[kg_veteran]

Originally Posted by Mavdog

kg, the issue of somalia was in BOTH the wallace interview (he brought it up) and in the article YOU posted. how is addressing the inaccuracies of the book a "change" in subject?

the book is what provoked the reaction from clinton. surely it is in the subject matter...

The only thing that Wallace said about the book was:

"There's a new book out, I suspect you've already read, called 'The Looming Tower.' And it talks about how the fact that when you pulled troops out of Somalia in 1993, bin Laden said, 'I have seen the frailty and the weakness and the cowardice of U.S. troops.'"

The article I cited referred to Wallace's statement as "historically factual." Isn't that true? And what the heck does that have to do with our discussion of whether Clinton lied when he said that "conservative Republicans" and "all of Bush's neo-cons" claimed he was obsessed with bin Laden?

It doesn't. Stay on topic, please.

no, the quotes in your article show that SOME conservative republicans supported clinton's actions.

I don't know how much simpler I can make this for you.

Clinton said: "And I think it's very interesting that all the conservative Republicans, who now say I didn't do enough, claimed that I was too obsessed with bin Laden. All of President Bush's neo-cons thought I was too obsessed with bin Laden."

In response to that claim, the writer of the article states: " . . . a thorough LexisNexis search identified absolutely no instances of high-ranking Republicans ever suggesting that Mr. Clinton was obsessed with bin Laden, or did too much to apprehend him prior to the bombing of the USS Cole in October 2000. Quite the contrary, Republicans were typically highly supportive of Clinton’s efforts in this regard."

The writer did the research and could not find ONE instance where someone was criticizing Clinton for being too obsessed with bin Laden. That indicates that he was LYING when he said that such statements were made.

Unless, of course, you can point us to such statements, in which case I will be happy to concede the point.

here is an example of a "conservative republican" who stood in the way of a clinton anti-terrorism initiative, believing that clinton was "obsessed" over something that wasn't needed.

gramm was wrong.

Show me a quote where Gramm said that Clinton was obsessed with bin Laden.

that is a fair question of who are the people clinton mentions, at the same time the fact that some republicans gave support to clinton does not prove clinton's remark is a lie.

Of course it's a fair question. It's THE question. The fact that some Republicans gave support to Clinton doesn't prove that his remark is a lie, but the fact that not a single instance can be found of someone criticizing Clinton like he claimed DOES prove it.

bs. it is your contention that coming up with one republican who supported clinton proves clinton is lying? not in the least.

I believe that rhetoric, especially political sort we are discussing, includes quite a bit of exaggeration and hyperbole.....just as we saw from clinton on sunday.

if your position is truly that every word counts, just how many "lies" do you expect we could pin on dubya? the list would be pretty long. yes, bush engages in exaggeration and hyperbole too.

no, let's not try and hold that standard you propose to apply to either of them.

Again, you're trying to change the subject. If you want to talk about George Bush, do it in another thread. Let's talk about Bill Clinton.

If Clinton said "all" and the reality was "some", that might be an exaggeration. But when you can't point me to ANY, that's more than exaggeration. It's a lie.

Feel free to prove me wrong. Point me to one statement made by a "conservative Republican" or a "neo-con" where they said that Clinton was obsessed with bin Laden or doing too much to try and get him.