I’m putting this here mostly so I can find it when I need it. To quote the Downing Street memo:
“the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy”
Yep, I know – old news, but it actually is oh so applicable as time goes on.
What do I mean? I mean humans, me included, tend to filter our “facts” or find ways to shape them to our preconcieved goals. For instance making a mockery out of the words of Jesus or going totally bonkers on what our ForefathersTM intended.
While it does seem as of late that it’s mostly a conservative pre-occupation, I have no illusion that liberals, including myself, do it to. We humans have a way of seeing only what we want to see and choice picking the facts to support an end we already have chosen. Happens in (so called) science too.
PS: On a related line, despite the damning Downing Street memo, pretty much not a bloody thing happened other than maybe G.W.’s polling numbers went down (if that – it probably was more that we were losing than that we went in over a lie). When you consider that in some more civilized cultures one could call creating a war over a lie a “war crime”, it’s pretty pathetic really.
I honestly never thought I would live to see the crap I have (false wars, torture, indefinite detention, executive sponsored assassination, habeas corpus denial, kangaroo military tribunals, etc. etc.), but I have. Worse hardly anyone gives a damn, which has really made me question the soul of my nation that I once loved so much.
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