in over his head
Jun. 23rd, 2004 01:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
winterbadgerThanks to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
geekchick for pointing out this transcript of a recent The Daily Show exchange between host Jon Stewart and guest Stephen Hayes, of the conservative The Weekly Standard.
Mr Hayes seems unable to effectively justify why Douglas Feith and his staff, not trained intelligence officers, could be trusted to produce a more coherent and trustworthy analysis of (selectively chosen) source material than trained and experienced intelligence analysts. Nor does he seem conscious of the logical trap that he argues himself into (that limited indicators are adequate for declaring war in the absence of a casus belli, but equally limited indicators didn't even tell us someone was planning to attack us on 9/11). He falls flat on his face when he reveals he did not know Iran used chemical weapons in their war with Iraq. He admits that the Bush administration is not credible. He insists that the UN believed before the late war that Iraq had WMD stockpiles (in fact, Hans Blix, in a BBC interview before the war said "...I'm not assuming at all that the Iraqis have retained weapons of mass destruction. At the same time, it would evidently be naïve of me to conclude that they don't. In that case, the inspection would not be needed. So inspection on site is important."). And he slips into admitting that Saudi Arabia, as well as Iran and Sudan (as well as, let's face it, Syria and our close friend and ally Pakistan) finance and support terrorists, which he argues is a key criterion for unilateral US attacks.
This guy is not ready to be out on his own in the hostile atmosphere of interview programs where he has to think on his feet. The darn things keep ending up in his mouth.
geekchick for pointing out this transcript of a recent The Daily Show exchange between host Jon Stewart and guest Stephen Hayes, of the conservative The Weekly Standard.Mr Hayes seems unable to effectively justify why Douglas Feith and his staff, not trained intelligence officers, could be trusted to produce a more coherent and trustworthy analysis of (selectively chosen) source material than trained and experienced intelligence analysts. Nor does he seem conscious of the logical trap that he argues himself into (that limited indicators are adequate for declaring war in the absence of a casus belli, but equally limited indicators didn't even tell us someone was planning to attack us on 9/11). He falls flat on his face when he reveals he did not know Iran used chemical weapons in their war with Iraq. He admits that the Bush administration is not credible. He insists that the UN believed before the late war that Iraq had WMD stockpiles (in fact, Hans Blix, in a BBC interview before the war said "...I'm not assuming at all that the Iraqis have retained weapons of mass destruction. At the same time, it would evidently be naïve of me to conclude that they don't. In that case, the inspection would not be needed. So inspection on site is important."). And he slips into admitting that Saudi Arabia, as well as Iran and Sudan (as well as, let's face it, Syria and our close friend and ally Pakistan) finance and support terrorists, which he argues is a key criterion for unilateral US attacks.
This guy is not ready to be out on his own in the hostile atmosphere of interview programs where he has to think on his feet. The darn things keep ending up in his mouth.
