Quotes of the Morning: Fearless Leader Explains

“Nearly six years after the 9/11 attacks, America remains a nation at war. The terrorist network that attacked us that day is determined to strike our country again, and we must do everything in our power to stop them. A key lesson of September the 11th is that the best way to protect America is to go on the offense, to fight the terrorists overseas so we don't have to face them here at home. And that is exactly what our men and women in uniform are doing across the world.
The key theater in this global war is Iraq.”
-George ‘Dubya’ Bush, July 24, 2007

“So we went into Iraq in order to fight the terrorists after 9-11?”
-Skippy

“Because Bush has told the public that Iraq is central to the war on terror, the worse things go in Iraq, the more the public thinks the war on terror is going badly. Asked at his press conference what invading Iraq had to do with Sept. 11, Bush seemed so dumbfounded that at first he answered directly. ‘Nothing,’ he said, before sliding into a falsely aggrieved self-defense – ‘except for it's part of -- and nobody has ever suggested in this administration that Saddam Hussein ordered the attack.’"
-Salon, August 24, 2006

“But I thought it had to do with Saddam. How is the War on Terror linked to our removing Saddam from power?”
-Skippy

“The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al-Qaida, because there was a relationship between Iraq and al-Qaida. This administration never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and al-Qaida. We did say there were numerous contacts between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida.”
-George ‘Dubya’ Bush, June 18, 2004

“So it had to do with terrorism, but Saddam wasn’t in charge. So al Qaeda was there and Saddam was supporting them?”
-Skippy

“A taped message believed to be from fugitive militant Osama bin Laden on Tuesday warned Arab nations against supporting a war against Iraq as threatened by the United States -- but branded Saddam Hussein an infidel.”
-Reuters, February 11, 2003

“I’m confused.. It certainly sounds like al Qaeda wasn’t an issue in Iraq until after we invaded.”
-Skippy

“Some note that al Qaida in Iraq did not exist until the U.S. invasion -- and argue that it is a problem of our own making. The argument follows the flawed logic that terrorism is caused by American actions. Iraq is not the reason that the terrorists are at war with us. We were not in Iraq when the terrorists bombed the World Trade Center in 1993. We were not in Iraq when they attacked our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. We were not in Iraq when they attacked the USS Cole in 2000. And we were not in Iraq on September the 11th, 2001.”
-George ‘Dubya’ Bush, July 24, 2007

“Ah.. So al Qaeda in Iraq is really just the same group that hit us on 9-11?”
-Skippy

“They know they're al Qaida. The Iraqi people know they are al Qaida. People across the Muslim world know they are al Qaida. And there's a good reason they are called al Qaida in Iraq: They are al Qaida ... in ... Iraq.”
-George ‘Dubya’ Bush, July 24, 2007

“Thank you sir, but you don’t need to be so condescending. I was just trying to figure out how al Qaeda managed to become big in Iraq since it doesn’t seem like they were really all that involved there before.”
-Skippy

“A good place to start is with some basic facts: Al Qaeda in Iraq was founded by a Jordanian terrorist, not an Iraqi. His name was Abu Musab al Zarqawi. Before 9/11, he ran a terrorist camp in Afghanistan. He was not yet a member of al Qaida, but our intelligence community reports that he had longstanding relations with senior al Qaida leaders, that he had met with Osama bin Laden and his chief deputy, Zawahiri.
In 2001, coalition forces destroyed Zarqawi's Afghan training camp, and he fled the country and he went to Iraq, where he set up operations with terrorist associates long before the arrival of coalition forces. In the violence and instability following Saddam's fall, Zarqawi was able to expand dramatically the size, scope, and lethality of his operation.”
-George ‘Dubya’ Bush, July 24, 2007

“Oh. So what you are telling me is that al Qaeda in Iraq was actually founded in Iraq after 9-11, and really didn’t gain any power until the chaos and instability caused by your half-assed invasion. They must have grown pretty quickly. How did that happen?”
-Skippy

“According to our intelligence community, the Zarqawi-bin Laden merger gave al Qaida in Iraq -- quote – ‘prestige among potential recruits and financiers.’ The merger also gave al Qaida's senior leadership -- quote – ‘a foothold in Iraq to extend its geographic presence ... to plot external operations ... and to tout the centrality of the jihad in Iraq to solicit direct monetary support elsewhere.’"
-George ‘Dubya’ Bush, July 24, 2007

“Huh… So we actually increased Zarqawi’s reputation by invading, and that helped him to build up to the point of becoming an actual threat to America. Scary. You’re sure that there is no distinction between the guys that are currently rebuilding in Pakistan and the ones that we are fighting in Iraq?”
-Skippy

“You might wonder why some in Washington insist on making this distinction about the enemy in Iraq. It's because they know that if they can convince America we're not fighting bin Laden's al Qaida there, they can paint the battle in Iraq as a distraction from the real war on terror. If we're not fighting bin Laden's al Qaida, they can argue that our nation can pull out of Iraq and not undermine our efforts in the war on terror. The problem they have is with the facts. We are fighting bin Laden's al Qaida in Iraq; Iraq is central to the war on terror; and against this enemy, America can accept nothing less than complete victory.”
-George ‘Dubya’ Bush, July 24, 2007

“Ok.. We have to fight them in Iraq because you think that your incompetence in the invasion set them up to take control if we leave…”
-Skippy

“We've already seen how al Qaida used a failed state thousands of miles from our shores to bring death and destruction to the streets of our cities -- and we must not allow them to do so again.”
-George ‘Dubya’ Bush, July 24, 2007

“…and because Iraq is currently a failed state. Wonderful. Bravo sir. Can’t imagine why anyone would ever doubt you.”
-Skippy