Conservative media accuse Obama of not taking attempted terrorist attack seriously
Numerous right-wing media figures have attacked the Obama administration's response to the attempted bombing of a Northwest Airlines flight by baselessly accusing the administration of not having initially been "serious" in its response. However, President Obama took several immediate actions following the incident, including ordering a review of national security measures and increasing airline security measures.
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Following attempted attack, conservative media say Obama and his administration are not "serious" about terror
Pruden: Obama treated bomber "as if it were merely an amusing story." In a January 8 Washington Times op-ed, editor emeritus Wesley Pruden wrote: "After first treating the Detroit panty bomber as if it were merely an amusing story ('an isolated incident') that an airline passenger could dine out on for a few days, President Obama is giving a good imitation now of a man getting a late education." In fact, Obama did not refer to the attack as an "isolated incident" and has consistently described the incident as an attempted terrorist attack.
Kristol: Brennan comment "shows a kind of not-serious-about-the-war mentality." On the January 3 edition of Fox News Sunday, Fox News contributor Bill Kristol said the United States is "not treating it [terrorist attacks] as a war." Then, discussing Homeland Security adviser John Brennan's assertion that there was "no smoking gun" that would have led U.S. intelligence to prevent the attack, Kristol said that "[bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab] is the smoking gun. And frankly, for Mr. Brennan to say, 'Well, no smoking gun,' that itself shows a kind of not-serious-about-the-war mentality."
Gretchen Carlson: "Let's face it," their "tone" is "not quite that serious." On the January 8 edition of Fox & Friends, co-host Gretchen Carlson asked political analyst Doug Schoen about the "tone ... specifically in the White House right now when it comes to terror" and whether there is "a war waging behind the scenes between the CIA and the White House." After Schoen said that "there is no clear division of responsibilities or plan to deal with the inevitable conflicts," Carlson added, "Is that why everyone felt comfortable being on vacation, because the tone -- let's face it -- is not quite that serious?"
Washington Times: For Obama, "Terrorism doesn't rate that much effort." In a December 30 editorial, The Washington Times wrote that "President Obama gives resounding campaign-style speeches to back agenda items he actually cares about. Terrorism doesn't rate that much effort. After Fort Hood and Northwest Airlines Flight 253, Mr. Obama seemed like he was dragged in front of the American people." The editorial went on to claim the White House did not take terrorism "seriously."
Obama took several steps to address attack, including ordering reviews, corrective actions
December 28: Obama ordered two reviews of air security and announced immediate increased airline security measures. After the incident, Obama ordered several actions to "protect the American people and to secure air travel," including a review of the watch list and airport security procedures. From his December 28 address:
Since I was first notified of this incident, I've ordered the following actions to be taken to protect the American people and to secure air travel.
First, I directed that we take immediate steps to ensure the safety of the traveling public. We made sure that all flights still in the air were secure and could land safely. We immediately enhanced screening and security procedures for all flights, domestic and international. We added federal air marshals to flights entering and leaving the United States. And we're working closely in this country, federal, state and local law enforcement, with our international partners.
Second, I've ordered two important reviews, because it's absolutely critical that we learn from this incident and take the necessary measures to prevent future acts of terrorism.
The first review involves our watch list system, which our government has had in place for many years to identify known and suspected terrorists so that we can prevent their entry into the United States. Apparently the suspect in the Christmas incident was in this system, but not on a watch list, such as the so-called no-fly list. So I have ordered a thorough review, not only of how information related to the subject was handled, but of the overall watch list system and how it can be strengthened.
The second review will examine all screening policies, technologies and procedures related to air travel. We need to determine just how the suspect was able to bring dangerous explosives aboard an aircraft and what additional steps we can take to thwart future attacks.
January 5: Obama ordered "initial reviews" to be completed and "reforms implemented immediately." While outlining several of the "concrete steps" he asked the administration to take to strengthen national security, Obama said in a January 5 address: "I made it clear today to my team: I want our initial reviews completed this week. I want specific recommendations for corrective actions to fix what went wrong. I want those reforms implemented immediately, so that this doesn't happen again and so we can prevent future attacks. And I know that every member of my team that I met with today understands the urgency of getting this right."
January 7: Security and intelligence review completed. The White House produced a security and intelligence review on January 7 and issued a statement along with it saying the review and corrective steps were a reflection of the "urgency" of the situation. From the statement:
The President spoke two days ago about "the urgency of getting this right," and the identification of failures in this review, along with the immediate ordering of reforms and corrective steps both today and in the days since this incident, are a recognition of that urgency. This review is also a recognition that while there is no place for partisanship and the old Washington blame game in dealing with Al Qaeda and the threat they represent, keeping American safe depends on honest and direct accountability.
January 7: Directive for "immediate actions" for intelligence and national security also completed. On January 7, Obama also issued a list of "immediate actions" for the "intelligence, homeland security, and law enforcement communities" to take "to enhance the security of the American people." The directive says the "actions are necessary given inherent systemic weakness and human errors revealed by the review." The directive addresses corrective actions for: the State Department, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the Director of National Intelligence, the CIA, the FBI/Terrorist Screening Center, the National Counterterrorism Center, the National Security Agency, and national security staff. Among other things, the directive orders DHS to "[a]ggressively pursue enhanced screening technology, protocols, and procedures, especially in regard to aviation and other transportation sectors, consistent with privacy rights and civil liberties; strengthen international partnerships and coordination on aviation security issues."
Contrary to right-wing claims, Obama has routinely used the word "terror" and did so in discussing attempted Christmas Day attack
Sargent: "[T]he plain fact is that Obama has used the word 'terror' and its variants lots and lots and lots of times." As The Plum Line's Greg Sargent wrote in a blog post, "No matter how many times critics say otherwise, the plain fact is that Obama has used the word 'terror' and its variants lots and lots and lots of times." Sargent also noted that despite Sen. Jim DeMint's (R-SC) claim that Obama is not "willing to use the word," "[i]n his weekly address only 24 hours before DeMint made his claim, Obama used the term 'terror,' 'terrorism,' or 'terrorists' a half dozen times."
Obama repeatedly referred to the attempted Christmas Day attack as a "terrorist attack." Despite the conservative media's attempts to falsely claim Obama does not use the word "terror" to describe the attacks, Obama addressed the nation on the incident on December 28 and repeatedly described the attack as a "terrorist attack." Obama also repeatedly used the word "terror" or some variation of the word in subsequent addresses.
So what about the next time, if you know you are fire-proof, what is your impetus to try harder, to get it right the next time? As I said, just more government shirking itself from responsibility, protecting its own, cya-ing again.
In that respect, Obama is no better than Bush.
Sigh.
~
If the engine dies on your car, do you "fire" the engine, or do you diagnose the problem and repair the broken part and keep going?
I have this vision of some conservatives wanting follow people in the security chain with predator drones and "fire on them" if they make any mistakes. It must be tough to be so perfect that you never make a mistake.
In most companies some degree of failure is tolerated. If there wasn't serious dereliction of duty, a reasonable organization will allow for people to make mistakes. An environment where mistakes are not allowed doesn't allow for any innovation or risk-taking, regardless of potential benefit. Everyone is in constant cya-mode.
What an organization needs to look at is frequency and seriousness of mistakes and level of negligence. And, most importantly, did they learn from the mistake and take steps to prevent recurrence. It would be idiotic to have a knee-jerk response of "Someone's head will roll."
Even in the analogy of sports, which you used a couple of days ago, you don't fire a coach on the basis of one lost game or even a losing season. You have to have a pattern of poor performance before it's reasonable to take action.
With regard to the failed bombing attempt, I haven't yet seen where anyone demonstrated gross negligence or failure to handle the mistakes properly. It would be a ridiculous over-reaction to demand a firing just on principle.
I don't agree.
I'm all for firing someone if that individual's actions warrant it. I don't like the idea of searching out a scapegoat or a fall guy. Let's see what the investigation and review come up with.
And here's the important part. Even if she was fired, the endless drivel would still pour from Fox. We'd be hearing stories about how Obama was just scapegoating her instead of doing what he should be doing--addressing the system that failed (a system that prevented any attacks while Bush was in office, har har). And then when she was replaced, we'd hear about how unqualified her replacement is and how Obama isn't serious about the safety of American and blah, blah blah...
But are we supposed to fire the person that made the spelling error? Fired for an spelling error? Was it a transcription error, or do we need to only hire people who we are assured will never make a spelling error?
So, firing someone who made a spelling error seems pretty off-base and is definitely an overreaction.
But what about the people who didn't connect the dots? Surely they can be located and fired, right? Because they knew that their methods were incomplete and haphazard, right? Well, no, not according to the findings released by Obama yesterday. They weren't trained to do what they needed to do in order to find all the dots to connect.
So, firing someone who wasn't given the tools and training to complete the required tasks doesn't seem fair either.
So, what about the people who should have known that the analysts tasked with connecting the dots weren't trained well enough to do the job? And the people who knew that the databases were too confusing or too overwhelming for the job to get done well? Well, what if they had expressed concern about the need for additiional training, and asked Congress and the previous President, via channels, to get additional funding, but they hadn't gotten it? Then they wouldn't be personally responsible for those problems, would they?
It's not easy to assign blame and fire "the" responsible parties here, and without a well-defined error or omission, it's not fair to do so either. The ONLY person who can fairly be fired in a circumstance similar to this is the head person IF they are found to have directly or indirectly caused the problems by their destructive direction, by their corrupt omission of competent leadership, or some other flaw in their managerial performance. And we have no evidence that Janet Napolitano exhibited any of those things.
Again, you don't even know what you are talking about.
She presented a very wide variety of extremely reasonable possibilities that would mean no one was negligent to such a degree that firing would be called for. It was something I made reference to, but she expanded on it very well. And even what she presented barely scratched the surface of what could have contributed.
It's very possible that no one was negligent to a degree that warranted firing. That's not scapegoating the system, it's dealing with reality. It's also possible that someone was that negligent, but it's narrow-minded to state that SOMEONE needs to be fired.
For you to dismiss DellDolly's detailed, well thought out post as simply blaming the failure on a misspelling is despicable.
The biggest reason this guy got on a plane was because there was a misspelled name, so they didn't know that he had a Visa to enter the USA. Had they known that, they would have proceeded differently when looking to tie him to terrorism!
And, of course, I never acted like it was the only reason. Had you just read past my first two paragraphs, you'd know that.
What a fool you prove yourself to be every workday you post here.
Specifically, the CIA is being tasked with "strengthening procedures related to how watchlisting information is entered, reviewed, searched, analyzed and acted upon." The Director of National Intelligence is tasked with "accelerating information technology enhancements, to include knowledge discovery, database integration, cross-database searches, and the ability to correlate biographical information with terrorism-related intelligence."
One would have thought that Bush's revamping of the intelligence community would have fixed this stuff long ago. One would have thought that these problems wouldn't be something that would need to be pointed out to the people who deal with this kind of analysis every day!
But it's good that it's happening now. It's too bad that Obama had to find out this way that it needed to be done, but he's fixing it, unlike our previous President!
I try to be respectful most of the time, but this is one of the most meaningless statements I've heard in a looooong time. All stable countries have one government. Not two, not three, not ten. ONE. How can a government be a monopoly? It doesn't even make any sense. That statement is indefensible and absurd. What are you advocating for? Competing governments in the U.S.?
go figure
I sorry you missed that point.
You post this in response to someone using the analogy of the financial sector meltdown...
That just a scant fourteen minutes after you psoted this...
If you were put off by it, you are a scant too sensitive for this playground.
No, you used the analogy of the private sector holding people to account as opposed to the "monopolistic government" first. To wit...
Ubermensch follows with a more detailed analogy also using the private sector and you tell him he's off topic.
Again - YOU made the claim of accountability in the private sector and another poster demonstartes the flaw in your reasoning, and then you tell them they're off topic. Are you trying out to be the new DellDolly?
Of course they would. They would have no choice.
Bur, whatever, DellDolly v2.0
...if all this information is made public.
So it would seem you acknowkledge, that in the private sector there would be attempts to bury this and, what did you call it before? Oh, yeah CYA-ing all over the place. That's what they do. I mean whenever they settle lawsuits for wrong doing there is always a confidentiality agreement ensuring the public doesn't become aware of the companies antics.
Another righton fail.
Do you get it now? Wow, you really stepped into that one, didn't you? You don't need me to make you look ridiculous.
I, for one, appreciate that.
All I see are empty fifths around the sofa and a scary green face with bulging eyes, pointy ears and a flailing red tongue.
But you still won't acknowledge the fact that you admonished another poster for using an analogy which you previously used just minutes before. And once again, you can't come to grips with the real world example of private sector financial companies, who very publicly fouled up the world economy and not only did none of them take responsability by falling on their swords or getting fired, they gave themselves bonuses! Doofus.
And wow, you and the private sector should get a room. Your drooling slavishness to it is unseemly.
The only thing I stepped in was your nonsense bs. But I knew with whom I was dealing, so I donned the hip waders first.
Instead you divert to your hurt feelings because I said another poster was off topic, and continue to show off your skills by repeating the word "doofus" over and over. I know you think that makes your point, but it only generates a mocking snicker from me.
But you entertain, and for that I drool for you.
'Cause I never tried to refute that. If I did, I would point out that at least there are elections whereby citizens can demand redress of these issues from those running for office. No such luck in the private sector. As you aptly described how only if their errors become public knowledge will there be an opportunity for accoutnability of those responsible. And again, there are many example of the private sector actively supressing information in order to avoid being held to account.
No hurt feelings here, only bemusement at the doofus.
And to be clear as to what my original post to you was pertaining, you constantly tell DellDolly that she's not the hall monitor here and then you do the exact same thing. Not only that, you do so after engaging in the very same behaviour just minutes before your admonishment. Is that plain enough now?
If your role here is as some irrelevant nitpicker who only wants to instigate petty arguments with people you dislike, like me, on distracting side points, then just say so. We can toss insults, like doofus, back and forth all day long and pull each others hair too.
I would just like to know who I am dealing with. Now I know.
I do however take exception at your transparent attempts to weasle out of being expected to back up your dodgy suppositions. In this case, that the private sector does a better job at accountability for screwups of it's employees/leaders than does the public sector. The only tangential issue I may have raised was my comparision of your behaviour to that of DellDolly.
Yet the government has no competition, you say the voters but that is hardly some direct hit to the forehead that a private company would take if they only paid lip service after a major screw-up such as this one. If you can demonstrate to me that government competes in any comparable way the way private industry does, then I will look at it. They don't.
Of course, the CEO's of these bailed out companies and their bonuses for failure is outrageous, and we should have let them fail and those in charge of the damage they inflicted left to pay the price. That is an inherent systemic problem as well, so I make no excuses for any of them. Fine, it is an example. But is also an exception.
Government's lack of accountability to anyone throughout their bureaucratic layer after layer is no exception, it is the rule. They make laws, they set laws. What private company gets to do that and monopolizes the market at the same time. None.
Anyway - you were wrong to admonish someone that did exactly as you did - use the private sector as an anaolgy in a discussion about accountability when things go sideways.
And now you still want to claim accountability is more likely and/or prevalent in the private sector than the public sector. You are wrong - just look at how any manufacturer handles product liability issues. They have people (risk managers) on the payroll deciding whether the fixing of a product flaw causing injury to clients is more economically feasible vs. not fixing it and paying out settlements to individuals harmed and making them sign confidentiality agreements so the big picture is never seen.
Here read and maybe (crosses fingers in futility) learn something. Here is a bit to get you started...
For instance, the Consumer Product Safety Act requires manufactures to report to the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) whenever a product is the subject of three verdicts or settlements arising out of claims of death or serious bodily injury.
From the time this reporting requirement began in 1991, to 2002, only 551 reports were filed with the CPSC, even through more than 150,000 product-liability lawsuits were filed in federal court alone.
Regular posters clearly have common times to post. I'm not usually here as early as other posters might be, but am here later than they are. I post on the weekends, too, for example.
But not RightON. He posts until a set time every weekday evening, and he will suddenly stop posting in the middle of a long debate. Sometimes he'll post that he's gotten tired of another poster's nonsense (when it's been he himself that's been the nonsense-pusher), but often he just leaves.
He's a paid poster, paid to derail threads in any way possible. Here, he distracted us from the point that we should have been discussing, that Obama clearly takes terrorism more seriously than Bush did.
Obama's had more drone attacks in Pakistan in his first year than in Bush's last year. He upped the troops in Afghanistan earlier this year, an increase that Bush let sit on his desk for months. He then had multiple meetings over a further troop increase, and he had a thoughtful decision announced! I could give ten other reasons why Obama is more capable than Bush.
But RightON didn't want us to be talking about that. He didn't want us to recognize that this is yet one more example in a series of events where it's clear that the rightwing is trying to attack their opponent's strength and turn them into weaknesses by distorting reality.
The sooner we recognize that we posters need to ignore his troll posts and warn others to ignore them, the better job we'll do at spreading the information to help remedy our nation's discourse that the right has had such a hand in poisoning with their toxic nonsense!
I prefer to stay out of those long derailments, when it's usually pretty easy to point out the BS in a line or two. Notice that I got called the drunk uncle, and had him resorting to ad hominem attacks on my gravatar (??) by quickly mentioning that his pants were down around his ankles logically.
and I don't think these posters who follow strict schedules are paid trolls, I'd guess they're some sort of office drones who try to pass their unproductive work days by repeating themselves endlessly here.
Dammit, now I've wasted four paragraphs writing about not paying attention to trolls ! :)
And I am positive that I'm right about paid trolls. I have some insider info on the topic, and the schedule-keeping by someone who used to seem obsessed about posting here (until I started calling him out on a regular basis) but never posts in the evening or on weekends is a clear sign. Obsessed people don't 'stop' just because the weekend, holiday, or nighttime came along.
Most trolls seem to feel validated as long as somebody is addressing their points, even if their points are being completely destroyed. It's the mindset seen on Fox; If I don't admit I'm fulla crap, I'm still in the debate. And as long as somebody is still talking to me, I must be doing ok.
What is your impetus, you ask??? How about caring about this country? How about having pride in your work? If these motivations are less meaningful than the fear of getting fired, then the wrong person has been hired in the first place.
There will be failures in the future. They are inevitable. No system is perfect. When that happens, rather than playing blame game, work to find the mistake and make it less likely to occur in the future.
We are able to gather info, but unable to act on it. That's a systems problem. I can tell at my job, I am a systems guy and if an individual fails then that's the easy part. If a system fails, then it is time for a new system.
I would also say, I hope the impetus for anyone in our national security positions is to keep their job. If it is, they do need to be replaced. I hope the impetus is to keep the country they love as safe from harm as possible.
D@MN! They will be on this story for the next 3 years! Everyday Fox Snooze will be consumed with only one story! "The Christmas Bomber!"
Or More!