[New Info]CIA repeatedly warned Bush about Sept 11; Neocons put OBL on ignore list

Fair enough. I take their silence as "we can't cogently answer your question."

 

It was always my understanding that the biggest failure leading up to September 11th was the "wall" separating US intel-gathering, not Clinton, not Bush, nor an international conspiracy involving martians and the masons.

Some things simply aren't that easily prevented. No government, person or corporation has the power to magically control the world's economy...or the actions of a few rogue extremists hell-bent on killing themselves. The people whose jobs it was to track the actions of Al-Queda were doing their jobs. What failed them was the bureaucracy to share that information...and that bureaucracy existed for a good reason: that kind of power has historically been abused.

 

REPPED! One of the most reasonable posts in this thread - and one of the main reasons for the reorganization of the FBI after 9/11

 

Partial FAIL on my behalf..can't rep you - "You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Deji again."

 

Once again, Deji provides the D&D with logic and facts.

Please post here more often.

 

To be fair Sam, military intelligence has made some bigger blunders, namely the Korean War, where "conventional" wisdom held that the Chinese would never attack UN forces. Then, as now, you're always going to find analysts and people privy to information who had it right all along, but were ignored, and it isn't necessarily a conspiracy or an act of malice that it happens.

I don't think Bush's cabinet was the only party guilty of cognitive dissonance, and it would be irresponsible and even hypocritical to blame him or his people. Most of Congress and most of us, even, gleefully and regrettably supported the adventurism in Iraq. I bought all the arguments for war, as did Congress. Hell, the US and Bush were soaring in popularity worldwide for a while there and what happened after was tragic. Everyone from Vladimir Putin to Christopher Hitchens was on the bandwagon...at first anyway.

Don't look to me to defend all the diplomatic opportunities, political capital, lives and careers (namely Powell's) that were lost. The events after the attack became very politicized and the nation suffered for it. Those policy decisions were certainly harder to defend. I'll leave that task to the Hobbesian defenders of the faith in the GOP.

But up until September 11th? It's tough for me to lay the blame on any one elected official or the US security apparatus, at least from the things I've read, including the report. I don't think anyone could have imagined what happened and taken the definitive steps to prevent it, and while I have a lot of grievances with what came later, it would be unfair to blame Bush for not preventing the attack.

 

No, your analysis was thoughtful, SC, and I would gladly state that even if it was a conservative. BigTexx is a huge *****, there's no doubt about it. But more than that, he's a shill. There's very little thought involved in anything he posts. At least Basso has a good sense of humor. BigTexx? Black-and-white world: all liberals bad, all conservatives good. Every liberal decision: horrible; every conservative decision: beautiful. For simple people, it's much easier to live in a world like that than one that requires more complex thought processes.

So, when someone doesn't even have the capacity to evaluate your points effectively, you can't be surprised at his/her response.

 

I remember watching this Frontline epsiode which basically damns the new Homeland Security and all its integration. You may disagree, but they seemed to have given pretty good reasoning for making this excuse look bad.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/are-we-safer/

If this reasoning is correct, then the US by spending trillions of dollars, sending thousands of troops abroad, resulting in the death of over a million people, helped destroy our country's economy and the livelihood of Americans, all for the sake of failing to prevent something they still can't prevent... If that's the case, it doesn't exactly make me feel better about my government.

 

I'm glad we can agree

 

Bush went on the record to say that as soon as the second plane hit, George Tenant was saying "al-Queda." As far as I understood it, the CIA was certainly aware of the threat of some of the people involved, but had no way of turning the trail over to domestic law enforcement due to the old "wall." For every possible scenario imaginable, no one had a plan in place to deal with a "hijackers using passenger aircraft as missiles" scenario (though I'm sure there is one now).

That's why I don't single out the administration out for not being able to prevent the attack. I don't see how it could have played out any differently. The weakness in security and bureaucracy that was exploited would have been there no matter who was in charge.

But I sure as hell don't defend the decisions made after, the cherry-picking of intel to justify those decisions, or the weak arguments made by people like Rice to defend those decisions, well after the fact. I'd have an easier time justifying the Opium Wars.

 

Keeping on the same theme of a regime ignoring intelligence warnings, where is your staunch criticism for the current regime's supposed failure on the Libyan embassy attacks? Are you incapable of bipartisan critique or have I missed it in a previous post? It seems only fitting that you'd be out in front of it.

 

welcome to D&D

 

http://www.mediamonitors.net/mosaddeq36.html#_Toc9410680

This simply isn't true- You should read the book linked-

 

Note, I don't claim this as fact: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/revealed-inside-story-of-us-envoys-assassination-8135797.html

I'm referring to the recent speculation. Just like you are referring to the OP piece that you claim are facts. Apparently there were intel warnings that these attacks might happen yet the embassy was given no warning, or at least that's what's being alleged.

Regardless, both would be horrible and inexcusable regardless of political party, which is why I asked why you wouldn't jump on this also.

 

I'm afraid it would be deaf ears. Which has been my point all along. You're cherry picking your criticism to suit your political preference.