (worse than with Hussein the murderous dictator) and then claims there was an “absence of planning” following the invasion. Now, this is common anti-Bush, anti-war nonsense. No one who has being serious and is sane is going to claim there was no post-invasion planning. You can argue the planning wasn’t very well thought out maybe- that would be a reasonable argument, but to argue there was no planning is just silly and should be embarassing to anyone making such a claim. It would take a fool to think the Bush admin, the US armed forces commander’s, the advisors, etc. said “let’s invade and oust the regime. What comes after that, we’ve no idea, and who cares? No planning is necessary.”

So, there was clearly a lot of planning, and Bolton said the problem with the plan was not to rely more on the Iraqis. You can argue that was a mistake, as Bolton does, but to say there was no planning is BS.

Paxman complains that Bolton says we don’t have an ultimate responsibility to ensure the Iraqi government succeeds. Our national interests lie in making sure it’s not a haven for terrorist groups who take over the entire country in an effort to use the nation and its resources and protections offered as being a soverign nation to launch attacks against the US. Point is- we can’t be in charge of everyone and make sure everyone on earth is happy and in peace. Paxman confuses here, as he’s clearly against the Iraq war, yet he has no problem demanding Bolton support the notion of ensuring a civil, peaceful, happy Iraq. It’s sort of the common liberal idea of late- don’t go into Iraq and remove a murderous despot, but you damned better make sure the Iraqi people live in peace now. What on earth do these people think the original point was? The regime posed a threat not only to the US and her allies, but to the entire world to some degree. Despots tend to pose threats in a broad general sense and cause trouble in a broad manner.

Paxman then complains:

“What do you say to those people who turn to you and say- ‘okay, Saddam Hussein was a dictator, but Iraq was not then a failed state, and it was not a haven for terrorists, and that’s precisely what you’ve created in Iraq.”

This question is absurd. A hypothetical question from a lunatic? I would say, no questions from crazies, next question!

Bolton’s answer is quite reasonable- you’d rather live under a brutal dictator as opposed to a failed state, that’s your choice, but it’s not what I’d want. And really- who would?! We know, we know Iraq was a peaceful heaven under Saddam before the big bad Americans and allies came in and destroyed that peace.

Bolton elaborates that Hussein used WMD against Iran and the war against them, he used them against the Kurds in his own nation, and he kept thousands of top nuclear scientists around to one day try to start up his nuclear program. All fair points- a man who does such a thing surely constitutes a threat to all people.

Paxman interrupts to say there were no WMD. Which is beside the point. The point was- all intel from numerous nations said there were WMD and the idea was, in a global age of terrorism, it’s better to be safe than sorry. By looking at the history of the regime, you knew he had at least twice before used deadly weapons, threatened his neighbors, the US and allies, and others…kept a system of terrorism alive in Iraq itself, trained and harbored terrorists within Iraq, etc. The idea was- put an end to it before he has even a chance to start it all up again…end it before we find out too late that he does, indeed, have deadly stockpiles. No doubt, he spent 12 years refusing to cooperate with hundreds of UN inspectors…refusal to cooperate usually means something, and it’s usually something very bad.

Bolton goes on to attempt to explain that Hussein had the intent, he had the scientists with the knowledge, the raw materials, and more..and that was where the danger lied.

Paxman then claims “But this claim turned out to be a lie, Mr. Bolton, didn’t it?”

This is the most common anti-war bit of nonsense. There is absolutely no evidence anyone, and I mean ANYONE, lied about Iraq and WMD. WMD was NEVER the sole reason for ousting the regime, and ultimately, looking at the big picture, it wasn’t the biggest reason…so, this is complete nonsense to even make such a claim. There was no lie, there is no evidence of a lie, and it’s garbage to make a claim that any such lie ever existed.

In the end Paxman comes off looking not only silly but downright deceptive. One has got to wonder if this is a common British problem (or just one suffered by Paxman only)- looking at the evidence, not looking at the evidence, looking past the evidence and projecting your own anti-Bush, anti-American bias to every issue.

I’d certainly have a hard time taking anything he says seriously after this mess of the facts in his interview with Bolton. I haven’t seen enough of his interviews to say what sort of jounralist he is in full, but with a shoddy performance like this, you can’t help but question anything he says. If I can get the facts straight, yet he can’t with what I assume is a staff of fact-checkers and journalists, then there’s a big problem.

I found this interview with Paxman and George Galloway and Paxman actually looks like the bigger fool here. (amazing, as Galloway is one of the craziest politicians on earth. I honestly believe Galloway actually suffers from some form of mental retardation.) Paxman comes off as Jerry Springer, whose only goal is to try to make others look foolish. I sure hope this isn’t the state of British journalism…