Apparently It Was "Faulty Intelligence"
Hello again everyone. I usually don't post so soon after a previous post, but this story has me shaking my head and wondering.
As loyal readers know, I have been on a tear about the whole Bush Admin/NSA domestic spying story. Just when I thought it couldn't get any stranger, this comes along.
The Washington Post is reporting that, earlier this week, the President rebuked reporters for breaking the NSA domestic spying story. During the rebuke, the President took reporters to task about publishing stories based on governmental leaks (basically he told them that they were being un-American by publishing news that might hurt intelligence gathering operations related to the war on terrorism. Call me a misguided idealist, but I thought that reporting news was the press' job. Guess White House approved news is the only acceptable news now!) Anyway...During the chastisement, Bush cited a 1998 news story (developed from a leak) that reported that Bin Laden was being tracked using his cell phone. The report supposedly caused Bin Laden to turn off his phone, and, thus, he was able to elude tracking for a while. Now, apparently in Bush's mind, no other reason would have caused him to shut down his phone. I mean the fact that we used cruise missiles to bomb his camps the day before he shut off the phone had nothing to do with him actually shutting it down, it was the newspaper story (yeah, that's the ticket).
Now the Post is reporting that the newspaper story cited by Bush is an urban myth. Plainly put, there never was any story. This "damaging" story never even existed, yet it was cited as "fact" by Bush. I guess it falls into the same category as the other facts bandied about by Bush and the White House. Facts like "Iraq has weapons of mass destruction", and "Iraq was involved in 9/11." Facts like "The Patriot Act isn't eroding or taking away your rights if you have nothing to hide" and "We don't have secret CIA prisons overseas and we never torture the prisoners in them." I guess this "fact" was just another example of the faulty intelligence that Bush is getting. It must have come from the same source as the Iraqi WMD intelligence. Gee, I wish Bush would get start getting some decent intel, and do so before more "faulty intelligence" kills another two thousand service men and women.
As always I am Chuck and this has been my "defeatist," but factual, rant.
As loyal readers know, I have been on a tear about the whole Bush Admin/NSA domestic spying story. Just when I thought it couldn't get any stranger, this comes along.
The Washington Post is reporting that, earlier this week, the President rebuked reporters for breaking the NSA domestic spying story. During the rebuke, the President took reporters to task about publishing stories based on governmental leaks (basically he told them that they were being un-American by publishing news that might hurt intelligence gathering operations related to the war on terrorism. Call me a misguided idealist, but I thought that reporting news was the press' job. Guess White House approved news is the only acceptable news now!) Anyway...During the chastisement, Bush cited a 1998 news story (developed from a leak) that reported that Bin Laden was being tracked using his cell phone. The report supposedly caused Bin Laden to turn off his phone, and, thus, he was able to elude tracking for a while. Now, apparently in Bush's mind, no other reason would have caused him to shut down his phone. I mean the fact that we used cruise missiles to bomb his camps the day before he shut off the phone had nothing to do with him actually shutting it down, it was the newspaper story (yeah, that's the ticket).
Now the Post is reporting that the newspaper story cited by Bush is an urban myth. Plainly put, there never was any story. This "damaging" story never even existed, yet it was cited as "fact" by Bush. I guess it falls into the same category as the other facts bandied about by Bush and the White House. Facts like "Iraq has weapons of mass destruction", and "Iraq was involved in 9/11." Facts like "The Patriot Act isn't eroding or taking away your rights if you have nothing to hide" and "We don't have secret CIA prisons overseas and we never torture the prisoners in them." I guess this "fact" was just another example of the faulty intelligence that Bush is getting. It must have come from the same source as the Iraqi WMD intelligence. Gee, I wish Bush would get start getting some decent intel, and do so before more "faulty intelligence" kills another two thousand service men and women.
As always I am Chuck and this has been my "defeatist," but factual, rant.
posted by Chuck | 00:30
1 Comments:
z.h.e.,
Thank you for your comment, I appreciate it. I am glad you like this blog, but I would call it anything but simple. I shall "pop over" and take a look at your blog as time allows. I will also leave a comment on it.
Once again, thanks for taking the time to leave a comment.
Cheers,
Chuck.
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