Ray McGovern whose writings are all over the internet. He has also
appeared in the Tampa Bay area several times and spoken during our
local peace events...this was just shown on NBC, protesters were
taken away but the questioning by Ray McGovern was to the point and
the questioning continued from other members of the audience.
the Tarotlaydee )0(
>From the Associated Press...
Q and A Gets Rough for Rumsfeld
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?
vnu_content_id=1002463146
ATLANTA Anti-war protesters repeatedly interrupted Defense Secretary
Donald H. Rumsfeld during a speech Thursday, and one of them, a
former CIA analyst, accused him in a question-and-answer session of
lying about Iraq prewar intelligence.
"Why did you lie to get us into a war that caused these kind of
casualties and was not necessary?" asked Ray McGovern, the former
analyst.
"I did not lie," shot back Rumsfeld, who waved off security guards
ready to remove McGovern from the hall at the Southern Center for
International Studies.
Three other protesters were escorted away by security as each
interrupted Rumsfeld's speech by jumping up and shouting various anti-
war messages.
Rumsfeld focused his speech on a U.S. need to increase its emphasis
on more flexible partnerships with foreign militaries and rethinking
of the role of long-established alliances like NATO.
A transcript of his encounter with McGovern follows.
*
RUMSFELD: Well, first of all, I haven't lied. I did not lie then.
Colin Powell didn't lie. He spent weeks and weeks with the Central
Intelligence Agency people and prepared a presentation that I know he
believed was accurate, and he presented that to the United Nations.
The president spent weeks and weeks with the Central Intelligence
people and he went to the American people and made a presentation.
iIm not in the intelligence business. They gave the world their
honest opinion. It appears that there were not weapons of mass
destruction there.
QUESTION: You said you knew where they were.
RUMSFELD: I did not. I said I knew where suspect sites were and
QUESTION: You said you knew where they were-- Tikrit, Baghdad,
northeast, south, west of there. Those are your words.
RUMSFELD: My words my words were that no, no, wait a minute, wait
a minute. Let him stay one second. Just a second.
QUESTION: This is America.
RUMSFELD: You're getting plenty of play, sir.
QUESTION: I'd just like an honest answer.
RUMSFELD: I'm giving it to you.
QUESTION: Well we're talking about lies and your allegation there was
bulletproof evidence of ties between al Qaeda and Iraq.
RUMSFELD: Zarqawi was in Baghdad during the prewar period. That is a
fact.
QUESTION: Zarqawi? He was in the north of Iraq in a place where
Saddam Hussein had no rule. That's also
RUMSFELD: He was also in Baghdad.
QUESTION: Yes, when he needed to go to the hospital.
Come on, these people aren't idiots. They know the story.
(PROTESTER INTERRUPTS)
RUMSFELD: Let me give you an example. It's easy for you to make a
charge, but why do you think that the men and women in uniform every
day, when they came out of Kuwait and went into Iraq, put on chemical
weapon protective suits? Because they liked the style? They honestly
believed that there were chemical weapons. We believed he had those
weapons.
QUESTION: That's what we call a non sequitur. It doesn't matter what
the troops believe; it matters what you believe.
MODERATOR: I think, Mr. Secretary, the debate is over. We have other
questions, courtesy to the audience.
************************************************
Rumsfeld challenged about Iraq, heckled by protesters during Atlanta
speech
Posted 5/4/2006 4:51 PM ET
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-05-04-rumsfeld-
protesters_x.htm
ATLANTA (AP) Anti-war protesters repeatedly interrupted Defense
Secretary Donald Rumsfeld during a speech Thursday and one man, a
former CIA analyst, accused him in a question-and-answer session of
lying about Iraq prewar intelligence.
"Why did you lie to get us into a war that caused these kind of
casualties and was not necessary?" asked Ray McGovern, the former
analyst.
"I did not lie," shot back Rumsfeld, who waved off security guards
ready to remove McGovern from the hall at the Southern Center for
International Studies.
With Iraq war support remaining low, it is not unusual for top Bush
administration officials to encounter protests and hostile questions.
But the outbursts Rumsfeld confronted on Thursday seemed beyond the
usual.
Three protesters were escorted away by security as each interrupted
Rumsfeld's speech by jumping up and shouting anti-war messages.
Throughout the speech, a fourth protester stood up in the middle of
the room with his back to Rumsfeld in silent protest.
Rumsfeld also faced tough questions from a woman identifying herself
as Patricia Robertson, who said she had lost her son in Iraq.
Robertson said she is now raising her grandson and asked whether the
government could provide any help.
Rumsfeld referred her to a website listing aid organizations.
President Bush seldom faces such challenges. Demonstrators usually
are kept far from him when he delivers public remarks.
Rumsfeld has been interrupted by anti-war demonstrators in
congressional hearing rooms as he has delivered testimony to
lawmakers in recent months.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has had direct confrontations
overseas. These include demonstrators who called her a murderer and
war criminal in Australia in March, and throngs of anti-war
protesters who dogged her every move in northern England in April.
Demonstrators were kept far away from Rice during a visit last week
to Greece, where riot police confronted a violent street mob that
smashed shop windows in protest of U.S. policies and Rice's role in
the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.
More than half of Americans say the war in Iraq was not worth the
cost financially or in loss of life, recent public polling has found.
Just over one-third of those surveyed say they approve of Bush's
handing of the war. Public sentiment about the war has been at those
low levels since fall.
Just over one-third of the public says Rumsfeld is doing an excellent
or pretty good job, according to polling in March, while six in 10
said fair or poor.
In recent weeks, at least a half dozen retired generals have called
for Rumsfeld's resignation, saying he has ignored advice offered by
military officers and made strategic errors in the Iraq war,
including committing too few troops. But he has received strong
backing by Bush, who repeatedly has indicated he will keep Rumsfeld
at the Pentagon.
When security guards tried removing McGovern, the analyst, during his
persistent questions of Rumsfeld, the defense secretary told them to
let him stay. The two continued to spar.
"You're getting plenty of play," Rumsfeld told McGovern, who is an
outspoken critic of the war in Iraq.
Responding to another protester who also accused Rumsfeld of lying,
the secretary said such accusations are "so wrong, so unfair and so
destructive."
Rumsfeld focused his speech on a U.S. need to increase its emphasis
on more flexible partnerships with foreign militaries and rethinking
of the role of long-established alliances like NATO.
He called such changes "necessary adjustments, based on the new
realities and the new threats that have emerged since the end of the
Cold War."
He also said, "We need ways to make sure we're better understood in
the world than we are."
Rumsfeld also likened the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan to the
Cold War.
"There is no question our country is facing difficulties in Iraq and
difficulties in Afghanistan," he said
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