a) The journal you’ve quoted is one that may reasonably be suspected of bias. It’s “The Bible of the Right”, according to itself. Coulter writes for it. Novak writes for it.
b) The sentence “The particular report that was in the President’s Daily Briefing that day was about three years old, it was not a contemporary piece of information.” obviously refers to the paragraph about the 1998 hijacking attempt.
c) You cannot use that sentence to attempt to prove, as you have done, that the other paragraph about hijacking, i.e. the one that you quoted, is also three years old. The claim is ridiculous on its face. Patently absurd. Silly.
You notice that some GOP mouthpiece claims this. I’m a bit more suspicious.
It’s not just your analytical skills that are lacking. Your geography could use some work, too.
Heck, how would he react? He campaigned strong for Arab voters on precisely this issue (see sig). In fact, his Florida booster and pal was an Islamic professor who was later arrested for supporting terrorists. Bush started out as the patron saint of Saudi interests and Arab freedom from excessive security oversight.
What sort of expert in “change in large organizations” claims that she can effectively direct the course government bureaucracies by “pulsing” them? You cannot direct the course government bureaucracies by “pulsing” them. You’ve got to shake the tree. Anything less, and you may as well be peeing in the Bush’s.
Is this only one aspect of what would be considered the Daily Briefing on National Security? Does he get 10 of these a day or is each memo a focal point of that days meeting? Also, where is the report about suspected terrorists learning to fly but not land? How far up the ladder did that go?
Sandy Berger apparently considered it the job, the duty of the NSA to bitchslap George Tenet and Louis Freeh daily until they began producing and sharing intelligence on terrorism. Taking what they had and making it actionable. It seemed to work to the extent that the millenium plot was defeated. As far as public records indicate Rice did not engage in “shaking the trees” like her predecessor.
Hand me a few billion and a staff of thousands to perform my own intelligence operations whose analysis I can have access to, and I will shoulder all the responsibility you care to put my way. Until then, I will hold those who friggin jobs it is to do so responsible.
On the basis of a memo like this being “proof” of a specific threat, or someone paying no attention to a threat, of course I would. I see nothing saying we ever had specific information of the hijacking of four planes on 9/11 and what their targets were supposed to be. Picking up more of the middle easterners involved might have prevented what we now call “9/11” - it might not have prevented the same thing on 10/12, or 11/30, or some other Plan B the following January, or whatever. And it definitely would have prompted lawsuits. I can just imagine what accusations would have been levelled against Clinton or Bush had they begun an all-out war against al-Qaida prior to an attack here.
I agree with Sam Stone about this being a Rorschach test. Good one.
The defense that there was no specific information as to the time and nature of the attacks, therefore no more could be done to stop them does, however carry the implication that a similar event could quite easily happen again now.
Maybe it should be a campaign slogan. Vote Bush: if Osama lets him know where and when the next attack will come, he’ll be sure to stop it.
You mean wishes that led to stuff like metal detectors, bomb detectors, ID checks, and baggage x-ray screeners?
What you’re leaving out is what the public knew.
Was anybody outside of the national security apparatus aware of the Bin Ladin/AQ threat? Precious few, perhaps.
The general public knew zilch about the threat of AQ striking within the US.
Our national security apparatus knew a whole hell of a lot about it, as evidenced by the “Bin Laden determined to strike in US” PDB.
If the public knew what was in the PDB you don’t think there would be a clamor for tighter airport security, more vigilance, even profiling of arab males buying one-way tickets? I think there would.
Would there be a stink about it? Of course. People can handle it.
My question was specifically about intensifying inspection procedures in the airports. In concrete terms, such as: detain all young Arab men, no boxcutters allowed, shoes go off etc. I have yet to see anybody recommending that to Bush before 9-11.
Were boxcutters allowed on planes before 9/11? Why would anyone want or be allowed to take boxcutters onto a plane. The point is, it was the lack of any adherence at American airports to what the rest of the world considered normal security procedures that made the plan so easy to execute.
I don’t know about box-cutters, but Swiss Army knives were. I took mine on board all the time.
George Carlin has a bit, recorded well before 9/11, about how airport security is useless because you are allowed to take knives on board. It is absolutely frightening to listen to now. Maybe if they made him head of security this wouldn’t have happened.
What I am trying to say is that 9-11 was a failure of Democracy, pure and simple. We all are responsible for what happened.
In practical terms, how US political system implements the basic tenets of Democracy? Wishes of the population are communicated to the administration in power through appeals by supporting constituency and criticisms by the opposition. Besides responding to those demands, the adm. also has a full time job to assure national security and some other things. Sooner or later the conflict arises between wishes of the population and demands of regular functions of government. When population is not scared it quickly becomes complacent (it also behaves idiotically when scared, but that is a different matter). As a result, the gov. faces a surge of demands to execute “nice” things like end all kinds of discrimination, clear the skies and waters etc., while keeping the country safe, which goes absolutely without saying. But even US gov. doesn’t have infinite resources.
The general public absolutely refused to recognize the danger brewing in the ME. All the warnings were there, yet there was practically no reaction until the real disaster struck. What would happen if 9-11 was somehow prevented? Suppose Bush would take a decisive approach from early on, sending troops into Afghanistan and implementing draconian measures inside US directed specifically against Muslims? Suppose it worked, suppose 9-11 wouldn’t take place: would he get any credit? To the contrary, the uproar of uninjured, complacent and misguided public would be probably much greater than anything we see now. Only now, after many years and lives lost, people are beginning to recognize what Clinton was doing against terrorism. Until 9-11, nobody cared, nobody wanted to know. What public wanted to know was all the sordid details of Lewinsky affair. The same treatment would be reserved for Bush.
Should Bush have risked public disapproval and try to do more than he had? I think he should have. He bears good chunk of blame. However, I’m not angry at him. But I sure am angry with people who endlessly and heedlessly pester the gov. in the name of Democracy, while fully expecting the same Gov. to fully protect them in time of danger. Those who want full and true Democracy have to realize the risks associated with it.
Does anyone know the level of specificity that that the Cinton Administration had about the Millennium plots? I’m pretty sure they never had a roadmap, but was it more or less specific than the PDB?
The hollowness of the Administration argument is further demonstrated by what they do now when they get an unspecific threat. I think the tree is now shaken, they don’t sit on their butts anymore working on a grand strategy.
“Historical”, though? Consider the document in total before you dismiss it so frantically.
(Looking around for the middle … nope, excluded again) Okay, let’s be generous about what you mean by “emergency”. A Level Red, duck and cover, everybody go buy plastic sheeting and duct tape, kind of situation? Is that what you mean? Nobody else does. Well, how about sending out heads-ups to people who might be able to use it, some hints what to look for, use some police shoe leather and knock on some doors and make some calls, that kind of thing? Of course. What *did * they do? Nothing. That’s no Rorschach test, it’s simple ostriching. Or maybe you can help us by explaining what course of action you think a responsible chief executive should have followed.
Suppose we give George W. Bush the benefit of a doubt, and say that 9/11 couldn’t have been prevented even after he saw the PDB – that while there was a strong suspicion that terrorists were planning to hijack airplanes, no one had anticipated they would use them as flying missiles into big buildings (already shown to be false, but ignoring that…).
Even assuming this was all true, doesn’t it reflect poorly on Bush that his apparently planned response to this danger was to do nothing? Did he want to negotiate with hijackers after they had taken over an airliner held a hundred people hostage, and maybe killed a stewardess or two?
“Mr. President, the hijackers have just killed a stewardess. They say they’ll kill one prisoner every hour until we concede to their demands.”
“Perfect, Karl – we’ve got them right where we want them!”
“If I may say so, sir, it was a brilliant idea of yours to let them go ahead with their plans. Warning the public and the FAA would have had a negative impact on summer vacation travel.”
Is this what the Bush apologists are expecting us to believe?
I like rjung’s line of thought – what’s the difference between having warnings about planes being hijacked and having warnings about planes being flown into buildings? I’d still be pretty pissed if four planes had merely been hijacked on 9/11 and the Prez had this memo on 8/6. I’d want to know the answers to the same questions I have now: What’d you do about it? Who did you bug? Who did they bug? What policies were changed? What was stepped up? Don’t give me empty euphemisms about “swatting flies.” I’m an adult, dammit, I can handle specifics. And I don’t want some obvious rhetoric about an arbitrary distinction between tactics and strategy, between “rolling back” and eliminating aQ. SHOW ME WHAT YOU DID.
Here’s the main question that’s been bugging me, and maybe you guys could help me hypothesize some answers. I seem to recall Condi saying that the 8/6 PDB had information about aQ because Dubya had been asking questions. Squink had a link (heh, that rhymes) which seems to confirm that. So let’s accept that as true (or contradict it, if you want). Given that, how can this report possibly be merely “historical”?
Did the Prez say, “Look, I’ve been hearing bad things about aQ from my daily CIA briefings. Can we get a quick reference sheet to use as we’re pursuing this issue?” If that’s the case, this isn’t simply a “historical” document; it’s a plank in a policy, and I want to see the follow-up that resulted from this PDB.
In order for this document to be “historical,” what must the President have requested? “You guys don’t really do much. Hand in a book report about aQ and I’ll give you a grade, and then file it in a library somewhere for the sake of posterity”?
I don’t get it. If it’s historical, why did the President request it?
Shortly before 9/11 (and boy I wish I knew the exact date), Family Guy pretty much showed the same idea.
[Family Guy]
Stewie Griffin walks up to the security checkpoint and notices the x-ray machines. He puts his backpack full of weapons on the x-ray belt and then starts singing “Good Ship Lollypop”.
Everyone is so distracted by the kid singing that nobody looks at the monitor while the backpack full of weapons is x-rayed.
Then Stewie runs over to the end of the belt, grabs his backpack and says, “Here’s hoping Osama Bin Laden doesn’t know any show tunes”.
Then the camera pans over to show Osama singing “I hope I get it” from some musical I can’t recall (A Chorus Line?).
[/Family Guy]
Of course, everyone knows that animated sitcom creators are far more skilled at putting together intelligence than the US Government.
Hell, imagine what Seth MacFarlane could come up with if billions were shoveled his way?
They were not doing “nothing”. Gov. never does “nothing”, it is a machine that is constantly running. They continued basically in the mode they inherited from Clinton adm. Perhaps they assumed that measures implemented by Clinton will work a while longer?
Why didn’t Clinton grab Osama when he had a chance?