If this is true...
Via Robin Grant, if true then this would make me very angry indeed. Edward at Fistful has more, as does Tim Ireland.
There are ALWAYS limits to what the public should be told, don't let anyone tell you otherwise, and now this is true more than ever. It's this little thing called responsibility, tactics. If playing Poker, you do not show your hand for fear of tipping off your opponents and letting them know not to go all-in in case you wipe them out in one stroke. Counter-terrorism operations are, I'm sure we can all agree, just a tad more serious than Poker.
When it comes to last week's attacks I've tried to avoid too much finger-pointing (bar highlighting the impact a certain fascist party may have had), because playing politics over the bodies of the innocent dead is one of the most distasteful things I can imagine.
But if there is any truth to these suggestions - if it does turn out that politics has been played with our national security - impeachments alone won't be enough. This would be gross, irresponsible negligence of the highest order. A blase disregard of people's safety and lives resulting in the maiming and death of scores of innocents. And for what? Power, plain and simple. If this is true, our leaders will have become as bad as those they are supposed to be fighting.
15 Comments:
Hmmm....
Careful: we are in danger of moral equivalence here.
If this is true....
...That Bush should be impeached for using an arrest forpolitical purposes is probably a fair point.
..the world needs to know this. You are right to draw attention to it.
...That he is beneath contempt is also beyond doubt.
BUT. The crucial but: you are entirely and completely wrong to infer from this that Bush has the blood of the London dead on his hands. That blame rests only with the nutcases and those that incited and equipped them to do so.
The nutcases would have got through at some stage. It was only a matter of time.
Lives were put at risk solely because nutcases deliberately detonated bombs on the tube with the specific purpose to kill innocent civilians.
"If this is true, our leaders will have become as bad as those they are supposed to be fighting."
No nosemonkey. They will not be as bad. I deeply and strongly reject this assertion. Political chicanery is not morally on a par with the deliberate slaughter of civilians.
You are better than this.
I know, But - ANGRY.
Call me old-fashioned, but I see the prime duty of government to be protecting its citizens. If a government fails in that duty due to irresponsible actions which it chose to take for short-term political gain, that government is no longer worthy of any respect. Were we still in the 17th century, that government would probably no longer be worthy of any allegiance.
Obviously failing to act to prevent a terrorist attack isn't as bad as perpetrating a terrorist attack. But acting hastily and against advice and in the process buggering up an intelligence operation which may have prevented a terrorist attack is up there with seeing some psycho running around with a bomb and not bothering to tell anyone.
For evil to triumph all it takes is for good men to do nothing and all that. Consciously not preventing something terrible when you could have done is obviously not as bad as actually causing the thing in the first place, but as far as I'm concerned it's as near as damn it - especially when it's your JOB to get involved in such situations. It's like a policeman ignoring a burglar or a fireman ignoring a fire.
But it's still not certain that this is true. If it is, one thing that is certain is that the bastards HAVE to be held to account.
Nosey calm down.
None of this is proven, or even provable probably. Only political conspiracy junkies are interested in BS like this. If it serves to affirm some of your own prejudices and assuage your rightful anger over the senseless deaths of innocents that's OK. It was just a matter of time before Bush got blamed for this by the people who hate him. Hate does that... reason does not matter.
Of course FDR knew about Pearl Harbor and tricked the US into war as an act of treason. And LBJ had Kennedy shot so he could start the war in VN. Just ask Oliver Stone.
I wonder if Oliver wrote this lates piece of crap.
Hence the plentiful use of the word "if". I'm fully aware this isn't proven. I HOPE it isn't proven. It is, however, worryingly plausible.
And anyway, I quite like Oliver Stone... He's shit-rabid mental, obviously, but when he's good he's superb. As long as you remember to treat it as historical fiction, not history, that is...
There doesn't yet seem to be any confirmation that the escapees last year are the same people as the bombers from last week. Until that's clearer, I'd keep this one firmly in the tinfoil hat zone. That said, I've blogged it.
Hew BG is right actually. Even if it turns out there is no connection between Noor Kahn and the bombers the act of exposing someone who, if your war on terror is your first priority, as you say it is, was your first crack in the wall built around terrorist organisation...well, I think that's reprehensible in and of itself.
A lot of people have made a lot of sacrifices for Bush's ideal of "freedom-spreading-throughout-the-world-to-combat-terror" thing. Those people deserve a leader that gives as much to the fight as they do. What treachery to not even believe in it enough to risk a little loss of political capital.
At the very least, the conspiracy theorists are putting that FACT back into the news.
What treachery to not even believe in it enough to risk a little loss of political capital.
Hmm. Not sure that's fair - the Iraq war is obviously a case where much political capital has been risked, and lost, in the name of the war on terror. That this specific case has shown up a failing is unfortunate, but it seems to be Ridge, rather than Bush, who screwed up.
If its true - a big if - one might have to consider at some point if re-electing Bush instead of President Kerry is more important to the war on terror going forward than any single suspect or almost any information they might have
If the choice is between losing one chance at stopping a possible, or even definite, attack that kills 50 - or having President Kerry sworn in this last January to have Sec of State Dean rush to replay Vietnam 1973 for us - well...one must consider the wider picture at times
IF this is true
OF PHARISAIC LIARS & BORN-AGAIN TROTSKYTE MARXISM
For Rove, Cheney and their Neocon advisers there is no such thing as “objective truth”: Leo Strauss, Dick Cheney’s favorite “philosopher” once wrote that a “modern government must use all media resources available to enhance its control over an ignorant populace”!
The Soviet-Stalinist brand of Marxism is dead- good riddance! And (most of) its third-world avatars were wiped out: from the bloody “red Khmer” Cambodian version of Pol-Pot to the failed Yemini experiment in “scientific Arabian socialism” (whatever that means!)
Unfortunately the Trotsky/Hannah Arendt Pharisaic brand of Marxism is alive and well in America today: from the main ideologues of the Bush regime (“neo-conservatives” such as Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz and other disciples of Leo Strauss now infesting the White House) to many of the country’s leading pundits and opinion makers (Tom Friedman, William Safire…etc)
These modern proponents of “social engineering” want to reshape the Middle-East into a series of miniscule “freedom”-loving statelets, because “a strong central government” (except when it’s called Israel!) is the “enemy of liberty/democracy/peace/the people/civil society/the Shi’ites/the Kurds/my dog/younameit”
Fox News, National Review, US News & World Report, Rush Limbaugh & Co. have become conduits of choice for Neocon/Troskyte propaganda about the “irrelevance of cowardly Democrats/Clintonites/Europeans/the French/Tahitians” or the “failure of Pan-Arabism” and/or the “Horrendous crimes of Ba’athist butchers/ Muslim terrorists (whether imported or homegrown) /Right-wing anti-Semites/the enemies of the people/Afghan Jihadis/ Pakistani fundamentalist/my cat... etc
Well, it seems Arabs know better. They know a Pharisaic lie when they hear it: from Nouakchott to Baghdad, their unfaltering support for the rising Iraqi resistance is clear testimony to the fact that the Arab nation is still alive.
You see, my good doctor, it's precisely that sort of thing which leads most people to dismiss theories such as the above as the ravings of conspiracy-obsessed madmen, and thus let the bastards get away with it.
Good grief!! Doctor of what?
Sorry about one of the posts above being anonymous Nosey, Blogger did that, not me.
Or maybe it was Karl Rove, or maybe even Elvis, who did it. Between the six media companies that rule the world (Oliver Stone), the Masonic cartel, the cult of the Bonesmen, the International Jewish conspiracy, the oil cartel, and the vast right wing conspiracy folks do seem to spend a lot of time and energy getting the FACTS so they can prevent all of these plots from succeeding. Let's all get out our copies of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and see what all of this means. Maybe we should call a G8 style meeting of the secret leaders of all of these secret organizations in a secret location and let them secretly plot to secretly divide their entire secret world. Just don't tell me about it please. Just keep it secret.
Good grief!!
Sorry I can't be as enthusiastic about Oliver Stone, Nosey. With two of his most popular movies he lost any suspension of disbelief I could ever have. I was an infantry platoon leader in VN and Platoon was about as realistic a depiction of infantry life and combat as the Sylvester Stallone movies. Add to that that I'm from New Orleans, knew Jim Garrison, and knew him for the complete loon that he was. The entire JFK movie with Kevin Costner playing Camp Street Jim with that absurd Atlanta accent was a 12 out of 10 on the unintentional comedy scale. Imagine Boy George playing Churchill during the Battle of Britain with an Aussie accent. I still have trouble taking Donald Sutherland seriously in any role he plays anymore. I keep waiting for him to explain why he isn't in Dallas.
I didn't see Alexander but from what I hear Oliver should be glad that the Great One is not alive and kicking, or slashing.
But to get back to the subject you can reasonably expect this new "Chimpy George BusHitler did it" story to move from "if" to "trusted sources confirm" in short order. If "if" gets you that worked up, old man, keep the nitro handy.
Ronnie - I was thinking more of Nixon - made me take another look at the guy, and see him for the president he was rather than the bogeyman I'd been led to believe. Thanks to that film I've actually got a lot of time for Nixon. An arsehole, but a good president.
Damn Nosey. Would you just learn to spell asshole. Then I may be able to agree with you.
Didn't see Nixon. If it makes me laugh as much as JFK I'm probably missing something.
The Pedant-General expresses his displeasure here
I was expecting this.
Essentially, there is a good number of people out there who can't stand the idea of blaming the poeple who actually carry out attrocious acts. After every bomb in Northen Ireland, eleaborate arguments were made to put the blame for the casualties on the RUC & the "security forces" for alegedly not doing something right. This behaviour reached a peak with the Omagh bombing.... When the Guardian solemly published Gerry Adams statements blaming the police....
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