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Ridge accuses Bush White House of political use of terror alert system

Crunch said:
Would you please point out the terrorist attacks on US soil after 9/11?

Maybe it's true, only Bush could keep us safe... everyone knows Libs are very weak on defence.
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No terrorist attacks on US soil after 9/11 is a meaningless statement. Without knowing why, we have no way of knowing who to give credit to. I suppose we can give Bush credit for only one big terrorist attack on US soil, but that is hardly worth glowing praise.

And then we get to the "every one knows" argument. What every one knows is, somehow, wrong a surprising amount of the time, as it is in this case. Remember, it was a republican who came up with the phrase "peace dividend".
 

Maybe they just decided to take an extended vacation. :roll:
And then we get to the "every one knows" argument. What every one knows is, somehow, wrong a surprising amount of the time, as it is in this case. Remember, it was a republican who came up with the phrase "peace dividend".
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The Democrats 'Soft' Jihadist


FOXNews.com - Lieberman Calls Dem Opponents Soft Spendthrifts - Politics | Republican Party | Democratic Party | Political Spectrum


Democratic Strategist

I could go on for hours, but I think I've made my point.
 

Were we getting attacks every single day before 9/11? Maybe we were getting them weekly? Monthly? No? Because to my knowledge large scale attacks on U.S. soil by foreign terrorist are rare occurrences. So rare in fact that most people could name at least the last 4 or 5 and have intervals of 5-10 years between them.
 
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Crunch said:
Would you please point out the terrorist attacks on US soil after 9/11?
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That's a double edged sword for an argument. The rabbit hole goes very deep.

Maybe it's true, only Bush could keep us safe... everyone knows Libs are very weak on defence.
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No, it's not "true." How many terrorist attacks have there been on U.S. soil since Barack Obama has been President? Well then....there you go...Libs are very strong on national security and defense.
 
aps said:
Hmmm, so somehow discussing these new facts will take away our addressing the present? Give me a break.

Everybody, stop commenting on this subject matter RIGHT NOW because danarhea says so. :roll:
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With all due respect, aps (And I do give you plenty of respect. You and I go back a long way.), I was totally disgusted with the Clinton Penis Envy shown by Republicans when Bush was screwing up. I am hoping to avoid the same thing, now that Obama is in office. I don't mean that we should forget the crap Bush did while in office, but finger pointing at Bush, while Obama is in charge, isn't going to cut it for me, just as finger pointing at Clinton didn't cut it for me when Bush was in office. Obama is the chief in the here and now, and when he screws up, we ought to speak out about it.
 
talloulou said:
Was the terror alert raised or is he claiming he was pressured but didn't do it? If he was pressured he should have said so at the time vs. waiting to sell the info in his new book.
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He claims he was pressured but didn't raise the alert level & I agree that the time to say something was then. However, that doesn't change the fact that, if he's proven right, it was yet another attempt by the Bush Admin. to politicize the whole Exec. branch in violation of law.
 
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Yeah, if it's true it's completely wrong. However it sucks that we can only choose to believe him or not without ever knowing for sure. It is supposed to be the most exciting bit of information in his entire book. It is the line that the book is going to be marketed with. It's basically the selling point. Probably he's not lying, but I can't know that and it sort of pisses me off. He should have said something THEN vs now when saying something scandalous earns him money. If his book didn't have that tidbit it probably wouldn't sell as well. How would they market it, then?

The whole situation disgusts me frankly.
 

I pretty much agree with you & hate it when people only release info to sell a book. If the info is true, it's usually too late to do any good if you wait years until you can sell your story.

That being said, from all I know of Tom Ridge, he's a stand-up guy & I believe his story...which can either be corroberated or refuted by others. I believe him but lost any respect for him due to waiting until he could SELL the info.
 

Has anyone collaborated with his story? Frances Townsend doesn't and others have dismissed it out of hand.

I don't know the guy at all so I have no idea if he's a stand up guy or not. I'm not sure how "stand up" it is to release info such as this as a marketing scheme for your book.
 

I have not yet heard any corroboration, though I don't consider that surprising. There just are not many who would be able to corroborate it.

It's certainly sad that people do stuff like this to sell books, but hardly uncommon. I sometimes doubt we will ever find a really moral public official.
 

We need better investigative reporters to get to the bottom of some of this crap while it's happening. Seems today much of journalism has been reduced to he said/she said with little to no real old fashioned investigation.
 
talloulou said:
We need better investigative reporters to get to the bottom of some of this crap while it's happening. Seems today much of journalism has been reduced to he said/she said with little to no real old fashioned investigation.
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No kidding. When was the last really important scandal broken by the media? Or that was really advanced by the media? Reporters need to go watch All The President's Men a few times...
 

FWIW, he wasn't the one who released this info - it was the company publishing his book. There are quotes from Ridge and the book itself that directly contradict the claim advanced by the publisher.
 

Problem is..(unless people are really stupid) when they engage in criminal activity they don't usually record/transcribe their crimes, unless their name is Nixon. If the meetings where this alleged crime was committed was recorded or transcribed, we will get our proof. Lack of such proof doesn't prove it didn't happen.
 
What Ridge actually said is different from the title of this thread. You and others need to read his comments and you would've already if you'd been reading the thread.
 
talloulou said:
We need better investigative reporters to get to the bottom of some of this crap while it's happening. Seems today much of journalism has been reduced to he said/she said with little to no real old fashioned investigation.
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They investigated the hell out of Joe the plumber.
 
mpg said:
What Ridge actually said is different from the title of this thread. You and others need to read his comments and you would've already if you'd been reading the thread.
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So the linked article posted by the OP is inaccurate when it says this?

In his new book, the first Homeland Security chief, Tom Ridge, accuses top aides to President George W. Bush of pressing him to raise the terror alert level to influence the 2004 presidential election.
 
That quote contradicts Ridge's comment, which was already posted in this thread.

There's a second point here which is also huge. Some people in this thread (including the title) are claiming that this actually changed the terror level. That also isn't true.
 
mpg said:
That quote contradicts Ridge's comment, which was already posted in this thread.
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Repost it here please.

mpg said:
There's a second point here which is also huge. Some people in this thread (including the title) are claiming that this actually changed the terror level. That also isn't true.
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I don't know any credible source who said that. Certainly not Ridge, & the topic title makes no such claim.
 
Devil505 said:
Repost it here please.


I don't know any credible source who said that. Certainly not Ridge, & the topic title makes no such claim.
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It's somewhere in this thread.

The title of this thread does indeed make that claim and someone claimed that it changed the outcome of the election.
 

Also, God, the Easter Bunny, Santa Claus and Leprechauns also exist.
 
Ridge didn't accuse anyone of a crime.
 
mpg said:
Ridge didn't accuse anyone of a crime.
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He certainly did. It's a felony for federal employees (like the AG) to use their official powers for political purposes. It's a Hatch Act violation, for starters. (trying to get Ridge to use the Alert status of the U.S. to help Bush get reelected is a crime, whether the actual act was done or not)
 
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