• Click here to download mp3 (~15 megabytes)
• Click here for streaming mp3

Bob Paquette from WFCR public radio and Diane Broncaccio of the Greenfield Recorder were on site. The conference patched in Kimiko Aoki from Japanese Public Broadcasting, Andrew Stelzer from Portland's KBOO radio, Michael Rivaro from the website WhatReallyHappened.com and others.

Traprock is focused on providing a community to support peace education programs regionally and nationally. Their website is rich in resources and has information on events they've organized, as well as upcoming events.  Check it out at TraprockPeace.org.

Traprock gives permission to anyone to download and replay this material for free if replayed or distributed without fees. They only ask attribution to be made to Traprock and Scott Ritter.

Photo Credit: Charlie Jenks

Related story: "20 Lies About The War."  Glen Rangwala's writings and analysis on Iraq is aggregated on the web by Traprock:  click here to pull it up

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Ritter is your basic total loser. I'd like to spit on him.

Maybe I'll attend this event. Looks like a spitting opportunity.

Once again, you show the world you respond to stimulus like a robot.

B.A., read the headline and then look at your calendar.

So, when are you going to address this:

http://la.indymedia.org/news/2003/07/72262_comment.php#72473

Pretty funny, Texas big man. You're so quick with testosterone-laden boasts about debating, but you're unwilling to go on record, explaining why Condi isn't lying.

Oh well.......guess you'd rather be a windbag showing (spitting?) your drivel rather than speaking to specific facts/issues/events.

Damn it! You're right X. I've missed a major spitting opportunity.

A couple of years ago I missed a similar spitting opportunity on Bill Clinton.

One thing I want to do before I die is to spit on Bill Clinton. A big juicy one right in the middle of his face will do fine.

SF Indymedia is down at the moment, and that's where the mp3 linked above is hosted. To get around that for now, you can find other copies of the mp3 here:

http://www.indymedia.nl/nl/2003/07/12846.shtml

or

http://traprockpeace.org (has realaudio version too)

or

http://radicalempathy.org/traprock/

Eventually, SF Indymedia will come back and the links in my original post will likely work again. Sorry for the inconvenience.

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Scott Ritter's credibility should be called into question by all serious observers.

Mr. Ritter traveled to Baghdad last September where he delivered an address to the Iraqi National Assembly. The United States “seems to be on the verge of making a historical mistake,” he told the Iraqi parliament. He said that Iraq poses no threat to the United States, adding, “Iraq is not a sponsor of the kind of terror perpetrated against the United States on September 11 and in fact is active in suppressing the sort of fundamental extremism that characterizes those who attacked the United States on that horrible day.”

It would be interesting to see the evidence Mr. Ritter used to make the claim that Iraq was suppressing radical Islam. We can assume, though, that he had forgotten about Iraq's payments of $10,000 to families of suicide bombers attacking Israelis.

For now, though, let's focus on Ritter's credibility.

In 1998, his stint as a weapons inspector in Iraq came to an end. Subsequently, he appeared before committees in both houses of Congress. The following is an excerpt from his testimony before the House of Representatives regarding Iraq's capability to possess weapons of mass destruction:

MAJOR RITTER: What I have indicated in the past is that the special commission had received sensitive information of some credibility, which indicated that Iraq had the components to assemble three implosion- type devices, minus the fissile material, and that if Iraq were able to obtain fissile material of the quality and of the proper physical properties conducive to such a weapon, then they could assemble three nuclear devices in a very short period of time.

REP. GILMAN: Major, one last question. You mentioned a "short period of time." Would that be weeks, months, years? What would you define as a short period of time?

MAJOR RITTER: If the components of the implosion device are operational, if they have not been damaged through moving them around the country and hiding them from the inspection teams, and the fissile core is of the correct properties, it's a matter of days, maybe weeks before they could be assembled into a device.

Days, maybe weeks. It's now four years later. Four years since Mr. Ritter was in Iraq as a U.N. inspector.

On September 3, 1998, Ritter testified before a Senate committee:

SEN. BROWNBACK: And yet you were stopped on two occasions. In your opinion, in the absence of a robust inspection regime, how quickly could Iraq restart its weapons of mass destruction program?

MR. RITTER: Iraq has -- in my opinion, within a period of six months, simply put. Six months.

SEN. BROWNBACK: Do you have any information as to whether they are continuing with it to even today?

MR. RITTER: Yes, sir.

SEN. BROWNBACK: You do?

MR. RITTER: Yes, sir.

SEN. BROWNBACK: What's your opinion about that continuation of their weapons-of-mass-destruction program today?

MR. RITTER: They're -- Iraq has positioned itself today that once effective inspection regimes have been terminated, Iraq will be able to reconstitute the entirety of its former nuclear, chemical and ballistic missile delivery system capabilities within a period of six months.

Six months. Again, remember that these statements were made four years ago.

On August 25, 2002, Mr. Ritter was quoted on NBC's Meet The Press as saying, “Iraq has been disarmed fundamentally. Their weapons programs have been eliminated. Iraq poses no threat to any of its neighbors. It does not threaten its region. It does not threaten the United States. It does not threaten the world.”

In the four years since Ritter's resignation as a weapons inspector, there have been no inspections inside Iraq. How does Mr. Ritter know that what he said in 1998 is no longer true? How does he know that Iraq has been “disarmed fundamentally”?

Which Scott Ritter are we to believe? Should we believe the Scott Ritter of 1998 that gave testimony under oath to the congress immediately following his gig as a weapons inspector? Or should we believe the Scott Ritter of today that is trying to sell a book?

If his testimony following his work in Iraq was factual, then we have no reason to believe that what he is saying today is in any way useful. If we believe that he is telling the truth now, then his credibility is still in doubt because we must conclude that he perjured himself before two committees of the U.S. Congress.

I would just like to add that in my world, the sky is green.

If you want to talk about credibility....where the hell has Little Bush's been, buddy. Talk about el-zero credibility....the Boy Emperor is the king. ha ha ha

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