OK - just because you asked nicely and warned me about the botter paper with Bush’s face on it.
I would venture that Ridge would’ve blown off any of them if he thought they were operating on their own, not consider resigning.
I don’t know.
And neither do you.
Only one of us, however, is claiming that we’re certain that what we don’t don’t is absolutely certainly true.
Whenever a member of the Bush administration comes out with a critical book, it is SOP to question his credibility and motives. (“That doesn’t sound like the Scott McClellan I know,” or words to that effect.)
It will be interesting to see what happens when Cheney’s book comes out.
From Salon:
Even the cite offered to start this thread doesn’t say anyone was ordered. He says he was “pushed to.” He didn’t but he was encouraged to. He doesn’t say it was someone “above him.”
So how I feel about that depends entirely on who did it, and how strong a “push” it was.
EXAMPLE A:
“Mr. Secretary, I’m calling on behalf of the White House communications group, and we wanted to get a heads-up on the threat level for next week.”
“It’s Yellow, and I don’t see anything on the horizon to change it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, why?”
“You sure it isn’t going to be Orange?”
“Yes.”
“Completely sure? Since there’s an election, and all…”
“No. I’m completely sure.”
“Ok.” (pause) “How sure, again? Because Orange might help us…”
-click-
“Mr. Secretary? Hello?”
EXAMPLE B:
“Tom, Dick Cheney here. We’re going to need the threat level elevated to Orange on November 1st. Say it’s Al-Queda, or some shit like that. Frankly I don’t care. I just want Orange on headlines, got it?”
“Mr. Vice-President, I don’t change the threat level based on–”
“Don’t give me any shit, Tom. If you don’t want to be back in Pennsylvania writing a book about the shortest term of any cabinet secretary this century, I better damn well see ‘Orange’ while I’m sipping my coffee Monday morning.” -click-
Example B is despicable. Example A is nothing.
Oh, face it, you “don’t don’t” all the time. All you do is don’t. So we don’t have a videotaped and notarized order from the President personally to Ridge saying he must, despite all’s that holy, perform a political act from a position of power within the U.S. government. So what?
To you this is the absence of evidence, and therefore total exoneration, while to any observer without powerful biases, this is more than sufficient evidence. I’m comfortable with what we have, both to indict Bush and to add to the partisan nature of your defense of Bush.
Yeah. I know how much Bricker hates the the false dilemma fallacy so I’ll offer FIVE options
- The order came from Bush or Cheney
- The order came from a lower level flunky on behalf of Bush or Cheney
- The order came from a lower level flunky all on his or her own with no knowledge or input from Bush or Cheney
- The information in the link is incorrect
- Ridge is lying
We have no evidence as of yet that either #4 or #5 are correct. #1 and #2 are just as awful to contemplate. Hell, I’d say #2 is even worse because of how weasely you’ve got to be to not even have the balls to make the phone call yourself.
Bricker suggests that it could be #3. Let’s assess the liklihood of that. Tom Ridge was the Secretary of the newly created Department of Homeland Security. He serves at the pleasure of, and answers only to, The President of the United States. So some pissant calls him up and says “hey, why don’t we change the color rating from green to yellow just to mess with the election?” I believe Tom’s only response would be “are you fucking kidding me? Go fuck yourself and the horse you rode in on.”
And then he writes a book describing the episode. And the publisher summarizes that event as “…was pushed to raise the security alert on the eve of President Bush’s re-election…”
Ridge headed the “Dept. of Homeland Security” He did not answer to secretaries and lesser officials. . Someone who told him to change alert levels near an election, would have to be very high up the ladder. Very high.
*Last edited by Bricker; Today at 12:58 PM. *
How unintelligible was that sentence before you edited it?
Do it! Outstanding! Go, Algher! Kick ass, take no prisoners! If you never believe another word I say, believe this: I mean it, do it for our country!
(But, shamefaced full disclosure…it probably wasn’t me, I haven’t had any truck with blotter paper/window panes, anything LSD since before the Err Apparent was born. Acid is pretentious, it keeps pretending its telling you something important.
Now, some 'shrooms, get away from the city, some fishing, maybe, listen to the Goddess hum songs you can’t *quite *make out… Oh, yeah.)
Not at all. If Ridge’s book says that Bush or Cheney ordered him to do it, that’s good enough for me.
What’s not good enough for me is the publisher’s summary: “he was pushed to raise the security alert on the eve of President Bush’s re-election.” It doesn’t say who did it.
So of our two positions, which is the more reasonable? Without the slightest hint of the specific circumstances, you’re absolutely willing to say it was Bush or Cheney. I’m saying I want to read Ridge say it, specifically, and then I have no trouble accepting it as true.
Which one of us is being more partisan, and which more reasonable?
Mistakes were made.
It was in Urdu, punctuated by aboriginal click language.
Don’t be absurd. I know you know very little, but didn’t you ever watch the West Wing? In that show, what level of White House staffers passed on information and guidance to the executive departments?
Man’s got a point, there. “Pushed” is too unclear.
I’m not really sure I follow your argument.
I can totally see how case A would make him consider resigning.