Pervert, you’ve just been pitted.
Staff Member: “Mr. President, the United States is under attack”
Dubya: "How? By whom?
SM: “Uh, we don’t know yet. The World Trade Center is on fire and there’s conflicting reports. We’ll let you know as soon as we hear more.”
W: “Uh, oh. OK.”
Fair enough. If all he had to do to satisfy you would have been ask for the name of the pilots, then that’s your opinion.
When he was free of the press and civilians to do so. AIR.
But you never did answer the question. My appologies. I thought you were following. I asked you why people of your persuasion paid so much venom to this issue. You seem to think it is a very minor issue. Fine, I do too. I go farther and think it is totally preposterous, but I’m willing to disagree as to the degree of irrelevancy. Many of the liberal persuasion (or is it simply Bush haters) think it is indeed a major issue. I asked your opinion as to the nature of this emotional attachment because I do not trust myself to judge the internal working of people I disagree with. Too much temptation to think the worst and all that.
Obviously B. Can anyone tell us how many ways this analogy does not apply?
I hope I never said this. I don’t think I accused anyone of being unqualified for any particular purpose. I have tried to keep most of my comments aimed at the criticism, not the criticizer. If I missed, I appologize.
His staff, of course. What did you think the President was going to jump in a jet and chase the hijackers down? Obviously his staff are going to do the vast majority of the work. A true leaders job comes before the battle.
Exactly so. If they had needed presidential authority for any particular action, they would have interrupted him just as they did with the note about the attack. The true power of the American system is that lower level members of it are very empowered to act in ways they think appropriate. This is simply an offshoot of our belief in freedom, but it has the advantage of puttin decision making power right down at the point where it can do the most good.
Thanks very much. I live to bring joy to the world. 
It’s not complicated at all. The question is what was so wrong. Again, he sat for 7 minutes while he was in the middle of something (admitadly unimportant) at a time when there was nothing he could have done, learned, or been involved in that would have made any difference whatsoever. The problem, it seems to me is that he did not “feel your pain”.
Ok, but react by doing what, exactly? What would you have had him do?
Reallly? My first one! I feel honored. Meet you there.
I ask you again, what could he have done which would have satisfied you. I’ve got one mildly plausible order he could have given, and one admission that any question would be satisfactory. Anyone else care to pony up?
Hmmm. Maybe. Can a President abdicate?
See, now that’s funny. I disagree with just about everything you write, elucidator, but I almost always find them funny.
Since I don’t think this is very important in the first place (and I didn’t say I’d be satisfied, I said it would be an improvement), we’ll leave the bar there, which is about the lowest I can think to set it. Short of nuking half the world, I think sitting there, saying and doing nothing is the worst possible response from a leader in a crisis.
I just re-read this so I’ll re-reply. I don’t know if he could have asked anything that would have mattered. That’s beyond hypothetical. I’m asking "Why did he not asking anything, period? That’s just confusing to me. Who could get information like that and not even think to ask the basics? Unless he’s expecting other people to make the important decisions - what information to get, what immediate preparations to make as far as the military goes - what’s the sense of that response? Everybody was shocked, but how many people (especially given such official word it was terrorism) would have just sat there and thought “I’ll get around to that later?” At best, it strikes me as a bad decision, at worst, like I said, it’s bad management and a complete lack of curiosity and desire to take charge. Which is sorta bad in a President.
I’m not saying I’d have called him a hero if he’d said “Oh. By who?” But why would he react in a manner that says ‘I need no further information on this right now because I’m too busy reading to these kindergarteners?’
Why was he not free to say anything to Card when he was told “America is under attack?” Earlier cites show the press knew about the crashes and (though most of us were probably having trouble digesting the idea) the second crash made it clear this was an attack. I doubt he had to keep it a secret. You don’t need to be “free of the press” to ask “who did this?” or “what do we know?” or the kind of simple question it would be most people’s response to ask right away. And he was going to tell the press shortly thereafter anyway, so again I don’t buy that he just had to keep it a secret for a few more minutes while he bravely read the book, posed with the teacher, talked, and eventually made his way out of the room.
A bunch of people have already explained why it matters, if at all, to them. If the majority has said it’s a huge deal and people died because of his dawdling, I missed it. I thought jshore summed it up perfectly way back on page one.
Yes, in a way. He compared it to the super market scanner incident with Bush Sr. He was correct in that they are comparibly irrelevant, and that they are comparibly stupid attacks.
I don’t remember if he was the one who pointed out the “depends on what is is” line from Clinton, but I agreed that this was a similarly irrelevant and stupid political attack.
Just for reference, how many people who have posted in here do you think agree that the 7 minute issue is really a cannard? You and jshore, although you seem to agree that it was bad on the President’s part. Anyone else?
But given your admission that there was nothing else for him to do, why is this? I really don’t understand. You admit over and over again how this is unimportant and the Bush could not have done anyting relevant during that short time period. And yet you say it is the worst thing a leader could do. These statements seem incongruous to me.
But what evidence do you have that this is what he thought? This is another issue that confuses me about this whole line of reasoning. Who has said that he thought this? I hate to ask for a cite, but…
But, you see, his reaction did not say this to me at all. I certainly won’t speak for his staff. And if you have some testimony from one of them which suggests that they thought he was brushing them off, then I’ll look. But my read on what he did was to accept the admonision not to say anything about the attacks and continue with his activity. I read that as “Her’s what happened, don’t say anything, we are not ready yet.” As in we are on it and will get back to you when it is appropriate.
Now, if he distrusted his staff, or if he distrusted their abilities, I can see where he would second guess them and cut short the photo op and begin asking questions and giving orders. Otherwise, I’m not at all sure what you guys want him to have done. Besides “Feel your pain”, that is.
And, of course if he had simply don this, no one would be criticizing his first few actions. right? :rolleyes:
Of course, and I’ll assume you didn’t know this, the line I was talking about was “The point isn’t exactly what the President could have done in retrospect that would have made the difference. Rather, the question is whether this President has the intellectual curiosity in a crisis to find out what is going on and what the options are.” (And also “I tend to think that engaging your brain and learning the facts about a situation is the first step in planning a course of action.”)
What’s incongruous here? Could he have solved the crisis? No. Would it have probably been a good idea to try and take the very first steps in planning? mmmmaybe. Instead, he figured one way or the other that ten minutes or so during a crisis wouldn’t make a difference. If anything, he’s lucky he couldn’t have done anything - because he didn’t.
I’m not playing Kreskin. I’m talking about the attitude that this response projects. Other people have done the same, but you either haven’t gotten it or are acting like you don’t get it. If there is a crisis in your life, nevermind the Presidency - say it’s at your office and you’re the boss - and you’re told about it, and your response is to sit there and take your sweet time doing an unimportant task, doesn’t that suggest you don’t think the situation is very important? (Any time you don’t deal with a situation right away, you’re at least indicating your time is better spent elsewhere.)
I doubt that’s what he actually thought. He can’t possibly have felt reading to these kids was the most important thing he could do. That’s why his (non) response is confusing.
But you’d be completely ridiculous to do so, since I wasn’t attributing it as a comment from anyone.
I didn’t suggest he brushed them off.
Again, this suggests that reading to the kiddies is more appropriate at that point in time than asking questions about the attack, getting any information that is available, or indeed doing anything.
Yeah, those softie Democrats, always wanting empathy instead of a man who decisively leads by sitting around and then chatting for a few minutes. :rolleyes:
If the president is on the radio, telling me that there are hijackers in my plane, that they WILL crash it if they get in the cockpit, and knowing that I have an axe in the cockpit, I can guarantee you that I will at the very least slow those terrorists down to a crawl, and find a landing strip fast. I may or may not pull it off, but I’d sure as hell like the opportunity to give it a shot.
Reading stories about goats takes that opportunity away.
Everyone else is complaining about those seven - to - thirty minutes when he knew we were under attack. Personally I think Bush’s egregious lack of leadership was on display much earlier that day.
It’s absurd that Bush went into that classroom after hearing that the first plane crashed into the WTC, even though at that point supposedly everyone thought it was an accident.
(Which I think is bullshit – according to transcripts of phone calls by flight attendants on board, by 8:45AM the FAA knew that Flight 11 had been hijacked by Middle Eastern men claiming to have a bomb on board; American Airlines knew the plane was incommunicado and off-course, which one would think would be a big freakin’ clue right there that there was some serious shit going down. Info that didn’t trickle upwards, I guess. Too bad. Of course no one’s lost his job over that yet, but … Anyway.)
So fine, they didn’t know it was an attack. However, Bush and his staffers in attendance (particularly CoS Andy Card) did know by the time they got to the school that a plane had just struck the World Trade Center, one of this country’s most well-known landmarks and one that’s populated by thousands. This meant that hundreds of people on board and at the point of impact were almost certainly dead, and thousands more in the building and on the crowded NYC streets below were in grave danger.
Isn’t this a time for a president to be, y’know, moderately interested and even involved in speaking to NYC or FAA officials? Here we have a horrific accident with grievous loss of life for hundreds of U.S. citizens, and the potential for God only knows how many more deaths … and Bush chooses to go on with a photo op with some kiddies?
I mean, if he had been headed into a meeting with Arafat and Sharon, yeah I can see him continuing with his plans. But a vote-grubbing PR event?
That shows some seriously screwed up priorities there.
So sure, at that point Bush couldn’t have done anything to prevent the planes from hitting those buildings … but he could damn well have been the leader that he’s supposed to be. The leader of our country, our commander in chief, when faced with an unfolding tragedy thinks to himself “that’s a terrible pilot, what a bad accident” (according to his own comments) and then blithely goes ahead with his little reading event for the next half hour.
That Bush lacked the instinct to do *anything whatsoever * is what I condemn him for. Geeze, call me crazy, but when some major event like that happens, I don’t expect my president to sit on his ass looking to gain some votes by posing with preschoolers. I expect him to get up, to talk to his staff and demand to be informed, to show some compassion and interest and active involvement in the welfare of his citizens.
Yes, even if there’s nothing practical he can do, even if it’s merely for show, even if it’s only to “feel our pain” as pervert so mockingly states. That’s what a real leader does.
In light of many of the major decisions Bush has approved since 9/11, it would have been best if Bush had spent far more time reading “My Pet Goat” rather than attempting to be a president.
Bush’s lack of intellectual curiosity, poor judgment, and improper behaviour which he displayed at the start of 9/11 did not cause any harm, but were illustrative of his utter inadequacy as a president, which since then has led to terrible mistakes that have harmed both the USA and other nations.
Until the Americans wise up and dump the dodo, it would be best to keep Bush busy studying “My Pet Goat” rather than attempting to be the war leader of the world’s most powerful nation.
Yeah, especially since, as he later claimed at least twice, he was watching television and saw the first plane hit the north tower before he even went into the classroom. :dubious:
Not to mention it being a building that had been bombed several years before.
Knowing what we know now about all the warnings that were zooming around in the months before (including “bin Laden Determined To Strike Within US” or whatever the memo was called), his inaction comes off as even worse to me.
King George obviously can do no wrong in some people’s eyes, but I’m very very curious about one last thing.
pervert, what were you doing that morning, and what did you do when you first heard that something was happening? What did you hear and what did you do when you heard it?
I remember that morning, I remember every instinct I had was to get in the car and go get my daughter from school, and just hold her. I guess if President Bush didn’t want to dissapoint kids and wanted to hold a child right before dealing with the first attack on American soil since pearl harbor, then I guess I can understand it. In the end this is a silly argument. Those that like the man will not be persueded by this, for those of us that dont like the man this really isn’t a deciding factor. For those few who haven’t decided it must be an alienating argument.
Are you kidding? Sharon would have cancelled the meeting. 9/11 had serious global reprcussions, after all.
Even I asked myself that question immediately and I was not even in the US nor was I in the air heading to the US.
From what I saw so far of Bush in that classroom, he was informed about the matter ( apparently the second plane hitting the WTC) and his face got an expression like: Oh, was that for today?.. Forgot all about it. Damned, what now… OK, let’s read about the goat since we are here, no? Fix this thing when my important job here is done…
“Hello children, let’s see about this goat story and how well you all can read… “
The difference between myself and Bush in the classroom seeing nothing and not interested in knowing anything but reading from a goat book to children, was that I jumped up to try to find out about my friend and that I could conclude immediately that this was not just some extremely weird unimaginable accident.
Bush was informed it was not an accident, yet he did not show any interest in informing himself about the real nature of the attacks, about the impact on the people in the towers, about the impact on the whole of the USA.
He did not jump up to get information, as little as there was maybe available at that moment.
He did not show any interest in even getting to the nearest TV screen, like millions of people on this globe did when hearing about this. Inside and outside the USA, millions of people sat frozen an where overwhelmed by what they saw, were immediately thinking about the victims and about the overall safety of all other planes in the air (I certainly was no exception in that).
The president of the USA sat in a classroom and found it needed and of extremely greater urgency to finish the important job he had there that morning before he was willing to give attention to his country and its population.
His country was in shock, the world was in shock. The president of the USA was not interested but in being in a classroom with a few children in the role of a good nice uncle who showed them how good and nice an uncle he was.
Salaam. A
That is something which really makes me wonder about Bush.
If a plane were to go down without any extenuating circumstances, that would be one thing, but for a plane to ram the World Trade Centre, that is quite another.
In our office we gathered at the TV upon learning of the first plane crash. We assumed that it was a terrorist strike against the same complex that had previously been bombed a few years earlier, and we wondered if there would be further crashes there or elsewhere. We talked about the US bomber that had accidentally crashed into the Empire State Building, but assumed that such a mistake would be extremely remote given today’s avionics and that particular day’s weather. Then we sat, and watched, and waited, assuming that it was a terrorist attack, and hoping that it was an isolated event. When the second plane hit we were horrified, but not surprised.
If we, a handful of Canadians watching the TV, thought that the first crash was an attack and might not be isolated, then surely to god the Commander and Chief of the USA and his aides should have at least thought that possibility through. What was Bush thinking? That the building was hit at random by Douglas Adams’ friendly whale falling out of the sky?
It astounds me that once the first plane hit, Bush did not act on the assumption that there was a serious possibility that the crash was an attack, and that further attacks might follow.
That Bush and his aides failed to think the matter through and instead went into a “My Pet Goat” reading, is very telling. That Bush did not pull out of the “My Pet Goat” reading upon learning of the second attack is beyond the pale.
The problem here is that he didn’t even try. He’s the Commander in Chief, the head of our armed forces. As such it is his responsibility and duty to react when the country is attacked. Many balls were dropped on 9/11 because of lapses in communication and cases of the right hand not knowing what the left hand was doing. The 9/11 Commission report makes this clear. Bush was no different than everybody else who got up for work not knowing 3,000 people were about to die. Yet somehow, officials at all levels of government scrambled to figure out what was going on. Many middle-level people who were NOT the president were making decisions and taking action. How many times do you think someone said “get me the President?” “What’s the President say?” Even if Bush couldn’t effectively change anything with his action, his mere presence as a leader could have made a big difference to his subordinates who were operating in a vacuum.
And then there’s this from the 9/11 Commission Report. Compare these times with the other events of the morning.
The president had no information. He didn’t ask for it and for some reason none of his staffers forced it in his hands. The country was under attack, and the Commander in Chief did not even try to contact his military.
If the captain of a warship had been attacked but was absent from the bridge for 7-20 minutes afterwards, what do you think would happen to him? It’s inexcusable for a man in a leadership position not to assume control in an emergency. That’s what leaders are for. The arguments defending Bush amount to “Meh, what could he have done, he’s only human. He’ll do better next time.”
EZ
Well, I don’t think I’d really say it is a canard. It is way down my list of beefs with Bush only because there are so many things that he has done badly. The fact that such poor judgement in a crisis doesn’t bother me suggests to me that even I have lowered the bar (to the point where I apparently am not excessively worried about the fact that I think I could have done a better job than the President in such a situation even though I don’t consider myself to be presidential material.
pervert, you are certainly a natural defense lawyer. As I said in another thread on a very different topic involving Bush, if I committed murder I’d want you as my lawyer (or, better yet, in the jury) because you seem to be able rationalize just about anything when you want to!
pervert is right - there is some funny stuff here.
A lot of posters have been arguing to this effect:
This is all based on the apparent belief that, unless the President specifically and clearly asks, his staffers will make no effort to find out more about a terrorist attack. If Bush doesn’t ask, they will just sit there and do nothing.
Or else they already had the information, but they felt like playing “Twenty Questions” with the leader of the free world, and he didn’t ask, so they didn’t tell him.
Do you really believe this?
Haven’t you ever had the experience of trying to get something important done as quickly as possible? Do you really feel like you could have done it a lot faster if your boss was standing at your shoulder asking “Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet?”
I’ve said it before, and it is still true. If Bush reacted instantly, you would have said he panicked. If he waits to find out the situation before acting, you say he froze.
Regards,
Shodan