I say you win a package of rich, buttery Lorna Doone cookies. Unless you have a problem with sugar. Then, maybe some rice cakes.

Perhaps you will win a hug. This could become currency in the bleargh world!

I believed for decades that the moon was made of Gorgonzola cheese, based on bad information.
They believed because they wanted to believe, and they still believe Vietnam was a noble cause, Tonkin and hundreds of lies before and after.
Bush needed a scalp after 9-11. Osama was out of reach, Saddam was not. And Iraq offered great opportunitie for control of resources and corporate profit.
The CIA predicted the fall of the Soviet Empire in the early 1980s, but Weinberger still got his defense budget. Bad information my foot.
We are a nation of snake oil drinkers. For profit or for comfort.

Saddam was behaving exactly as I would have behaved if I had WMD, so I concluded that he had them.

Interesting how she claims that her belief in Saddam's Scary Weapons was based on her own reading of Saddam's behavior, and not on the fact that the Fucking President of the United States told her that Saddam had Scary Weapons.

Isn't the most plausible excuse for anyone believing the WMD hype simply that we were endlessly told, by people who were supposed to know more about this stuff than we are, that there were WMD?

But that's not the out McArdle chooses to take. I wonder why.

Funny basing one's interpretation of how other people should behave in certain situations by one's interpretation of how other people should behave in certain situations. Not ha ha funny. Peculiar.

I've been having this discussion over at Oliver Willis' forum, here:

http://www.oliverwillisforum.com/viewforum.php?f=2

about OJ Simpson and whether or not he committed the murders. I was reminded of John Carmen, who used to review television shows for the SF Chronicle. Right after Simpson was acquitted he appeared on a show on BET. Carmen observed that he appeared to be honest and sincere, which meant that he had to be acting.

Basing your belief of one's secret intentions on your own belief of someone else is really simple (but can we give Wilhelm Ockham a rest here?) in that it doesn't get complicated by that someone else at all.

A good salesman believes in his product, even when he KNOWS different.

Now Megan has me wondering: how does she know whether it's going to rain this weekend? Does she go outside and try to guess at the sky's intentions, or does she consult something like, oh, I don't know, like an, um, weather forecast?

Isn't that the whole idea of having experts, whether they work for the CIA or the National Weather Service? That they supposedly have the expertise and time to look into these questions that the rest of us lack?

Megan isn't one to rely on the experts, though. Her estimation that Saddam had WMD wasn't based on the screaming newspaper headlines she saw or the breathless "news" reports that came out of her TV set every day. No, she looked deeply into Saddam's eyes and made her own decision, based entirely on what she saw there.

I think it's funny that people who would probably never think of trying to unclog their own bathroom sink nevertheless think they are able to do their own intelligence analysis.

"study of his behavior"? BULLSHIT. If Saddam had WMD, HE WOULD HAVE TESTED THEM TO SHOW EVERYONE HE DID.

"This make me wonder: did you know UNSCOM was infiltrated by US spies trying to set up a coup in which Saddam would certainly be killed, and that the Iraqi regime was aware of this?"

I think that, to someone unfamiliar with the case, this reads like something written by a wacko. Thus no response.

I think that, to someone unfamiliar with the case, this reads like something written by a wacko. Thus no response.

Which part was wacko? That this was something known to the Iraqi regime, but unknown (and totally off the reality scope) of the average American news/geopolitical follower?

This whole premise of, I believe that Saddam/Iran/Iraq had/has WMD's, therefore it justifies a pre-emptive war is asinine. Why for do we have this over-the-top defense budget, year after year, if we can't contain a theoretical threat from some backwoods dictator with 1/100th of the military resources or 1/10,000th of our economic resources. Oh sh*t. My head hurts again.

I still contend that Cohen arriving, trembling, on the Sunday talky shows some years back (in the days of Clin-ton) with his 5-lb bag of flour (or was it sugar?) is the low point of US geopolitics. For me, that was the very moment the point of inflection was reached. It's all been a rush of hell and handbaskets since then.

A McCardle syllogism: (Major premise) If I were guilty, I'd deny it. (Minor premise) X denies that he's guilty. (Conclusion) Therefore, X is guilty.

A McCardle syllogism: (Major premise) If I were guilty, I'd deny it. (Minor premise) X denies that he's guilty. (Conclusion) Therefore, X is guilty.

I think that, to someone unfamiliar with the case, this reads like something written by a wacko. Thus no response.

The Great Chomsky once said that the ruling class, if they really knew what they were doing, would feature more leftists like himself on TV because, to the average American lacking the necessary background information, anything they said would just sound crazy.

Ted -

I don't remember Cohen and the bag of sugar, but (Math Nerd here) that wasn't an inflection point - what you describe is a local (or quite possibly absolute) maximum.

Doubtless the change in the sign of the second derivative occurred at some earlier time - Oliver North's Congressional testimony, perhaps, or the 1980 October Surprise. Or, hell, maybe NSC-68.

Good point, Mark, but I seem to recall reading this in a mainstream newspaper quite some time ago.

What's interesting is that if McArdle had weapons of mass destruction, she wouldn't use them against an invading army or use them to threaten people, but instead would desperately claim she didn't have them whilst secretly hording them. I guess, like Saddam Hussein was, she's truly a dove at heart.