Questions to Condi.

Listening to some of the questions asked of Dr. Rice at her hearing today made me think that some of those Senators are lost in space. Sen. Chaffee(R-RI) and Sen. Boxer(D-CA) more specifically.

Condi said, " But Senator Boxer, we went to war not because of aluminum tubes. We went to war because this was the threat of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of a man against whom we had gone to war before, who threatened his neighbors, who threatened our interests, who was one of the world's most brutal dictators. And it was high time to get rid of him, and I'm glad that we're rid of him."

Boxer replied, " And, if I might say, again you said you're aware of the stakes in Iraq; we sent our beautiful people -- and thank you, thank you so much for your comments about them -- to defend freedom. You sent them in there because of weapons of mass destruction. Later, the mission changed when there were none. I have your quotes on it. I have the president's quotes on it.

And everybody admits it but you that that was the reason for the war. And then, once we're in there, now it moves to a different mission, which is great. We all want to give democracy and freedom everywhere we can possibly do it. But let's not rewrite history. It's too soon to do that."

Now notice the bolds...

Condi says we went to war because we were worried about WMDs in the hands of Saddam. Then, Boxer...who seems not to have heard a word she said replies, that everyone but Condi admits we went to war over WMDs.

Is she on crack?

And of course the mission changed. There were phases to the campaign...for those of you who don't know how military campaigns are run.

First phase was the removal of Saddam from power...which, unless you live in a barn, knows was a complete success. (though when the President pointed that out on the carrier Abe Lincoln, some people thought otherwise...again, they must live in a barn).

Each succeeding phase has been dealing with the rebuilding of Iraq. We are at the fourth phase now, which are elections.

You can get this exchange in text here.

Next, ol' Chaffee...and I swear to God. Once I get out of the Army I'm going to run against him... I realize that in a liberal state, such as RI, you have to be atleast a moderate for a Republican to win in the state...but he isn't...not even close. I think he's trying to swindle the people of RI in a quite clever way.

He runs as a Republican to get some of those Conservative sheep that don't pay attention and just vote for who ever the Republican candidate is, and then he gets all of the far left in the state to vote for him too.

Anyway...back to the subject.

I couldn't find a transcript of this exchange(so I'm paraphrasing and can't vouch for its complete accuracy) but basically it's Chaffee asking why we treat some nations one way and other nations another way. He used Venezuala and Kazakstan as the examples.

Dr. Rice had to explain to him (a member of the foriegn relations committee for God's sake) that each country is different so each require a different approach and that we expect some countries to be further along than others. Kazakstan is a newer Democracy than Venezuala and there are different forces at work in each nation.

Pretty sad that she had to explain that to someone who is supposed to be an expert in the field.