Hannity: Ted Kennedy won't be "happy until" we have "mass slaughter" in Iraq
On the January 10 edition of his nationally syndicated radio program, while discussing Democrats' unfavorable reaction to President Bush's then-forthcoming speech, in which he proposed to send more than 20,000 additional U.S. troops to Iraq, Fox News host Sean Hannity said, "[T]o be honest about this, I'm convinced that some of these left-wingers, like [Sen.] Ted Kennedy [D-MA], and some of these other groups -- they're not going to be happy until we have a repeat of ... mass slaughter." Kennedy has introduced a Senate bill that would "prohibit the use of funds for an escalation of United States military forces in Iraq above the numbers existing as of January 9, 2007." Hannity continued "I guarantee you if [Kennedy and others] are successful in their, quote, "redeployment retreat," I guarantee there will be a mass slaughter, a human toll that we have not seen since the killing fields or Saddam Hussein, depending on which one you want to say."
As Media Matters for America previously noted, on the August 22, 2006, edition of Fox News' Hannity & Colmes, Hannity asserted that "some people are saying" that a Democratic victory in the November elections would be a "victory for the terrorists."
From the January 10 edition of ABC Radio Networks' The Sean Hannity Show:
HANNITY: So the president is going to speak tonight.
[...]
And one of the main points that he's expected to make is that we need a troop surge, or the need to send additional troops to Baghdad for a period of time to push back the terrorists, the insurgency, the Baathists, to end the sectarian violence. And it's mind-numbing and shocking that it is -- and yet, although very predictable that in the lead-up to the president's speech tonight, you have one congressional Democrat after another scheming, plotting, planning on ways to diminish the importance of the president's announcements, denounce what he is proposing, you know, go against immediately his efforts to adjust our military response to the enemy. One liberal Democrat after another, one press conference after another, one TV appearance after another, one statement released after another, denouncing the president, denouncing his efforts to reinforce the troops. You get a steady drumbeat of defeatism, and ultimately what this is, is an ideology of pacifism that is aimed at ensuring that we lose in Iraq. And we can lose there. But let your heart be troubled. And to be honest about this, I'm convinced that some of these left-wingers, like Ted Kennedy, and some of these other groups -- they're not going to be happy until we have a repeat of the kind of mass slaughter -- which, by the way, will happen. If you care, on a humanitarian level about people, about humanity, I guarantee you if they're successful in their, quote, "redeployment retreat," I guarantee there will be a mass slaughter, a human toll that we have not seen since the killing fields or Saddam Hussein, depending on which one you want to say.
Apparently, Hannity can't look further than one day in the past for someone to blame.
Try four years, Sean.
The invasion of Iraq.
THERE is where your blame for the "mass slaughter" belongs.
Hey Seano, it is a mass slaughter, and it was perpetuated by your "side."
Sheesh... the audacity. It still surprises me. This guy's one of the worst.
Resign your lucrative postion at FOX, enlist in a branch of the U.S. military and volunteer for hazardous duty in Iraq immediately. Before you leave FOX, encourage every single one of your devoted followers to follow your example and do the same. Convince your wife, your siblings and your neighbors to enlist. If your children are of service age drive them immediately to the nearest recruitment office. Only true Americans like yourself, Sean, are worthy of prosecuting this war and of saving Iraq from the defeatist traitors that infest your beloved country.
IRONY 101!
this guy is SO messed up. "We're degenerating into pacifism, ahhh! Ted Kennedy is EVIL, he wants the Iraqi people to die! There is but one way to stop him: Hunt down all liberals, and intern them, reinstate the draft and suspend all civil liberties until further notice. Oh, and purge the Federal Government of moderate woossies!" Okay, that's not what he said, but this is where it's all leading.
Liberals are ENEMIES OF THE STATE... starting with that Sean Penn guy. ;>)
Can you imagine how divisive Sean Hannity could be if he actually had a brain? Thank God he's stupid and his followers are limited to like minded people.
That IF we hadn't invaded Iraq in the first place looking for WMD's that didn't exist the mass slaughter that IS already happening in Iraq today wouldn't be taking place.
there would only be Saddam's mass slaughter which was more than our mass slaughter.
And if we went home tomorrow both together wouldn't add to 1/100th of the slaughter that would take place.
Our troops being there is the best alternative for Iraq.
So then Bush would be responsible for 100 times the deaths that have already occurred, right? Considering that there were no validly compelling reasons to start the war in the first place, Bush's actions sound criminal, in my opinion. In any event, I suspect that the world will long be paying for Bush's incompetence and ineptitude. There might be a lesson in there somewhere about electing a dry-drunk frat boy with no foreign policy experience to the most powerful position on earth.
As much as I do not like Bush, it is those foolish animals (the radical Iraqis) that are killing thousands.
Say Saddam had just fallen over dead. You think Iraq would be a peacful Nation?
Since our invasion and occupation of Iraq, it is estimated that 600,000 people have died. Several hundred thousand more died under Saddam. Let's assume that the total is 800,000. 800,000 times 100 is 80,000,000. The current population of Iraq is about 26,000,000. So, you're projecting that everyone will die more than 3 times?
I've got 3 words for you, Pumpkin: remedial math class.
I'd suggest that when we tally up the body count under Saddam, we subtract the bodies that were killed with our weapons, our poison gas, our policies (Bush Senior's instigating the Shia to rise up against Saddam after the Gulf war and then leaving them hang while they were slaughtered). That blood is on our hands too.
Forgive me if I am mistaken, but I believe it was a Kurd uprising that Bush Sr. did not support.
You are mistaken it was the Shiite uprising Bush Sr encouraged then failed to support
The war with Iran. The only way to get anywhere near those numbers is to add the casualties for the war with Iran by THAT logic Bush is responsible for the slaughter of thousands of Americans in Iraq.
Bad America, BAD AMERICA! I can not believe with all the past bitterness, you enjoy living here.
In your simplistic Manichean thinking. Countries, ALL countries, arent one thing they do good things and bad things. The thing about reality is you accept ALL of it you dont ignore some of it and trumpet other parts of it to satisfy some delusions you happen to enjoy. We do good things, we do bad things this is without possible reasonable dispute. No country in the world could claim otherwise so the old America love it or leave it stupidity is just that, stupidity. It becomes RELEVANT when it is pretended that there are no consequences TO the bad actions we have, without dispute, engaged in. Try to remember we are MOST responsible for OUR actions. Those who cannot discern the difference between who we are and what we sometimes do are simpleminded. They need to grow up
remember when 'you' supported Saddam through the iran-iraq war and the gassing of the kurds/iraqis and the invasion of kuwait?
Oh, I remember you choose to forget your involvement.
By leatherhead. This is your brain on rightwing propaganda, limp, insipid, and incapable of higher brain function or reality recognition. There was NO ongoing slaughter in Iraq justifying an invasion Human rights watch among others put out reports that said that directly. The mass slaughters took place while he was our good ally, we didnt seem to care much about them WHILE THEY WERE HAPPENING. Now in true Orwellian fashion what we get is leatherhead telling us to go to the memory well and deposit everything we were TOLD about why we invaded Iraq its really because Saddam was such a bad guy, forget about how much worse he was while he was our ally, in fact put reality itself into the same place leatherhead has put his brain, in a blind trust and take whatever lame excuse he tosses out TODAY about why we need to kill, kill, KILLL. Its all about the glorious slaughter in Iraq. We also have to STAY in Iraq for the sake of the Iraqi people despite the FACT more than 80% of them want us gone. Them dumb Iraqis have no say in their spanky new democracy about how much HELP we give them. What do they think they are a soveriegn nation with some respect for what their PEOPLE want? Not on leathers planet. Whatever the color of the sky is there.
instead of Kennedy?
including 37 bodies found tortured, plus 7 people kidnapped from a bus in a Shia neighborhood.
Someone define mass murder to Hanitty please.
AP story
allows him so say the stupidest things as well as the brilliant ones. So sad he falls into the former category.
considering you've been 0/1,000 on everything about the Iraq War and its build-up, maybe you should have a Hawaiian Punch and STFU.
the dumbest of the Bushmonkeys.
Doesn't this guy talk to people on earth? mean besides his callers?
Oh wait, he talks to, or rather shrieks at, people who are smarter than he is. I've seen it on his show. What I should have asked is, doesn't he ever LISTEN to other people.
If you care, on a humanitarian level about people, about humanity... you don't start wars lightly. You don't WANT WAR, unlike these right-wing ignorant pricks. If you care, you don't just send skilled people into an untamable civil war. If you care about truth, facts or any of that holy crap, you want this war ended asap. This is not done by throwing gasoline onto the fire.
Whatever becomes of Iraq, there is now one and ONLY one man to blame. One man responsible. BUSH.
It can't be Saddam any more, and it can't be Kennedy, as much as Sean is desperate to avoid responsibility, which after all is the hallmark of the Bush Administration.
Talk, talk, talk, Sean. Take no PERSONAL action. The BLAME will fall on Bush, and history will show it was a dark day when Bush was placed in power (against the will of the People), and he birthed an era a Rightwing hatred and warmongering which ALMOST succeeded in establishing America as a propagandized tyranny, stripping us of rights and civil liberties.
The effort failed, Sean.
Barry Bonds tested positive for drugs, and his response was he took some pills from a teammate's locker, and, not knowing what they were, TOOK them. I believe YOUR blame shifting, Sean, equally to that of Bonds: NOT AT ALL. We ain't buying it.
The fact remains that if we pull out, the killing increases.
Iraq under Saddam was our enemy. The current factional Iraq is our enemy. It is not always a bad idea to engage and defeat your enemy.
If the posters on this site spent 1/10 the energy hating Muqtada al Sadr as they do hating George W. Bush, we would be well on our way to succeeding in Iraq.
Before when Saddam was fighting with Iran, he was our friend. Should I point you to the pictures of Rumsfeld meeting with the man, and then selling him WMDs?
I have asked crazy people such as yourself before, and have had no good answers to this question; how was Saddam a threat to the US again? Let me know when you get a good answer, one that actually has facts behind it. It won't happen. Why? He was no threat. Containment was working wonderfully.
We leave now, the killing may increase, but we send in more troops, the killing is going to increase as well. Bush started an unjust war, for no apparent reason, and now we're stuck, and he's looking to expand it to Iran and Syria. Good thinking Bush. You're an idiot.
I love how you use the argument against liberals, saying why aren't we criticizing al Sadr over in Iraq? Maybe because he isn't a politician in the US? Maybe just maybe we want to make changes at home here to better our position. We don't have any control over Sadr. And since he is a good buddy of the Prime Minister of Iraq, he doesn't have much control over him either. We spend time haranguing Bush because he is leading OUR country down into a hole, down into the dregs, and destroying much of what many people in this country find to be the best parts of living in America.
Wrong, IT WILL INCREASE.
WHAT?? Oh you dont have any? Saying something louder and repeating it are not magic formulas to make them true. Its your OPINION that the deaths will increase, it may or may NOT be true. Considering the track record of the rightwing on Iraq you guys dont look good as prophets.
"Considering the track record of the rightwing on Iraq you guys dont look good as prophets." --Solon
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Maybe the neocons have something going for them.
As Jon Stewart put it on the Daily Show, you kinda have to figure these guys are due to be right about something. The law of averages has to kick in sometime. It is actually pretty darn difficult to be as wrong as often as Republicans/conservatives have been about anything even vaguely related to Iraq.
The fact remains that if we pull out, the killing increases.
Really? If it's a fact, prove that it's true.
I can not believe you said that. It is clear to see they would demolish eachother over there if we pull out or not.
If we pull out, we may not sufffer any attacks. But the Iraqis will continue to go balistic on eachother.
Clevelandsteamer didn't say the killing would continue, he/she said the killing would increase. That it is a FACT that the killing would increase. Not just continue, but increase.
Well, if it's a fact, it should be easy to prove.
if we pull out, the killing increases
I don't know if that's true or not. Perhaps it is, although it's worth noting that in a poll of Iraqis reported just last month, nearly 66% of them believed that violence would decrease if US forces left.
In any event, I say here what I've said elsewhere: Our leaving will not stop the bloodshed. But the bloodshed will not stop until we leave.
Not that warmongers care what Iraqis think. Not that they care about anything but justifying more killing. Another point is that there are TWO factors concerning the killing even if it DID increase but didnt last as long then it would be a net gain for Iraqis not that a warmonger like Cleavelandsteamroll cares what happens to Iraqis. It is just ludicrous to even MAKE the argument that we need to say in Iraq for the SAKE of the Iraqis the vast majority of whom WANT US TO LEAVE.
believe that is a credible source.
The Coalition Provisional Authority approved of them. What is your particular objection? Other than your apparent philosophical differences with the conclusion? Would you so seemingly reflexively doubt a poll that supported your view?
"The Iraq Centre for Research conducts monthly polls and is approved by the now defunct Coalition Provisional Authority," Jonathan Steele reported in the June 29, 2004, Guardian (UK). "Its latest results were handed to CPA officials on Sunday, the eve of their [the CPA's] departure."
we don't hate George Bush. We hate his sins. You see, we believe that you should love the sinner, but hate his sins. George needs to repent and bear as much responsibility as possible. He admitted in his last speech that he is responsible for the mistakes in Iraq.
Well, if I admitted to my neighbor that I was responsible for the tree limb from the oak tree that had overhung his garden, busted, and broke a pot in his yard, I'd buy him a new pot.
If George is responsible for the mistakes in Iraq, he should sell his ranch, convert his stocks to cash, and devote the rest of his life to building a first-rate facility for maimed troops and caring for them. But the VERY BEST that George can do is allude to error, so he truly bears no responsiblity. Words without action are nothing.
And Clevelandsteamer, we are liberals. Or progressives. We aren't leftists. That's a silly word. I know you're trying to overlay communist on left for dramatic effect, but consider this word: rightist. Silly, yes?
Let me see if I understand, the factional Iraq is our enemy, correct?
The "factions" in Iraq were squabbling more than a thousand years before there was a United States.
And are you suggesting that we hate the Shi'a in Iraq? I know were supposed to hate the Sunni's. Who the hell are we supposed to be over there helping?
It's not always good to engage your enemy. If a decision is made to go to war, you had damn well better be prepared. Once a decision is made to do so, there should be a plan for the prosecution of the war, a plan for the logistical support of all those sent into harms way, a plan for the aftermath of the removal of the government and a plan for extraction of our troops if needed.
There was no plan for Iraq, other than the plan to bask in the admiration of the free and liberated people of Iraq. Some plan.
Iraq under Saddam was also our ally. Enemies and allies seem to be little more than whims anymore.
I suppose this makes this a whimsical war.
you pack a lotta punch in a few words. I'm your insta-fan.
"Iraq under Saddam was our enemy. The current factional Iraq is our enemy. It is not always a bad idea to engage and defeat your enemy."...by clevelandsteamer
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Iraq may have been our enemy, BUT were they threatening us? Were they behind 9/11? Nope. Did they have WMD they planned on attacking us with? Nope. Did they have nuclear weapons pointed in our directions? Nuclear weapons at all? Nope. Had Saddam planned on invading the USA with his meager military? Nope.
So WHY engage Iraq at all?
The Soviet Union & Red China were our enemies [some could argue they still are], BUT other than a "cold war" with the USSR, did we engage in any other type of [direct]WAR with either?
Today North Korea, Iran, Syria, Libya, Cuba, Venezuela & others could be classified as OUR ENEMY...are you suggesting we should go to WAR with each and every one?
Sometimes diplomacy rather than bombs actually works. It ALSO costs less in lives & cash.
Don't we already?
And with the possibility of 200,000+ troops on their way for their turn?
So 600,00 have died in the Iraq War? So iraqbodycount.com (oh, that right-wing site,eh?) only sees 59,000 dead? What do they know? Sean Hannity's comment about mass slaughter is a realistic one--he's remembering what happened in Vietnam after Congress defunded that war--millions were killed by the North Vietnamese. There's no reason to suspect this would be different.
There was no bloodbath in Vietnam after we left. No genocide. In Cambodia yes but not in Vietnam. There was some revenge taking less than against the Vichy French after WW2 but some however the claim of millions is an out and out lie.
Just as the 3,000 + Americans this incompetently waged and immorally launched war has killed is not -- as Fox's Daddy Rupert called it -- "a pittance."
One person killed in an unjust and immoral military adventure is one person too many. If we allow ourselves to say "only", we are already dehumanizing the situation and, of course, ourselves. So stop it.
The question remains, though -- and it's a very disturbing one -- of our responsibility for the lives of the Iraqi's who haven't yet been killed. We -- yes, you and me, as well as people like Hannity -- are responsible for the shambles Iraq has become. From strictly an economic and American point of view, of course we should get the hell out. We've already spent our grandchildren's inheritance on this bloody fiasco, and we've seen 10's of thousands of our sons and daughters killed or maimed in it.
But from a moral point of view, an ethical point of view, can we leave 20-some million people in harms way who, to be honest, were not in harms way until we pre-emptively invaded? Seriously, to what degree are we (all of us) responsible for preventing the chaos we've caused from getting worse. (And please don't give me that stuff about how you all opposed the war in spirit and in your writing! Isn't that the same skirt that those soporific Republican collegians hide behind when they say they support the war but really don't feel they actually have to put themselves in harms way? Who took to the streets? Who put their own health and life on the line to stop the madness?)
If Hannity is right -- OK, Hannity is usually wrong, but in this instance he is probably at least partially right -- and there is to be a slaughter in the absence of American troops, should we stay or should we go? And if we go, who among us is NOT responsible for the first Iraqi infant whose head is blown off by an explosion aimed by one faction at another?
Okay, I can't prove that more Iraqis will die if the US pulls out, but the likelihood is high.
To say Iraq was our ally is a bit apocryphal. We aided them in their war with Iran, but that was because we judged Iran the greater evil (which they probably still are). Likewise we aided the Taliban against the Soviets, but again that was a matter of convienience against a perceived greater evil.
Sometimes you need to engage enemies in combat, not always.
Iraq under Saddam had designs on WMDs, and did little to belay that fear. Iraq aided various terror groups apart from the 9/11 hijackers.
I don't buy the "Bush is 100% responsible for the Iraq mess". I'll heap alot of blame on Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, et al, but if the Iraqis built a house of cards, they carry some blame when it starts to fall.
Bush was more like a snowmobiler, high marking in the mountains, that triggered an avalanche. He didn't build the precarious snow drift over the Iraqis below.
A snowmobiler. That sounds like fun, just minding his own business, going for a spin on the ol' Skidoo.
Who could have anticipated an avalanche?
We DIDNT aid the Taliban against the Soviets, there WAS no Taliban we aided Ben Laden and the Muhajadeen BEFORE the soviets invaded Afghanistan. Its not even CLOSE to apochraphal to say we were Iraqi allies we supplied them with weapons, we gave him loans Raygun took Iraq OFF the list of terrorists nations in order to make all that possible now you can point to Iran as WHY but the FACT is not in dispute. Name a SINGLE international terrorist act which involved Iraq in the last decade before the invasion, this will be tough since the CIA said they had NO EVIDENCE of any such international terrorists connections with Iraq in that time period. Not paying suicide bombers families AFTER the fact, that regional action which Saudi Arabia also does doesnt qualify.
that Saddam was helping the terrorists. We already know the thruth about THAT little claim...
"We DIDNT aid the Taliban against the Soviets, there WAS no Taliban..."
Okay, we aided the muhajideen in Afghanistan in the "80s, who morphed into the Taliban in the "90s.
"Its not even CLOSE to apochraphal to say we were Iraqi allies..."
If you count Iraq as one of our allies, your standards are pretty low. We aided them purely as a regional balance against Iran. Our aid to them was pretty slight, anyway. Most of Iraq's weaponry came from the Soviets or France.
"Name a SINGLE international terrorist act which involved Iraq in the last decade before the invasion..."
Iraq harbored major terrorists, such as Abu Nidal and Abu Abbas. Iraq ran some terrorists training camps, and made some supplies available to terrorists. I'll grant you this activity did not warrant a full invasion, but here we are.
"...since the CIA said they had NO EVIDENCE of any such international terrorists connections with Iraq in that time period..."
This CIA, are they friends of yours? Do they do good work?
"Not paying suicide bombers families AFTER the fact, that regional action which Saudi Arabia also does doesnt qualify."
I think it does qualify, and I don't count Saudi as much more of a friend than Iraq.
It has been estimated that Saddam Hussein may be responsible for the deaths of 200,000 Kurds and Shiite Iraqis over his 30 year rule.
The estimated number of Iraqis (Shiites as well as Sunnis) who have died since the U.S. led invasion in 2002: 600,000. Plus over 3,000 American troops.
Its a good thing we invaded, otherwise some one could get killed.