Fox News goes on a witch hunt for Janet Napolitano
Since the attempted Christmas Day bombing of a Northwest Airlines flight, Fox News has waged war on Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, going so far as to ask whether she should be fired. In doing so, various Fox News figures and outlets have seized on Napolitano's comments that "the system worked" after the attempted terrorist attack while ignoring both Napolitano's later clarification that she was discussing the emergency response notification system that took place following the attempted attack, and that Bush administration officials Attorney General John Ashcroft and Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge previously claimed success for passengers' ability to thwart "shoe-bomber" Richard Reid's December 2001 attempted bombing of a domestic airline.
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Fox News wages war on Napolitano
Doocy: Napolitano is "number one on the list" of people who might be fired. On the January 5 edition of Fox & Friends, co-host Steve Doocy quoted President Obama saying the airline security breach was "totally unacceptable" and remarked that "it did sound for a little while like some career person might wind up losing their job, and Janet Napolitano was number one on the list" because, in Doocy's words, she said, "Everything worked before she said it did not work." The on-screen graphic that aired during Doocy's comments said, "What to Watch For; Do Heads Roll?" Later during the broadcast, Doocy again asked, "Will heads roll? Remember, it was Janet Napolitano, the director -- the secretary of Homeland Security, who came right out and said, 'The system worked.' OK, which part of the system worked? Was it the five guys who jumped on this guy, who were sitting nearby? Or was it the fact that something else happened, because a couple of days later she came out -- the next day she came out and said, 'OK, there was a system failure.' So will her head roll? Chances are, no."
Fox Nation: "Fire Napolitano? She Says 'The System Worked,' Then Backtracks." On December 28, Fox Nation posted an article about Napolitano, claiming that she "conceded Monday that airline security failed ... a turnaround from her declaration a day day [sic] earlier that 'the system worked.' " The headline asked if Napolitano should be fired, though the article to which Fox Nation linked contained no such declarations.
Fox Nation highlighted attacks on "hapless" Napolitano who shouldn't "remain in office." On December 30, Fox Nation posted a NewsBusters article under the headline, "Words NOT in Napolitano Op-ed: War, Islam, Yemen, Nigeria." The article claimed that "Janet Napolitano is seeking to diminish the Obama administration's NWA 253 failure by exaggerating the cunning of the Christmas Day plot"; described Napolitano as "hapless"; and asked, "How much longer can she possibly remain in office?"
Fox guest "Gunny" Bob Newman claimed Napolitano "not qualified to conduct a cavity search on a bowling ball." On the January 4 edition of America's Newsroom, former radio host "Gunny" Bob Newman said, "With all the ways Al-Qaeda can attack us, is we have got to get qualified people in the jobs." After naming deputy national security adviser John Brennan and national security adviser James Jones as examples of qualified people, Newman claimed, "Then you have the other end of the spectrum, again, and you look at Janet Napolitano, in charge of Homeland Security, and she's not qualified to conduct a cavity search on a bowling ball."
Cavuto compares Napolitano to fired Redskins coach Zorn. On the January 4 edition of Fox News' Your World, host Neil Cavuto compared the job that former Washington Redskins head coach Jim Zorn did with his NFL football team to the job Napolitano is doing as secretary of Homeland Security. Cavuto said that "Jim Zorn is out as coach of the Washington Redskins, Janet Napolitano still in as head coach of Homeland Security. He lost some games and lost his job. She could have lost a lot more and keeps hers."
Hannity calls Napolitano remarks "laughable," "absurd." On the January 4 edition of Hannity, Sean Hannity claimed that Napolitano "tried to convince us that [Abdulmuttalab's] attempt failed because 'the system worked.' Her laughable explanation had many enraged and now has critics from both sides of the aisle calling for her to step down." He added, "[A]bsolutely no one bought Napolitano's absurd claim."
Peter Johnson Jr. claims, "We should be concerned as Americans." Appearing on the December 28 edition of Hannity, Fox News legal analyst Peter Johnson Jr. claimed that his impression of the interview he conducted with Napolitano was that "we should be concerned as Americans. It was a disturbing interview. She gave an interview yesterday on all networks and embarrassed herself. She did the same thing today. And if she's embarrassing herself, and she's embarrassing us as Americans, what do our enemies think?" Guest host Tucker Carlson replied later, "That's such a measured way of saying she's a disaster."
Fox ignored context of and later explanation of Napolitano's "the system worked" remarks
Napolitano said "the system worked" before discussing the "the whole process of making sure that we respond properly, correctly and effectively." On the December 27 broadcast of CNN's State of the Union, Napolitano stated that "the system worked" before discussing the emergency notification system and response to the incident. From the December 27 edition of State of the Union:
NAPOLITANO: One thing I'd like to point out is that the system worked. Everybody played an important role here. The passengers and crew of the flight took appropriate action. Within literally an hour to 90 minutes of the incident occurring, all 128 flights in the air had been notified to take some special measures in light of what had occurred on the Northwest Airlines flight. We instituted new measures on the ground and at screening areas, both here in the United States and in Europe, where this flight originated.
So the whole process of making sure that we respond properly, correctly and effectively went very smoothly.
Napolitano later clarified that "the system worked" comments were in reference to the emergency response and notification system. On the December 28 edition of NBC's Today, after co-host Matt Lauer asked Napolitano to explain her remarks, Napolitano said, "I think the comment is being taken out of context, what I'm saying is once the incident occurred, moving forward, we were immediately able to notify the 128 flights in the air on protective measures to take, immediately able to notify law enforcement on the ground, airports both domestically, internationally, all carriers, all of that happening within 60 to 90 minutes."
Previously, when public thwarted shoe-bomber attack, Bush administration officials claimed success
Ridge: "Because of the vigilance of some citizens, we certainly have gotten some folks on airplanes, shoe bombers." In a December 28 article, ABC News' Jake Tapper noted that Bush administration officials "claimed success" in the public's role in thwarting a similar failed attempt by "shoe-bomber" Richard Reid. Reid was subdued and detained by fellow passengers when he unsuccessfully attempted to detonate a shoe-bomb on an American Airlines flight. According to Tapper:
Napolitano's predecessor as Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Tom Ridge, went on MSNBC's Hardball on September 10, 2002, where host Chris Matthews asked him if the US government had thwarted any terrorist attacks within the US.
"You can't measure that success," Ridge said, "because it's difficult to determine with an organization that's so decentralized."
Matthews suggested that such success could in fact be measured "if you catch a guy about to blow up a building" or "you catch a guy moving a car bomb into an area of their building."
"Because of the vigilance of some citizens, we certainly have gotten some folks on airplanes, shoe bombers," Ridge said.
Ashcroft: "We've asked citizens to be vigilant" and "alert to any possible threat," and "success of this policy was made clear" in Reid case. Tapper also reported that Attorney General John Ashcroft stated in a 2002 press conference:
"Throughout the war on terrorism, our military and intelligence officials have made a concerted effort to share appropriate information with the public in order to enlist their assistance," Ashcroft said. "We've asked citizens to be vigilant, to be alert to any possible threat. The success of this strategy was made clear by yesterday's indictment of Richard Reid, who may very well have succeeded in destroying American Airlines Flight Number 63, as the indictment charges, had it not been for the courage and attentiveness of the citizen passengers and crew."
Witch hunt? Ridiculous. It's called holding people accountable for their job. We have to go through tremendous security measures every time we fly and Napolitano claimed the system worked. Baloney. What worked was an incompetent buffoon of a terrorist and the courage of some passengers.
Calling it a witch hunt is nothing more than playing the victim.
And NO Righty has the right to say "as bad as Bush" with any credability. When you people compare people to prominent Republicans it's historically been complimentary. NOt our fault YOU elected a moron. Unless you voted Gore, Kerry, I don't want to hear it. "As bad as Bush" - from a guy who voted for him twice. That's rich.
You got nothin'. You'll just take any opportunity to bash Democrats. So: Either Nepoltiano needs ot go or Obama does. I love it.
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Unless you called for Rice to be fired after 9/11 and Ridge after Richard Reed, I don't wanna hear it from you.
She needs to be fired, period. That is called accountability and it shows a serious president willing to do it. What Bush did was cronyism, no different here it looks like it.
And why her (now) and not Condi Rice (then)? Rice was the NSA on the day 3000+ people burned to death in an attack that we had TONS of intel on prior to. The whole creation of the HSA practically REAKED of an effort to shield her from blame.
So yeah, I thought she should have at least be taken to task for [9/11]. You want Nepolitcano called before congress? Fine. I'll back that. But calling for her ouster at this point is baseless. And you do not provide ANY GROUNDS upon which to justify it.
Fired because some guy boarding a plane IN AMSTERDAM (a city in a country that doesn't even allow us to post Marshals on their planes, BTW - and that's not Nepolitano's decision either, that dates back to the prior admin as well) had something he shouldn't have in his underpants and then set his own pants on fire. Is it her fault that the NETHERLANDS (or NIGERIA?!) didn't pay attention to the NO FLY LIST that this dude was on?
On Secretary Rice's watch thousands of people died in an attack that we HAD prior intel and warnings on, but calling for her ouster was "partisan hackery."
On Secretary Nepolitano's watch, some zealot burns his d!ck off and calling for her oster is just common sense.
Riiiiight.
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And I noticed you didn't contradict me on your feelings regarding Rice, so don't go trying to suggest YOU'RE the "principled" one here! I'm all for them being treated equally.
I'll bet you voted for that moron twice, so you have no right to try and use that nonsense HERE, NOW.
You think that bashing a 'Pub will somehow resonate with us? Coming from you, so disingenuously as it does, just makes up throw-up in our mouths a little.
How WAS she "responsible" anyway? Notice how you never really get to that? The dude got on the plane in AMSTERDAM! (NIGERIA, first actually!) What... is she somehow "responsible" for Airport security in the Netherlands now? And Africa?
Add GEOGRAPHY FAIL to the list. (Or do you realize that those are NOT in fact part of THIS country?)
Dude: YOU GOT NOTHIN' HERE!
And with each passing moment you further reveal that you have NO CLUE why you think she should be fired, other than 'she's a Democrat' and 'you're a republican' and 'something bad happened.'
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If we applied your standard in any pricipled way, the Republican Party would have had to be disbanded sometime between Nixon's first year and Reagan's last!
Forget it, trying to define accountability and responsibility to some liberals is futile, you will wiggle out of it and search for any excuse you can get your hands on.
And she does have some oversight over the people who evaluate threat risks.
However, holding her responsible for the errors of someone to not react appropriately to a threat warning from a parent, and for the workers who didn't attempt to tie together that info with the data about Yemeni Al Qaeda making terrorism plans and that a Nigerian was in Yemen? Those people should be fired. Unless RightON can document how Janet Napolitano's management style, directives, or inept oversight caused those things to happen, it's inappropriate to go after her.
She needs to be fired, period.
She took no responsibility, all she did was preen on how it was handled.
You don't get it, do you? She is the head of Homeland Security, period. That is her job. So she can just throw her hands up in the air and say whoa, this started in Amsterdam, not my area? Absurd. If that is how you show accountability then you are seriously lacking.
If a MLB team loses 100 games or an NFK team loses 15 games, who gets fired? The players whose ineptness directly contributed to the losing season, or the coach who is ultimately responsible? Work on that and you will have your answer as to what should be Napolitano's fate.
Comparing her to an NFL coach or MLB manager who knows the names and the stats of ever person who plays for him is evidence that you don't have any idea how to craft a reasonable analogy!
Unless you have some evidence that some behavior of her, some direction, some leadership of hers, led to these shortcomings by her employees, then she doesn't deserve to be canned.
And, BTW, lots of NFL coaches and MLB managers get fired when they didn't really do anything wrong. It doesn't make it right or reasonable just because it happens a lot. And lots of times, players DO get fired or released or traded if they are inept.
Your analogy sucked.
they all did a great job in this case, and on 9/11 and in the london train bombings and many others cases. seems your great spy agencies are only good at spying on their own citizens.
No one.
Now... unless you expect us to believe that this really bothered you at the time: S.T.F.U!
Rice wasn't fired over 9/11 and Ridge wasn't fired over Richard Reid. And honestly? They probably shouldn't have been. (Ridge especially. Rice... it's certainly debateable. But RIDGE is the far more appropriate comaprison here anyway: Nothing actually happened THEN either!)
You say that we set our expectations low? Well... not lower than YOU LOT DO apparently. And arguably higher, since some of us might have fired Rice.
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You got nothin' dude. As usual. And DellDolly PWNS you.
Well, because, we don't ALWAYS hold people with responsibility accountable for every aspect under them, that's why. It was a ridiculous thing for you to assert. It was so stupid it makes me laugh at how ignorant you look that you even TRIED to float that argument!
If the higher-up is responsible for the shoddy work of the people below them, then yes, we should fire the higher-ups. But there's no evidence that any Napolitan policies, directives, or leadership flaws had ANYTHING to do with the failure for these analysts to tie together these bits and pieces of intelligence!
Since there's nothing that we can point to that SHE did wrong, nothing at all, then she shouldn't get fired.
Actually, RightOn, that depends on how bad the team was they took over. And, this team that Obama was taking over hadn't made the playoffs in 8 years after being consistently dominant for the eight years prior. Certainly, the next coach would not be fired after the first mediocre season. The fans would be eager that they finally had a coach who seemed to be righting the ship after a coach who was historically perhaps the worst coach in franchise history. I think the Lions would be willing to keep the coach around as long as they saw changes from the previous administration.
My point is simply this. Obama is not Bush. And Bush was roundly and rightly criticized for not firing Mike Brown over Katrina as it was his agency, his department, responsible. Bush did not hold people accountable for their responsibilities during much of his administration, he merely paid lip service, patted them on the back and back they went to their jobs.
I am not saying it is Napolitano's fault directly, of course it isn't. But she is the head of the agency that oversees our homeland security. And a plane headed for the US almost got blown up if it weren't for an incompetent terrorist and a courageous passenger.
We averted a major disaster in this country and I believe Obama should hold the ultimate person responsible. Even he said the dots were missed. Apparently he is going to leave her in place, it's his choice. I just happen to disagree with it.
But, my fear is that this is still the same problem we have had all along. We have too much bureaucracy and not enough trust between departments when it comes to national security. We have invaded countries and spent billions of dollars and caused hundred of thousands of deaths, and our issue is still the same. We have too many hands in the national security jar and they cannot all maneuever in sync. Now, we have another unnecessary (in my opinion) layer added onto this heap and our original problem still remains. We need to streamline national security, not keep adding new departments to pretend we have done something.
Americans have NO IDEA what a hugely intelligent, hard-working, GREAT public servant they have in Napolitano.
I've known her for 30 years -- and she's just as humble and nice and funny as can be. She was smart then, but she's incredibly smart. You can't imagine how hard she has been workikng since she hit office -- trying to drag the security for government systems into the 21st century, meeting with Google and companies like that, working on FEMA, so much. It takes an ETERNITY to make even the smallest change in the federal gov't. We've been 10 years trying to get the CIA and the FBi to exchange info - -and, as this incident proved yet again -- they still won't. Napolitano is NOT in charge of the CIA, FBI or any of the key groups that should have stopped this/passed on info.
Having said that, I think G-Dub's entire Homeland Security Department is a joke and should be done away with. The idea that the bureaucracy was a chief problem that led to 9/11 may have some merit, but adding another entire layer to the bureaucracy was supposed to help this? This was a knee-jerk reaction of fear to make us feel better. And, it seems to me that we are still having the bureaucratic issues within the departments. G-Dub's plan failed miserably yet again. I would be in favor of doing away with Homeland Security altogether.
Napolitano is NOT the head of the CIA, FBI or any of the other organizations that were reponsible for sharing this info, etc. Obama took the CIA and the FBI to task yesterday in no uncertain terms for the continued in-fighting going on that makes them refuse to cooperate and share info.
As for her remarks: Do you REALLY think that the Secretary of Homeland Security goes on all the national talk shows right after this, WITHOUT having been told by Obama EXACTLY what she is to say and not say? You can't be that naive.
Napolitano went on because she is "no drama Napolitano" -- she was chosen to take the fall for this for some reason.
And you haven't asked yourself why the director of the CIA (which had a MAJOR disaster of enormous, historic proportions a couple of days after this) was never on national tv being asked why the info the bomber's dad had supplied was never passed on?
ANYONE who listens to O'Reilly or FOX isn't really interested in anything approaching the truth anyway. It's fascist cant,designed to inflame the ignorant and get Republicans back into power (and create a little vigilantism along the way). It's a really dangerous force.
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It happens. Thanks for the correction!
But he was on the lowest level of the list. And that's part of the problem. With 550,000 on the list, that's too many to skim through to easily find a bad guy. Thank god for computers - can you imagine the problems if this terrorism had begun after we had lots of international travel by planes but before computers?
I think that the person who put him on that lowest tier of lists needs to be made aware, as do all the people who do similar work, that the kind of warning we got from the father of the terrorist should have elevated him to a higher level of watch.
Next, we need to have more warm bodies doing analysis and trying to tie pieces of info together faster - more translators, more clever people who can ferret out connections from puzzle pieces.
Last, we need more human intelligence, and that takes years to develop. I hope we're working on that now - it's the kind of item that's not shown on any public budget priorities, so I hope that it's the kind of funding that has been getting lots of money for the past 8 years. Whether or not it has, I sure hope that Obama ups that funding.
Now, I guess as soon as we get rid of that Janet Nepolitano, all the rest of this stuff will just fall into place, huh?
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LOL
Bush was a terrible excuse for everything he said he stood for. As a Republican, he more often lined with the Democrats. As a self proclaimed Conservative, he was ANYTHING BUT. He did not hold up any right wing values once-so-ever. He was a disgrace. BUT... He was better than the inventor of Ted Steven's "Internets Tubes" and Mr. Ketchup-Waffles.
As the lead figure in that department, she had an entire year to look at it and say this doesnt work and start changing it. She has made no move to fix it.
See : Bremer, Tenet & Franks
There should have been no need to clarify at all if people would take an honest look at what she actually said. She referred to the response to the attack, not what led up to it. That was the only system that she said worked. Only a liar would claim she was talking about anything else. Unfortunately, there are a lot of liars out there.
You're a partisan hack jumping on the Fox badwagon and taking any opportunity, no matter how ludicrous, to bash a Democrat.
Civics and logic FAIL.
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It's would be embarassing how shameless you guys are being about this... if you had any shame, that is. Who sells "ambien" anyway? Their stock could skyrocket if they can help YOU GUYS sleep at night.
Partisan hack, heal thyself.
1) You have not said that you would have treated NSA Rice the same way after 9/11.
2) You have not said that you would have treated HSD Ridge the same way after Shoebomber Richard Reid.
3) You criticise Bush, but only for saying "good job brownie"... About a guy that he eventually got rid off anyway. (And who was hardly a parallel to the current scenario ANYWAY.)
So either (A) Tell me why Rice and Ridge should have kept their jobs if Napolitano deserves to fired, or (B) admit that they were every bit as incompetant as you claim Napolitano to be.
Or...
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You will end up proving the very accusation you sought to discredit.
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That's what happens when you mistake conviction for priciple.
Those liars and ignoramuses are the only reason she had to emphasize what she had plainly said in the first place.
As I said, it's Brownie all over again.
Thick as a brick. Would you beleive ANYONE that told you this couldn't happen again? If you would, you may be a bigger doofus than your posts indicate.
There is no absolute security.
The right wants to pretend that there's a possibility that we could "win" against terrorism. That we can, if we only try hard enough and do the right things, that we can declare victory. That's why they keep harping on the fact that Obama won't say those things. It's part of the rightwing talking points faxed out every week to rightwing pundits and paid trolls.
What they like to do is to attack their opponent's strengths to help disguise their own weaknesses. They figured out early on that a war on terror is a ludicrous platform, but they don't want to admit it, so they have to mock those on the left who realize it too!
One of the telling remarks was that guy on MTP this week, saying that either Cheney was ignorant or disingenuous. I suspect it's both.
How about you answer the question - would you believe anyone that told you this would never happen again?
For the love of dog you ARE that big of a doofus.
Yet you say, in response to someone asking you if you'd believe anyone who would tell you that, that you would believe that person if they held themselves responsible.
That's just ludicrous. And somehow it becomes the flaw of the person who pointed out that it's ludicrous? Wow.
Anyone who would give you any sort of assurance that terrorism wouldnt' happen again isn't being honest. No one, including you, should ever believe anyone who would give you any sort of assurance that it would never happen again. But that's one of the things you said you wanted from Janet Napolitano that you didn't get.
It's not our fault that you said that ignorant thing.
Ever.
And again, cash for a ticket ISN'T a warning sign.
Secondly, he didn't HAVE a one way ticket, you fool. If you don't even know that basic fact, then you shouldn't be even having this discussion. And the father didn't give us clear indications that he was going to do what he did, but I do agree that this kid should have been on a higher level of warning based upon the info the fathe did give us - But that's NOT something that Napolitano is responsible for - that was a judgment call by some low level employee that she never saw, approved of, or directed in any way!
That's the argument that you can't get around - you're doing a witch hunt, trying to make Napolitano responsible for what she's not responsible for. That's the very definition of a witch hunt, BTW. Trying to blame someone as a guilty party when there's no evidence that anything bad that happened was actually the targeted person's fault!
You are a liar!
Contained within the Time article above "But even without that clue, Abdulmutallab's recent stay in Yemen, combined with his father's warning and the fact that he paid cash for a one-way ticket and didn't check any luggage, should have been sufficient to set off alarm bells.
Will you go to any length to lie and look like a complete fool. And you talk of credibility. You have none.
Your observational talents are going to waste. You should be working for at least the TSA and probably the Department of Homeland Security. Whattya waiting for? Get going!!!
What have news groups (even FoxNews) told us? That he had a round trip ticket that cost about $2800.
In new information released Thursday, Information Minister Dora Akunyili said Abdulmutallab flew into Lagos from Accra, Ghana on Christmas Eve and ''spent less than 30 minutes'' in the airport before catching the flight to Amsterdam.
Nigerian officials had said earlier that his round-trip ticket was bought in Accra for $2,831 in cash on Dec. 16. Akunyili's statement did not say how he spent the rest of the week before flying to Lagos.
Harold Demuren, the head of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, said Abdulmutallab paid cash on Dec. 16 for the $2,831 round-trip ticket from Lagos, Nigeria, to Detroit via Amsterdam -- a ticket that came from a KLM office in Accra, Ghana. Demuren said Abdulmutallab checked into his flight with only a small carryon bag.
Pwned, RightON.
Will you go to any length to lie and look like a complete fool? And you talk of credibility. You have none.
She failed. There is no witch hunt.
I guess you need a blown up airplane over a major city in the US to have evidence that something bad happened.
You are too biased in your love of your massia and his staff of incompetents and socialists to realize that attempts are attacks.
And Old_Benjamin did not mention the word guarantee, by the way.
Nothing but insults? I gave you a chance to clarify your statement and you parsed with that gem. So what is the definition of "assurance'?
The lable of "doofus" is therefore appropriate.
Sure, once you finally have to face up to the fact that her statements were NOT backtracking and were NOT cya, it becomes irrelevant. Looks like a little cya on your part.
As for her responsibility, how far should it go? Exactly what failures was she personally responsible for? Did she put any policies into place that made us more vulnerable to attack? Are there any specific answers to any of these questions? I'm no big Napolitano fan, but if she's going to be criticized there should be a reasonable basis for the criticism. On the "system worked" quote the criticisms have been blatantly dishonest. On the issue of her performance, I haven't really seen a solid case that she personally failed in the duties of her office.
She has acknowledged the failures and is taking action on them. It would be too much to expect the DHS Secretary to be fully aware of all aspects of security procedures and all vulnerabilities. That's what the department analysts are for. If there isn't some specific failure on her part that can be pointed to, resignation isn't warranted.
For the record, I'm confident that I would have the same attitude toward a republican cabinet secretary.
What the hell are you talking about?!
How is one guy getting stopped by passengers in his attempt to blow up a plane ANYTHING like the gov't standing idly for a week while an entire US city rots and drowns under 10 feet of water?!
I'd say a more apt comparison would be to...: One guy getting stopped by passengers in his attempt to blow up a plane.
Which would mean this is nothing more than TOM RIDGE all over again. And it's funny, because after teh Shoebomber, I don't recall ANYONE calling for HIS ouster, on the left OR the right!
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And we STILL have to take our shoes off because of that @$$hole!
Again, if you can show me some facts as to where she screwed up then I am all for her losing her job. I am even for the Department of Homeland Security being done away with. But, I would not be for firing people just so the bedwetters can sleep better tonight rocking themselves back and forth repeating the line "the terrorists can't get me".
It isn't about screwing up. Is the only way you would approve of Napolitano's dismissal was if she had personally let the terrorist through the airport screening line herself, or that she handed down an order that directly went to the reason for some disaster? It isn't about that. It's about ultimate responsibility and about a president who holds people 100% accountable for the positions they hold in his administration.
If this attack had been successful do you believe Napolitano should be fired? I do. And simply because, thankfully it was not, it was not due to anything she or her department did to thwart it. She took the job, she owns every aspect of it. The buck stops with her.
But that's NOT the way the world works. When a person who oversees a dept messes up, then they should get canned. If they don't mess up, then they shouldn't be canned. Sometimes people who deserve to be fired don't get fired, and sometimes people who didn't do anything wrong get fired, but just because injustices happen sometimes, it doesn't make them right.
Since there's no evidence that Napolitano did anything wrong, she shouldn't get fired. It doesn't matter if sometimes people who aren't personally responsible DO get fired - they shouldn't. She shouldn't.
But because YOU are allergic to admitting that you're wrong, you can't admit that you were wrong here to blame her. You want to demonize her because that's what your bosses told you to do in the rightwing talking points that got sent out to people like you SAID to do. And that's why FoxNews went on a witch hunt for her! That's why that opinion piece you cited had the wrong info about the ticket he purchased - because they are ready, willing and able to buy into the rightwing spin that said that Napolitano is not capable and that Obama is a bad leader and a bad judge of who he picked to be on his cabinet.
If she had actually exhibited some failures, we'd be there calling for her to resign. But she didn't. Your argument, as usual, doesn't hold water.
And yeah, we all noticed that you failed to acknowledge that YOUR personal attack on me, where you called me a liar, was totally baseless. Once again, you showed your personal animus towards me. And we all had a good laugh when it turned out that you were citing an opinion piece from someone who didn't know what they were talking about! Have you EVER successfully debunked a single thing I've posted? Ever, in 5 months? Nope. Not once. Have I destroyed almost every argument you've ever made? Yup. I have.
Having said that, I am all in favor of doing away with the Department of Homeland Security and her position. Our original issue from the beginning has been that we have too many different layers of national security. We need to streamline national security into a singular or perhaps two departments, not keep adding layers to the already convoluted issue.
It seems to me that after attacking and invading multiple countries, killing thousands, and spending billions, we still have the original problem. We have too many different departments and not enough trust between departments to operate quickly, efficiently, and effectively. It seems that, once again, we were able to gather the necessary info but not efficient enough to act on it in time. This was the same problem that allowed 9/11 to happen originally. This needs to be fixed. We need less chiefs and more indians who trust one another in the national security game. And, this extra bureaucracy was G-Dub's doing. But, it will take a real leader to fix it. I won't hold my breath.
Oh for cryin' out loud. You really can't read can you?
That was not her clarification - it was the paragraph that immediately followed the statement the system worked. It's right in this post. here, I'll paste it so you can maybe understand...
Get it?
And she preens.
What she told us, what was reasonable for her to tell us in the immediate aftermath, was that they knew some of the problems, but had to do more research to find out what the core problems were and what the causes of those problems were.
There are some problems that aren't simple. Sometimes it takes some time to figure out where the flaws were that caused the problem. But, being a black and white thinker that you are, you think that every problem is a nail, and so a hammer solves every problem.
Turns out that after 10 days, they figured out that in fact, she wasn't really guilty of anything. Someone tasked with looking at the report from the CIA at the US Embassy in Nigeria didn't think that the information rose to the level sufficient to demand that the guy be put on a watch list or a no-fly list. That analyst failed, not Janet Napolitano. And the analysts tasked with gathering disparate pieces of info and matching them together, didn't do their jobs so that they matched the Dad's warning with the info about terrorism coming from Yemen with the info about a Nigerian training in Yemen.
Again, that's not a failure that Napolitano has any responsibility for - her leadership, or lack thereof, didn't cause those behaviors. She didn't direct or fail to direct anyone to miss those signs!
And that's why, shortly after the attempted bombing over Detroit, I ordered two reviews. I directed Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano to review aviation screening, technology and procedures. She briefed me on her initial findings today, and I'm pleased that this review is drawing on the best science and technology, including the expertise of Secretary of Energy Steven Chu and his department.
I also directed my counterterrorism and homeland security advisor John Brennan to lead a thorough review into our terrorist watch-listing system so we can fix what went wrong. As we discussed today, this ongoing review continues to reveal more about the human and systemic failures that almost cost nearly 300 lives. We will make a summary of this preliminary report public within the next few days, but let me share some of what we know so far.
As I described over the weekend, elements of our intelligence community knew that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab had traveled to Yemen and joined up with extremists there. It now turns out that our intelligence community knew of other red flags -- that al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula sought to strike not only American targets in Yemen, but the United States itself. And we had information that this group was working with an individual who was known -- who we now know was in fact the individual involved in the Christmas attack.
The bottom line is this: The U.S. government had sufficient information to have uncovered this plot and potentially disrupt the Christmas Day attack. But our intelligence community failed to connect those dots, which would have placed the suspect on the "no fly" list.
In other words, this was not a failure to collect intelligence; it was a failure to integrate and understand the intelligence that we already had. The information was there. Agencies and analysts who needed it had access to it. And our professionals were trained to look for it and to bring it all together.
Now, I will accept that intelligence, by its nature, is imperfect, but it is increasingly clear that intelligence was not fully analyzed or fully leveraged. That's not acceptable, and I will not tolerate it. Time and again, we've learned that quickly piecing together information and taking swift action is critical to staying one step ahead of a nimble adversary.
Report Says FAA Got 52 Warnings Before 9/11
Associated Press
Friday, February 11, 2005; Page A02
The Federal Aviation Administration received repeated warnings in the months before Sept. 11, 2001, that al Qaeda hoped to attack airlines, according to a previously undisclosed report by the commission that investigated the terrorist attacks.
The report detailed 52 such warnings to FAA leaders between April 1 and Sept. 10, 2001, about the terrorist organization and its leader, Osama bin Laden.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A13203-2005Feb10.html
The book's opening anecdote tells of an unnamed CIA briefer who flew to Bush's Texas ranch during the scary summer of 2001, amid a flurry of reports of a pending al-Qaeda attack, to call the president's attention personally to the now-famous Aug. 6, 2001, memo titled "Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in US." Bush reportedly heard the briefer out and replied: "All right. You've covered your a$$, now."
C.I.A. Was Tracking Hijacker Months Earlier Than It Had Said
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F06EFDC133AF930A35755C0A9649C8B63
Bush before September 11: the awful truth
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/29/1080412286089.html
How many people dies from Katrina and how many people died from the bombing?
Napolitano is one of the greatest asset this government has. (Full disclosure: I know her -- have never worked with or for her and am not in any position -- ever -- to be favored by her in any way.)
But it's really HORRIFYING to see such a fine, fine person being crucified like this -- just reinforces my (very sad) thought that anyone would be an idiot to go into public service. And that's the beginning of the end, if we all believe that...
Yeah, that makes sense.
What failure of DHS was this and why should she be fired for it?
Nope, heckuva job!
What we're saying is that there's no evidence so far that ANY failure is the result of Janet Napolitano's direction, missteps, omissions, or lack of leadership.
Paying cash is the standard way to buy plane tickets in East Africa. Flying without bags is common too - they ship bags nowadays, and travel with only carry-on's. Neither one of those behaviors can be used as signs that something untoward is about to happen.
And a father reporting that his son has been radicalized should have gotten more scrutiny. But Janet Napolitano didn't hinder that at all. She didn't provide any direction that should concern us in that regard. The analyst who decided that it wasn't important enough - now that guy should be called to account for his lack of escalation. And the people who are supposed to be tying together random bits of evidence, like the Yemen connection to Nigeria and the chatter about a terrorist attack coming up - that info should have been tied to ANY info about ANY Nigerian on ANY level of watch list - but it wasn't. But that's not something that Napolitano was involved in either! The people who failed SHOULD BE called to account.
But blaming Janet Napolitano is a witch hunt. Like MMFA said.
If you labor under the mistaken impression that SHE connects those kinds of dots, you're really insane AND ignorant. Or disingenuous becuase you don't really believe what you typed.
OMG! You seriously are the most misguided soul I have ever come across, or just a complete fool.
Paying cash IS the standard way to buy plane tickets in much of the third world. Flying without bags is very common too. Neither one of those signs can be used to identify a potential terrorist.
You entertain if nothing else. I love seeing you display such idiocy.
2. Nope, no serious concern can possibly be raised by the buying of a ticket with cash unless we're going to examine millions of people who fly each year for no good reason. Buying with cash is NOT the red flag you think it is. And if it becomes a red flag, terrorists will start ensuring that they use some bogus credit card that's not really associated with a real person to buy the tickets. Looking for that as a warning sign will NOT make us safer.
3. Only a carry-on is not unusual in this day and age. People try to travel light, people in many developing nations don't HAVE a ton of clothing, and don't bathe and change clothes as often as Americans do, and because of the fear of losing baggage in transit and the cost of having extra bags, many people will ship their heavier stuff and only carry what they immediately need. Again, that can't be a warning sign. Otherwise, the terrorists will start packing a suitcase with clothes and checking that bag! Just like with the ticket for cash thing, it's NOT a thing that we can rely upon, since millions of people travel with only a carry-on!!! But if we start making it a red flag, they'll pack a suitcase!
See, I have common sense. Luckily for us, so do the folks who actually oversee travelling safety.
But you don't. You think you won here, and in actuality you lost so badly it would be terribly embarrassing to any normal person. Too bad, so sad.
While right ON snivels about her taking reponsibility, she is busy helping to find solutions. She is not Brownie or Ridge or Ashcroft or Rice - she is a far better administrator than any of those people - and she is doing her job.
This is a crock.
'Nuff said.
You are sadly mistaken if you believe the same of janet napoloitano. She is savvy and she is the most competent administrator I have seen. In Arizona, a Republican stronghold, she was elected (and re-elected) by strong majorities. She performed so well in her first term that the Republicans did not support their own candidate in the next election.
You want to fire her because she did not seem to take responsibility? That is just stupid. She is taking responsibility by doing her job and not making excuses.
You are only proving what we have long known: you don't know what you are talking about.
The weirdest logic always comes out of liberals.
You are snivelling because she didn't use the words, "It was all my fault". That is just idiotic.
You Rightwing whackos sure are hung up on semantics. On the Left, we prefer action to a bunch of meaningless rhetoric. You boys ought to give it a try.
Objective analysis is not their best strength.
You whackjobs whine because he didn't step out the next day (even though your hero, GWB took 6 days) - yet that is all he would have been able to say. Then, when he takes action, all you can focus on is a handful of words.
You have zero credibility and SADD (Selective Attention Deficit Disorder). When you are able to make sense, come on back and we will have a discussion.
You have done the exact thing that you accursed Napolitano of doing.
You have not taken responsibility.
You have not addressed or conceded the fact that “he did not have a one way ticket”
You have not directly addressed any of the arguments that have been offered (Ridge, Rice)
You just continue to repeat or rework your droning statement.
I guess this would be a good time to mention that I am a conservative and I would love for you to have presented a convincing argument and shut down these “libs” but you have not. As a matter of fact, I find that the other arguments here have won me on this issue. That is the advantage of being a conservative and not a lock step republican. We must be moved by the facts and by our ability to remain open to change our minds. Simply because the argument is presented by the “evil lib” we cannot dismiss it in every case. While I cannot see a single current major issue that I might agree with a liberal on in regards to the way our country is governed and I agree with the majority of the republican lean, I will not just disagree for the sake of disagreeing. Don’t forget what web site you are posting on and that you are far outnumbered as it relates to your opinion and political slant. You have openly been out classed on this one. I think it would be a good idea to retire this thread because frankly, I am embarrassed for you and by you. When we post on a site like this we must keep in mind that our goal is to reveal what a true conservative is and what they look like. Not to reinforce the idea that we are mindless “followers” of all things anti-lib or pro-republican. We must consider the thought, idea or opinion on our own and weigh it against our own opinions and decide which way we lean issue by issue. Please be clear that I applaud your effort and appreciate that we share a lot of the same views. But this one is in the can. Go and fight a battle that you are more equipped to win.
With much respect,
You conservative brother.
From Condoleezza Rice on May 16, 2002
"I don't think anybody could have predicted that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the World Trade Center, take another one and slam it into the Pentagon; that they would try to use an airplane as a missile, a hijacked airplane as a missile."
American aviation officials were warned as early as 1998 that Al Qaeda could "seek to hijack a commercial jet and slam it into a U.S. landmark,"
Federal Aviation Administration officials were also warned in 2001 in a report prepared for the agency that airport screeners' ability to detect possible weapons had "declined significantly" in recent years, but little was done to remedy the problem, the Sept. 11 commission found.
At least President Obama actually admits mistakes were made, that alone seems to say they are much further along with any kind of accountabilty
Isn't that just pure irony? The people on the plane with Richard Reid thwart his attack and the wingnuts congratulate them for that and call it a success, but not in this case. Again, another example that wing nuts have such a short-term memory that they can't remember what they have done and said in the past so they don't contradict themselves.
Regarding whether she should be fired or not... I guess I don't care one way or the other, but honestly, this isn't the first time this woman has demonstrated administrative incompetence in less than one year in office. The first incident was the infamous "right wing veterans organizations" memo that was published shortly after President Obama took office. She's also said a few questionable, brow raising things (like re-labeling her organization's role as "a man-made disaster" prevention organization, not a "terrorism prevention" organization -- in other words "we're softening the rhetoric and choosing to be more PC"). I wonder if she's wishing she could take back those comments now. It seems to me that there's mounting evidence that this woman isn't competent for the job she has, or her organization itself doesn't make sense (which is probably just as likely I guess). In any event, she's on pretty thin ice. If one more thing happens, I don't think Obama will have any choice but to can her, and he might be smart to do it now before he's put in that forced position.
The Department of Homeland Security is proving to be another pointless Bush/Cheney created organization. The law authorizing its creation should be repealed, and all the pre-existing subsidiary organizations should be returned to their original reporting structure. There's no logical reason for anything more than the CIA, NSA, FBI, and Defense Department. If those four organizations can't manage national security, adding an incompetent fifth one isn't going to help. The TSA should be stripped down to an auditing organization that simply monitors and fines airline managed security staff, and should be made to be part of the FAA. It'll cost a lot less, and we'll be no worse than we are right now.
This is a BLATANT witch-hunt.
The CIA got the info from the bomber's dad -- and did NOTHING with it. Panetta is head of the CIA, NOT Napolitano -- yet I have done Google searches daily , and nothing anywhere suggesting he should be fired.
Additionally, that information was supposed to be collated and passed on to Napolitano's Dept. ONLY the Christian Science Monitor has (rightly) this week pointed out the following (excerpt)
"...the statement by Rep. Dan Burton (R) of Indiana that the blame for allowing a bomber to board a Detroit-bound plane in Amsterdam "rests solely on the shoulders of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano” is a curious one.
"It was Nigerian and Dutch officials who were responsible for airport checkpoints. It was the US State Department that did not not revoke the multiple-entry visa of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, a young Nigerian with suspected ties to terrorism. And it was the job of the Director of National Intelligence, Dennis Blair, to make sure there was adequate sharing of intelligence among agencies."
So -- why is Napolitano being hounded like this? "No drama Napolitano" was clearly told by the Obama admin to go on the talk shows and take the heat -- you mean to tell me Obama and his people didn't TALK to Napolitano and tell her exactly what she would and would not say? Of course they did.
FOX is after her because Republicans hate her because as Gov. of AZ, she not only went after illegal Mexican immigrants, but had the brains to also go after businesses that employed them: fine for first offense; revoked business license for second. When a report was leaked from her office (not written by her, BTW) saying (correctly) that bombs had been planted in the past by aniimal rights supporters, anti-abortion groups and a couple of wacked vets -- they tried to fan that spark into a HUGE fire under the very conservative vets organizations and get her out of office -- WHY? Because she was one of four people on the short list for Sup. Court Justice. (Napolitano was in charge of the AZ National Guard and is now in charge of the Coast Guard -- she "hates vets"? I don't THINK so!)
I am a Catholic- and that report stated that some CAtholic anti-abortion groups might possibly pose a threat. Did I take offense? No. Why? Because they're right. THe vets groups that were crucifying Napolitano were pretty silent when, shortly after this was leaked, a VET went beserk again.
Glenn Greenwald points out that our intelligence people are already overwhelmed with too many people who don't deserve surveillance already being watched, too much intelligence to go through, too many emails to pore over, etc. But RightON wants us to add to that heap of mostly useless information. Why? So that Obama will fail? Yup. Just like Dick Cheney wants to pretend to the terrorists that America is weaker now that Obama's in office, because he believes that terrorists attack us when we're weak (of course, his argument condemns Bush's admin, but he is too stupid to figure that out!).