TwistedCopper said:
Special K -
Not one of those say Saddam is linked to 9/11. Iraq to terroists, Terrorists to 9/11. It is true that Saddam and his Irqi regime had links to terror networks. It is true 9/11 was carried out by terrorists.
Spare me the spin, I see it every evening on cable TV.
Absolutely no spin necessary. So he never said precisely "Saddam was directly connected to 9/11"...but he is using Al Qaeda as a proxy for 9/11 and the result is a clear implication that Saddam was connected to 9/11...and that's no stretch and no spin. Is it unreasonable or a stretch that people associate Al Qaeda with 9/11?
There are several ways to lie and this is one of them...that is, association and context. For instance, in answering one question of
why we're in Iraq, he directly states that it's a response to the attacks of 9/11 ("...we didn't do anything to provoke the attack of 9/11...we were attacked...and we responded..."). To no surprise, anyone can argue that what he said is technically correct since he stated that we were responding to terrorists, but the message comes across largely as written above.
If you wanted to lie to say that you didn't cut down an apple tree (when you did) without being clearly called on a blatant lie, you might say "I wasn't in the area most of that day and I've hardly even know how to use a saw." Both of those statements could be absolutely positively correct, but when the two are put together in response to the direct question like "Did you (or who) cut down that apple tree?"...the result misleads the listener...the truths are constructed in a way that encourages the listener to LOGICALLY DEDUCE a false conclusion. This is still a just as big of a lie as "I didn't cut down that apple tree"...it's simply not as direct. As a result, one could still argue that everything that was said was correct.
Blatant and black and white it may not be, but it is still very real and very potent. The mass perception that Saddam was directly connected to 9/11 didn't just magically materialize in most people's minds. It was planted and regularly fertilized by repeated statements like these. Through that intentional, repeated association and tightly linked context many people have a clear impression that Saddam and yes, 9/11, were directly connected...and the existence of that impression is no accident. Once or twice...coincidence, maybe. Just about every single time, carefully worded to
indirectly mislead in this manner...no coincidence. Furthemore, there's been no clarification to boot.
Call it nuance, but welcome to the real world. It may not always be black and white, but even the grays are very real.