We should always strive for an independent judgment when its neither absurd or pendantic to do so.Originally Posted by Ken White
Here's where we part ways, and perhaps this is because I was and still am restricted to declassified and otherwise open source literature on the subject. It was obvious to everyone that Iraq didn't have militarily significant quantities of chemical or biological weapons, and everyone agreed that Iraq did not have a nuclear weapon--yet. However, if it were obvious that Hussein didn't have any finished products, or was obviously opposed to working with radical Islamist groups like al Qaeda, there would have at least been one single open source analysis of the probabilities and variances. There wasn't. None. Even more telling, after five years of backbiting leaks not even the smell of a pre-war one has emerged from DoD, CIA or State. Not one.If one presumed all the blather about Saddam, threat and WMD was accurate -- and it quite obviously was not at the time to anyone who paid attention -- then some of the arguments here would make sense.
In what way would the two analyses differ? Given the same evidence, the only way the skeptic could arrive at a different set of numbers is if he assumed the worst case away--that's about as dishonest as assuming the worst case as fact. Otherwise, both should end up with the same expected values and variances--they'd differ only in the principles they'd follow in issuing judgments based on those estimates. The neocon would argue "we can't afford to wait," while the critic would respond with "we don't have enough information to act."If, OTOH, one did not believe that blather (and I didn't know very many who did but obviously I lead a sheltered life or have weird relatives, friends and acquaintances...) then one would do a quite different cost-benefit analysis based on quite different parameters compared to the person who believed a politician or political appointee -- or a pundit...
Hmm?Just so...
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