Watching John Kerry give Colin Powell's speech I am disgusted

[karynnj]

187. Except for the fact that what Kerry says very likely happened -- very likely happened

and what Powell claimed Saddam had was NOT true and he likely knew that. NOTHING that SOS Kerry said is a "lie" - and he did takes pains to qualify his assertions with "highly likely". In fact, I suspect in most of the world, the dispute is NOT with what Kerry said Syria likely did - but what should be done about it.

In the case of Powell, there was no current action of Saddam that triggered anything. It was purely the US providing bogus information of FUTURE dangers. (ie the model they followed was to have a fake version of the Kennedy presentation showing that Russia had placed missiles in Cuba.) Here, Kerry is speaking of a chemical attack that nearly everyone conceded happened and to make the case of why our intelligence agencies see that it was very likely done by the regime.

For those equating Powell and Kerry, it is easy to list things that Powell said that he likely knew were not true. I have seen NO post here that details any charge in the Kerry speech as clearly untrue. I see a lot of - but what about something the US (or others) did, isn't that just as bad? Note that does not make Kerry's summary less accurate. It COULD be used as an argument into what we should do in response - to suggest that even if everything Kerry charges were true, this is not beyond behavior that was not responded to.

An intelligent discussion would be if given what we are pretty sure happened, we can make things better by any attack. THAT is a real question and it is the one that Obama and Kerry are obviously still working on per the coverage of their phone call with legislators.

Some questions, that should at least be considered are:

1) Will a limited attack make further use of chemical weapons less likely - as ANY leader would know there could be a response?

2) What does the country and the world really think of responding militarily to war crimes? Shouldn't that effort come from some international consensus? What happens - when like in Syria, the country in question is a client state of one of the UN permanent members?

Consider the people who spoke of "our" not responding in time to save - the Jews in Nazi days, the various victims in the former Yugoslavia, Darfur, Cambodia (until communist Vietnam did), Rwanda ... etc (far too many to list and I would miss some even if I tried to remember all I know of. What about the 100,000 plus people already killed in this civil war. Should the international community try to stop all civil wars? How and who would do this?

This really comes down to philosophical questions that have raged for at least a century on whether there should be international intervention to stop atrocities. It is a real dilemma when, on one side, there are moral questions of whether you can look the other way when there are crimes of this magnitude, and on the other side, a genuine concern that intervention can often make things worse.

Back to Syria. If the purpose is really a shot over the bow, why not persuade France to push for war crime indictments in the International court that the US does not (but should) belong to. What Kerry presented is a solid case for an indictment against some in the Syrian regime.

3) Should Obama demand a vote from Congress. I think this is the way to go. There is no real reason to rush on this - and if we do nothing ultimately, the longer worldwide and US discussion is even more important than if we attack. This is something worth marking.