Sep 24 2006
Did We Create Or Expose More Islamo-Fascism? Or, Did We Expose More CIA Abuse?
The ‘intelligence’ community, which missed 9-11 and the WMD situation in Iraq, is out with an NIE saying terrorism is worse now than prior to 9-11. Sadly, this report indicates a real proplem within our government and it is not with the Bush plan to take on terrorism. The NIE could easily be saying we now have a clearer view of what is arrayed against us because now we are focused on terrorism. Since we missed much prior to 9-11, then I am not surprised 5 years of focused effort has brought the picture into focus. It is also obvious that we would instill a backlash by taking on Bin Laden and his ilk because the many Muslims see him as a hero after9-11.
But what is really troubling is we still have a revolt in our intelligence community which is trying to use the news media to influence our elections. The second greatest threat to our democracy is the intelligence community using intel against their political opponents. The whole FISA-NSA debate is about someone using intelligence assets to undermine a political foe. The thrust of this debate has been the President using these powers to undermine our country. But a battle takes two sides and what we have seen is the abuse of power and responsibility in the IC leaks to the NY Times, which regularly spins the information fed to them.
Did the anti-American fever go up when we attacked the Taliban? Yes it did. But to worry about the hornet nest as it is arrayed to kill us just emphasizes once again why the left cannot be trusted to lead us. There are a million excuses (as Clinton can attest) why not to go to war. It is easy to hope the threat will go away after the latest attacks. But at some point those who care will say ‘enough is enough’ and fight back. Knowning in advance to fight will create an initial burst of effort on the opposing side. The idea is to win the battle of strength and endurance.
What I want to know is where are the checks and balances so these people in sensitive positions with access to classified information cannot abue their powers? We know the President has checks to make sure he doesn’t misuse his powers, but what about these other partisans using their positions to undermine our elections?
Update: Not surprisingly, Mac Ranger agrees with me on just about every point.
Isn’t it typical? The NIE that Bush used to take us to War in Iraq is flawed. This NIE, which says what they want it to say, is the gospel.
About that National Intelligence EstimateÂ……
AJ Strata has some pertinent comment on the leak of that NIE:……
The very first question of Bill Frist on TWWGS was about the NIE report. his response: ” It’s a classified report, I haven’t read it.”
This is another case of classified information getting leaked to the News media. Aiding the terrorists. I believe the report says what it is alleged that it says about terrorists, but I also believe it is WRONG. Al Queada grew exponentially during the 90’s, and I doubt very much that it is growing any faster now. I believe, that had the US focus only on Afghanistan and never put any troops into Iraq, that Iraq would now be the center of all terrorist training (as it had been in Afghanistan previously). I believe the objective of this report is another manifestation of BDS.
Look, if you have a school of piranhas’s swarming around, they don’t get excited until a little meat is thrown into the water. Do you see more activity? yes. Are they more dangerous? No. Is Al Quaeda always dangerous? Yes.
But who leaked this report to the Media?
Who is aiding and abetting the enemy?
While I’m on a rant about Sunday morning news shows. TWWGS had a segment about George Allen and his ancestry. EVERYONE on the show had a problem with the way George Allen handled it. NOBODY had a problem with the fact that his ancestry was brought up. and that includes George (formerly conservative) Will, now a sellout to the media.
What is TWWGS?
I think the most important question is not what does piss these people off, but what doesn’t?
Think they are mad now, see what happens if we go after Iran.
This Week with George Stephanoupolus
Oh ok.
I wish the Bush administration would get on the ball and find out who these leakers are. They are traitors and should have jail time. If Scooter Libby faces maybe 30 years for saying “I heard that too” what would actual leakers leaking information detrimental to the national security get…6 months? I know the left will holler if anyone is arrested, but so what else is new?
Barbara:
Sometimes I wonder if there might me a sting going on.
Terrye
I know I have more time available to do the reading and looking than most, because they are more consumed by their day to day requirements of making a living, but if you were to look at all the members of the Clinton administration ie the top 60 or 80 not just a couple and see all the places they ended up post Clinton you would see a lot of dots and it would raise your eyebrows.
More people ending up in sensitive places than most prior administrations, and a lot of them placed during the time Al Gore was contesting the Florida results and delaying the Bush transition team to even get a start.
Not a high profile item, but if you look at it as a whole, a really strange occurrance.
AJ, I asume then you predicted in 2002 a resurgence of the Taliban
in 2006,a failure to stabilize that country in all the years Bush has been there? And that bin Laden would still be free, and Zawahawri?
And that Iraq would inflame European Moslems to commit
terror in England and on the Continent and go to Iraq if Bush extended the war to Iraq to fight us there?
And you predicted in the run-up to the Iraq invasion, the foreign
jihadists would flock there and with some native recruits, play a key part in creating a brilliant insurgency that has quagmired America in hopeless morass?
And you predicted the jihad by 2006 would exponentially add to their ranks in such a way as to be able to fight us both there and eventually here,with Rumsfeld admitting he has no clue if we are winning or losing?
Finally when For Enforcement can utter such nonsense as his belief that the jihad would have flocked to an unoccupied Iraq where Saddam’s Baathists could have wiped them out more effectively than the hapless US troops, as they wiped out the Shia rebels,he shows he is divorced from reality.
Ken
The fact that Saddam did not eliminate Ansar al Sunna in the Kurdish regions gives your argument no weight.
Your propose a condition that is not supported by the facts.
Color me surprised.
Ken
You show your weakness with your reference to Bush.
Bush was just coming into office with a delayed start and all the hadicaps associated with that when 9/11 occurred.
The plot was put in motion long before Bush was elected.
You paint it in the wrong light when you ascribe things to him that are wrong.
This was an attack against America, not a specific person. Of course I realize that this concept will be lost on you.
I guess you support the first WTC attack as a prestrike of the Bush accendancy to warn us off of our sinful ways. How convienent.
Perhaps pollsters should hire OBL for his pressence!
Ken, how’s the weather over there in France?
“Finally when For Enforcement can utter such nonsense as his belief that the jihad would have flocked to an unoccupied Iraq where Saddam’s Baathists could have wiped them out”
Well, ole buddy the fact that all the terrorists training camps DID in fact move to Iraq after Afghanistan may have a little to do with my belief that they were there..,,,
Divorced from reality? you never even knew reality, much less divorced it.
Tell Jacque, we said hi.
Ken, the whole excuse the Democrats give for Saddam not being tied to AlQaida was that he could not take out Zarqawi on his own.
Merlin,
More facts for Ken to digest. Bush’s cabinet was delayed somewhat from Al Gore’s lame attempt to get the courts to select him as President, but it was also delayed when whats-his-name turned the Senate over to the Democrats for two years. In addition, all policies and budgets until 9/30/01 (after 9-11 Ken) were Clinton budgets and policies. To move money and efforts required Congressional approval and with the Senate in Dem hands it was unlikely to happen. Finally, Bush immediately started to work on much stronger plans to take out Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. Clinton always failed the Colin Powell test of going in with superior fire power. His plans for Afghanistan were like his plans for Somalia – minimal effort leading to dangerous results.
Don’t worry about Ken folks. If it was not for liberals like him Reps wouldn’t be winning the elections. Sadly, the Reps need a lot of work and their competition is so weak and fickled they have become a bit shabby.
AJ
If memory serves, that was Jeffords who did the party switch.
I remember sitting here in Florida and Gore was proposing to Bush that they should come up with a compromise on how to resolve the ballot issue.
Not very nice for a presidential candidate to propose an end run around state sovereignty and those little things called laws!
Cherry-Filled NIE on Terrorism (Update)…
Wow, the (still classified) NIE on terrorism reportedly points out that the war in Iraq has sown a new crop of Jihadists and ratcheted up the terrorist threat since 9/11/01.
The intelligence estimate, completed in April, is the first formal appraisal o…
NIE, Dated April 2006
6 months old. Already out of date, but never too late for election time.
Besides, why should we be suprised that confronting monstrous evil would activate the dormant elements of that evil. The benign neglect of the Clinton administration just allowed it to fester.
AJ , realizing I am an America First righty,not a Clinton defender, loves to distract by calling me a liberal. Then addressing red herrings …. Did Strata predict the “backlash” wherein a botched Iraq War and a failure in Afghanistan if Bush shifted the troops would lead to an exponentially sharp increase in worldwide jihad membership?
Merlin-Saddam was “discouraged” by the US administered fly zone from taking out the tiny group of jihadists. The camps moved post-US occupation.