Do you believe in global warming? Or do you agree with Cockburn that:

Gore's contribution to the debate has been an appalling mishmash of cooked statistics, demagoguery about "scientific consensus" and New Age hocus pocus about spiritual renewal.

But hey it is kinda surprising considering your repeated pessimistic calls for the end of mankind, apocalypse....one would think you would be cheering global warming on.

The specific reason why this man of blood shares the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with the IPCC is for their joint agitprop on the supposed threat of anthropogenic global warming. Bogus science topped off with toxic alarmism.

...

The notorious "man-made" greenhouse gasses comprise about .26 per cent of the total greenhouse gas component of the earth's atmosphere and the influence of this component remains entirely unproven, as I have pointed out on this site many times,and will be doing so again in reflections that will be published early next year in my forthcoming book, A Short History of Fear. Gore's contribution to the debate has been an appalling mishmash of cooked statistics, demagoguery about "scientific consensus" and New Age hocus pocus about spiritual renewal. Anyone who has studied the antics of his co-winner of the peace prize, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, will know that the IPCC's prime role every three years has been to ignore the work--some of it respectable scientific research--of its expert panels and issue entirely mendacious and to issue alarmist press releases designed to win headlines in the New York Times.

This man (Cockburn) appears to know NOTHING about this topic. I can't believe this crap got published on Counterpunch. Then again, I don't read Counterpunch much, so maybe they've gone off the deep end.

If you want to read about how badly off the mark Cockburn is, just click here to read RealClimate's review of his "science."

Alexander Cockburn is CounterPunch, so asking why the site published his work is pointless. And, rightly or wrongly, for years now the man has carried what appears to be a deeply personal hate for Al Gore. Check out his book:

http://www.amazon.com/Al-Gore-Manual-Alexander-Cockburn/dp/1859848036

And whatever his feelings toward Gore, his take on climate science is horrible.

If "Bush lies" doesn't cut it, neither does "Gonzales/Bremer/Rumsfeld are stupid" - from the rest of us looking in from the outside, the notion that the American people are the least culpable of the players as Rich asserts doesn't cut much ice. Culpability founded on an unwillingness to confront the structural is every bit as real as culpability founded on electing bad leaders.

When Bush was reelected Americans went from little culpability to full complicity.

...be possible to have elected Kerry and still be complicit. If much of this is due underlying structural factors that no one is willing to address rather than convenient personalities that it can all be pinned on, then complicity is a much more problematic issue.

"Ambiguously loose statements on the one hand, and euphemisms that link terrorism and fascism to Islam on the other, have created confusion and resentment on all sides." ~ Fariborz Mokhtari

that the push would have been as heavy under Kerry. I don't see him setting up a shadow intelligence office to cherry pick intelligence. I'm not saying a decision would not have been made to invade Iraq but do believe the process would have been more transparent, better planned and more likely a surgical strike attack.

...that it is a minority part. By far the biggest part is that US forces started off with quite little insight into the minds of their opponents. Interrogation is a battle of wits that they were substantially unprepared for - things like "fear up, harsh" make great little ditties, but they're a hell of a lot less useful on a day to day basis than understanding the underlying tribal structures, for example. Seems to me that US intelligence focussed far too much on systems - and in the absence of Iraq I fear they are likely to go back to that comfortable ground.

In large part, I think the underlying factor is that everyone, of all political stripes, finds it very convenient to continue supporting a massive apparatus devoted to industrial war, one that is very poorly suited for war among the people. Everybody is focusing on technologies and processes and systems rather than obtaining, training and supporting the best people. Certainly the level of the disaster can be affected by the personalities in charge, but until there's a fundamental shift, I don't see things changing away from the negative.

"Ambiguously loose statements on the one hand, and euphemisms that link terrorism and fascism to Islam on the other, have created confusion and resentment on all sides." ~ Fariborz Mokhtari

but how do they refute the fact that we re-elected Bush and gave the Republicans a stronger majority in 2004? After the war? The 2006 election shows that the majority of people have turned against the war now, not that they were always against the war.

From the Council on Foreign Relations in October, 2002:

As in previous surveys, a solid majority (62%) of Americans say they support military action to "end Saddam Hussein’s rule," about the same percentage indicating support for military action last month.

You are correct, imo, that the elite manipulated the news and influenced public opinion. They take the lion's share of the blame. It's also very ironic that Rich is writing this column in the mainstream press--which either cheerled the war or stayed silent when it mattered most.

But we are still all to blame. We elected the idiots who did this. We continue to pay for the newspapers where the lies are printed. We watch and support the news programs that spew out the propaganda. The majority of this country opposes the war NOW, but did not oppose it when it mattered most--before it was launched. We oppose the war because its gone badly, not because it was wrong in the first place.

As I said, the majority of the blame goes to the elite--those with more power have more responsibility and should face more severe consequences. But this country went along with them. We're only just now starting to wake up, though I have my doubts about what lessons we've learned.

It's hard to say what the majority of the country thought. Looking at the polls at the time (best source I could find) it looks like American citizens supported an invasion of Iraq
at a considerably lower level than the American Congress did. In early 2003, nearly 90% of poll respondents believed that Saddam Hussein supported terrorists planning to attack America (hmmm, wonder where they got THAT idea!). Nonetheless, when you look at the results of questions like "Should the U.S. take more time or act quickly now?" or "Should the U.S. take military action without support from the U.N. or allies?" or "Should the U.S. invade with ground troops?" it looks like support for the war was not dominant once you get past the Hooya!!! type questions. And remember, that's with an overwhelming majority thinking that Hussein was involved in terrorism.

I'm going on about this for several reasons. First, there's an issue with identifying the problem in order to reach a solution. If a reasonably informed citizenry cried "havoc" and loosed the dogs of war, then use of force against the U.S. nation would appear to be the world's only recourse from further U.S. aggression. It's not a conclusion I want to come to. On the other hand, if a propagandized people followed corrupt elites, then a resurgent press and restoration of democracy and will help prevent future immoral wars.

A pretty fair number of people have done what they could to stop this war, through petitioning the government, demonstrating, supporting anti-war candidates with time and money. If you think they are to blame, then I'll ask you the same thing I would ask Rich -- what should we be doing? Into the streets with pitchforks?

I object when civilians are bombed in an ostensible attempt to kill enemies. The rightwing argument is that they didn't overthrow Hussein and they're not stopping the insurgency now, so they're to blame. Same argument to me. Every member of the group is guilty for the sins of its leaders.

I think it's a corrupting argument.

has always seemed to me to be a smoking gun pointing directly at one inescapable conclusion - the American people went to the polls in 2004 to vote for overwhelmingly more progressive and multilateral policies, Kerry and Bush supporters alike.

But there was a little problem. The majority of Kerry supporters accurately knew the positions of both candidates. However, startlingly, Bush supporters correctly identified Kerry's positions but understood Bush's positions to be the diametric opposite on many issues than those he actually held.

Bush supporters had been deceived (they might have simply guessed wrong, but it strains credulity to believe that so many all guessed wrong in the same direction on issue after issue after issue). This poll does not speak to that directly, but I am convinced this was intentionally done through a massive and coordinated campaign. I believe one of the main vectors for the deception operation was FOX.

The majority of Bush supporters voted for him believing his positions to be 180 degrees opposite to his actual positions.

The Separate Realities of Bush and Kerry Supporters.

snip

The key findings were:

1. Iraq, WMD, and al Qaeda
A large majority of Bush supporters believe that before the war Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or a major program for building them. A substantial majority of Bush supporters assume that most experts believe Iraq had WMD, and that this was the conclusion of the recently released report by Charles Duelfer. A large majority of Bush supporters believes that Iraq was providing substantial support to al Qaeda and that clear evidence of this support has been found. A large majority believes that most experts also have this view, and a substantial majority believe that this was the conclusion of the 9/11 Commission. Large majorities of Kerry supporters believe the opposite on all these points.......................3

2. What the Bush Administration is Saying About Pre-War Iraq
Large majorities of Bush and Kerry supporters agree that the Bush administration is saying that Iraq had WMD and was providing substantial support to al Qaeda. In regard to WMD, these majorities are
growing............................................................................................6

3. The Decision to Go to War
Majorities of Bush supporters and Kerry supporters agree that if Iraq did not have WMD or was not providing support to al Qaeda, the US should not have gone to war with Iraq.............................................8

4. World Public Opinion on the Iraq War and George Bush’s Reelection
Only three in ten Bush supporters believe that the majority of people in the world oppose the US going to war with Iraq, while an overwhelming majority of Kerry supporters have this view. A majority of Bush supporters assume that the majority of people in the world would like to see Bush reelected, while a large majority of Kerry supporters believe the opposite. Bush supporters also lean toward overestimating support in Islamic countries for US-led efforts to fight terrorism, while Kerry supporters do not ..............8

5. Candidates’ Foreign Policy Positions
Majorities of Bush supporters misperceive his positions on a range of foreign policy issues. In particular, they assume he supports multilateral approaches and addressing global warming though he has taken strong contrary positions on issues such as the International Criminal court and the Kyoto Agreement. A majority of Kerry supporters have accurate perceptions of Kerry’s positions on the same issues..............11

I can't seem to find the original on the PIPA site any more, but there is a copy posted here (warning, .PDF).

An essential read. It takes a little while to fully digest some of the implications here. But when you do, maybe you'll come to the same conclusion I did long ago - you're under attack.