mattp

I understand how they may think this is a good argument for much of their base who may be looking for a reason to ignore the current criticisms of their great leader, but this may or may not turn out to be a good tactic. For one thing, it makes an easy target for nit-picking: for example, the Dem's are idiots if they allow the President to maintain they had access to the same intelligence (does anybody think some senator from New York or the governor of Vermont had or should have had access tot he same intelligence as the President?). For another, they are only going to look like worse liars if it turns out there are more leaks that show they actively twisted something. And given the statement from Powell (UN Speech was low point of his career), the Downing Street Memo, statements from El Baradi, and the ongoing Plame affair, do they really want to argue that it is the Dem's who are rewriting history? Even Wolfilwitz has said that the WMD's were really not the reason we went into Iraq.

He could be a companion to that Jim Wittacker doll upstairs at Paradise.

I don't think we want the press to portray everything as a two sided issue as your post may be read to imply. In fact, there is sometimes something called "truth." In the run-up to the war, the press published stuff that they KNEW was crap, and they repeatedly allowed the White House to lie without ever questionning it. Even if the Democrats were too weak to do so, the press had a responsibility to ask real questions, to once in a while stand up and say "Hey, Mr. Secretary -- that is not what you said last week..." and to allow American readers to learn of the fact that, for example, nobody has ever made any connection between Saddam and AlQueeda. They do us equal disservice, I think, if they print the Democrats talking points uncritically now. Well not quite equal disservice, because the Democrats have better points. But the point is, these important issues cannot be explained by two contrary political statements. First of all, sometimes one or the other of thse statements is complete B.S. and to give it credibility at all is a complete distortion in itself, and second of all, the issues are much more complex than partisan sound bytes can tell.

I think you're getting a little over optimistic there, Dave. Yes, they have been printing some information critical of the Bush administration lately but,in case you haven't noticed, that is all the rage and they are simply resurrecting old news that they buried three years ago. It'd be nice to see the press "come out of its coma" but I don't think we are seeing that yet.

Yeah. I'd have a hard time picturing BG pulling the lever for Bush. Look at his father's politics and his wife's charities. It just doesn't compute.

I bdelieve the reason for the access threads restriction, Fairweather, was announced some time back. You apparently missed it. The first post for Access issues and Events appears on the front page. I assume it is set that way because Jon and Tim want to keep the front page clear of trolls, speculation, and other nonsense like uninformed personal attacks. (It is only the first post to a new thread that has this restriction, as far as I know. And I don't know how the interface works - so I can't tell you how you get a post approved. Whenever someone brings something to my attention like the current mining giveaway thread, all I know how to do is post a couple of quotes from somewhere else.)

Kiss my a**, Fairweather. I had nothing to do with any decision about how to set up permissions for that forum, and not only that but I don't even get the messages of any proposed post. I would have put that thread on there immediately if I had.

SexualChocolate added: Westerners for Responsible Mining

Jim wrote: These guys have no shame: More than 50,000 acres of old mining claims in Washington -- including some inside Mount Rainier, Olympic and North Cascades national parks -- could be converted to private land under legislation expected to pass the U.S. House next week. The proposal also would open up millions of acres in Washington's national forests -- and more than 350 million acres across the West -- to be newly privatized under a revision of the 1872 Mining Law tucked into a 184-page budget bill. Critics who have dissected the language of the bill say it would make it easy to use a law passed 133 years ago to speed development of ski resorts, golf courses and the like in the backcountry today. Seattle PI Article

No kidding! Ptarmigan (and Mt. Rainier in general) is exactly the kind of climb where skis would be vastly better than snowshoes. If you were to "carry over," the extra length of the skis extending above your pack would be little or no problem on the route and ski boots would be perfectly adequate for the climb. (I'm not so sure I'd carry over, though.)

In deep snow, the skier may well win your race. That is not difficult terrain to navigate on skis unless the trail is all hammered out by snowshoers. Also, I think you should consider the trip back out again -- hopefully, your trip "into" the North Ridge of Stuart is not just a one-way trip. More practical sometimes. "Necessary evil?" Generally not.

Around camp, anyway, it is pretty easy to line a 5 gallon bucket with a garbage bag and put a toilet seat on top of it. Is that all they are asking?

Let me know if you ever want real discussion. Two minutes research and you could have found ample argument for the opposite view of that interviewor the next two. I threw you a softball, Pete.

(Ah, but Peter: perhaps you have forgotten our other thread where you declined to answer "yes" or "no" to my question: were Bush and his team misleading about the reasons they wanted to invade Iraq when they did? The dishonest debate took place in 2002 and 2003 and you - echoing the Republican party playbook -- refuse to acknowledge that point. I would agree with him if he were saying only that Hilary Clinton or John Kerry were self-serving to vote for the war powers then and attack the president on credibility now without acknowledging that they too were wrong, lying, or spineless then; but he is suggesting that - with the possible exception of Kennedy who he derisively notes voted against war powers and against the 87 billion - all who now suggest that Bush and Co. distorted or misrepresented their reasons for war are the real liars in this area and that is something quite different.) Meanwhile, read the transcript I linked and see if you can argue how it was scripted for or by the "liberal press."

We’ve seen several of our esteemed colleagues on this site argue ad nauseam that there is a liberal bias to NPR and other leftist powerhouses of the “mainstream media.” However, I watched PBS Newshour tonight and in the Republican v. Democrat debate, Lowry v. Shields, moderator Jim Leher seemed to repeatedly give the Repubican guy Lowry cover, or ask softball questions of him. For example, when Shields comes out of the gate saying that 60% of Americans say they believe Bush has misled American on the reasons for the war in Iraq, Leher turns to Lowry and asks “Why the outcry now? It was a long time ago and haven’t we held elections since then?” At least twice in the conversation Lowry was able to say – more or less unchallenged – that we tolerate or even invite political dissent in this great nation but it is irresponsible or wrong for those who voted to authorize the war to engage in a debate based on false premises or “rewriting history” now. The real coup was when, toward the end of this segment, Lowry says “Bush didn’t lie – the CIA told him the WMD threat case was a “slam dunk” Lehrer then quickly changed the topic, so Shields didn’t get a chance to reply “CIA actually told him there was no effort to purchase Uranium in Niger.” The transcript is available here: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/political_wrap/july-dec05/sl_11-11.html So much for the liberal press. (To make matters worse, in the following segment, Rick Steeves misidentified the Eiger in his segment on the Berner Oberland. I think our right wing brothers are right: the liberal press is the worst thing to happen to this country since Benedict Arnold.)

PP: Are you saying that they didn't put forth a vivid picture of Iraq as a real and current threat? Are you saying that Bush, Rumsfeld, et all made it clear to the Nation that there was no imminent threat to the U.S? Did they say we could safely wait longer before invading Iraq? I thought not. Did they lie at any level? [ ]yes or [ ]no Even a "lie of omission?" You may be pleased with yourself over all your hair splitting and smokescreen, but it is BS.

Peter- You continue to - what was KK's phrase about confusing and obfiscating? In all of your vast research, have you found any indication that Bush and Rumsfeld and their boys EVER told us that we could calm down and wait a little longer because the threat wasn't imminent? No. Their entire effort was to portray the situation as "urgent" and requiring a sooner rather than later invasion. They clearly said, over and over again, that we couldn't wait. They could have said "hey folks, he is a bad guy but we've got him surrounded, and he can't fly in either the north or the south, and we have time to see if something other than military invasion RIGHT NOW will work but we are going to have to go in sooner or later so it might as well be RIGHT NOW. They didn't say that. They said his threat, including the threat of a nuclear attack against our home state, was so urgent that they couldn't wait. You can slice and dice their speeches and find how Bush at one point said it might take a year for Saddam to build a weapon, but that was not at all the picture they painted. Your duck is getting old here.

Here's why I voted the way I did:

PP: You are right, I couldn’t predict with certainty this morning that you would not follow up with any real discussion this time. However, youir past record is consistent: post a link or excerpt from some right wing blog, and then follow up with a few jabs here and there without putting any real effort into a real response. I am challenging you to try something new: researching your points and putting together a cogent argument. It took me about a half hour to read and draft my immediate impression of that Podheretz article. It is really not that hard. By the way, this reply took me ten minutes. I gotta get some work done today, though, so you have plenty of time to reply on your own terms as I may not be ready to quickly reply to your next reply so you can reply to mine... As to your question about the mushroom cloud: Do you have Google on your computer? Type “mushroom” and “Iraq.” You will quickly find this: I believe I could do some further research and find where others echoed these words. But a quick “hit” I got listed the following: Read them and then argue how anybody could draw the impression from these statements, in context or not, that there was no immediacy to the threat? "The dictator of Iraq and his weapons of mass destruction are a threat to the security of free nations." • President Bush, 3/16/03 "This is about imminent threat." • White House spokesman Scott McClellan, 2/10/03 Iraq is "a serious threat to our country, to our friends and to our allies." • Vice President Dick Cheney, 1/31/03 Iraq poses "terrible threats to the civilized world." • Vice President Dick Cheney, 1/30/03 Iraq "threatens the United States of America." • Vice President Cheney, 1/30/03 Iraq poses a serious and mounting threat to our country. His regime has the design for a nuclear weapon, was working on several different methods of enriching uranium, and recently was discovered seeking significant quantities of uranium from Africa." • Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, 1/29/03 "Well, of course he is.” • White House Communications Director Dan Bartlett responding to the question “is Saddam an imminent threat to U.S. interests, either in that part of the world or to Americans right here at home?”, 1/26/03 "Saddam Hussein possesses chemical and biological weapons. Iraq poses a threat to the security of our people and to the stability of the world that is distinct from any other. It's a danger to its neighbors, to the United States, to the Middle East and to the international peace and stability. It's a danger we cannot ignore. Iraq and North Korea are both repressive dictatorships to be sure and both pose threats. But Iraq is unique. In both word and deed, Iraq has demonstrated that it is seeking the means to strike the United States and our friends and allies with weapons of mass destruction." • Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, 1/20/03 "The Iraqi regime is a threat to any American. ... Iraq is a threat, a real threat." • President Bush, 1/3/03 "The world is also uniting to answer the unique and urgent threat posed by Iraq whose dictator has already used weapons of mass destruction to kill thousands." • President Bush, 11/23/02 "I would look you in the eye and I would say, go back before September 11 and ask yourself this question: Was the attack that took place on September 11 an imminent threat the month before or two months before or three months before or six months before? When did the attack on September 11 become an imminent threat? Now, transport yourself forward a year, two years or a week or a month...So the question is, when is it such an immediate threat that you must do something?" • Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, 11/14/02 "Saddam Hussein is a threat to America." • President Bush, 11/3/02 "I see a significant threat to the security of the United States in Iraq." • President Bush, 11/1/02 "There is real threat, in my judgment, a real and dangerous threat to American in Iraq in the form of Saddam Hussein." • President Bush, 10/28/02 "The Iraqi regime is a serious and growing threat to peace." • President Bush, 10/16/02 "There are many dangers in the world, the threat from Iraq stands alone because it gathers the most serious dangers of our age in one place. Iraq could decide on any given day to provide a biological or chemical weapon to a terrorist group or individual terrorists." • President Bush, 10/7/02 "The Iraqi regime is a threat of unique urgency." • President Bush, 10/2/02 "There's a grave threat in Iraq. There just is." • President Bush, 10/2/02 "This man poses a much graver threat than anybody could have possibly imagined." • President Bush, 9/26/02 "No terrorist state poses a greater or more immediate threat to the security of our people and the stability of the world than the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq." • Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, 9/19/02 "Some have argued that the nuclear threat from Iraq is not imminent - that Saddam is at least 5-7 years away from having nuclear weapons. I would not be so certain. And we should be just as concerned about the immediate threat from biological weapons. Iraq has these weapons." • Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, 9/18/02 web page

I gotta say, Podhoretz is a brilliant writer, PP. That essay is likely to be effective propaganda for those who haven’t been paying attention or who desperately want to believe that their President hasn’t lied to them or that there is a good reason we are involved in Iraq. First of all, the facts. He does a good job of trying to say the President told the truth because he believed his lies, but the fact is Bush and his advisors definitely knew they were delivering the message that there was an imminent threat even if they carefully worded things in a way that they could mostly deny that fact later, but I have to say “mostly.” Condoleeza Rice cannot deny that she claimed we might see a mushroom cloud over Manhattan and Scott Ridder said, just before the war, that they could be weeks away from having three nuclear weapons if they got the material. When the press reported an imminent threat, at no time did Rumsfeld or somebody call a press conference and clear up any confusion – quite to the contrary. Podhoretz also tries to deny that they had reason to question their own statements about the existence of WMD’s. He does a good job of cherry-picking a few examples of where some Clinton analyst or even a French one agreed there was a worry, but BushCo definitely knew their intelligence about the existence of weapons of mass destruction was shaky at best and largely relied upon CHaliabi and a couple of his buddies. That is why they engaged in the Bushco-Judith Miller-talk show shell game whereby they would send Miller information to be published in the New York Times and then they'd have people talking to the press to say "see: even the liberal leaning New York Times believes he poses this serious threat." Podhortez is playing this same shell game over again, when he spends a quarter of his essay quoting legislators and others who got their information from the Administration, or from Judith Miller's newspaper articles. Im afraid his smear agains Wilson is disingenuous, too: others have tried to argue that Joseph Wilson has lied about what he concluded after going to Africa, but there is nobody in any position of vulnerability on this point who is standing up to do so. And where is the comprehensive Congressional investigation into the intelligence failures leading up to the war? We haven’t seen it because the majority party doesn’t want us to see it. He also effectively confuses things when he argues that our European allies believed Saddam had WMD’s. While they had no way to dispute our intelligence and may have sought to be diplomatic or may even have believed that Saddam could have had a biological weapons program, the fact is that the Europeans were nearly united in arguing that we could wait while the U.N. inspectors continued their work. Bush and Rumsfeld didn’t want to wait, because they feared a final U.N. report would undermine their rush to war. Remember: it was NOT Saddam who pulled the inspectors out; it was the U.S. And then let’s turn to the conclusion. Podhoretz tells us that the war was good policy because what we really went there in order to establish a beach-head for democracy in the Middle East and to make the world a safer place for America as a result. He concludes we are winning. The first point, if true, belies the whole thesis of his essay: if we went in there to establish a democracy while our President told us he was going in because Iraq posed a threat that required fast action, he lied about why we were going to war. As to the success of our effort? I don’t know what newspapers Podheurtz has been reading but they are not the same ones I read. We shall see if this Iraq venture ends up successful or not.

So much for that idea. I would have gone to the K&K for an Aussie pie and a catbeer, but I was away from the computer all day and at 8:00 pm when I looked on here it was not at all clear there was any gathering anywhere.

A rare event, I believe, but Wear your beacons, and practice the recovery, but don't count on 'em.

Doesn't the Stampede Pass road take you to Lester, where the road is gaited and you are not allowed to enter the watershed? It might provide an alternate pass for someone with some special clearance, but I don't think regular citizens are allowed to pass.

If it is raining, your goretex doesn't breath anyway (wet cloth does not breather because the water itself is an impermeable membrane). For snow and wind and light rain, goretex is good. For real rain, when you won't be able to get out of it, take the real thing.

I doubt anybody who actually works outside relies on goretex. I actually wonder why so many climbers do. Uniroyal used to make some kickin rain gear that was a little lighter than Helly Hansen but tough as hell.