Why is George W. Bush not in jail?

I am kind of baffled with this. Why is this war criminal not behind bars in the US? He lied to americans and invaded a country who had nothing to do with the attack on the US.

Dick Cheney aswell, why aren't these guys put behind bars? I wannt hear the thoughts from people on this

Bribery.

If Reagan didn't go to prison for Iran Contra, there's nothing Bush did to get prison time. Unless they personally murder someone in cold blood, U.S. Presidents won't go to jail.

Because he does cute paintings?

Also, when the Presidents does it, it means it is not illegal.

Even though he killed thousands of people?

Edgy thread/10

That's how it works. Not ideal, I'll agree, but presidents are rarely held accountable for things that happen under their watch.

But how hasn't he even been asked questions about this. The media in your country is hiding this

I was going to say, it's the Nixon precedent.

@Master_Live said:

Because he does cute paintings?

WTF!? Either I've drank enough alcohol to see Unicorns and princesses or this is weird....

Sadly our entire government is filled to the brim with corrupt scumbags (also known as lifetime politicians). Vincent Bugliosi wrote a fantastic book about this back in 2008 setting up for the prosecution of GW Bush (and Dick Cheney) for the murder of thousands of Americans and over a million Iraqi's.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Prosecution_of_George_W._Bush_for_Murder

I assume we're talking about Iraq?

I'll start this off by saying: I didn't like George Bush. I didn't agree with the invasion of Iraq.

My girlfriend and I had a discussion about this the other day actually. Here is how she put it: 'If someone was getting raped next door and you knew about it, would you just stand there and watch it happen or do something about it?'

Now the reasoning for going into Iraq was horseshit. But Hussein did massacre the Kurds and Shi'ites. Was that reason enough to go in? I don't know. Definitely not worth the 8.5 year long war.

He didn't break any laws. Where is the lie? His actions were based on intelligence from every major intelligence agency in the western world. We are now going to have to back in Iraq to stop ISIS. I am in favor of sending over one plane and one bomb and be done with it.

Obama wanted to look forwards, not backwards.

what's ? Don't like when something is happening in a country? Just level the whole country! I wish everyone had this mentality, Like if a nuclear equipped country didn't like how a president handled his time in office? Just nuke the hell out of the US because **** it.

Here's the thing you need to look at. Plenty of people call President Bush a war criminal because he ordered the invasion of Iraq. However, while people may have disagreed with the invasion, it wasn't illegal according the the laws that have jurisdiction over Bush. Bush received approval from the U.S. Congress to invade and while the UN may have said they didn't want us to go in the UN doesn't have any real authority.

If you want somebody to blame for the invasion of Iraq blame the intelligence agencies that gave incomplete information about Saddam Hussein's capabilities and blame the Congressmen that voted for the invasion (ironically President Obama likes to brag he voted against it but is sending thousands of troops into Iraq now to train Iraqi forces to fight ISIS). Bush gets most of the blame because he was the president when the invasion happened.

It is unlikely that he outright lied but instead invaded based on faulty intelligence. Not because he is a honest man (the mere suggestion would cause a series of people quoting my post with laughing gifs) but because we all know that lies eventually rear their head. If Bill Clinton couldn't keep a blowjob between him and an intern secret then it's unlikely Bush could keep flat out lying about reasons to invade Iraq involving hundreds of top military and politician personnel secret.

Bush flat out lied about functional weapons in Iraq, and that Hussein was building more in secret facilities. None of that was ever indicated in the intelligence reports from every and all government agencies in the U.S. Bush made it up.

And the reports were incomplete because...they were incomplete--we hadn't finished investigating Hussein for violating the UN resolution. Bush jumped the gun asking for war.

Bush was led to believe that Hussein had functional weapons by both intel agencies and by Saddam himself, who believed that he had good reason to lie in order to make himself seem stronger against Iran. Also, consider that many of the intel reports are still classified, or not available to the people who are posting here on Gamespot. So saying that none of the intel indicates that is premature. There are things that go back to before most of us were born that are still classified to this day.

Same can be said for Obama, Clinton, Bush Sr, Reagan....etc...

The problem is the fact that the Bush Administration suppressed and ignored intelligence that contradicted their goals in mind.. They were not given indisputable fact that suggested that, they were given intelligence that stated there were no WMD's and ignored it.. And I disagree with that second notion about whole Bill Clinton scandal.. If there is one thing the US is against, it is sex, and more people know who Bill Clinton had sex with in the United States than where they can find Iraq on a map to which we spent over 8 years in..

and Kissinger.

@Master_Live:

That was funny. Lol.

But, didn't he get a pardon (or something similar) when Obama took office??

Oh give me a break Iraq's invasion had nothing to do with any of that. Besides states cannot be moral especially towards other foreign states. Its not the fault of anyone that's just how things are. The best a state can be on the morality spectrum is neutral. The Israelis have been killing us for a few decades now and it seem that its the U.S that is mainly providing the ammunition and the impunity to back that up. I don't want to go off on a tangent here and hijack the topic but you get the idea.

The reasoning for going into Iraq as you have already put it was horseshit, let's just leave it at that.

Irrespective of where you stand, that dog picture had got to be the cutest thing I've ever seen.

When a **** up of colossal proportions occurs in a public entity or official body, no matter how transparent the place might be and no matter how much accountability is upheld there the organization would have no other choice but to cover it up if it doesn't want to risk complete annihilation. That's pretty much why its highly possible that Bush did outright lie about the pretext of Iraq's invasion. To hold Bush accountable would jeopardize the entire American political regime.

Yes, he committed the war crime of aggression - said to be the worst war crime there is - but he did so with the US state's approval and sanction. Well, the US is the Godfather of the world, so what institution outside of the US would dare bring Bush to justice? The UN? The ICC? Bush's Black counterpart said it best...

@thebest31406 said:

Yes, he committed the war crime of aggression - said to be the worst war crime there is - but he did so with the US state's approval and sanction. Well, the US is the Godfather of the world, so what institution outside of the US would dare bring Bush to justice? The UN? The ICC? Bush's Black counterpart said it best...

If the world didn't approve, the usa would not be able to withstand an all out attack.

The war in iraq was after 9/11, wether he had something to with it or not, sadam hussein was not exactly somebody that repected human rights. I'm too uneducated to judge bush in this.

What i do know though is that you can't do what you want because you have a big army, the rest of the world would team up on you if the usa would do things that are not respected by the rest of the world. Not every country agreed with the war in iraq, but a lot of em did.

@GazaAli: If Bush lied, how would covering it up be in the be in the best interest of Washington? Let's assume that the Bush Administration knew the president lied but covered it up to protect him. What was stopping the Obama Administration from attempting to prosecute him after President Obama took office? Obama has access to all of the classified information Bush had and combine that information with subpoenas and the Justice Department and people would be going to jail.

Throwing Bush in jail would have been a huge victory that would all but guarantee the next president after Obama would be a Democrat unless they royally fucked up. Bush's supporters couldn't come up with a reasonable reason not to prosecute him if there was proof he knowingly lied and sent thousands of troops to their deaths to steal Iraq's oil, which is probably the biggest reason people like to preach why Bush invaded Iraq.

Maybe you shouldn't attack.

Same reason the banks only get a slap on the wrist for commiting fraud and market rigging on a massive scale.....

he had bad intelligence. it's not that complex, even for special people like you.

i know you're trying to insult me, but what bad intelligence. The UN said there was nothing there...

The banks really need to get their act together. After the derivatives scandal, things like the Libor scandal and insight into the "oversight" the NY Fed offers has not been encouraging.

But colin powell did, he was given intel that they had nuclear weapons. It's not his fault, but that is what he was told and he reacted accordingly to it.

This is common knowledge btw.

The UN told everyone when they inspected in Iraq, several times btw, that there were no weapons there. There was no threat whatsoever. It's not making the case better when Dick Cheney recieved money from Halliburton for starting the war either. How the hell do you explain that?

The UN is only one entity and when they are coming to inspect they are usually announced. The US government, as well as the UK government and other allies have intelligence sources that can do their thing unannounced and out of sight.

I know the easy answer is to believe the theory that we went to war in Iraq to steal all of Iraq's oil and make defense contractors richer but sometimes the simplest solution and not the conspiracy theory is the correct one.

Also, it would be incorrect to say that they found absolutely nothing whatsoever. While there were no nuclear weapons found, there were chemical weapons found that Saddam claimed he disposed of.

You don't have to agree with the war and you can say we should have left Iraq to Saddam and eventually his kids when he died of old age. But that doesn't change the fact that Bush and Cheney are not guilty of war crimes and as such aren't going to jail.

One more thing I have to think about is how many Americans here are legitimately mad because of Iraqi civilians and US troops who died there? Or are they only mad because they think the money we spent in Iraq could have made their student loans cheaper?

Because he didn't do anything to warrant it? Why don't you ask why every nation's leader who helped invade Iraq isn't in jail.

It is in the best interest of the American political regime to cover it up in the sense that it would have destroyed the public's confidence in their leadership and it'd have really shaken the foundations of that regime for the public to learn that the president of the country and his cabinet outright lied to everyone on a matter of this significance and consequence. Considering the repercussions of Iraq's invasion, the American and the Iraqi death toll and casualties and the heaps of resources that have fueled operation Iraqi freedom (rofl) civil unrest and nationwide riots wouldn't have been out of the question. That doesn't take into account the damage that would have been done to the U.S' image worldwide and how much it'd have undermined American influence too. It was no longer about Bush and his administration. As such, no one attempted to hold anyone responsible for that colossal **** up.

But you know what, its really irrelevant whether Bush lied or not. We can dispute the matter all we want but no one in his right mind would attempt to dispute the damage the invasion has done. The Iraqi death toll, casualties and the complete destabilization of Iraq that eventually conduced to present day's buzz word ISIS in addition to the American death toll, casualties and the thousands that still wet their beds at night and hear voices all day long are all indisputable and real damages that that war caused. Premeditation and intent are not prerequisites for culpability. People are punished for negligence and incompetence everyday.

I know they intelligence off the books.

There is no conspiracy theory. Cheney got money after he made a weapon dealer richer.

And yet he didn't use them and those were not the reason US went in there. So that means they were wrong again.

Yes he is, he's killed thousands of iraqees and gotten away with it. Based on a lie.

That is not Iraq's fault, it's your own damn fault

The world is yet to be the type of place where my country answers for it's wrongdoing. And you know what? Gonna ride this all the way to the end, kicking and screaming.

true, seing how the NSA stuff is unacceptable aswell. Guantanamo and much more. But the war in Iraq has been uncalled for and i don't see a lot of people recognizing it

That's the only reason we give a crap about that cluster **** that is the Middle East in the first and last place. Were it not for that sweet, sweet cude, our foreign policy would ignore the middle east and, by extension Israel, altogether.

When was the last time any US president went to jail?

I completely agree with you. I was just putting it out there.

Simple, The US government doesn't care much for the UN unless something can be done in their favor.

*facepalm

*tin foil hat

@MakeMeaSammitch: Really? You do know that everyone of your allies is thinking this right?

Because George W. Bush did not break any laws in ordering the invasion of Iraq. We don't know the extent of the intelligence the White House received in regards to Iraq but it was apparently enough to convince both Bush and pretty much all of Congress that war with Iraq was necessary. Remember presidents rarely act alone, instead they trust the knowledge and advice of their White House advisers, especially military and intelligence advisers in this case. He sought the approval of congress first and approval for war was given. All national protocols were followed and the war was handled within the guidelines set out by governing agencies. Even if you wanted to put George W. Bush in prison there would be no legal case against him.