Swift Boat Veterans for Truth - Service to Country
Wednesday, August 04, 2004
Tuesday, August 03, 2004
North Korea and our borders
A word of caution, please consider the consequences of trashing the Bush administration on this one. Just for one moment, before you react, consider life under the Siamese-Johns with looming international threats from North Korea. Remember, it is John Kerry's photo hanging in the War Heroes Museum in Hanoi. He was and may still be sympathetic to the reds.
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The New York TimesAugust 3, 2004New N. Korean Missiles Said to Threaten U.S.By REUTERSFiled at 11:42 a.m. ETBERLIN (Reuters) - North Korea is deploying new land- and sea-based ballistic missiles that can carry nuclear warheads and may have sufficient range to hit the United States, according to the authoritative Jane's Defense Weekly.In an article due to appear Wednesday, Jane's said the two new systems appeared to be based on a decommissioned Soviet submarine-launched ballistic missile, the R-27.It said communist North Korea had acquired the know-how during the 1990s from Russian missile specialists and by buying 12 former Soviet submarines which had been sold for scrap metal but retained key elements of their missile launch systems.Jane's, which did not specify its sources, said the sea-based missile was potentially the more threatening of the two new weapons systems.``It would fundamentally alter the missile threat posed by the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) and could finally provide its leadership with something that it has long sought to obtain -- the ability to directly threaten the continental U.S.,'' the weekly said.Apart from targeting the United States, South Korea or Japan, cash-strapped North Korea might seek to sell the technology to countries that have bought its missiles in the past, with Iran a prime candidate, the article added.Ian Kemp, news editor of Jane's Defense Weekly, said North Korea would only spend the money and effort on developing such missiles if it intended to fit them with nuclear warheads.``It's pretty certain the North Koreans would not be developing these unless they were intended for weapons of mass destruction warheads, and the nuclear warhead is far and away the most potent of those,'' he told Reuters.NUCLEAR POTENTIAL UNCLEARNorth Korea pulled out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in January 2003 and is locked in long-running crisis talks with the United States, China, Russia, Japan and South Korea over terms for scrapping its atomic weapons program.The extent of that program remains unclear, although North Korea's deputy foreign minister was quoted as telling a senior U.S. official last year that Pyongyang possessed nuclear weapons.Jane's said the new land-based system had an estimated range of 2,500 to 4,000 km (1,560 to 2,500 miles), and the sea-based system, launchable from a submarine or a ship, had a range of at least 2,500 km.``If you can get a missile aboard a warship, in particular aboard a submarine...you can move your submarine to strike at targets such as Hawaii or the United States, just as examples. Whereas it would be much more difficult to actually develop a ground-launched missile to achieve that sort of a range,'' Kemp said.Until now only the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China have been known to possess submarine-launched nuclear weapons, although there has been speculation that Israel has a similar capability.Jane's said North Korea appeared to have acquired the R-27 technology from Russian missile experts based in the Urals city of Chelyabinsk. It said one such group was detained in 1992 when about to fly to North Korea, but others visited later.It said Pyongyang was also helped by the purchase, through a Japanese trading company, of 12 decommissioned Russian Foxtrot-class and Golf II-class submarines which were sold for scrap in 1993.It said the missiles and electronic firing systems had been removed, but the vessels retained their launch tubes and stabilization sub-systems.
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The New York TimesAugust 3, 2004New N. Korean Missiles Said to Threaten U.S.By REUTERSFiled at 11:42 a.m. ETBERLIN (Reuters) - North Korea is deploying new land- and sea-based ballistic missiles that can carry nuclear warheads and may have sufficient range to hit the United States, according to the authoritative Jane's Defense Weekly.In an article due to appear Wednesday, Jane's said the two new systems appeared to be based on a decommissioned Soviet submarine-launched ballistic missile, the R-27.It said communist North Korea had acquired the know-how during the 1990s from Russian missile specialists and by buying 12 former Soviet submarines which had been sold for scrap metal but retained key elements of their missile launch systems.Jane's, which did not specify its sources, said the sea-based missile was potentially the more threatening of the two new weapons systems.``It would fundamentally alter the missile threat posed by the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) and could finally provide its leadership with something that it has long sought to obtain -- the ability to directly threaten the continental U.S.,'' the weekly said.Apart from targeting the United States, South Korea or Japan, cash-strapped North Korea might seek to sell the technology to countries that have bought its missiles in the past, with Iran a prime candidate, the article added.Ian Kemp, news editor of Jane's Defense Weekly, said North Korea would only spend the money and effort on developing such missiles if it intended to fit them with nuclear warheads.``It's pretty certain the North Koreans would not be developing these unless they were intended for weapons of mass destruction warheads, and the nuclear warhead is far and away the most potent of those,'' he told Reuters.NUCLEAR POTENTIAL UNCLEARNorth Korea pulled out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in January 2003 and is locked in long-running crisis talks with the United States, China, Russia, Japan and South Korea over terms for scrapping its atomic weapons program.The extent of that program remains unclear, although North Korea's deputy foreign minister was quoted as telling a senior U.S. official last year that Pyongyang possessed nuclear weapons.Jane's said the new land-based system had an estimated range of 2,500 to 4,000 km (1,560 to 2,500 miles), and the sea-based system, launchable from a submarine or a ship, had a range of at least 2,500 km.``If you can get a missile aboard a warship, in particular aboard a submarine...you can move your submarine to strike at targets such as Hawaii or the United States, just as examples. Whereas it would be much more difficult to actually develop a ground-launched missile to achieve that sort of a range,'' Kemp said.Until now only the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China have been known to possess submarine-launched nuclear weapons, although there has been speculation that Israel has a similar capability.Jane's said North Korea appeared to have acquired the R-27 technology from Russian missile experts based in the Urals city of Chelyabinsk. It said one such group was detained in 1992 when about to fly to North Korea, but others visited later.It said Pyongyang was also helped by the purchase, through a Japanese trading company, of 12 decommissioned Russian Foxtrot-class and Golf II-class submarines which were sold for scrap in 1993.It said the missiles and electronic firing systems had been removed, but the vessels retained their launch tubes and stabilization sub-systems.
Hollywood's Bold and Beautiful & Mr. Kerry - O
Hollywood is on the campaign trail. Have you seen the ubiquitous Ben Afleck? Ever present and always comforting. Or the world’s current darling, Michael Moore. How adorable was he sitting with President Carter at the DNC? Oh, what is that? You are asking about their credentials? Their qualifications for contributing to the Democratic Presidential candidate?
Well pardon my crudeness, but crap floats, so what else would we expect to find around the Johns? Or am I mistaken and did Madonna and Johnny Depp complete their postgraduate fellowships at Rand or CSIS?
No, none of the Hollywood “ACTORS” have any formal training or education in foreign policy, counter terrorism or political science. They are “ACTORS”. They are trained monkey people. Now they seem to believe they are the roles they briefly stepped into.
Look at Mr. Afleck’s career:
Surviving Christmas (2004) (post-production) .... Drew Lathem
Jersey Girl (2004) .... Ollie Trinke
Paycheck (2003) .... Michael Jennings
Gigli (2003) .... Larry Gigli
Daredevil (2003) .... Matt Murdock/Daredevil... aka Daredevil 1.5 (2005) (USA: DVD title (director's cut))
Third Wheel, The (2002/I) .... Michael
Sum of All Fears, The (2002) .... Jack Ryan... aka Anschlag, Der (2002) (Germany)
Changing Lanes (2002) .... Gavin Banek
Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001) .... Holden McNeil/Himself
Daddy and Them (2001) .... Lawrence Bowen
Pearl Harbor (2001) .... Capt. Rafe McCawley... aka Pearl Harbour (2001) (UK: promotional title)
Bounce (2000) .... Buddy Amaral
Joseph: King of Dreams (2000) (V) (voice) .... Joseph
Reindeer Games (2000) .... Rudy Duncan... aka Deception (2000/II) (UK) (USA: working title)
SNL Fanatic (2000) (TV) .... Jason
Boiler Room (2000) .... Jim Young
Dogma (1999) .... Bartleby
Forces of Nature (1999) .... Ben Holmes
200 Cigarettes (1999) .... Bartender
Shakespeare in Love (1998) .... Ned Alleyn
Armageddon (1998) .... A.J. Frost
Phantoms (1998) .... Sheriff Bryce Hammond... aka Dean Koontz's Phantoms (1998) (USA: complete title)
Good Will Hunting (1997) .... Chuckie Sullivan
Office Killer (1997) (scenes deleted) .... Man in Office
Chasing Amy (1997) .... Holden McNeil
Going All the Way (1997) .... Tom 'Gunner' Casselman
Glory Daze (1996) .... Jack
"Lifestories: Families In Crisis" (1995) TV Series .... Aaron Henry
Mallrats (1995) .... Shannon Hamilton
Body to Die for: The Aaron Henry Story, A (1994) (TV) .... Aaron Henry
"Against the Grain" (1993) TV Series .... Joe Willie Clemons
Dazed and Confused (1993) .... Fred O'Bannion
School Ties (1992) .... Chesty Smith
Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992) (uncredited) .... Basketball Player #10
Daddy (1991) (TV) .... Ben Watson... aka Danielle Steel's 'Daddy' (1991) (TV)
"Second Voyage of the Mimi, The" (1988) TV Series .... C.T. Granville
Hands of a Stranger (1987) (TV) .... Billy Hearn
Wanted: The Perfect Guy (1986) (TV) .... Danny Coleman... aka Wanted: A Man for Mom (1986) (TV) (USA)
"Voyage of the Mimi, The" (1984) TV Series .... C.T. Granville
Dark End of the Street, The (1981)
Ben is writing speeches for John Kerry. Does that strike you as odd or frightening? The man who starred in Gigli and Jersey Girl is helping to shape the policy and voice of the man who would be responsible for the greatest nation on earth.
How very sad and troubling for John Kerry that he would have no more authoritative resources than Hollywood, troubled and pathetic “ACTORS” to surround his campaign. Oh, I am sorry, I nearly forgot, he does have the bold and beautiful, John Edwards who couldn’t make it as an “ACTOR” so he settled for being a trial liar. My mistake.
Well pardon my crudeness, but crap floats, so what else would we expect to find around the Johns? Or am I mistaken and did Madonna and Johnny Depp complete their postgraduate fellowships at Rand or CSIS?
No, none of the Hollywood “ACTORS” have any formal training or education in foreign policy, counter terrorism or political science. They are “ACTORS”. They are trained monkey people. Now they seem to believe they are the roles they briefly stepped into.
Look at Mr. Afleck’s career:
Surviving Christmas (2004) (post-production) .... Drew Lathem
Jersey Girl (2004) .... Ollie Trinke
Paycheck (2003) .... Michael Jennings
Gigli (2003) .... Larry Gigli
Daredevil (2003) .... Matt Murdock/Daredevil... aka Daredevil 1.5 (2005) (USA: DVD title (director's cut))
Third Wheel, The (2002/I) .... Michael
Sum of All Fears, The (2002) .... Jack Ryan... aka Anschlag, Der (2002) (Germany)
Changing Lanes (2002) .... Gavin Banek
Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001) .... Holden McNeil/Himself
Daddy and Them (2001) .... Lawrence Bowen
Pearl Harbor (2001) .... Capt. Rafe McCawley... aka Pearl Harbour (2001) (UK: promotional title)
Bounce (2000) .... Buddy Amaral
Joseph: King of Dreams (2000) (V) (voice) .... Joseph
Reindeer Games (2000) .... Rudy Duncan... aka Deception (2000/II) (UK) (USA: working title)
SNL Fanatic (2000) (TV) .... Jason
Boiler Room (2000) .... Jim Young
Dogma (1999) .... Bartleby
Forces of Nature (1999) .... Ben Holmes
200 Cigarettes (1999) .... Bartender
Shakespeare in Love (1998) .... Ned Alleyn
Armageddon (1998) .... A.J. Frost
Phantoms (1998) .... Sheriff Bryce Hammond... aka Dean Koontz's Phantoms (1998) (USA: complete title)
Good Will Hunting (1997) .... Chuckie Sullivan
Office Killer (1997) (scenes deleted) .... Man in Office
Chasing Amy (1997) .... Holden McNeil
Going All the Way (1997) .... Tom 'Gunner' Casselman
Glory Daze (1996) .... Jack
"Lifestories: Families In Crisis" (1995) TV Series .... Aaron Henry
Mallrats (1995) .... Shannon Hamilton
Body to Die for: The Aaron Henry Story, A (1994) (TV) .... Aaron Henry
"Against the Grain" (1993) TV Series .... Joe Willie Clemons
Dazed and Confused (1993) .... Fred O'Bannion
School Ties (1992) .... Chesty Smith
Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992) (uncredited) .... Basketball Player #10
Daddy (1991) (TV) .... Ben Watson... aka Danielle Steel's 'Daddy' (1991) (TV)
"Second Voyage of the Mimi, The" (1988) TV Series .... C.T. Granville
Hands of a Stranger (1987) (TV) .... Billy Hearn
Wanted: The Perfect Guy (1986) (TV) .... Danny Coleman... aka Wanted: A Man for Mom (1986) (TV) (USA)
"Voyage of the Mimi, The" (1984) TV Series .... C.T. Granville
Dark End of the Street, The (1981)
Ben is writing speeches for John Kerry. Does that strike you as odd or frightening? The man who starred in Gigli and Jersey Girl is helping to shape the policy and voice of the man who would be responsible for the greatest nation on earth.
How very sad and troubling for John Kerry that he would have no more authoritative resources than Hollywood, troubled and pathetic “ACTORS” to surround his campaign. Oh, I am sorry, I nearly forgot, he does have the bold and beautiful, John Edwards who couldn’t make it as an “ACTOR” so he settled for being a trial liar. My mistake.
Monday, August 02, 2004
John Kerry CV
JOB APPLICATION NAME: John Kerry
RESIDENCE: 7 mansions, including Washington DC, worth multi-millions.
EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE: Law Enforcement. I voted to cut every law enforcement, CIA and defense bill in my career as a US Senator. I ordered Boston to remove a fire hydrant in front of my mansion, thereby endangering my neighbors in the event of fire.
MILITARY: I used three minor injuries to get an early discharge from the military and service in Vietnam (as documented by the attending doctor). I then returned to the US, joined Jane Fonda in protesting the war, and insulted returning Vietnam vets, claiming they committed atrocities and were baby killers. I threw my medals, ribbons, or something away in protest. Or did I? My book; Vietnam Veterans Against the War: The New Soldier shows how I truly feel about the military.
COLLEGE: I graduated from Yale University with a low C average. Unlike my counterpart George Bush, I have no higher education and did not get admitted to Harvard nor graduate with an M.B.A
PAST WORK EXPERIENCE: I ran for U.S. Congress and have been there ever since. I have no real world experience except marrying rich women and running HJ Heinz vicariously through my wife Teresa.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS: As a US Senator I set the record for the most liberal voting record, exceeding even ted kennedy and hillary clinton. I have consistently failed to support our military and CIA by voting against budgets, thus gutting our country's ability to defend itself. Although I voted for the Iraq War, now I am against it and refuse to admit that I voted for it. I voted for every liberal piece of legislation. I have no plan to help this country but I intend to raise taxes significantly if I am elected.
My wealth so far exceeds that of my counterpart, George Bush, that he will never catch up. I make no or little charitable contributions and have never agreed to pay any voluntary excess taxes in MA, despite family wealth in excess of $ 700 million.
I (we) own 68 manufacturing plants (Heinz) outside of the U.S. in places like Asia, Mexico and Europe. We can make more profit from the cheaper cost of labor in those Countries, although I Blame George Bush for sending all of the jobs out of Country.
Although I claim to be in favor of alternative energy sources, Ted Kennedy and I oppose windmills off Nantucketand Martha's Vineyard as it might spoil our view of the ocean as we cruise on our yachts.
RECORDS AND REFERENCES: None.
PERSONAL I ride a Serotta Bike, cost $6,000 + My Gulfstream V Jet I call The Flying Squirrel. I call my $850,000 42-foot Hinckleytwin diesel yacht the "Scarmouche". I am fascinated by rap and hip-hop and feel it reflects our real culture. I own several "Large" SUVs including one parked at my Nantucket summer mansion, though I am against large polluting inefficient vehicles and blame George Bush for the energy problems.
PLEASE CONSIDER MY EXPERIENCE WHEN VOTING IN 2004.
RESIDENCE: 7 mansions, including Washington DC, worth multi-millions.
EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE: Law Enforcement. I voted to cut every law enforcement, CIA and defense bill in my career as a US Senator. I ordered Boston to remove a fire hydrant in front of my mansion, thereby endangering my neighbors in the event of fire.
MILITARY: I used three minor injuries to get an early discharge from the military and service in Vietnam (as documented by the attending doctor). I then returned to the US, joined Jane Fonda in protesting the war, and insulted returning Vietnam vets, claiming they committed atrocities and were baby killers. I threw my medals, ribbons, or something away in protest. Or did I? My book; Vietnam Veterans Against the War: The New Soldier shows how I truly feel about the military.
COLLEGE: I graduated from Yale University with a low C average. Unlike my counterpart George Bush, I have no higher education and did not get admitted to Harvard nor graduate with an M.B.A
PAST WORK EXPERIENCE: I ran for U.S. Congress and have been there ever since. I have no real world experience except marrying rich women and running HJ Heinz vicariously through my wife Teresa.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS: As a US Senator I set the record for the most liberal voting record, exceeding even ted kennedy and hillary clinton. I have consistently failed to support our military and CIA by voting against budgets, thus gutting our country's ability to defend itself. Although I voted for the Iraq War, now I am against it and refuse to admit that I voted for it. I voted for every liberal piece of legislation. I have no plan to help this country but I intend to raise taxes significantly if I am elected.
My wealth so far exceeds that of my counterpart, George Bush, that he will never catch up. I make no or little charitable contributions and have never agreed to pay any voluntary excess taxes in MA, despite family wealth in excess of $ 700 million.
I (we) own 68 manufacturing plants (Heinz) outside of the U.S. in places like Asia, Mexico and Europe. We can make more profit from the cheaper cost of labor in those Countries, although I Blame George Bush for sending all of the jobs out of Country.
Although I claim to be in favor of alternative energy sources, Ted Kennedy and I oppose windmills off Nantucketand Martha's Vineyard as it might spoil our view of the ocean as we cruise on our yachts.
RECORDS AND REFERENCES: None.
PERSONAL I ride a Serotta Bike, cost $6,000 + My Gulfstream V Jet I call The Flying Squirrel. I call my $850,000 42-foot Hinckleytwin diesel yacht the "Scarmouche". I am fascinated by rap and hip-hop and feel it reflects our real culture. I own several "Large" SUVs including one parked at my Nantucket summer mansion, though I am against large polluting inefficient vehicles and blame George Bush for the energy problems.
PLEASE CONSIDER MY EXPERIENCE WHEN VOTING IN 2004.
Kerry Bounce Or Not
Geopolitical Diary:
Monday, Aug. 2, 2004 August 02, 2004
Americans got their first glimpse of the shape of the presidential campaign on Sunday. The first polls following the Democratic convention have appeared, showing that Sen. John Kerry received little if any bounce from the event. In addition, Department of Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge went on TV to announce that an al Qaeda threat had been detected, targeting business and quasi-government organizations in New York and Washington. These included the IMF and World Bank in Washington, D.C., the New York Stock Exchange and -- for reasons we are still trying to grasp -- the Prudential building in Newark, N.J. What Prudential or Newark have done to tick off al Qaeda is not immediately clear, but it must have been pretty bad.
A Newsweek poll released on Saturday and taken right after the Democratic convention showed Kerry receiving a four-point bounce after the convention: Kerry with 49 percent of the vote, President George W. Bush with 42 and independent candidate Ralph Nader with 3 percent.
This compared to a Kerry lead of 47-44-3 in the same poll prior to the convention. The bounce was about what we would have expected, given the polarization of the electorate. There are very few voters up for grabs: Bush doesn't go much below 42 percent, and the convention pushed Kerry's support to the limit.Then something interesting happened: Polls taken a day or two later showed Kerry's bounce dissolving. A CNN-USA Today poll taken a day later than the Newsweek survey had Bush leading Kerry 50-47. Among likely voters, Bush was behind by 2 points. This means that the candidates are in a dead tie, since all the numbers are within the margin of error of the poll. So, the important news is that the Democratic convention not only didn't give Kerry much of a bounce, but what bounce he had seems to have dissipated almost immediately.
The Democratic convention reflected Kerry's strategic problem: His core base of support is built around Michael Moore Democrats -- voters who have been utterly alienated by Bush. Like Clinton-haters, these voters intensely personalize the election and are extremely suspicious of any move that Kerry makes that appears to be buying into any Bush position. This is an extremely volatile base that can bleed off rapidly if it concludes that Kerry is a Bush clone -- they can move toward Nader or stay at home. Kerry has to hold this base -- but if he merely holds this segment, he loses. He must pick up another 6 percent. But that 6 percent dislikes the stridency of the Democratic left.
They are open to the view that Kerry is more competent in carrying out Bush's policies, but not to a repudiation of those policies outright. Kerry could not find a way to reconcile his two needs at the convention. What the weekend has shown is that Bush can remain fairly passive. The dynamic works against Kerry, whose challenge will be to figure out a way to keep his voters locked in while moving to the center. We don't think we are exaggerating when we say the success of Michael Moore's vision of George W. Bush may have done more than anything else to help his re-election. By fueling the most extreme vision of Bush among Kerry's support base, Moore deprived Kerry of much room for maneuver.
If Bush is the monster Moore portrays him to be, anything less than absolute opposition is unacceptable among Kerry supporters. If all Kerry has to offer is absolute opposition, Bush wins. Kerry will have to reshape the psychology of his base, which will not be easy to do.That was particularly demonstrated by Sunday's terrorism alert, when Ridge announced intelligence pointing to a pending attack. An interesting point here is that the Bush administration can push Kerry off the front page and off the first five minutes of news whenever it wants to. Given the fact that the overwhelming majority of voters believe there is a major threat from al Qaeda, the administration can rivet all attention there at will.
Given that there is enough intelligence at any point to indicate that al Qaeda is about to poison all the cheese in Wisconsin or sink the Statue of Liberty, when to call an alert is pretty much up to Homeland Defense. It isn't that the alert isn't valid; it's just that there is a degree of flexibility in calling one. Kerry not only doesn't get a major bounce, not only doesn't hold it for more than a day, but by Sunday, he is pushed out of the public mind by Tom Ridge.Kerry has got to change the game somehow.
Copyrights 2004 - Strategic Forecasting, Inc. All rights reserved.
Monday, Aug. 2, 2004 August 02, 2004
Americans got their first glimpse of the shape of the presidential campaign on Sunday. The first polls following the Democratic convention have appeared, showing that Sen. John Kerry received little if any bounce from the event. In addition, Department of Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge went on TV to announce that an al Qaeda threat had been detected, targeting business and quasi-government organizations in New York and Washington. These included the IMF and World Bank in Washington, D.C., the New York Stock Exchange and -- for reasons we are still trying to grasp -- the Prudential building in Newark, N.J. What Prudential or Newark have done to tick off al Qaeda is not immediately clear, but it must have been pretty bad.
A Newsweek poll released on Saturday and taken right after the Democratic convention showed Kerry receiving a four-point bounce after the convention: Kerry with 49 percent of the vote, President George W. Bush with 42 and independent candidate Ralph Nader with 3 percent.
This compared to a Kerry lead of 47-44-3 in the same poll prior to the convention. The bounce was about what we would have expected, given the polarization of the electorate. There are very few voters up for grabs: Bush doesn't go much below 42 percent, and the convention pushed Kerry's support to the limit.Then something interesting happened: Polls taken a day or two later showed Kerry's bounce dissolving. A CNN-USA Today poll taken a day later than the Newsweek survey had Bush leading Kerry 50-47. Among likely voters, Bush was behind by 2 points. This means that the candidates are in a dead tie, since all the numbers are within the margin of error of the poll. So, the important news is that the Democratic convention not only didn't give Kerry much of a bounce, but what bounce he had seems to have dissipated almost immediately.
The Democratic convention reflected Kerry's strategic problem: His core base of support is built around Michael Moore Democrats -- voters who have been utterly alienated by Bush. Like Clinton-haters, these voters intensely personalize the election and are extremely suspicious of any move that Kerry makes that appears to be buying into any Bush position. This is an extremely volatile base that can bleed off rapidly if it concludes that Kerry is a Bush clone -- they can move toward Nader or stay at home. Kerry has to hold this base -- but if he merely holds this segment, he loses. He must pick up another 6 percent. But that 6 percent dislikes the stridency of the Democratic left.
They are open to the view that Kerry is more competent in carrying out Bush's policies, but not to a repudiation of those policies outright. Kerry could not find a way to reconcile his two needs at the convention. What the weekend has shown is that Bush can remain fairly passive. The dynamic works against Kerry, whose challenge will be to figure out a way to keep his voters locked in while moving to the center. We don't think we are exaggerating when we say the success of Michael Moore's vision of George W. Bush may have done more than anything else to help his re-election. By fueling the most extreme vision of Bush among Kerry's support base, Moore deprived Kerry of much room for maneuver.
If Bush is the monster Moore portrays him to be, anything less than absolute opposition is unacceptable among Kerry supporters. If all Kerry has to offer is absolute opposition, Bush wins. Kerry will have to reshape the psychology of his base, which will not be easy to do.That was particularly demonstrated by Sunday's terrorism alert, when Ridge announced intelligence pointing to a pending attack. An interesting point here is that the Bush administration can push Kerry off the front page and off the first five minutes of news whenever it wants to. Given the fact that the overwhelming majority of voters believe there is a major threat from al Qaeda, the administration can rivet all attention there at will.
Given that there is enough intelligence at any point to indicate that al Qaeda is about to poison all the cheese in Wisconsin or sink the Statue of Liberty, when to call an alert is pretty much up to Homeland Defense. It isn't that the alert isn't valid; it's just that there is a degree of flexibility in calling one. Kerry not only doesn't get a major bounce, not only doesn't hold it for more than a day, but by Sunday, he is pushed out of the public mind by Tom Ridge.Kerry has got to change the game somehow.
Copyrights 2004 - Strategic Forecasting, Inc. All rights reserved.
Swift Boat Veterans for Truth - Disinfopedia
"We resent very deeply the false war crimes charges he made coming back fromVietnam in 1971 and repeated in the book "Tour of Duty." We think thosecast an aspersion on all those living and dead, from our unit and otherunits inVietnam. We think that he knew he was lying when he made the charges, andwe think that they're unsupportable. We intend to bring the truth about thatto the American people.We believe, based on our experience with him, that he is totally unfit tobe the Commander-in-Chief." -- John O'Neill, spokesman, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth .
"I do not believe John Kerry is fit to be Commander-in-Chief of the armedforces of the United States. This is not a political issue. It is a matterof his judgment, truthfulness, reliability, loyalty and trust -- allabsolutetenets of command. His biography, 'Tour of Duty,' by Douglas Brinkley, isreplete with gross exaggerations, distortions of fact, contradictions andslanderous lies. His contempt for the military and authority is evident byeven a mostcasual review of this biography. He arrived in-country with a stronganti-Vietnam War bias and a self-serving determination to build a foundationfor hispolitical future. He was aggressive, but vain and prone to impulsivejudgment, often with disregard for specific tactical assignments. He was a'loose cannon.'In an abbreviated tour of four months and 12 days, and with his speciousmedals secure, Lt.(jg) Kerry bugged out and began his infamous betrayal ofallUnited States forces in the Vietnam War. That included our soldiers, ourmarines,our sailors, our coast guardsmen, our airmen, and our POWs. His leadershipwithin the so-called Vietnam Veterans Against the War and testimony beforeCongress in 1971 charging us with unspeakable atrocities remain anundocumented butnevertheless meticulous stain on the men and women who honorably stayed thecourse. Senator Kerry is not fit for command."-- Rear Admiral Roy Hoffman, USN (retired), chairman, Swift Boat Veteransfor Truth.
"During Lt.(jg) Kerry's tour, he was under my command for two or threespecific operations, before his rapid exit. Trust, loyalty and judgment arethe key, operative words. His turncoat performance in 1971 in his grubbyshirtand his medal-tossing escapade, coupled with his slanderous lines in therecentbook portraying us that served, including all POWs and MIAs, as murderouswarcriminals, I believe, will have a lasting effect on all military veteransand their families.Kerry would be described as devious, self-absorbing, manipulative,disdain for authority, disruptive, but the most common phrase that you'dhear isrequires constant supervision.'"
-- Captain Charles Plumly, USN (retired)
"Thirty-five years ago, many of us fell silent when we came back to thestain of sewage that Mr. Kerry had thrown on us, and all of our colleagueswho served over there. I don't intend to be silent today or ever again. Ouryoung men and women who are serving deserve no less."
-- Andrew Horne.
"In my specific, personal experience in both coastal and river patrolsover a 12-month period, I never once saw or heard anything remotelyresemblingthe atrocities described by Senator Kerry. If I had, it would have been myobligation to report them in writing to a higher authority, and I wouldcertainly hae done that. If Senator Kerry actually witnessed or participatedinthese atrocities or, as he described them, 'war crimes,' he was obligated toreport them. That he did not until later when it suited his politicalpurposesstrikes me as opportunism of the worst kind. That he would malign my serviceand thatof his fellow sailors with no regard for the truth makes him totallyunqualifiedto serve as Commander-in-Chief."-- Jeffrey Wainscott
"I signed that letter because I, too felt a deep sense of betrayal thatsomeone who took the same oath of loyalty as I did as an officer in theUnited Sates Navy would abandon his group here (points to group photo) tojointhis group here (points to VVAW protest photo), and come home and attempt torally the American public against the effort that this group was sovaliantlypursuing. It is a fact that in the entire Vietnam War we did not lose onemajorbattle. We lost the war at home... and at home, John Kerry was the FieldGeneral."-- Robert Elder
"My daughters and my wife have read portions of the book 'Tour of Duty.'They wanted to know if I took part in the atrocities described. I do notbelieve the things that are described happened.Let me give you an example. In Brinkley's book, on pages 170 to 171,about something called the 'Bo De massacre' on November 24th of 1968... InKerry's description of the engagement, first he claimed there were 17servicementhat were wounded. Three of us were wounded. I was the first..."-- Joseph Ponder.
"While in Cam Rahn Bay, he trained on several 24-hour indoctrinationmissions, and one special skimmer operation with my most senior and trustedLieutenant. The briefing from some members of that crew the morning afterrevealed that they had not received any enemy fire, and yet Lt.(jg) Kerryinformed me ofa wound -- he showed me a scratch on his arm and a piece of shrapnel in hishand that appeared to be from one of our own M-79s. It was later reported tomethat Lt.(jg) Kerry had fired an M-79, and it had exploded off the adjacentshoreline. I do not recall being advised of any medical treatment, andprobably said something like 'Forget it.' He later received a Purple Heartfor thatscratch, and I have no information as to how or whom.Lt.(jg) Kerry was allowed to return to the good old USA after 4 monthsand a few days in-country, and then he proceeded to betray his formershipmates,calling them criminals who were committing atrocities. Today we are here totell you that just the opposite is true. Our rules of engagement were quitestrict, and the officers and men of Swift often did not even return firewhen they were under fire if there was a possibility that innocent people --fishermen, in a lot of cases -- might be hurt or injured. The rules and thegoodintentions of the men increased the possibility that we might take friendlycasualties." -- Commander Grant Hibbard, USN (retired) .
"Lt. Kerry returned home from the war to make some outrageous statementsand allegations... of numerous criminal acts in violation of the law of warwere cited by Kerry, disparaging those who had fought with honor in thatconflict.Had war crimes been committed by US forces in Vietnam? Yes, but such actswere few and far between. Yet Lt. Kerry have numerous speeches and testimonybefore Congress inappropriately leading his audiences to believe that whatwas only an anomaly in the conduct of America's fighting men was anepidemic.Furthermore, he suggested that they were being encouraged to violated thelaw of war by those within the chain of command.Very specific orders, on file at the Vietnam archives at Texas TechUniversity, were issued by my father [Admiral Elmo Zumwalt] and others inhis chain of command instructing subordinates to act responsibly inpreserving the lifeand property of Vietnamese civilians."
-- Lt. Col. James Zumwalt, USMC (retired) .
"We look at Vietnam... after all these years it is still languishing inisolated poverty and helplessness and tyranny. This is John Kerry's legacy.I deeply resent John Kerry's using his Swift boat experience, and hisbetrayal of those who fought there as a stepping-stone to his politicalambitions." -- Barnard Wolff
"In a whole year that I spent patrolling, I didn't see anything like awar crime, an atrocity, anything like that. Time and again I saw Americanfighting men put themselves in graver danger trying to avoid... collateraldamage.When John Kerry returned to the country, he was sworn in front ofCongress.And then he told my family -- my parents, my sister, my brother, myneighbors -- he told everyone I knew and everyone I'd ever know that I andmycomrades had committed unspeakable atrocities." -- David Wallace
"I served with these guys. I went on missions with them, and these menI served honorably. Up and down the chain of command there was noacquiescence to atrocities. It was not condoned, it did not happen, and itwas not reportedto me verbally or in writing by any of these men including Lt.(jg) Kerry. In 1971, '72, for almost 18 months, he stood before the televisionaudiences and claimed that the 500,000 men and women in Vietnam, and incombat, wereall villains -- there were no heroes. In 2004, one hero from the VietnamWar has appeared, running for President of the United States andCommander-in-Chief.It just galls one to think about it." -- Captain George Elliott, USN (retired)
"During the Vietnam War I was Task Force Commander at An Thoi, and mytour of duty was 13 months, from the end of Tet to the beginning of theVietnamization of the Navy units. Now when I went there right after Tet, I was restricted in my movements.I couldn't go much of anyplace because the Vietcong controlled most of thearea.When I left, I could go anywhere I wanted, just about. Commerce wasbooming, the buses were running, trucks were going, the waterways werefilled withsampans with goods going to market, but yet in Kerry's biography he saysthat our operations were a complete failure. He also mentions a formalconferencewith me, to try to get more air cover and so on. That conference neverhappened..."-- Captain Adrian Lonsdale, USCG (retired).
"I was in An Thoi from June of '68 to June of '69, covering the wholeperiod that John Kerry was there. I operated in every river, in every canal,andevery off-shore patrol area in the 4th Corps area, from Cambodia all theway around to the Bo De River. I never saw, even heard of all of theseso-called atrocities and things that we were supposed to have done.This is not true. We're not standing for it. We want to set the recordstraight." -- William Shumadine.
"In 1971, when John Kerry spoke out to America, labeling all Vietnamveterans as thugs and murderers, I was shocked and almost brought to myknees, because even though I had served at the same time and same unit, Ihadnever witnessed or participated in any of the events that the Senator hadaccusedus of. I strongly believe that the statements made by the Senator were notonlyfalse and inaccurate, but extremely harmful to the United States' efforts inSoutheast Asia and the rest of the world. Tragically, some veterans,scorned by the antiwar movement and their allies, retreated to a life ofdespair andsuicide. Two of my crewmates were among them. For that there is noforgiveness. "-- Richard O'Meara .
"My name is Steve Gardner. I served in 1966 and 1967 on my first tour ofduty in Vietnam on Swift boats, and I did my second tour in '68 and '69,involved with John Kerry in the last 2 1/2 months of my tour. The John Kerrythat Iknow is not the John Kerry that everybody else is portraying. I servedalongside him and behind him, five feet away from him in a gun tub, andwatched as hemade indecisive moves with our boat, put our boats in jeopardy, put ourcrews in jeopardy... if a man like that can't handle that 6-man crew boat,howcan you expect him to be our Commander-in-Chief?"-- Steven Gardner.
"I served in Vietnam as a boat officer from June of 1968 to July of 1969.My service was three months in Coastal Division 13 out of Cat Lo, and ninemonths with Coastal Division 11 based in An Thoi. John Kerry was in An Thoithe same time I was. I'm here today to express the anger I have harbored forover 33 years, about being accused with my fellow shipmates of waratrocities.All I can say is when I leave here today, I'm going down to the Wall totell my two crew members it's not true, and that they and the other 49Swifteeswho are on the Wall were then and are still now the best."-- Robert Brant.
"I never saw, heard of, or participated in any Swift boat crews killingcattle, poisoning crops, or raping and killing civilians as charged by JohnKerry, both in his book and in public statements. Since we both operated atthesame time, in the same general area, and on the same missions under the samecommanders, it is hard to believe his claims of atrocities and poorplanning of Sea Lord missions.I signed this letter because I feel that he used Swift boat sailors toproclaim his antiwar statements after the war, and now he uses the sameSwift boat sailors to support his claims of being a war hero. He cannot haveit bothways, and we are here to ask for full disclosure of the proof of hisclaims."-- James Steffes
"I do not believe John Kerry is fit to be Commander-in-Chief of the armedforces of the United States. This is not a political issue. It is a matterof his judgment, truthfulness, reliability, loyalty and trust -- allabsolutetenets of command. His biography, 'Tour of Duty,' by Douglas Brinkley, isreplete with gross exaggerations, distortions of fact, contradictions andslanderous lies. His contempt for the military and authority is evident byeven a mostcasual review of this biography. He arrived in-country with a stronganti-Vietnam War bias and a self-serving determination to build a foundationfor hispolitical future. He was aggressive, but vain and prone to impulsivejudgment, often with disregard for specific tactical assignments. He was a'loose cannon.'In an abbreviated tour of four months and 12 days, and with his speciousmedals secure, Lt.(jg) Kerry bugged out and began his infamous betrayal ofallUnited States forces in the Vietnam War. That included our soldiers, ourmarines,our sailors, our coast guardsmen, our airmen, and our POWs. His leadershipwithin the so-called Vietnam Veterans Against the War and testimony beforeCongress in 1971 charging us with unspeakable atrocities remain anundocumented butnevertheless meticulous stain on the men and women who honorably stayed thecourse. Senator Kerry is not fit for command."-- Rear Admiral Roy Hoffman, USN (retired), chairman, Swift Boat Veteransfor Truth.
"During Lt.(jg) Kerry's tour, he was under my command for two or threespecific operations, before his rapid exit. Trust, loyalty and judgment arethe key, operative words. His turncoat performance in 1971 in his grubbyshirtand his medal-tossing escapade, coupled with his slanderous lines in therecentbook portraying us that served, including all POWs and MIAs, as murderouswarcriminals, I believe, will have a lasting effect on all military veteransand their families.Kerry would be described as devious, self-absorbing, manipulative,disdain for authority, disruptive, but the most common phrase that you'dhear isrequires constant supervision.'"
-- Captain Charles Plumly, USN (retired)
"Thirty-five years ago, many of us fell silent when we came back to thestain of sewage that Mr. Kerry had thrown on us, and all of our colleagueswho served over there. I don't intend to be silent today or ever again. Ouryoung men and women who are serving deserve no less."
-- Andrew Horne.
"In my specific, personal experience in both coastal and river patrolsover a 12-month period, I never once saw or heard anything remotelyresemblingthe atrocities described by Senator Kerry. If I had, it would have been myobligation to report them in writing to a higher authority, and I wouldcertainly hae done that. If Senator Kerry actually witnessed or participatedinthese atrocities or, as he described them, 'war crimes,' he was obligated toreport them. That he did not until later when it suited his politicalpurposesstrikes me as opportunism of the worst kind. That he would malign my serviceand thatof his fellow sailors with no regard for the truth makes him totallyunqualifiedto serve as Commander-in-Chief."-- Jeffrey Wainscott
"I signed that letter because I, too felt a deep sense of betrayal thatsomeone who took the same oath of loyalty as I did as an officer in theUnited Sates Navy would abandon his group here (points to group photo) tojointhis group here (points to VVAW protest photo), and come home and attempt torally the American public against the effort that this group was sovaliantlypursuing. It is a fact that in the entire Vietnam War we did not lose onemajorbattle. We lost the war at home... and at home, John Kerry was the FieldGeneral."-- Robert Elder
"My daughters and my wife have read portions of the book 'Tour of Duty.'They wanted to know if I took part in the atrocities described. I do notbelieve the things that are described happened.Let me give you an example. In Brinkley's book, on pages 170 to 171,about something called the 'Bo De massacre' on November 24th of 1968... InKerry's description of the engagement, first he claimed there were 17servicementhat were wounded. Three of us were wounded. I was the first..."-- Joseph Ponder.
"While in Cam Rahn Bay, he trained on several 24-hour indoctrinationmissions, and one special skimmer operation with my most senior and trustedLieutenant. The briefing from some members of that crew the morning afterrevealed that they had not received any enemy fire, and yet Lt.(jg) Kerryinformed me ofa wound -- he showed me a scratch on his arm and a piece of shrapnel in hishand that appeared to be from one of our own M-79s. It was later reported tomethat Lt.(jg) Kerry had fired an M-79, and it had exploded off the adjacentshoreline. I do not recall being advised of any medical treatment, andprobably said something like 'Forget it.' He later received a Purple Heartfor thatscratch, and I have no information as to how or whom.Lt.(jg) Kerry was allowed to return to the good old USA after 4 monthsand a few days in-country, and then he proceeded to betray his formershipmates,calling them criminals who were committing atrocities. Today we are here totell you that just the opposite is true. Our rules of engagement were quitestrict, and the officers and men of Swift often did not even return firewhen they were under fire if there was a possibility that innocent people --fishermen, in a lot of cases -- might be hurt or injured. The rules and thegoodintentions of the men increased the possibility that we might take friendlycasualties." -- Commander Grant Hibbard, USN (retired) .
"Lt. Kerry returned home from the war to make some outrageous statementsand allegations... of numerous criminal acts in violation of the law of warwere cited by Kerry, disparaging those who had fought with honor in thatconflict.Had war crimes been committed by US forces in Vietnam? Yes, but such actswere few and far between. Yet Lt. Kerry have numerous speeches and testimonybefore Congress inappropriately leading his audiences to believe that whatwas only an anomaly in the conduct of America's fighting men was anepidemic.Furthermore, he suggested that they were being encouraged to violated thelaw of war by those within the chain of command.Very specific orders, on file at the Vietnam archives at Texas TechUniversity, were issued by my father [Admiral Elmo Zumwalt] and others inhis chain of command instructing subordinates to act responsibly inpreserving the lifeand property of Vietnamese civilians."
-- Lt. Col. James Zumwalt, USMC (retired) .
"We look at Vietnam... after all these years it is still languishing inisolated poverty and helplessness and tyranny. This is John Kerry's legacy.I deeply resent John Kerry's using his Swift boat experience, and hisbetrayal of those who fought there as a stepping-stone to his politicalambitions." -- Barnard Wolff
"In a whole year that I spent patrolling, I didn't see anything like awar crime, an atrocity, anything like that. Time and again I saw Americanfighting men put themselves in graver danger trying to avoid... collateraldamage.When John Kerry returned to the country, he was sworn in front ofCongress.And then he told my family -- my parents, my sister, my brother, myneighbors -- he told everyone I knew and everyone I'd ever know that I andmycomrades had committed unspeakable atrocities." -- David Wallace
"I served with these guys. I went on missions with them, and these menI served honorably. Up and down the chain of command there was noacquiescence to atrocities. It was not condoned, it did not happen, and itwas not reportedto me verbally or in writing by any of these men including Lt.(jg) Kerry. In 1971, '72, for almost 18 months, he stood before the televisionaudiences and claimed that the 500,000 men and women in Vietnam, and incombat, wereall villains -- there were no heroes. In 2004, one hero from the VietnamWar has appeared, running for President of the United States andCommander-in-Chief.It just galls one to think about it." -- Captain George Elliott, USN (retired)
"During the Vietnam War I was Task Force Commander at An Thoi, and mytour of duty was 13 months, from the end of Tet to the beginning of theVietnamization of the Navy units. Now when I went there right after Tet, I was restricted in my movements.I couldn't go much of anyplace because the Vietcong controlled most of thearea.When I left, I could go anywhere I wanted, just about. Commerce wasbooming, the buses were running, trucks were going, the waterways werefilled withsampans with goods going to market, but yet in Kerry's biography he saysthat our operations were a complete failure. He also mentions a formalconferencewith me, to try to get more air cover and so on. That conference neverhappened..."-- Captain Adrian Lonsdale, USCG (retired).
"I was in An Thoi from June of '68 to June of '69, covering the wholeperiod that John Kerry was there. I operated in every river, in every canal,andevery off-shore patrol area in the 4th Corps area, from Cambodia all theway around to the Bo De River. I never saw, even heard of all of theseso-called atrocities and things that we were supposed to have done.This is not true. We're not standing for it. We want to set the recordstraight." -- William Shumadine.
"In 1971, when John Kerry spoke out to America, labeling all Vietnamveterans as thugs and murderers, I was shocked and almost brought to myknees, because even though I had served at the same time and same unit, Ihadnever witnessed or participated in any of the events that the Senator hadaccusedus of. I strongly believe that the statements made by the Senator were notonlyfalse and inaccurate, but extremely harmful to the United States' efforts inSoutheast Asia and the rest of the world. Tragically, some veterans,scorned by the antiwar movement and their allies, retreated to a life ofdespair andsuicide. Two of my crewmates were among them. For that there is noforgiveness. "-- Richard O'Meara .
"My name is Steve Gardner. I served in 1966 and 1967 on my first tour ofduty in Vietnam on Swift boats, and I did my second tour in '68 and '69,involved with John Kerry in the last 2 1/2 months of my tour. The John Kerrythat Iknow is not the John Kerry that everybody else is portraying. I servedalongside him and behind him, five feet away from him in a gun tub, andwatched as hemade indecisive moves with our boat, put our boats in jeopardy, put ourcrews in jeopardy... if a man like that can't handle that 6-man crew boat,howcan you expect him to be our Commander-in-Chief?"-- Steven Gardner.
"I served in Vietnam as a boat officer from June of 1968 to July of 1969.My service was three months in Coastal Division 13 out of Cat Lo, and ninemonths with Coastal Division 11 based in An Thoi. John Kerry was in An Thoithe same time I was. I'm here today to express the anger I have harbored forover 33 years, about being accused with my fellow shipmates of waratrocities.All I can say is when I leave here today, I'm going down to the Wall totell my two crew members it's not true, and that they and the other 49Swifteeswho are on the Wall were then and are still now the best."-- Robert Brant.
"I never saw, heard of, or participated in any Swift boat crews killingcattle, poisoning crops, or raping and killing civilians as charged by JohnKerry, both in his book and in public statements. Since we both operated atthesame time, in the same general area, and on the same missions under the samecommanders, it is hard to believe his claims of atrocities and poorplanning of Sea Lord missions.I signed this letter because I feel that he used Swift boat sailors toproclaim his antiwar statements after the war, and now he uses the sameSwift boat sailors to support his claims of being a war hero. He cannot haveit bothways, and we are here to ask for full disclosure of the proof of hisclaims."-- James Steffes
Sunday, August 01, 2004
Can He Float Your Boat?
The New York TimesAugust 1, 2004 OP-ED COLUMNIST Can He Float Your Boat?
By MAUREEN DOWDBOSTON
So here's the race: the Skipper takes on the Sheriff.(And, of course, the undercard in the fight: Bambi meets Godzilla.)Talk about drowning in metaphor.At least Teresa Heinz Kerry kept her subliminal message simple: She wore a ketchup-red suit to introduce the second senator in her life.Her husband, as usual, went overboard. The Democratic convention, which was focus-group-dial-a- metered to death, needed a dose of dramamine. It was awash in allusions about Commander Kerry steering the ship of state - from the curved design of the metal and wood-paneled lectern, meant to evoke a ship's bridge; to the Massachusetts senator's arrival in Boston Harbor on the prow of a ferry, making like Washington crossing the Delaware; to the dramatic Vietnam Swift boat scenes in the biographical film; to Jim Rassman's iconic story of being saved when Lieutenant Kerry reached down and pulled him from the water over the bow, to the nominee's hokey salute and "reporting for duty."Like the picture of Bill Clinton pumping J.F.K.'s hand at Boys Nation, there is a star-struck teenage Galahad picture of John Kerry with his idol on a Coast Guard yawl in Newport.
The convention center halls were adorned with more than 30 blown-up pictures of John Kerry in uniform. This signaled that the Navy lieutenant, who had requested a transfer to a Swift boat because he was inspired by J.F.K. and PT-109, is gunning for the flextime Texas National Guardsman."I learned a lot about these values on that gunboat patrolling the Mekong Delta with young Americans," Senator Kerry told the Democratic delegates in his acceptance speech, adding: "We were literally all in the same boat. That is the kind of America I will lead as president - an America where we are all in the same boat."Ensign Kerry, Max Cleland exhorted the crowd, is "the next captain of our ship of state."Bill Clinton got on board: "Since we're all in the same boat, we should choose a captain of our ship who is a brave, good man, who knows how to steer a vessel through troubled waters to the calm seas and the clear skies of our more perfect union."
John Edwards was a synchronized swimmer in the Kerry ocean of love: "In the heat of battle, they saw him decide in an instant to turn his boat around, drive it straight through an enemy position, and chase down the enemy to save his crew. Decisive. Strong. Aren't these the traits you want in a commander in chief?"Even Alexandra Kerry echoed the aquatic heroic theme, telling of how her dad saved the family's pet hamster, Licorice, who was bubbling "down to a watery doom," after falling off a dock. He "hunched over the soggy hamster and began to administer C.P.R.," she said, denying rumors of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
The Kerry campaign even tried to spin Teresa Kerry's "shove it" in a more nautical vein, claiming that the chatelaine of the Nantucket manse had meant to say, "shove off."
Mr. Kerry had to go the skipper route since W. had already laid claim to the West, making the cocky cowboy sheriff his motif, the dusty gorge at his Crawford ranch his milieu, and the Louis L'Amour "smoke 'em out" language his argot.It doesn't seem to matter to his fans that he often doesn't come through on his gunslinging taunts; they feel reassured simply by the "High Noon" patois.Mr. Bush's prized possession is Saddam's old pistol. He keeps it in the study off the Oval Office as a trophy of their desert duel in the sun.
At the White House press briefing on Friday, a reporter asked Scott McClellan: "But does the president have to present himself as not quite the, you know, kind of, trigger happy, tough, shoot him from the hip cowboy, and sort of fill out that image a little more?"Mr. McClellan replied that the president was leading in a - yup, you guessed it - "strong and decisive" way.Given that the Kerry convention featured a skipper brave and sure, a first mate who makes others comfortable, a millionaire called "Lovey" by her spouse, two pretty young Kerry castaways and a movie star (the ubiquitously annoying Ben Affleck), I suppose we should be grateful that Camp Kerry didn't introduce the nominee with the "Gilligan's Island" theme song.Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip
By MAUREEN DOWDBOSTON
So here's the race: the Skipper takes on the Sheriff.(And, of course, the undercard in the fight: Bambi meets Godzilla.)Talk about drowning in metaphor.At least Teresa Heinz Kerry kept her subliminal message simple: She wore a ketchup-red suit to introduce the second senator in her life.Her husband, as usual, went overboard. The Democratic convention, which was focus-group-dial-a- metered to death, needed a dose of dramamine. It was awash in allusions about Commander Kerry steering the ship of state - from the curved design of the metal and wood-paneled lectern, meant to evoke a ship's bridge; to the Massachusetts senator's arrival in Boston Harbor on the prow of a ferry, making like Washington crossing the Delaware; to the dramatic Vietnam Swift boat scenes in the biographical film; to Jim Rassman's iconic story of being saved when Lieutenant Kerry reached down and pulled him from the water over the bow, to the nominee's hokey salute and "reporting for duty."Like the picture of Bill Clinton pumping J.F.K.'s hand at Boys Nation, there is a star-struck teenage Galahad picture of John Kerry with his idol on a Coast Guard yawl in Newport.
The convention center halls were adorned with more than 30 blown-up pictures of John Kerry in uniform. This signaled that the Navy lieutenant, who had requested a transfer to a Swift boat because he was inspired by J.F.K. and PT-109, is gunning for the flextime Texas National Guardsman."I learned a lot about these values on that gunboat patrolling the Mekong Delta with young Americans," Senator Kerry told the Democratic delegates in his acceptance speech, adding: "We were literally all in the same boat. That is the kind of America I will lead as president - an America where we are all in the same boat."Ensign Kerry, Max Cleland exhorted the crowd, is "the next captain of our ship of state."Bill Clinton got on board: "Since we're all in the same boat, we should choose a captain of our ship who is a brave, good man, who knows how to steer a vessel through troubled waters to the calm seas and the clear skies of our more perfect union."
John Edwards was a synchronized swimmer in the Kerry ocean of love: "In the heat of battle, they saw him decide in an instant to turn his boat around, drive it straight through an enemy position, and chase down the enemy to save his crew. Decisive. Strong. Aren't these the traits you want in a commander in chief?"Even Alexandra Kerry echoed the aquatic heroic theme, telling of how her dad saved the family's pet hamster, Licorice, who was bubbling "down to a watery doom," after falling off a dock. He "hunched over the soggy hamster and began to administer C.P.R.," she said, denying rumors of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
The Kerry campaign even tried to spin Teresa Kerry's "shove it" in a more nautical vein, claiming that the chatelaine of the Nantucket manse had meant to say, "shove off."
Mr. Kerry had to go the skipper route since W. had already laid claim to the West, making the cocky cowboy sheriff his motif, the dusty gorge at his Crawford ranch his milieu, and the Louis L'Amour "smoke 'em out" language his argot.It doesn't seem to matter to his fans that he often doesn't come through on his gunslinging taunts; they feel reassured simply by the "High Noon" patois.Mr. Bush's prized possession is Saddam's old pistol. He keeps it in the study off the Oval Office as a trophy of their desert duel in the sun.
At the White House press briefing on Friday, a reporter asked Scott McClellan: "But does the president have to present himself as not quite the, you know, kind of, trigger happy, tough, shoot him from the hip cowboy, and sort of fill out that image a little more?"Mr. McClellan replied that the president was leading in a - yup, you guessed it - "strong and decisive" way.Given that the Kerry convention featured a skipper brave and sure, a first mate who makes others comfortable, a millionaire called "Lovey" by her spouse, two pretty young Kerry castaways and a movie star (the ubiquitously annoying Ben Affleck), I suppose we should be grateful that Camp Kerry didn't introduce the nominee with the "Gilligan's Island" theme song.Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip
Saturday, July 31, 2004
Washington Post: Learning From 9/11
Dear friends:
Our President has indicated that he will enact some of the 9/11 commission's recommendations within a short time, and that he will carefully study the long and short term ramifications of the entire report.
John Kerry stated unequivocally during his speech in Boston, that he would enact all of the recommendations immediately if he were President, and will enforce all of the changes if elected.
Following are 8 critical reviews and perspectives on the recommendations. Clearly there is not unanimity within the intelligence community and Senate. Nor have we as a nation had time to consider the efficacies of the individual recommendations and the costs associated with their implementation.
I believe that this issue is the most salient of the considerations on the agenda for voters as we approach November. Without a secure homeland; jobs, the economy, taxes and immigration won't matter. Radical, fundamentalist, extremists are looking for their place within our society, just as cancer looks for a host environment within healthy body tissue. Once in, the steady and menacing process of destruction commences. Unless the cancer is placed in check, completely destroyed or cut from the body, the outcome is destined to be grim.
We need to understand the cancer targeting our homeland, and with a united voice launch an unforgettable defense. Our ability to accomplish that rests within our knowledge of the subject.
You will certainly not agree with all of the reviews that follow, they are sent to you for your information and consideration as you begin to formulate your own opinions on the subject.
Thank you for your support. Please share this information with your address books.
Sincerely,
Susan Moses
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Washingtonpost.comLearning From 9/11Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B01
Would a cabinet-level director for coordinating the nation's sprawling intelligence apparatus make America any safer?As the Senate began scrutiny last week of the 9/11 commission's central recommendation, Outlook sought answers from seven former guardians of national security: William S. Cohen, John Deutsch, Robert C. MacFarland, Phyllis Oakely, William E. Odom, and John J. Devine, Stansfield Turner. The Post's culture critic, Philip Kennicott, assesses the unusual novelistic style of the commission's official report.© 2004 The Washington Post Company----------------
--------------------- William S. Cohen-----------
washingtonpost.com
William S. CohenSunday, August 1, 2004; Page B04
The purpose behind creating a national intelligence director (NID) to coordinate all of our intelligence agencies is to reduce or remove the structural "stovepipes" that impede the flow of vital intelligence within and between agencies. The 9/11 commission was right to give this need a high priority -- and it was also right to identify the need for agencies to put greater emphasis on sharing intelligence rather than shielding it.This does not mean, however, that the need to protect sources and methods of intelligence collection will be any less important. Establishing a "joint staff," like the one that currently exists in the Department of Defense, could help meet the twin needs of disseminating and protecting intelligence. Such a staff would also be valuable in planning counterterrorist activities involving multiple participants.Creating an effective joint staff will be no easy task. Traditions and old habits die hard. It took more than four decades for our military services to conclude that serving on the joint staff was a positive contribution to national security and not a career-ending assignment.One of my principal concerns about the commission's recommendations is making sure that the NID office, however it is structured, is prohibited from having any advocacy role on operational matters. This is essential if we want to reassure the public that intelligence, which from pressure or favoritism. Those charged with collecting, collating and distilling intelligence should not indulge in policy debates. Past examples should remind us of the danger and folly of allowing this.Here, Congress must be vigorous in the exercise of its oversight responsibilities. And as Congress examines deficiencies within the executive branch, it should give equal weight to the need to reform its own budgetary and oversight processes.In order to mitigate concerns over the politicization of the NID, I also suggest that the director have a fixed term, rather than be subject to the political fortunes of any given president. The measure of success for an intelligence chief should not rest on a personal bond with the president. The relationship between the two should always be cordial, but above all else, it should be professional.If we are serious about real reform, we have to contemplate both the intended and unintended consequences of any changes that are made. Arguably, for instance, creating the NID could add just one more layer of bureaucracy over existing processes. But virtually every reorganization of an institution aimed at improving efficiency and decision-making will eventually reveal weaknesses or produce dislocations that will, in turn, need to be reengineered.The need for thoughtful examination of the commission's recommendations should not be used as an excuse to delay action. The urgency of the commission's findings require us to make haste, but wisely. We cannot afford to temporize in dealing with the threat of terrorism. Whether the commission's recommendations are adopted in whole or in part, it is important that we recognize that old ways have to yield to new demands if we hope to win the long struggle against an implacable, ideological enemy.William S. Cohen, secretary of defense from 1997 to 2001, is chairman and CEO of the Cohen Group.© 2004
The Washington Post Company--------------------John Deutsch----------
washingtonpost.com John Deutsch Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B04
The Sept. 11 commission report presents a compelling case for greater centralization of U.S. intelligence activities, but its recommendations fall short of achieving that goal.Establishing a cabinet-level position -- a national intelligence director (NID) -- is no substitute for properly aligning authority with responsibility. And the commission, while calling for one person to manage national intelligence, does not insist on giving that person enough authority to carry out that responsibility.Under the commission's proposals, the director would lack authority over the budgets of most of the Defense Department's intelligence programs -- Joint Military Intelligence Program (JMIP) and Tactical Intelligence and Related Activities (TIARA) -- as well as the FBI's national security activities. What's more, it remains unclear to whom the director of the National Security Agency (NSA) or the chiefs of other intelligence agencies would report. Requiring the NID to function through three "double-hatted" deputies -- who would simultaneously be running their own agencies -- would sharply limit his executive authority. The national intelligence director could become no more relevant than the drug "czar."The 9/11 commission report cites an interesting, though imperfect, model for centralizing the intelligence community: the Department of Defense military command structure established in 1986. Authority was centralized in the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, as opposed to the different services, making it easier to carry out joint military operations. In the Pentagon, both the unified military command and the supporting military services fall under the executive authority of the secretary of Defense. This is not true of the proposed intelligence community organization, whose member agencies would also be reporting to other Cabinet members. Moreover, the proposal for a civilian-led unified joint command for counterterrorism works better for counterterrorism than for managing intelligence regarding other security issues that may arise in the Taiwan Straits, in the Palestine-Israel conflict or on the Indian subcontinent.In searching for a more effective way to assure effective and responsible intelligence, the commission made observations about the need for stronger congressional oversight that are very pertinent. But if the subtext is to make the NID more responsive to Congress, this has a significant disadvantage -- especially if, as some members of Congress have suggested, the director serves for a fixed term. The president should have complete authority over intelligence (as he or she does for defense) and the NID would be responsible for carrying out the president's wishes.My own experience is that cabinet-level status does not make any difference to the role or influence of the director of central intelligence. Influence depends upon performance, and upon the reliance the president and the rest of the national security team places on him or her. The single most important criterion for success of a NID would be a close relationship with the president -- especially if the NID's authority is limited. The core question is how much executive authority the NID should have to accomplish the very demanding and needed functions set out by the commission.John Deutch, director of central intelligence from 1995 to 1996 and deputy secretary of defense from 1994 to 1995, is an Institute Professor at MIT.© 2004
The Washington Post Company------------------- Robert C. McFarlane------
washingtonpost.com Robert C. McFarlane Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B04
Over the past 30 years, through abuse, neglect and poor leadership, the CIA has slowly ground to a virtual halt. More broadly, the so-called intelligence "community" -- structurally dysfunctional and lacking effective oversight -- essentially failed in its analyses of the two salient threats of the late 20th century: the Soviet Union and radical Islam. The Sept. 11 commission's proposed overhaul would go far toward restoring its effectiveness.At present, the six peer agencies (CIA, DIA, NSA, INR, FBI and National Reconnaissance Office) are dominated by one -- the CIA. Since all intelligence is filtered through the CIA, this creates an inevitable bias in what is presented to the president and diminishes the prospect that sound, though differing, judgments will be heard. The goal of the commission's recommendations is to make the bureaucracy functional by removing it from the control of one of its members and relying on the new national intelligence director's staff to oversee the production of objective, integrated intelligence.I see no reason for concern that this restructuring could distance the president even further from dissenting intelligence voices. It would be far less threatening for a lone dissenter to approach the president's staff directly than to have to risk first going through a CIA filter to make his or her point.In addition, as it would be unfettered by agency loyalty and bias, the new staff could have a dramatic impact on what I call "inertial budgeting" -- the practice of funding systems and programs this year because we did it last year -- and instead could make it possible to focus resources on new priorities or to exploit new technologies in a more timely way.The military's unified command structure, which has proven so effective in bringing the four uniformed services into a cooperative working relationship, is a sound model for the new director's office. A superior NID staff could be created by careful recruiting of experienced professionals from within and outside government. And giving staff members separate career status would insulate them against special pleading from their former "parent" agency.Giving the new director a fixed term that overlaps administrations, as suggested by some in Congress, is the right way to go to avoid the post's becoming politicized. The challenge lies in selecting a nonpartisan, experienced individual, but there's a solid cohort of candidates to choose from, including such professionals as John Lehman, 9/11 commission member and former Navy secretary; Marine Gen. Jim Jones, NATO's top military commander; retired Adm. Dennis Blair, former commander of all U.S. forces in the Pacific; Jim Woolsey, former director of central intelligence; and former ambassador David Miller, to name a few.Do I think that this arrangement risks placing more power over intelligence gathering in the national intelligence director's hands than in the president's? No. Clearly, the director would receive tasking from -- and be accountable to -- the president.Robert C. McFarlane, national security adviser to President Ronald Reagan from 1983 to 1985, now chairs an energy development firm in Washington.© 2004
The Washington Post Company------------------Phyllis Oakely-------
washingtonpost.com Phyllis Oakley Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B05
You can't talk about a national intelligence director, or intelligence czar, without understanding the structure beneath such a job or where the money for intelligence goes. In my experience in government, people pay attention only to people who control resources with real, not nominal, authority.Our national intelligence structure was set up to be competitive -- to encourage independent analysis from different agencies in hopes such competition produces better judgments about how to act on the intelligence we have. So, for example, the work of the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) would compete with the CIA's or Defense Intelligence Agency's.Professionals from each agency would note differences in analysis and, by investigating and resolving them, come to a better understanding. When they are not worked out, differences must be highlighted and explained, all the way to the very top, and not papered over. With an intelligence czar and a unified intelligence center, the system would lose the competitiveness that's been an important element of its successes until now.Not everything about the present situation is bad. On the question of whether Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, INR did better than everyone else. It's just that no one listened. It seems to me that whatever structure is set up, the principle of competitive analysis, as well as a system in which people can argue and disagree, needs to be preserved. And those people need to be heard by the national security adviser or the president.The relationship between an intelligence czar and a president needs to be a personal one. Look at President Bill Clinton's first CIA director, James Woolsey. He never saw Clinton, which made it difficult for intelligence to inform policy.It may seem paradoxical, but the only thing we need as much as competitiveness among agencies is coordination, especially if we go along with the commission plan to maintain separate agencies. The 9/11 commission's report made it clear that coordination was strikingly lacking three years ago, and that was at the root of our intelligence failure. For example: Before Sept. 11, 2001, the CIA had information about some of the hijackers, but they weren't on the Immigration and Naturalization Service watch list for visas.Having a joint coordination center might have helped, but having an overarching czar wouldn't have solved that problem. If the national intelligence director is a member of the Cabinet and has all sorts of other responsibilities, he's not going to have time to run the center. Moreover, the real coordination isn't going to come from the top -- it has to be encouraged at a lower level, among analysts.All these things need to be thought about -- and urgently. But there ought to be real discussion about how any reconfigured intelligence structure would work. The thought that the president is just going to adopt all these things -- especially in an election year -- is just wacky. You have to look at the total intelligence structure before you can say yea or nay.Phyllis Oakley, former assistant secretary of state for intelligence and research, spent a quarter century in the U.S. Foreign Service.© 2004
The Washington Post Company----------------William E. Odom------
washingtonpost.com William E. Odom Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B05
No organizational design will compensate for incompetent incumbents, but some designs prevent competent incumbents from performing well. The 9/11 commission's design for a new national intelligence director (NID) is sure to accomplish the latter. There is already a layer of bureaucracy above the CIA, NSA, DIA and other intelligence agencies, and it consists of the Community Management Staff and the National Intelligence Council. It simply has not been used effectively because the director of central intelligence is double-hatted -- that is, he is both CIA director and coordinator of the nation's intelligence agencies. Creating a NID with three deputies -- for homeland security, domestic intelligence and foreign intelligence -- would make things much worse. It would assure turf battles and prevent effective budget management.Several senators have endorsed a fixed term for the NID, saying this would prevent the post from being politicized. It's a bad idea. The FBI director's term is fixed, and more often than not, this arrangement has fostered bad relations between the FBI director and the president. It would create worse ones for a NID. There is no way to depoliticize the role of the president's intelligence chief. It is a desirable aspiration, but intelligence is just as political as policymaking and military operations.The popular notion that apolitical intelligence will prevent bad policies is an illusion. Intelligence chiefs can be no more effective than their political leaders or military commanders allow them to be or demand that they be. The intelligence failures surrounding the 9/11 attacks and in Iraq are primarily political failures. Effective leaders do not tolerate inadequate intelligence performance or leave it to commissions to fix intelligence problems.The following historical anecdote may be instructive:In late 1944, as the German Wehrmacht prepared to launch its last counteroffensive at the Battle of the Bulge, several pieces of intelligence suggested it was coming. The top American generals couldn't agree on the value of the intelligence. Montgomery and his obedient intelligence officer (known as his G-2) stubbornly rejected the facts; Bradley and his G-2 remained skeptical and passive. Eisenhower and his G-2 were somewhat quicker to sense the danger but slower than Patton, whose G-2 saw it coming several weeks beforehand, prompting Patton to get his divisions ready to meet the offensive.So four commanders with essentially the same intelligence turned in different performances. Though slightly disadvantaged by being at a lower echelon than all the others, Patton was far ahead of them in his appreciation of the impending assault.In writing up this case study, Harold Deutsch, a military historian in World War II, showed how the personalities of these commanders intimidated their G-2s, discouraging them from emphasizing unpleasant findings or pursuing other lines of analysis. In his words, "Whether the commanding general was on the correct or wrong track, therefore, the G-2 was likely to be right there with him. Perhaps the fine performance of Gustave Koch [Patton's G-2] was largely due to being lucky in his boss."When we ask how to improve the intelligence community's performance, we must recognize that it cannot be much better than the performance of the policymakers and commanders who own it.William E. Odom, director of the National Security Agency from 1985 to 1988, is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.© 2004
The Washington Post Company------------------------------- John J. Devine -------
washingtonpost.com John J. Devine A Heady Is Herey Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B05
The 9/11 commission served a very useful purpose in laying out the events and circumstances surrounding this horrific terrorist attack. Unfortunately and unintentionally, its recommendations regarding the intelligence community -- and specifically the CIA -- are potentially destructive.Because of the deep emotions about 9/11, the commission's findings are being treated as almost sacrosanct. Yet we should not allow ourselves to be stampeded into adopting these recommendations for short-term political expediency. We can't afford it. The security risks associated with dismantling the CIA are just too great, and this is the likely end result of the commission's principal recommendations.The creation of a national intelligence director (NID) and the removal of the counterterrorism mission from the CIA would leave the agency a demoralized shell. This would very likely not only lead to a major exodus of talented personnel, but to a failure to attract America's best and brightest, who are needed more than ever. This surely is not the commission's intent. The establishment of a national intelligence director and the national counterterrorism center (NCTC) would add a cumbersome bureaucracy without improving performance on the core issue -- the collection of very hard to obtain intelligence on the plans and intentions of terrorists. Without this information, all the restructuring in the world won't help. Nor would it add to the capacity to attack and destroy these groups before they attack us again. A counterterrorism center that reports to the new national intelligence director and is not under the CIA director's full control could only lead to confusion and internecine feuding. Moreover, separating operational planning and execution, as proposed in the report, would inevitably lead to unrealistic planning and lukewarm execution.There is no argument that the intelligence process should be consolidated and streamlined but this could and should be done within the existing CIA structure. Counterintuitive as it may seem in the aftermath of the commission and the Senate intelligence committee reports, the CIA needs to be strengthened. It needs a major infusion of resources and talent in order to get the job done. Just how under-resourced it has been is only now becoming clear, even to those of us who have worked in the intelligence business for most of our lives. Its overseas component alone should be several times larger than it is today. Surely, the problems that have recently been identified need to be corrected, but not this way. Why create a new position similar to the director of central intelligence (DCI)? It is redundant. Instead the DCI should be given the broad authority to direct the priorities and budgets of the other agencies in the intelligence community. Likewise, why create a NCTC when we are well along in the process of creating a multi-agency terrorism center called the Terrorist Threat Integration Center? The TTIC is the right road map for the future and should operate under the full control of the DCI.Embedded in the commission's recommendations are other very problematic suggestions, such as removing the CIA's paramilitary responsibility for covert action and transferring it to the Pentagon. This will not work. Let's ask ourselves whether the Soviets would have been driven out of Afghanistan or the Taliban toppled if we had to do this without the CIA's covert paramilitary capability. This transfer would greatly reduce the speed with which we can act and would surely lead to diplomatic, legal and political problems in the countries where we try to exercise this capability. No matter how you slice it, this activity is covert and if it is left to the Pentagon, the Defense Department would have to undergo the same Congressional oversight that the CIA does today. This is something that the Pentagon has not rushed to embrace in the past.The Sept. 11 commission also addresses the "need to share" and the "need to know" principles. While the emphasis, and rightfully so, is now on how to broaden the information sharing among all relevant government entities, we should not lose sight of the importance of protecting sources. Access to certain sensitive data must be limited to only those who need the data to get their jobs done. The cost of losing a communication system or a person who has penetrated a hard intelligence target can be incalculable in dollar, intelligence and human terms. Before broadening the information flow, we must weigh this risk.It is also worth remembering where the staff would come from to support the new national intelligence director. It would come from the CIA and other intelligence agencies, further reducing their workforces. In addition, whole new staffs would have to be created in all the agencies to respond to the NID and to provide the necessary tailored data. The amount of unnecessary bureaucratic paperwork and oversight should not be underestimated. After all, the NID would not produce any intelligence. His or her office would only be a consumer.The politicization of information threatens to corrupt policy choices and violates intelligence tradecraft. The CIA's value rests on the integrity of its reporting. Resisting all forms of politicization is central to effective analysis and collection. It is a question of the agency's culture, not its structure. Historically this resistance has engendered problems between the president and the DCI -- as it should. It is the job of the agency to provide the president with impartial intelligence so that he can make policy decisions for our country.John J. Devine, former CIA associate director of operations, spent 32 years with the agency. He served as both acting and associate director of operations from 1993 to 1995. Earlier, he headed the agency's counter-narcotics center and its Afghan task force during the Soviet war in Afghanistan.© 2004
The Washington Post Company------------- Stansfield Turner --------
From the Top . . .Stansfield Turner Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B01
The 9/11 commission's recommendations don't create a new intelligence structure. Mostly, they repackage what we have now. For instance, the recommended position of national intelligence director (NDI) already exists. It is the director of Central Intelligence (DCI) created by the National Security Act of 1947, with responsibility for coordinating the nation's 15 intelligence agencies. The DCI today has a staff just for this coordinating function. We don't need a new layer of bureaucracy. What we do need is a review of what authority a coordinator of intelligence should have, whether we call him or her an NID or a DCI.The commission recommendation of separating the NID/DCI from the job of heading the CIA is a fine idea. The two jobs are more than one person should try to handle. And there is a conflict of interest in running one of the agencies that's being coordinated.A serious problem today, which the commission addresses nicely, is that the 1947 law did not give the DCI sufficient authority to ensure adequate exchange of data among the agencies. It would take only an executive order from the president to give the DCI, or a new NID, the authority to set the standards for classifying secret intelligence materials. Today, each of the heads of the 15 agencies can create classification categories so as to exclude other agencies from their data. Some intelligence does deserve special treatment. But that should be decided by the NID/DCI, who has the national interest in view, not someone with an agency's perspective.The same presidential executive order could give the NID the authority to set the budgets for all 15 agencies, to reallocate funds and people among them, and to set priorities for both collecting and analyzing intelligence, thus implementing the intent of the 1947 law. President Jimmy Carter gave me, as his DCI, that authority. This enabled a far greater degree of coordination than we have today.Should a new NID be given a fixed term -- not to coincide with the president's -- to help insulate him or her from political pressures to twist the intelligence? Absolutely not. Why? First, because one responsibility of the chief of intelligence is to be intelligence adviser to the president. A harmonious working relationship between the two is essential. In the past, a number of DCIs have resigned and a number of others have been fired just because of a lack of rapport with the president. Second, because the NID/DCI's authority derives in good measure from the support he or she receives from the president, especially vis-Ã -vis the more powerful secretaries of defense and state. A close relationship with the president is a NID/DCI's lifeblood.Finally and most importantly, a fixed term is a bad idea because we shouldn't overreact to the accusation of the day -- that is, the assertion that the Bush administration may have pressured DCI George Tenet and his people to slant the intelligence on Iraq. The idea behind a fixed term is to make the NID more independent, rather than serving at the pleasure of the current president. Thirty years ago, we reacted in exactly the opposite direction, establishing congressional and executive controls to rein in powerful DCIs and prevent them from overstepping legal and ethical bounds, as they were accused of doing in the 1950s and 1960s.Let's not now reinvite this problem of the past in dealing with a problem of today. All that is needed is to select as NIDs people who will stand up to improper pressures. We also have two congressional committees on intelligence whose job it should be to blow whistles at the slightest sign that the intelligence process is being politicized.Stansfield Turner, director of central intelligence from 1977 to 1981, is on the faculty of the School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland.© 2004
The Washington Post Company--A Novel Approach----------washingtonpost.com
A Novel ApproachBy Philip KennicottSunday, August 1, 2004; Page B01
In March 1966, after the California Governor's Commission on the Los Angeles Riots released its report, the critic Elizabeth Hardwick wrote a short, despairing essay called "After Watts." She called the whole examination an empty exercise, a ritual of little purpose or consequence. "They investigate, they study, they interview, and at last, they recommend," she wrote. "Society is calmed, and not so much by what is found in the study as by the display of official energy."In writing yet another report, about yet another tragedy and yet more failures of governance, the authors of the 9/11 Commission Report have made a vigorous effort to leave the public anything but calm. And far from retiring after a palliative display of "official energy," the 10 bipartisan commissioners have expressed their determination to be heard beyond the Beltway and, if asked, to continue work past the scheduled date for their dissolution on Aug. 26. They have written a report that upends the usual expectations -- about language, rhetoric and purpose -- of blue-ribbon prose.The report's sentences are lean and simple, all the more so as the anonymous authors approach pivotal moments of decision, failure or tragedy. The tone is restrained. A carefully chosen adjective here or there gives color, but there is nothing baroque. The dominant tone is wise and sad, not angry. Rhetorically, the knowing shake of the head trumps the angry clench of the fist. If reviewers blurbed this book, the key word they'd use would be "unflinching."This writing style is essentially that of America's busy industry of personal confessional. It is the tone of the trauma memoirist, the daughter writing about Daddy's alcoholism, the husband about the car accident that killed his children and left him in a wheelchair, the survivor about incest or abuse hidden under a cloak of shame and secrecy. It is the ultra-spare, purposely unemotional -- yet quietly seething -- language of American pain. The style is a cliché now, at least among memoirists. But adapted for a government document, a 567-page litany of American political and security failure, it works with bracing power. The 9/11 Commission Report is a collective memoir, and the language of memoir has exorcised the cant from its pages."Tuesday, September 11, 2001, dawned temperate and nearly cloudless in the eastern United States," begins the report. "Millions of men and women readied themselves for work."With those words, the report's authors invoke collective memory -- who can't remember the azure depth of that perfectly clear sky three years ago? -- and put all of America ("millions of men and women") front and center in the drama. Official boards of inquiry love details, lots of dry details; but these details capture a mood, a sense of calm vulnerability. The 1912 Senate committee report on the sinking of the Titanic began by recording who owned the boat; the 1942 presidential commission report on the Pearl Harbor bombing opened with the dry particulars of the attack and then told its readers, "The Territory of Hawaii comprises the group of islands known as the Hawaiian Islands." The 9/11 Commission Report begins like an idyll, with perhaps the exact words that many of us, were we writing our own memories of the day, would choose. And it continues for hundreds of pages to be "compulsively readable," as reviewers say of books that surprise them by being more interesting than they had expected.Listen to the language as the authors build their case about security failures: "In sum, the domestic agencies never mobilized in response to the threat. They did not have direction and did not have a plan to institute. The borders were not hardened. Transportation systems were not fortified. Electronic surveillance was not targeted against a domestic threat. State and local law enforcement were not marshaled to augment the FBI's efforts. The public was not warned."This is not just a list of mistakes. It is an insistent repetition of a basic sentence structure, driving home the word "not" until the reader can only wince when it is used for the last time: "The public was not warned." The language could be simpler, but not by much, which is remarkable in a government document written by committee."Imagination is not a gift usually associated with bureaucracies," says the report, in a passage devoted to the government's inability to foresee the scope and fury of the attack. Clear writing is not a gift one associates with bureaucracies either, which suggests that an extraordinary effort has been made to gain a wide, popular audience for this document. All indications are that the authors have been successful. The book came out in paperback with a better than bland cover that shows well on the tables and in the windows of bookstores. Sales are brisk. It has hit No. 1 on the Amazon.com sales rank. In New York, the Daily News ran on its July 23 cover a picture of the book in a lurid red box with the words "Act Now!" in huge type. Thus, the book has status as a visual icon as well; simply hold the book and point toward Washington and that, in itself, is argument against government torpor.In her essay on the Watts report, Hardwick lamented the way language created distance, and how this distance reflected the divide between black and white America. The 9/11 report seems determined to remain open, and transparent. There is little of the defensive, closing-off of inquiry that one finds in the inert language of the Pearl Harbor commission ("it is not within our province," "it [can] have no direct bearing on the execution of the mandate appointing this commission," "we have made no detailed findings on the subject . . ."). And the structure of the report, alternating moment-by-moment narrative with chapters on history and background, reflects a desire to keep things open, and moving, as well.Chapter 1, "We Have Some Planes," recounts the events of Sept. 11, 2001, but ends with a fax, from 1998, in which Osama bin Laden declares war on the United States. It leaves the reader hanging by introducing the villain, and noting the first of many missed and ominous signals: "The fax had been sent from thousands of miles away by the followers of a Saudi exile gathered in one of the most remote and impoverished countries on earth." Chapter 7, "The Attack Looms," ends on Sept. 10: "Now 19 men waited in nondescript hotel rooms to board four flights the next morning."Ending a chapter with a dramatic ellipsis is a technique that belongs as much to pulp fiction as to any other form, including memoir. But again and again the language in this report returns to the memoirist's tone of tempered sadness. "Faced with insufferable heat, smoke, and fire, and with no prospect for relief, some jumped or fell from the building," reads a passage in Chapter 9. This sentence pains us not just because the events it describes are painful. It follows a logical emotional progression: insufferable pain, no hope, then death. That moment, when people hurled their bodies off the World Trade Center, into the void, is perhaps the most horrifying and haunting image of that horrifying day. When they come to one of the most dreaded moments in this story, the authors choose simplicity, a single sentence that condenses all the essential facts and balances them with transparent syntax.Government-appointed panels concern themselves almost exclusively with facts, responsibility and recommendations. Memoirists are primarily concerned with recollection and the problems of memory. And yet, in the middle of this endless parade of facts are sentences that remind one more of a solitary writer pondering the problem of how a single moment can forever alter our ability to see the past as once we saw it. "Hindsight can sometimes see the past clearly -- with 20/20 vision," the authors write. "But the path of what happened is so brightly lit that it places everything else more deeply into shadow."This is not limpid prose, and it's intriguing that, when the report comes to the issue of blame, its language loses its simplicity and heads toward metaphor, and not a particularly clear one either. But it is a small lapse. Consider this sentence, from a different report, which struggles to express a similar thought about blame and hindsight: "He made a mistake, a very grievous mistake, but one in which, in face of the practice and of past experience, negligence cannot be said to have had any part; and in the absence of negligence it is, in my opinion, impossible to fix Captain Smith with blame." Thus the British investigation into the Titanic sinking absolved the boat's captain of responsibility for having steered the ship into iceberg-infested waters.The remarkable thing about the 9/11 Commission Report is how little of this nervous, grammatical obfuscation it contains. Someone, in the crafting of this long tome, seems aware of the danger of language that hides, rather than reveals. The hijackers, we learn, developed codes to speak openly of their plans. "They discussed targets in coded language, pretending to be students discussing various fields of study: 'architecture' referred to the World Trade Center, 'arts' the Pentagon, 'law' the Capitol, and 'politics' the White House." And when referring to the date, they "used a riddle" -- 9/11, or 11/9 in the form the rest of the world uses, was called "two branches, a slash and a lollipop."Compare that with the report's demand that Americans, and their leaders, be precise in thinking and in terminology. Words laden with fear -- words that can be misused to manipulate fear -- don't clarify. "But the enemy is not just 'terrorism,' some generic evil," they write. "This vagueness blurs the strategy." Don't conflate categories, don't mix categories. "Islam is not the enemy. It is not synonymous with terror." Again, those short, spare sentences.Memoirs of tragic events, if well written, both recall the past and put the past behind the author. The writer must prove him or herself changed, in some way. A memoir that shows the author still caught in cycles of recrimination and pain is a memoir probably best left in the author's desk drawer. The authors of the 9/11 Commission Report seem aware of that too, but they don't have the luxury of documenting change or growth in our national security policies. In that sense, it is half a memoir. The rest is left to us
Author's e-mail:kennicottp@washpost.com
Philip Kennicott is The Post's culture critic.
© 2004 The Washington Post Company
Our President has indicated that he will enact some of the 9/11 commission's recommendations within a short time, and that he will carefully study the long and short term ramifications of the entire report.
John Kerry stated unequivocally during his speech in Boston, that he would enact all of the recommendations immediately if he were President, and will enforce all of the changes if elected.
Following are 8 critical reviews and perspectives on the recommendations. Clearly there is not unanimity within the intelligence community and Senate. Nor have we as a nation had time to consider the efficacies of the individual recommendations and the costs associated with their implementation.
I believe that this issue is the most salient of the considerations on the agenda for voters as we approach November. Without a secure homeland; jobs, the economy, taxes and immigration won't matter. Radical, fundamentalist, extremists are looking for their place within our society, just as cancer looks for a host environment within healthy body tissue. Once in, the steady and menacing process of destruction commences. Unless the cancer is placed in check, completely destroyed or cut from the body, the outcome is destined to be grim.
We need to understand the cancer targeting our homeland, and with a united voice launch an unforgettable defense. Our ability to accomplish that rests within our knowledge of the subject.
You will certainly not agree with all of the reviews that follow, they are sent to you for your information and consideration as you begin to formulate your own opinions on the subject.
Thank you for your support. Please share this information with your address books.
Sincerely,
Susan Moses
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Washingtonpost.comLearning From 9/11Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B01
Would a cabinet-level director for coordinating the nation's sprawling intelligence apparatus make America any safer?As the Senate began scrutiny last week of the 9/11 commission's central recommendation, Outlook sought answers from seven former guardians of national security: William S. Cohen, John Deutsch, Robert C. MacFarland, Phyllis Oakely, William E. Odom, and John J. Devine, Stansfield Turner. The Post's culture critic, Philip Kennicott, assesses the unusual novelistic style of the commission's official report.© 2004 The Washington Post Company----------------
--------------------- William S. Cohen-----------
washingtonpost.com
William S. CohenSunday, August 1, 2004; Page B04
The purpose behind creating a national intelligence director (NID) to coordinate all of our intelligence agencies is to reduce or remove the structural "stovepipes" that impede the flow of vital intelligence within and between agencies. The 9/11 commission was right to give this need a high priority -- and it was also right to identify the need for agencies to put greater emphasis on sharing intelligence rather than shielding it.This does not mean, however, that the need to protect sources and methods of intelligence collection will be any less important. Establishing a "joint staff," like the one that currently exists in the Department of Defense, could help meet the twin needs of disseminating and protecting intelligence. Such a staff would also be valuable in planning counterterrorist activities involving multiple participants.Creating an effective joint staff will be no easy task. Traditions and old habits die hard. It took more than four decades for our military services to conclude that serving on the joint staff was a positive contribution to national security and not a career-ending assignment.One of my principal concerns about the commission's recommendations is making sure that the NID office, however it is structured, is prohibited from having any advocacy role on operational matters. This is essential if we want to reassure the public that intelligence, which from pressure or favoritism. Those charged with collecting, collating and distilling intelligence should not indulge in policy debates. Past examples should remind us of the danger and folly of allowing this.Here, Congress must be vigorous in the exercise of its oversight responsibilities. And as Congress examines deficiencies within the executive branch, it should give equal weight to the need to reform its own budgetary and oversight processes.In order to mitigate concerns over the politicization of the NID, I also suggest that the director have a fixed term, rather than be subject to the political fortunes of any given president. The measure of success for an intelligence chief should not rest on a personal bond with the president. The relationship between the two should always be cordial, but above all else, it should be professional.If we are serious about real reform, we have to contemplate both the intended and unintended consequences of any changes that are made. Arguably, for instance, creating the NID could add just one more layer of bureaucracy over existing processes. But virtually every reorganization of an institution aimed at improving efficiency and decision-making will eventually reveal weaknesses or produce dislocations that will, in turn, need to be reengineered.The need for thoughtful examination of the commission's recommendations should not be used as an excuse to delay action. The urgency of the commission's findings require us to make haste, but wisely. We cannot afford to temporize in dealing with the threat of terrorism. Whether the commission's recommendations are adopted in whole or in part, it is important that we recognize that old ways have to yield to new demands if we hope to win the long struggle against an implacable, ideological enemy.William S. Cohen, secretary of defense from 1997 to 2001, is chairman and CEO of the Cohen Group.© 2004
The Washington Post Company--------------------John Deutsch----------
washingtonpost.com John Deutsch Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B04
The Sept. 11 commission report presents a compelling case for greater centralization of U.S. intelligence activities, but its recommendations fall short of achieving that goal.Establishing a cabinet-level position -- a national intelligence director (NID) -- is no substitute for properly aligning authority with responsibility. And the commission, while calling for one person to manage national intelligence, does not insist on giving that person enough authority to carry out that responsibility.Under the commission's proposals, the director would lack authority over the budgets of most of the Defense Department's intelligence programs -- Joint Military Intelligence Program (JMIP) and Tactical Intelligence and Related Activities (TIARA) -- as well as the FBI's national security activities. What's more, it remains unclear to whom the director of the National Security Agency (NSA) or the chiefs of other intelligence agencies would report. Requiring the NID to function through three "double-hatted" deputies -- who would simultaneously be running their own agencies -- would sharply limit his executive authority. The national intelligence director could become no more relevant than the drug "czar."The 9/11 commission report cites an interesting, though imperfect, model for centralizing the intelligence community: the Department of Defense military command structure established in 1986. Authority was centralized in the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, as opposed to the different services, making it easier to carry out joint military operations. In the Pentagon, both the unified military command and the supporting military services fall under the executive authority of the secretary of Defense. This is not true of the proposed intelligence community organization, whose member agencies would also be reporting to other Cabinet members. Moreover, the proposal for a civilian-led unified joint command for counterterrorism works better for counterterrorism than for managing intelligence regarding other security issues that may arise in the Taiwan Straits, in the Palestine-Israel conflict or on the Indian subcontinent.In searching for a more effective way to assure effective and responsible intelligence, the commission made observations about the need for stronger congressional oversight that are very pertinent. But if the subtext is to make the NID more responsive to Congress, this has a significant disadvantage -- especially if, as some members of Congress have suggested, the director serves for a fixed term. The president should have complete authority over intelligence (as he or she does for defense) and the NID would be responsible for carrying out the president's wishes.My own experience is that cabinet-level status does not make any difference to the role or influence of the director of central intelligence. Influence depends upon performance, and upon the reliance the president and the rest of the national security team places on him or her. The single most important criterion for success of a NID would be a close relationship with the president -- especially if the NID's authority is limited. The core question is how much executive authority the NID should have to accomplish the very demanding and needed functions set out by the commission.John Deutch, director of central intelligence from 1995 to 1996 and deputy secretary of defense from 1994 to 1995, is an Institute Professor at MIT.© 2004
The Washington Post Company------------------- Robert C. McFarlane------
washingtonpost.com Robert C. McFarlane Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B04
Over the past 30 years, through abuse, neglect and poor leadership, the CIA has slowly ground to a virtual halt. More broadly, the so-called intelligence "community" -- structurally dysfunctional and lacking effective oversight -- essentially failed in its analyses of the two salient threats of the late 20th century: the Soviet Union and radical Islam. The Sept. 11 commission's proposed overhaul would go far toward restoring its effectiveness.At present, the six peer agencies (CIA, DIA, NSA, INR, FBI and National Reconnaissance Office) are dominated by one -- the CIA. Since all intelligence is filtered through the CIA, this creates an inevitable bias in what is presented to the president and diminishes the prospect that sound, though differing, judgments will be heard. The goal of the commission's recommendations is to make the bureaucracy functional by removing it from the control of one of its members and relying on the new national intelligence director's staff to oversee the production of objective, integrated intelligence.I see no reason for concern that this restructuring could distance the president even further from dissenting intelligence voices. It would be far less threatening for a lone dissenter to approach the president's staff directly than to have to risk first going through a CIA filter to make his or her point.In addition, as it would be unfettered by agency loyalty and bias, the new staff could have a dramatic impact on what I call "inertial budgeting" -- the practice of funding systems and programs this year because we did it last year -- and instead could make it possible to focus resources on new priorities or to exploit new technologies in a more timely way.The military's unified command structure, which has proven so effective in bringing the four uniformed services into a cooperative working relationship, is a sound model for the new director's office. A superior NID staff could be created by careful recruiting of experienced professionals from within and outside government. And giving staff members separate career status would insulate them against special pleading from their former "parent" agency.Giving the new director a fixed term that overlaps administrations, as suggested by some in Congress, is the right way to go to avoid the post's becoming politicized. The challenge lies in selecting a nonpartisan, experienced individual, but there's a solid cohort of candidates to choose from, including such professionals as John Lehman, 9/11 commission member and former Navy secretary; Marine Gen. Jim Jones, NATO's top military commander; retired Adm. Dennis Blair, former commander of all U.S. forces in the Pacific; Jim Woolsey, former director of central intelligence; and former ambassador David Miller, to name a few.Do I think that this arrangement risks placing more power over intelligence gathering in the national intelligence director's hands than in the president's? No. Clearly, the director would receive tasking from -- and be accountable to -- the president.Robert C. McFarlane, national security adviser to President Ronald Reagan from 1983 to 1985, now chairs an energy development firm in Washington.© 2004
The Washington Post Company------------------Phyllis Oakely-------
washingtonpost.com Phyllis Oakley Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B05
You can't talk about a national intelligence director, or intelligence czar, without understanding the structure beneath such a job or where the money for intelligence goes. In my experience in government, people pay attention only to people who control resources with real, not nominal, authority.Our national intelligence structure was set up to be competitive -- to encourage independent analysis from different agencies in hopes such competition produces better judgments about how to act on the intelligence we have. So, for example, the work of the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) would compete with the CIA's or Defense Intelligence Agency's.Professionals from each agency would note differences in analysis and, by investigating and resolving them, come to a better understanding. When they are not worked out, differences must be highlighted and explained, all the way to the very top, and not papered over. With an intelligence czar and a unified intelligence center, the system would lose the competitiveness that's been an important element of its successes until now.Not everything about the present situation is bad. On the question of whether Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, INR did better than everyone else. It's just that no one listened. It seems to me that whatever structure is set up, the principle of competitive analysis, as well as a system in which people can argue and disagree, needs to be preserved. And those people need to be heard by the national security adviser or the president.The relationship between an intelligence czar and a president needs to be a personal one. Look at President Bill Clinton's first CIA director, James Woolsey. He never saw Clinton, which made it difficult for intelligence to inform policy.It may seem paradoxical, but the only thing we need as much as competitiveness among agencies is coordination, especially if we go along with the commission plan to maintain separate agencies. The 9/11 commission's report made it clear that coordination was strikingly lacking three years ago, and that was at the root of our intelligence failure. For example: Before Sept. 11, 2001, the CIA had information about some of the hijackers, but they weren't on the Immigration and Naturalization Service watch list for visas.Having a joint coordination center might have helped, but having an overarching czar wouldn't have solved that problem. If the national intelligence director is a member of the Cabinet and has all sorts of other responsibilities, he's not going to have time to run the center. Moreover, the real coordination isn't going to come from the top -- it has to be encouraged at a lower level, among analysts.All these things need to be thought about -- and urgently. But there ought to be real discussion about how any reconfigured intelligence structure would work. The thought that the president is just going to adopt all these things -- especially in an election year -- is just wacky. You have to look at the total intelligence structure before you can say yea or nay.Phyllis Oakley, former assistant secretary of state for intelligence and research, spent a quarter century in the U.S. Foreign Service.© 2004
The Washington Post Company----------------William E. Odom------
washingtonpost.com William E. Odom Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B05
No organizational design will compensate for incompetent incumbents, but some designs prevent competent incumbents from performing well. The 9/11 commission's design for a new national intelligence director (NID) is sure to accomplish the latter. There is already a layer of bureaucracy above the CIA, NSA, DIA and other intelligence agencies, and it consists of the Community Management Staff and the National Intelligence Council. It simply has not been used effectively because the director of central intelligence is double-hatted -- that is, he is both CIA director and coordinator of the nation's intelligence agencies. Creating a NID with three deputies -- for homeland security, domestic intelligence and foreign intelligence -- would make things much worse. It would assure turf battles and prevent effective budget management.Several senators have endorsed a fixed term for the NID, saying this would prevent the post from being politicized. It's a bad idea. The FBI director's term is fixed, and more often than not, this arrangement has fostered bad relations between the FBI director and the president. It would create worse ones for a NID. There is no way to depoliticize the role of the president's intelligence chief. It is a desirable aspiration, but intelligence is just as political as policymaking and military operations.The popular notion that apolitical intelligence will prevent bad policies is an illusion. Intelligence chiefs can be no more effective than their political leaders or military commanders allow them to be or demand that they be. The intelligence failures surrounding the 9/11 attacks and in Iraq are primarily political failures. Effective leaders do not tolerate inadequate intelligence performance or leave it to commissions to fix intelligence problems.The following historical anecdote may be instructive:In late 1944, as the German Wehrmacht prepared to launch its last counteroffensive at the Battle of the Bulge, several pieces of intelligence suggested it was coming. The top American generals couldn't agree on the value of the intelligence. Montgomery and his obedient intelligence officer (known as his G-2) stubbornly rejected the facts; Bradley and his G-2 remained skeptical and passive. Eisenhower and his G-2 were somewhat quicker to sense the danger but slower than Patton, whose G-2 saw it coming several weeks beforehand, prompting Patton to get his divisions ready to meet the offensive.So four commanders with essentially the same intelligence turned in different performances. Though slightly disadvantaged by being at a lower echelon than all the others, Patton was far ahead of them in his appreciation of the impending assault.In writing up this case study, Harold Deutsch, a military historian in World War II, showed how the personalities of these commanders intimidated their G-2s, discouraging them from emphasizing unpleasant findings or pursuing other lines of analysis. In his words, "Whether the commanding general was on the correct or wrong track, therefore, the G-2 was likely to be right there with him. Perhaps the fine performance of Gustave Koch [Patton's G-2] was largely due to being lucky in his boss."When we ask how to improve the intelligence community's performance, we must recognize that it cannot be much better than the performance of the policymakers and commanders who own it.William E. Odom, director of the National Security Agency from 1985 to 1988, is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.© 2004
The Washington Post Company------------------------------- John J. Devine -------
washingtonpost.com John J. Devine A Heady Is Herey Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B05
The 9/11 commission served a very useful purpose in laying out the events and circumstances surrounding this horrific terrorist attack. Unfortunately and unintentionally, its recommendations regarding the intelligence community -- and specifically the CIA -- are potentially destructive.Because of the deep emotions about 9/11, the commission's findings are being treated as almost sacrosanct. Yet we should not allow ourselves to be stampeded into adopting these recommendations for short-term political expediency. We can't afford it. The security risks associated with dismantling the CIA are just too great, and this is the likely end result of the commission's principal recommendations.The creation of a national intelligence director (NID) and the removal of the counterterrorism mission from the CIA would leave the agency a demoralized shell. This would very likely not only lead to a major exodus of talented personnel, but to a failure to attract America's best and brightest, who are needed more than ever. This surely is not the commission's intent. The establishment of a national intelligence director and the national counterterrorism center (NCTC) would add a cumbersome bureaucracy without improving performance on the core issue -- the collection of very hard to obtain intelligence on the plans and intentions of terrorists. Without this information, all the restructuring in the world won't help. Nor would it add to the capacity to attack and destroy these groups before they attack us again. A counterterrorism center that reports to the new national intelligence director and is not under the CIA director's full control could only lead to confusion and internecine feuding. Moreover, separating operational planning and execution, as proposed in the report, would inevitably lead to unrealistic planning and lukewarm execution.There is no argument that the intelligence process should be consolidated and streamlined but this could and should be done within the existing CIA structure. Counterintuitive as it may seem in the aftermath of the commission and the Senate intelligence committee reports, the CIA needs to be strengthened. It needs a major infusion of resources and talent in order to get the job done. Just how under-resourced it has been is only now becoming clear, even to those of us who have worked in the intelligence business for most of our lives. Its overseas component alone should be several times larger than it is today. Surely, the problems that have recently been identified need to be corrected, but not this way. Why create a new position similar to the director of central intelligence (DCI)? It is redundant. Instead the DCI should be given the broad authority to direct the priorities and budgets of the other agencies in the intelligence community. Likewise, why create a NCTC when we are well along in the process of creating a multi-agency terrorism center called the Terrorist Threat Integration Center? The TTIC is the right road map for the future and should operate under the full control of the DCI.Embedded in the commission's recommendations are other very problematic suggestions, such as removing the CIA's paramilitary responsibility for covert action and transferring it to the Pentagon. This will not work. Let's ask ourselves whether the Soviets would have been driven out of Afghanistan or the Taliban toppled if we had to do this without the CIA's covert paramilitary capability. This transfer would greatly reduce the speed with which we can act and would surely lead to diplomatic, legal and political problems in the countries where we try to exercise this capability. No matter how you slice it, this activity is covert and if it is left to the Pentagon, the Defense Department would have to undergo the same Congressional oversight that the CIA does today. This is something that the Pentagon has not rushed to embrace in the past.The Sept. 11 commission also addresses the "need to share" and the "need to know" principles. While the emphasis, and rightfully so, is now on how to broaden the information sharing among all relevant government entities, we should not lose sight of the importance of protecting sources. Access to certain sensitive data must be limited to only those who need the data to get their jobs done. The cost of losing a communication system or a person who has penetrated a hard intelligence target can be incalculable in dollar, intelligence and human terms. Before broadening the information flow, we must weigh this risk.It is also worth remembering where the staff would come from to support the new national intelligence director. It would come from the CIA and other intelligence agencies, further reducing their workforces. In addition, whole new staffs would have to be created in all the agencies to respond to the NID and to provide the necessary tailored data. The amount of unnecessary bureaucratic paperwork and oversight should not be underestimated. After all, the NID would not produce any intelligence. His or her office would only be a consumer.The politicization of information threatens to corrupt policy choices and violates intelligence tradecraft. The CIA's value rests on the integrity of its reporting. Resisting all forms of politicization is central to effective analysis and collection. It is a question of the agency's culture, not its structure. Historically this resistance has engendered problems between the president and the DCI -- as it should. It is the job of the agency to provide the president with impartial intelligence so that he can make policy decisions for our country.John J. Devine, former CIA associate director of operations, spent 32 years with the agency. He served as both acting and associate director of operations from 1993 to 1995. Earlier, he headed the agency's counter-narcotics center and its Afghan task force during the Soviet war in Afghanistan.© 2004
The Washington Post Company------------- Stansfield Turner --------
From the Top . . .Stansfield Turner Sunday, August 1, 2004; Page B01
The 9/11 commission's recommendations don't create a new intelligence structure. Mostly, they repackage what we have now. For instance, the recommended position of national intelligence director (NDI) already exists. It is the director of Central Intelligence (DCI) created by the National Security Act of 1947, with responsibility for coordinating the nation's 15 intelligence agencies. The DCI today has a staff just for this coordinating function. We don't need a new layer of bureaucracy. What we do need is a review of what authority a coordinator of intelligence should have, whether we call him or her an NID or a DCI.The commission recommendation of separating the NID/DCI from the job of heading the CIA is a fine idea. The two jobs are more than one person should try to handle. And there is a conflict of interest in running one of the agencies that's being coordinated.A serious problem today, which the commission addresses nicely, is that the 1947 law did not give the DCI sufficient authority to ensure adequate exchange of data among the agencies. It would take only an executive order from the president to give the DCI, or a new NID, the authority to set the standards for classifying secret intelligence materials. Today, each of the heads of the 15 agencies can create classification categories so as to exclude other agencies from their data. Some intelligence does deserve special treatment. But that should be decided by the NID/DCI, who has the national interest in view, not someone with an agency's perspective.The same presidential executive order could give the NID the authority to set the budgets for all 15 agencies, to reallocate funds and people among them, and to set priorities for both collecting and analyzing intelligence, thus implementing the intent of the 1947 law. President Jimmy Carter gave me, as his DCI, that authority. This enabled a far greater degree of coordination than we have today.Should a new NID be given a fixed term -- not to coincide with the president's -- to help insulate him or her from political pressures to twist the intelligence? Absolutely not. Why? First, because one responsibility of the chief of intelligence is to be intelligence adviser to the president. A harmonious working relationship between the two is essential. In the past, a number of DCIs have resigned and a number of others have been fired just because of a lack of rapport with the president. Second, because the NID/DCI's authority derives in good measure from the support he or she receives from the president, especially vis-Ã -vis the more powerful secretaries of defense and state. A close relationship with the president is a NID/DCI's lifeblood.Finally and most importantly, a fixed term is a bad idea because we shouldn't overreact to the accusation of the day -- that is, the assertion that the Bush administration may have pressured DCI George Tenet and his people to slant the intelligence on Iraq. The idea behind a fixed term is to make the NID more independent, rather than serving at the pleasure of the current president. Thirty years ago, we reacted in exactly the opposite direction, establishing congressional and executive controls to rein in powerful DCIs and prevent them from overstepping legal and ethical bounds, as they were accused of doing in the 1950s and 1960s.Let's not now reinvite this problem of the past in dealing with a problem of today. All that is needed is to select as NIDs people who will stand up to improper pressures. We also have two congressional committees on intelligence whose job it should be to blow whistles at the slightest sign that the intelligence process is being politicized.Stansfield Turner, director of central intelligence from 1977 to 1981, is on the faculty of the School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland.© 2004
The Washington Post Company--A Novel Approach----------washingtonpost.com
A Novel ApproachBy Philip KennicottSunday, August 1, 2004; Page B01
In March 1966, after the California Governor's Commission on the Los Angeles Riots released its report, the critic Elizabeth Hardwick wrote a short, despairing essay called "After Watts." She called the whole examination an empty exercise, a ritual of little purpose or consequence. "They investigate, they study, they interview, and at last, they recommend," she wrote. "Society is calmed, and not so much by what is found in the study as by the display of official energy."In writing yet another report, about yet another tragedy and yet more failures of governance, the authors of the 9/11 Commission Report have made a vigorous effort to leave the public anything but calm. And far from retiring after a palliative display of "official energy," the 10 bipartisan commissioners have expressed their determination to be heard beyond the Beltway and, if asked, to continue work past the scheduled date for their dissolution on Aug. 26. They have written a report that upends the usual expectations -- about language, rhetoric and purpose -- of blue-ribbon prose.The report's sentences are lean and simple, all the more so as the anonymous authors approach pivotal moments of decision, failure or tragedy. The tone is restrained. A carefully chosen adjective here or there gives color, but there is nothing baroque. The dominant tone is wise and sad, not angry. Rhetorically, the knowing shake of the head trumps the angry clench of the fist. If reviewers blurbed this book, the key word they'd use would be "unflinching."This writing style is essentially that of America's busy industry of personal confessional. It is the tone of the trauma memoirist, the daughter writing about Daddy's alcoholism, the husband about the car accident that killed his children and left him in a wheelchair, the survivor about incest or abuse hidden under a cloak of shame and secrecy. It is the ultra-spare, purposely unemotional -- yet quietly seething -- language of American pain. The style is a cliché now, at least among memoirists. But adapted for a government document, a 567-page litany of American political and security failure, it works with bracing power. The 9/11 Commission Report is a collective memoir, and the language of memoir has exorcised the cant from its pages."Tuesday, September 11, 2001, dawned temperate and nearly cloudless in the eastern United States," begins the report. "Millions of men and women readied themselves for work."With those words, the report's authors invoke collective memory -- who can't remember the azure depth of that perfectly clear sky three years ago? -- and put all of America ("millions of men and women") front and center in the drama. Official boards of inquiry love details, lots of dry details; but these details capture a mood, a sense of calm vulnerability. The 1912 Senate committee report on the sinking of the Titanic began by recording who owned the boat; the 1942 presidential commission report on the Pearl Harbor bombing opened with the dry particulars of the attack and then told its readers, "The Territory of Hawaii comprises the group of islands known as the Hawaiian Islands." The 9/11 Commission Report begins like an idyll, with perhaps the exact words that many of us, were we writing our own memories of the day, would choose. And it continues for hundreds of pages to be "compulsively readable," as reviewers say of books that surprise them by being more interesting than they had expected.Listen to the language as the authors build their case about security failures: "In sum, the domestic agencies never mobilized in response to the threat. They did not have direction and did not have a plan to institute. The borders were not hardened. Transportation systems were not fortified. Electronic surveillance was not targeted against a domestic threat. State and local law enforcement were not marshaled to augment the FBI's efforts. The public was not warned."This is not just a list of mistakes. It is an insistent repetition of a basic sentence structure, driving home the word "not" until the reader can only wince when it is used for the last time: "The public was not warned." The language could be simpler, but not by much, which is remarkable in a government document written by committee."Imagination is not a gift usually associated with bureaucracies," says the report, in a passage devoted to the government's inability to foresee the scope and fury of the attack. Clear writing is not a gift one associates with bureaucracies either, which suggests that an extraordinary effort has been made to gain a wide, popular audience for this document. All indications are that the authors have been successful. The book came out in paperback with a better than bland cover that shows well on the tables and in the windows of bookstores. Sales are brisk. It has hit No. 1 on the Amazon.com sales rank. In New York, the Daily News ran on its July 23 cover a picture of the book in a lurid red box with the words "Act Now!" in huge type. Thus, the book has status as a visual icon as well; simply hold the book and point toward Washington and that, in itself, is argument against government torpor.In her essay on the Watts report, Hardwick lamented the way language created distance, and how this distance reflected the divide between black and white America. The 9/11 report seems determined to remain open, and transparent. There is little of the defensive, closing-off of inquiry that one finds in the inert language of the Pearl Harbor commission ("it is not within our province," "it [can] have no direct bearing on the execution of the mandate appointing this commission," "we have made no detailed findings on the subject . . ."). And the structure of the report, alternating moment-by-moment narrative with chapters on history and background, reflects a desire to keep things open, and moving, as well.Chapter 1, "We Have Some Planes," recounts the events of Sept. 11, 2001, but ends with a fax, from 1998, in which Osama bin Laden declares war on the United States. It leaves the reader hanging by introducing the villain, and noting the first of many missed and ominous signals: "The fax had been sent from thousands of miles away by the followers of a Saudi exile gathered in one of the most remote and impoverished countries on earth." Chapter 7, "The Attack Looms," ends on Sept. 10: "Now 19 men waited in nondescript hotel rooms to board four flights the next morning."Ending a chapter with a dramatic ellipsis is a technique that belongs as much to pulp fiction as to any other form, including memoir. But again and again the language in this report returns to the memoirist's tone of tempered sadness. "Faced with insufferable heat, smoke, and fire, and with no prospect for relief, some jumped or fell from the building," reads a passage in Chapter 9. This sentence pains us not just because the events it describes are painful. It follows a logical emotional progression: insufferable pain, no hope, then death. That moment, when people hurled their bodies off the World Trade Center, into the void, is perhaps the most horrifying and haunting image of that horrifying day. When they come to one of the most dreaded moments in this story, the authors choose simplicity, a single sentence that condenses all the essential facts and balances them with transparent syntax.Government-appointed panels concern themselves almost exclusively with facts, responsibility and recommendations. Memoirists are primarily concerned with recollection and the problems of memory. And yet, in the middle of this endless parade of facts are sentences that remind one more of a solitary writer pondering the problem of how a single moment can forever alter our ability to see the past as once we saw it. "Hindsight can sometimes see the past clearly -- with 20/20 vision," the authors write. "But the path of what happened is so brightly lit that it places everything else more deeply into shadow."This is not limpid prose, and it's intriguing that, when the report comes to the issue of blame, its language loses its simplicity and heads toward metaphor, and not a particularly clear one either. But it is a small lapse. Consider this sentence, from a different report, which struggles to express a similar thought about blame and hindsight: "He made a mistake, a very grievous mistake, but one in which, in face of the practice and of past experience, negligence cannot be said to have had any part; and in the absence of negligence it is, in my opinion, impossible to fix Captain Smith with blame." Thus the British investigation into the Titanic sinking absolved the boat's captain of responsibility for having steered the ship into iceberg-infested waters.The remarkable thing about the 9/11 Commission Report is how little of this nervous, grammatical obfuscation it contains. Someone, in the crafting of this long tome, seems aware of the danger of language that hides, rather than reveals. The hijackers, we learn, developed codes to speak openly of their plans. "They discussed targets in coded language, pretending to be students discussing various fields of study: 'architecture' referred to the World Trade Center, 'arts' the Pentagon, 'law' the Capitol, and 'politics' the White House." And when referring to the date, they "used a riddle" -- 9/11, or 11/9 in the form the rest of the world uses, was called "two branches, a slash and a lollipop."Compare that with the report's demand that Americans, and their leaders, be precise in thinking and in terminology. Words laden with fear -- words that can be misused to manipulate fear -- don't clarify. "But the enemy is not just 'terrorism,' some generic evil," they write. "This vagueness blurs the strategy." Don't conflate categories, don't mix categories. "Islam is not the enemy. It is not synonymous with terror." Again, those short, spare sentences.Memoirs of tragic events, if well written, both recall the past and put the past behind the author. The writer must prove him or herself changed, in some way. A memoir that shows the author still caught in cycles of recrimination and pain is a memoir probably best left in the author's desk drawer. The authors of the 9/11 Commission Report seem aware of that too, but they don't have the luxury of documenting change or growth in our national security policies. In that sense, it is half a memoir. The rest is left to us
Author's e-mail:kennicottp@washpost.com
Philip Kennicott is The Post's culture critic.
© 2004 The Washington Post Company
See Y'All in New York
CAMPAIGN 2004
See Y'All in New York
Why I skipped the Boston convention.
BY ZELL MILLER
Saturday, July 31, 2004 12:01 a.m.
Twelve years ago, I delivered one of the keynote addresses on the first night at the Democratic National Convention in New York. It was a stinging rebuke of the administration of George H.W. Bush and a ringing endorsement of Bill Clinton. This summer I'll again be speaking in New York, but it will be to the Republican Convention that renominates George W. Bush.
Many have asked how I could have come so far in just over a decade. Frankly, I don't think I've changed much at all. At 72, I don't feel much need to change my opinions. Instead, the reason I didn't attend the Democratic Convention in Boston is that I barely recognize my party anymore. Most of its leaders--including our nominee, John Kerry--don't hold the same beliefs that have motivated my career in public service.
In 1992, I spoke of the opportunity and hope that allowed me, the son of a single mother growing up in the North Georgia mountains, to become my state's governor. And I attributed much of my success to the great Democratic presidents of years gone by--FDR (a hallowed man in my home), Truman and JFK. The link these men shared was a commitment to helping Americans born into any condition rise to achieve whatever goal they set for themselves.
I spoke of Americans who were "tired of paying more in taxes and getting less in services." I excoriated Republicans who "dealt in cynicism and skepticism." I accused them of mastering "the art of division and diversion." And I praised Bill Clinton as a moderate Democrat "who has the courage to tell some of those liberals who think welfare should continue forever, and some of those conservatives who think there should be no welfare at all, that they're both wrong."
Bill Clinton did deliver on welfare reform, after a lot of prodding from the Republicans who took hold of Congress in 1995. But much of the rest of the promise I saw in his candidacy withered during his two terms in office.
Today, it's the Democratic Party that has mastered the art of division and diversion. To run for president as a Democrat these days you have to go from interest group to interest group, cap in hand, asking for the support of liberal kingmakers. Mr. Kerry is no different. After Hollywood elites profaned the president, he didn't have the courage to put them in their place. Instead, he validated their remarks, claiming that they represent "the heart and soul of America."
No longer the party of hope, today's Democratic Party has become Mr. Kerry's many mansions of cynicism and skepticism. As our economy continues to get better and businesses add jobs, Mr. Kerry's going around America trying to convince people that the roof is about to cave in. He talks about "the misery index" and the Depression. What does he know about either?
And when it comes to taxes and services, you'd be pressed to find anyone more opposed to the interests of middle-class Americans than John Kerry. Except maybe John Edwards. Both voted against tax relief for married couples, tax relief for families with children, and tax relief for small businesses. Now Mr. Kerry wants to raise taxes on hundreds of thousands of small-business owners and millions of individuals. He claims to be for working people, but I don't understand how small businesses can create jobs if they've got to send more money to Washington instead of keeping it to hire workers.
Worst of all, Sens. Kerry and Edwards have not kept faith with the men and women who are fighting the war on terror--most of whom come from small towns and middle-class families all over America. While Mr. Bush has stood by our troops every step of the way, Messrs. Kerry and Edwards voted to send our troops to war and then voted against the money to give them supplies and equipment--not to mention better benefits for their families. And recently Mr. Kerry even said he's proud of that vote. Proud to abandon our troops when they're out in the field? I can hear Harry Truman cussing from his grave.
I still believe in hope and opportunity and, when it comes right down to it, Mr. Bush is the man who represents hope and opportunity. Hope for a safer world. And opportunity for Americans to work hard, keep more of the money they earn, and send their kids to good schools. All the speeches we heard this week weren't able to hide the truth of what today's Democratic Party has become: an enclave of elites paying lip service to middle-class values. Americans looking for a president who understands their struggles and their dreams should tune in next month, when we celebrate the leadership of George W. Bush.
Mr. Miller is a Democratic senator from Georgia.
See Y'All in New York
Why I skipped the Boston convention.
BY ZELL MILLER
Saturday, July 31, 2004 12:01 a.m.
Twelve years ago, I delivered one of the keynote addresses on the first night at the Democratic National Convention in New York. It was a stinging rebuke of the administration of George H.W. Bush and a ringing endorsement of Bill Clinton. This summer I'll again be speaking in New York, but it will be to the Republican Convention that renominates George W. Bush.
Many have asked how I could have come so far in just over a decade. Frankly, I don't think I've changed much at all. At 72, I don't feel much need to change my opinions. Instead, the reason I didn't attend the Democratic Convention in Boston is that I barely recognize my party anymore. Most of its leaders--including our nominee, John Kerry--don't hold the same beliefs that have motivated my career in public service.
In 1992, I spoke of the opportunity and hope that allowed me, the son of a single mother growing up in the North Georgia mountains, to become my state's governor. And I attributed much of my success to the great Democratic presidents of years gone by--FDR (a hallowed man in my home), Truman and JFK. The link these men shared was a commitment to helping Americans born into any condition rise to achieve whatever goal they set for themselves.
I spoke of Americans who were "tired of paying more in taxes and getting less in services." I excoriated Republicans who "dealt in cynicism and skepticism." I accused them of mastering "the art of division and diversion." And I praised Bill Clinton as a moderate Democrat "who has the courage to tell some of those liberals who think welfare should continue forever, and some of those conservatives who think there should be no welfare at all, that they're both wrong."
Bill Clinton did deliver on welfare reform, after a lot of prodding from the Republicans who took hold of Congress in 1995. But much of the rest of the promise I saw in his candidacy withered during his two terms in office.
Today, it's the Democratic Party that has mastered the art of division and diversion. To run for president as a Democrat these days you have to go from interest group to interest group, cap in hand, asking for the support of liberal kingmakers. Mr. Kerry is no different. After Hollywood elites profaned the president, he didn't have the courage to put them in their place. Instead, he validated their remarks, claiming that they represent "the heart and soul of America."
No longer the party of hope, today's Democratic Party has become Mr. Kerry's many mansions of cynicism and skepticism. As our economy continues to get better and businesses add jobs, Mr. Kerry's going around America trying to convince people that the roof is about to cave in. He talks about "the misery index" and the Depression. What does he know about either?
And when it comes to taxes and services, you'd be pressed to find anyone more opposed to the interests of middle-class Americans than John Kerry. Except maybe John Edwards. Both voted against tax relief for married couples, tax relief for families with children, and tax relief for small businesses. Now Mr. Kerry wants to raise taxes on hundreds of thousands of small-business owners and millions of individuals. He claims to be for working people, but I don't understand how small businesses can create jobs if they've got to send more money to Washington instead of keeping it to hire workers.
Worst of all, Sens. Kerry and Edwards have not kept faith with the men and women who are fighting the war on terror--most of whom come from small towns and middle-class families all over America. While Mr. Bush has stood by our troops every step of the way, Messrs. Kerry and Edwards voted to send our troops to war and then voted against the money to give them supplies and equipment--not to mention better benefits for their families. And recently Mr. Kerry even said he's proud of that vote. Proud to abandon our troops when they're out in the field? I can hear Harry Truman cussing from his grave.
I still believe in hope and opportunity and, when it comes right down to it, Mr. Bush is the man who represents hope and opportunity. Hope for a safer world. And opportunity for Americans to work hard, keep more of the money they earn, and send their kids to good schools. All the speeches we heard this week weren't able to hide the truth of what today's Democratic Party has become: an enclave of elites paying lip service to middle-class values. Americans looking for a president who understands their struggles and their dreams should tune in next month, when we celebrate the leadership of George W. Bush.
Mr. Miller is a Democratic senator from Georgia.
The Biggest Liar of Them All
By David Horowitz
FrontPageMagazine.comJuly 30, 2004
Now we can understand why Democrats spent the last year attacking thePresident as someone who lied to take America into an unnecessary war anddestroy brave young American lives for his corporate friends in Texas. Theydid it to disarm and anesthetize us, to deconstruct the very idea of whattruth is or what a fact is or what "is" is -- and prepare us for the mostshameless charade in political memory, the phoniest convention for thephoniest party ever to mount an American electoral stage.In Boston the Democrats -- the party of Al Sharpton, Jimmy Carter, TeddyKennedy and Michael Moore -- presented themselves as the party of patriotismand military glory and American military strength, and John Kerry as a manwhose life has been one long preparation to be commander-in-chief. "I amJohn Kerry," he saluted his audience to begin his convention speech,"reporting for duty."
Pardon me while I hurl. This is a man who came backfrom Vietnam to stab not only his country but his comrades-in-arms in theback. This is a man who to this very day has an honored place in theCommunist enemy's "War Crimes Museum" -- that's American war crimes. This isa party and a wannabe commander in chief that has clamored and voted tooppose America's wars in Vietnam, the Persian Gulf and in Iraq. This is aparty and a commander in chief that lent comfort and aid to Communistdictators in Central America during the last years of the Cold War andnearly brought the Reagan presidency down for attempting to oppose theCommunist tide.This is a man and a party that voted to cut America's military and itsintelligence services year after year, a man and a party who refused toinstitute the security measures that would have prevented 9/11. And this is a man and a party that has sabotaged the war on terror since the day Baghdadwas liberated, that has embraced the reprehensible traitor Michael Moore,and the antiwar left of the Dean campaign, that has spread monstrous liesabout its commander in chief and in doing so undermined the nation'scredibility and defenses.
If another terrorist state were to become athreatening nuclear force (Iran comes immediately to mind) what Americanpresident can now face that enemy down with a credible military threat?This is a party that from the beginning to the end of its conventionpretended to be what it is not. And that is because it fears that Americanpeople already know what it is.
FrontPageMagazine.comJuly 30, 2004
Now we can understand why Democrats spent the last year attacking thePresident as someone who lied to take America into an unnecessary war anddestroy brave young American lives for his corporate friends in Texas. Theydid it to disarm and anesthetize us, to deconstruct the very idea of whattruth is or what a fact is or what "is" is -- and prepare us for the mostshameless charade in political memory, the phoniest convention for thephoniest party ever to mount an American electoral stage.In Boston the Democrats -- the party of Al Sharpton, Jimmy Carter, TeddyKennedy and Michael Moore -- presented themselves as the party of patriotismand military glory and American military strength, and John Kerry as a manwhose life has been one long preparation to be commander-in-chief. "I amJohn Kerry," he saluted his audience to begin his convention speech,"reporting for duty."
Pardon me while I hurl. This is a man who came backfrom Vietnam to stab not only his country but his comrades-in-arms in theback. This is a man who to this very day has an honored place in theCommunist enemy's "War Crimes Museum" -- that's American war crimes. This isa party and a wannabe commander in chief that has clamored and voted tooppose America's wars in Vietnam, the Persian Gulf and in Iraq. This is aparty and a commander in chief that lent comfort and aid to Communistdictators in Central America during the last years of the Cold War andnearly brought the Reagan presidency down for attempting to oppose theCommunist tide.This is a man and a party that voted to cut America's military and itsintelligence services year after year, a man and a party who refused toinstitute the security measures that would have prevented 9/11. And this is a man and a party that has sabotaged the war on terror since the day Baghdadwas liberated, that has embraced the reprehensible traitor Michael Moore,and the antiwar left of the Dean campaign, that has spread monstrous liesabout its commander in chief and in doing so undermined the nation'scredibility and defenses.
If another terrorist state were to become athreatening nuclear force (Iran comes immediately to mind) what Americanpresident can now face that enemy down with a credible military threat?This is a party that from the beginning to the end of its conventionpretended to be what it is not. And that is because it fears that Americanpeople already know what it is.
Friday, July 30, 2004
Why The Dems Will Lose .....
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July 30, 2004, 8:29 a.m.Why the Dems Will LoseAnd why they’ll be disconsolate.
You know how Democrats hate Bush now? How will they hate him when they lose to him on November 2 by three or four percentage points?
One of the political commentators I admire most for his astuteness said yesterday that the paroxysm of hatred the Democrats have been indulging for the last six months is the worst American political delusion he has seen in his entire life.
What will it be like — if after all this hatred, all this effort, all those millions upon millions of dollars spent to express disdain, contempt, and hate — Bush wins again, flashes a victory symbol over his head, grins, strides around shaking hands, glows with exuberance and radiance?
For Democrats, losing is much worse than for Republicans. For Democrats, the purpose of democracy is to milk government for ever more abundant benefits. Republicans in principle believe in limited government, and thus in a certain way they do even better out of power than when they must exercise it. Democrats without power suffer much more. Democrats go listless, purposeless.
In a minority, Democrats are fairly useless creatures. In victory, they cultivate grand visions of benefits to be shaken from government largesse; defeat, however, freezes the core of their being. Democratic defeat defies the natural order. For them, history halts. What had been an onward rushing tide swirls round and round, becoming still.So loss at any time (as in 2000) is almost inadmissible by Democrats. But a loss in 2004, particularly a solid loss, will be for them a disaster beyond imagination. Such recriminations there will be. Some will blame the "centrism" of the Kerry team, and the much-resented repression of the Left. Some will come to see the isolation in which the widespread paroxysms of hatred and contempt for George Bush blindly thrust them. Some will see that the core ideologies of the Left are faultily drawn — in economics, their attraction to a kind of governmental centralization, and their antipathy to capitalism, the market, corporations, and job creators. They claim to love employees while hating their employers, a self-defeating cycle. In matters of culture, others will see that the left-wing's sexual ethic and religious sensibility are too far out of tune with the American people. Nonetheless, one can predict that both in economics and in culture, others will try to drive the party more leftward still.
In any case, it would be wise to get ready for the coming cataclysm.In 2004, I see six reasons why the Democratic goose is cooked: 1. No one — neither his colleagues nor his wife nor his supporters nor he himself — has anything good to say about John Kerry except that he served bravely in Vietnam. The nearly 30 years since then have generated few boasts on his part, few commendations from others, few successes anyone can seem to remember. 2. The Democratic elite sitting in convention cannot present themselves as they are to the American people, but must stifle their deepest feelings, be silent about their most passionate aims, and hide their turbulent loathing of George Bush Republicans (lest it frighten independents with its ferocity). The Democratic elite is saying as little as possible about same-sex marriage. And guns. And very little about abortion. And not a word about total withdrawal of American troops from Iraq — quite the opposite. Democratic elites do not want the people to know what they really think. On that ground, they fear they will lose. 3. Democrats must hide from the public what they truly think about evangelicals, fundamentalists, and Catholics. They express these thoughts mostly among themselves. 4. John Kerry looks sillier in the pale blue NASA rabbit suit than Michael Dukakis did in a tank. 5. The months of April, May, and June were so heavy with bad news for George Bush — the huge Sorosian expenditures on anti-Bush ads came at him in torrents — and still he held even with Kerry in the polls. It is hard not to believe that there will be at least a slight change in the roaring winds. When it comes (and the change is already underway), it is bound to push Bush's sails steadily ahead as the weeks roll on. 6. The worst lies told by the Democrats about Bush — those of Joe Wilson, Michael Moore, and others, saying that Bush lied about Iraq — have already been proven wrong by the 9/11 Commission (which was supposed to blow Bush out of the water just before the election, but ended up destroying his worst calumniators). These lies were also proven wrong by the British inquiry. Even the Kerry Convention in Boston ended up taking the Bush strategic line in Iraq, except for one thing: Kerry is wistful about the probability of persuading France and Germany to bear some burden on behalf of liberty in Iraq. Good luck! God knows, Bush and Colin Powell tried.Finally, there is the matter of faith, even of the sort Tom Paine showed in 1776. Paine was no Christian, but he did believe that God had created this vast and splendid universe in order to share His friendship with free women and free men, and for this reason the Creator put freedom at the core of things. Tom Paine had no tolerance for the Bible, and less for Biblical fundamentalists, but he was not so much an atheist, he wrote, as to believe that the Almighty Who made the universe for liberty would allow the cause of people willing to die for it to come to naught. Paine couldn't bring himself to believe that God would favor George III.
In that same spirit, I find it hard to believe that the Creator who gave us liberty will ignore President Bush's willingness to sacrifice his own presidency for the liberation of Afghanistan and Iraq — their 50 million citizens, and perhaps their progeny for ages to come. A kind of cosmic justice (which does not always materialize, I recognize) calls for vindication. Especially when the president has been so unfairly calumniated by his foes, domestic and foreign.In accepting the nomination of his party Thursday night, John Kerry could not quite bring himself to give both the president and the volunteer military who performed so well some credit for this great and significant advance for human liberty. The theme of liberty in the Muslim world belongs to George Bush. It was he who named liberty the only real alternative to terrorism."With a firm reliance on Divine Providence," to cite our forebears once again, Bush has publicly held that one cannot fight terrorism merely by killing terrorists. One must provide an alternative of liberty, prosperity, and opportunity — one must labor to build free societies where they do not now exist. Liberty works. I think Bush will win because these are the truths Americans hold.
Bush believes these truths. At this moment, the Democrats (who used to believe them, nobly so) do not even see their relevance. Kerry spoke well about patriotism, the international leadership of America, and liberty — but he seems willfully blind to the relevance of these beautiful ideals to Iraq, Afghanistan, and the war on terrorism. For such ideals and purposes some 900 young Americans of this generation have laid down their lives. They will be thanked by generations yet unborn.
So will their commander-in-chief.
— Michael Novak is the winner of the 1994 Templeton Prize for progress in religion and the George Frederick Jewett Scholar in Religion, Philosophy, and Public Policy at the American Enterprise Institute. Novak's own website is www.michaelnovak.net.
July 30, 2004, 8:29 a.m.Why the Dems Will LoseAnd why they’ll be disconsolate.
You know how Democrats hate Bush now? How will they hate him when they lose to him on November 2 by three or four percentage points?
One of the political commentators I admire most for his astuteness said yesterday that the paroxysm of hatred the Democrats have been indulging for the last six months is the worst American political delusion he has seen in his entire life.
What will it be like — if after all this hatred, all this effort, all those millions upon millions of dollars spent to express disdain, contempt, and hate — Bush wins again, flashes a victory symbol over his head, grins, strides around shaking hands, glows with exuberance and radiance?
For Democrats, losing is much worse than for Republicans. For Democrats, the purpose of democracy is to milk government for ever more abundant benefits. Republicans in principle believe in limited government, and thus in a certain way they do even better out of power than when they must exercise it. Democrats without power suffer much more. Democrats go listless, purposeless.
In a minority, Democrats are fairly useless creatures. In victory, they cultivate grand visions of benefits to be shaken from government largesse; defeat, however, freezes the core of their being. Democratic defeat defies the natural order. For them, history halts. What had been an onward rushing tide swirls round and round, becoming still.So loss at any time (as in 2000) is almost inadmissible by Democrats. But a loss in 2004, particularly a solid loss, will be for them a disaster beyond imagination. Such recriminations there will be. Some will blame the "centrism" of the Kerry team, and the much-resented repression of the Left. Some will come to see the isolation in which the widespread paroxysms of hatred and contempt for George Bush blindly thrust them. Some will see that the core ideologies of the Left are faultily drawn — in economics, their attraction to a kind of governmental centralization, and their antipathy to capitalism, the market, corporations, and job creators. They claim to love employees while hating their employers, a self-defeating cycle. In matters of culture, others will see that the left-wing's sexual ethic and religious sensibility are too far out of tune with the American people. Nonetheless, one can predict that both in economics and in culture, others will try to drive the party more leftward still.
In any case, it would be wise to get ready for the coming cataclysm.In 2004, I see six reasons why the Democratic goose is cooked: 1. No one — neither his colleagues nor his wife nor his supporters nor he himself — has anything good to say about John Kerry except that he served bravely in Vietnam. The nearly 30 years since then have generated few boasts on his part, few commendations from others, few successes anyone can seem to remember. 2. The Democratic elite sitting in convention cannot present themselves as they are to the American people, but must stifle their deepest feelings, be silent about their most passionate aims, and hide their turbulent loathing of George Bush Republicans (lest it frighten independents with its ferocity). The Democratic elite is saying as little as possible about same-sex marriage. And guns. And very little about abortion. And not a word about total withdrawal of American troops from Iraq — quite the opposite. Democratic elites do not want the people to know what they really think. On that ground, they fear they will lose. 3. Democrats must hide from the public what they truly think about evangelicals, fundamentalists, and Catholics. They express these thoughts mostly among themselves. 4. John Kerry looks sillier in the pale blue NASA rabbit suit than Michael Dukakis did in a tank. 5. The months of April, May, and June were so heavy with bad news for George Bush — the huge Sorosian expenditures on anti-Bush ads came at him in torrents — and still he held even with Kerry in the polls. It is hard not to believe that there will be at least a slight change in the roaring winds. When it comes (and the change is already underway), it is bound to push Bush's sails steadily ahead as the weeks roll on. 6. The worst lies told by the Democrats about Bush — those of Joe Wilson, Michael Moore, and others, saying that Bush lied about Iraq — have already been proven wrong by the 9/11 Commission (which was supposed to blow Bush out of the water just before the election, but ended up destroying his worst calumniators). These lies were also proven wrong by the British inquiry. Even the Kerry Convention in Boston ended up taking the Bush strategic line in Iraq, except for one thing: Kerry is wistful about the probability of persuading France and Germany to bear some burden on behalf of liberty in Iraq. Good luck! God knows, Bush and Colin Powell tried.Finally, there is the matter of faith, even of the sort Tom Paine showed in 1776. Paine was no Christian, but he did believe that God had created this vast and splendid universe in order to share His friendship with free women and free men, and for this reason the Creator put freedom at the core of things. Tom Paine had no tolerance for the Bible, and less for Biblical fundamentalists, but he was not so much an atheist, he wrote, as to believe that the Almighty Who made the universe for liberty would allow the cause of people willing to die for it to come to naught. Paine couldn't bring himself to believe that God would favor George III.
In that same spirit, I find it hard to believe that the Creator who gave us liberty will ignore President Bush's willingness to sacrifice his own presidency for the liberation of Afghanistan and Iraq — their 50 million citizens, and perhaps their progeny for ages to come. A kind of cosmic justice (which does not always materialize, I recognize) calls for vindication. Especially when the president has been so unfairly calumniated by his foes, domestic and foreign.In accepting the nomination of his party Thursday night, John Kerry could not quite bring himself to give both the president and the volunteer military who performed so well some credit for this great and significant advance for human liberty. The theme of liberty in the Muslim world belongs to George Bush. It was he who named liberty the only real alternative to terrorism."With a firm reliance on Divine Providence," to cite our forebears once again, Bush has publicly held that one cannot fight terrorism merely by killing terrorists. One must provide an alternative of liberty, prosperity, and opportunity — one must labor to build free societies where they do not now exist. Liberty works. I think Bush will win because these are the truths Americans hold.
Bush believes these truths. At this moment, the Democrats (who used to believe them, nobly so) do not even see their relevance. Kerry spoke well about patriotism, the international leadership of America, and liberty — but he seems willfully blind to the relevance of these beautiful ideals to Iraq, Afghanistan, and the war on terrorism. For such ideals and purposes some 900 young Americans of this generation have laid down their lives. They will be thanked by generations yet unborn.
So will their commander-in-chief.
— Michael Novak is the winner of the 1994 Templeton Prize for progress in religion and the George Frederick Jewett Scholar in Religion, Philosophy, and Public Policy at the American Enterprise Institute. Novak's own website is www.michaelnovak.net.
Kerry In Vietnam Disputed
The Washington Times
www.washingtontimes.com Kerry's exploits in Vietnam are disputed in best seller
By Rowan ScarboroughTHE WASHINGTON TIMES Published July 30, 2004
Democrats capped Sen. John Kerry's presidential nomination last night by showing a Hollywood-produced movie of his life, featuring amateur film clips and testaments about his service in Vietnam as commander of a Navy river patrol boat. But a group of former sailors who served with Mr. Kerry are telling a different story. Rather than depicting Mr. Kerry as a war hero, they are quoted in a new book accusing him of exaggerating and falsifying his experiences. The group says that of 23 crew members photographed with Mr. Kerry more than 30 years ago in Vietnam, only one supports his presidential campaign. They will announce a nationwide campaign by "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" to tell the American public about what they say is Mr. Kerry's true war record.
The biographical movie shown last night, "A Remarkable Promise," shows "family and friends talking about the courage he has shown as a soldier and a veteran, the fights he has waged for middle-class values and the faith in family he has exhibited as a father and husband," the Kerry campaign said before its prime-time convention appearance. The film was produced by James Moll, a partner of director Steven Spielberg. The book, "Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry," from Regnery Publishing, is written by John E. O'Neill. Mr. O'Neill served in Vietnam at the same time as Mr. Kerry and followed him as commander on the swift boat. Mr. O'Neill, riled by what he considered Mr. Kerry's false charge in 1971 of widespread war crimes committed by U.S. troops, has waged a public debate with the politician dating back to the "Dick Cavett Show" that year.
The book quotes Mr. Kerry's fellow combatants as saying two of his Purple Hearts came from friendly fire, not the enemy. The veterans also will dispute other stories Mr. Kerry has told. "Unfit for Command" will not be released until Sept. 25, but the online Drudge Report yesterday broke news of what it called a "bombshell book." The book hit No. 2 on Amazon.com's best-seller list. Radio and TV hosts were clamoring for Mr. O'Neill to appear. Regnery, which boasts a long list of best-selling conservative books, has put a tight hold on information until the official release. Some of the book's charges have been aired by Veterans for Truth. Retired Rear Adm. Roy Hoffmann, who commanded Mr. Kerry's task force in Vietnam, is one of the book's sources.
Adm. Hoffmann said yesterday he has supplied several instances of Mr. Kerry's purported lies. One example, he said, is Mr. Kerry's contention that he warned admirals of the folly of a certain river operation. Adm. Hoffmann said he and others were at the meeting, and that Mr. Kerry never made such a statement. "The real truth is he didn't say a ... word," Adm. Hoffmann said. Mr. Hoffmann is chairman of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, which plans what it calls a grass-roots campaign. "We're going to tell the truth -- the fact that he was a perpetual, habitual liar," Adm. Hoffmann said. "I don't care whether it was perjury or lying before the Senate of the United States, or that two of his Purple Hearts are at least very specious, if not absolutely false, because he filed false after-action reports."
www.washingtontimes.com Kerry's exploits in Vietnam are disputed in best seller
By Rowan ScarboroughTHE WASHINGTON TIMES Published July 30, 2004
Democrats capped Sen. John Kerry's presidential nomination last night by showing a Hollywood-produced movie of his life, featuring amateur film clips and testaments about his service in Vietnam as commander of a Navy river patrol boat. But a group of former sailors who served with Mr. Kerry are telling a different story. Rather than depicting Mr. Kerry as a war hero, they are quoted in a new book accusing him of exaggerating and falsifying his experiences. The group says that of 23 crew members photographed with Mr. Kerry more than 30 years ago in Vietnam, only one supports his presidential campaign. They will announce a nationwide campaign by "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" to tell the American public about what they say is Mr. Kerry's true war record.
The biographical movie shown last night, "A Remarkable Promise," shows "family and friends talking about the courage he has shown as a soldier and a veteran, the fights he has waged for middle-class values and the faith in family he has exhibited as a father and husband," the Kerry campaign said before its prime-time convention appearance. The film was produced by James Moll, a partner of director Steven Spielberg. The book, "Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry," from Regnery Publishing, is written by John E. O'Neill. Mr. O'Neill served in Vietnam at the same time as Mr. Kerry and followed him as commander on the swift boat. Mr. O'Neill, riled by what he considered Mr. Kerry's false charge in 1971 of widespread war crimes committed by U.S. troops, has waged a public debate with the politician dating back to the "Dick Cavett Show" that year.
The book quotes Mr. Kerry's fellow combatants as saying two of his Purple Hearts came from friendly fire, not the enemy. The veterans also will dispute other stories Mr. Kerry has told. "Unfit for Command" will not be released until Sept. 25, but the online Drudge Report yesterday broke news of what it called a "bombshell book." The book hit No. 2 on Amazon.com's best-seller list. Radio and TV hosts were clamoring for Mr. O'Neill to appear. Regnery, which boasts a long list of best-selling conservative books, has put a tight hold on information until the official release. Some of the book's charges have been aired by Veterans for Truth. Retired Rear Adm. Roy Hoffmann, who commanded Mr. Kerry's task force in Vietnam, is one of the book's sources.
Adm. Hoffmann said yesterday he has supplied several instances of Mr. Kerry's purported lies. One example, he said, is Mr. Kerry's contention that he warned admirals of the folly of a certain river operation. Adm. Hoffmann said he and others were at the meeting, and that Mr. Kerry never made such a statement. "The real truth is he didn't say a ... word," Adm. Hoffmann said. Mr. Hoffmann is chairman of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, which plans what it calls a grass-roots campaign. "We're going to tell the truth -- the fact that he was a perpetual, habitual liar," Adm. Hoffmann said. "I don't care whether it was perjury or lying before the Senate of the United States, or that two of his Purple Hearts are at least very specious, if not absolutely false, because he filed false after-action reports."
POEM: Reporting For Duty - O
Attention, DNC, fellow Americans and the world at large
All we need is love
So give peace a chance
Help, we need somebody
Send heroes, hope and help
Silver Star and Purple Hearts
Ladies marry the girl next door
Abort the fetus and send the stem cells to
Voodoo doctors with magic trial lawyer smarts too
I am here with the Queen of Hearts
All we need is love
So give peace a chance
Help, we need somebody
Send heroes, hope and help
Silver Star and Purple Hearts
Ladies marry the girl next door
Abort the fetus and send the stem cells to
Voodoo doctors with magic trial lawyer smarts too
I am here with the Queen of Hearts
Thursday, July 29, 2004
Stratfor: The Art of Disguise
Terrorist Tactics: The Art of Disguise Jul 29, 2004 1550 GMT
Security sources in southern California have told Stratfor about incidents involving "vehicle-spoofing" -- or the use of falsely marked utility vehicles. The markings -- said to be fairly professionally done -- were identified by investigators looking into drug-smuggling cases.
That said, the potential for vehicle-spoofing and other types of disguises as terrorist tactics is a cause for concern.
The use of vehicles disguised as official or corporate cars, vans or trucks is an old tactic among criminals and militants that still bears review. It has cropped up everywhere -- from Iraq and Saudi Arabia to Maryland and San Diego -- and is even used by U.S. law enforcement agencies during surveillance operations. Such vehicles arouse little suspicion among the public -- and from a mental awareness standpoint, the mind has a tendency to discount the obvious, such as a delivery truck parked in a fire lane.
Stratfor has long argued that observance and vigilance among citizens are the best defenses against terrorism; the difficulty -- particularly during periods of heightened alert -- is knowing what to be on watch for.
Spoofed vehicles are only one example: Sources have told Stratfor that those identified in southern California were reasonable facsimiles of company vehicles -- utility trucks, delivery vehicles or even fleet sedans with corporate markings -- that would not attract notice from casual observers (emphasis on "casual"). In the past, militants also have used taxis as cover for surveillance; this has occurred in New York City and New Orleans, where investigators disrupted a Sikh militant assassination plot against Indian diplomats.
Other tactics include:
Official uniforms that are copied or stolen: This tactic has been used in terrorist attacks in the past, including the May assaults against Westerners at the Oasis housing compound in Khobar, Saudi Arabia. In the United States, theft of official uniforms -- such as those for police, firemen or security guards -- can be difficult to prevent; the most effective countermeasure usually is speedily reporting the theft to authorities.
Theft or copying of identification cards and badges: Requiring employees to display identification badges in order to enter the workplace is an effective security measure for many government agencies and companies, but it also renders the workplace vulnerable: Employees often wear their badges outside the building -- where they inadvertently could reveal important information or be lost or stolen. That said, employers can protect themselves through measures such as proxy card/badge readers, which allow specific numeric identifiers on lost or stolen cards to be deleted in real-time from computer memory banks, keeping any impostors from accessing the facility.
Stolen utility vehicles: These could be used in car- or truck-bombing plots, a tactic al Qaeda has discussed in the past. In 1993, militants in New York City considered using stolen delivery vans to gain access to target venues in several scenarios, such as blowing up the Waldorf-Astoria or U.N. Plaza Hotel. Countermeasures that can help to prevent against such attacks include the use of global positioning systems or similar technology that allows companies to trace lost or stolen vehicles quickly. GPS systems routinely are installed in commercial tractor-trailers, where federal officials say they have been extremely effective in preventing theft of cargo-loads traveling U.S. interstates.
Security sources in southern California have told Stratfor about incidents involving "vehicle-spoofing" -- or the use of falsely marked utility vehicles. The markings -- said to be fairly professionally done -- were identified by investigators looking into drug-smuggling cases.
That said, the potential for vehicle-spoofing and other types of disguises as terrorist tactics is a cause for concern.
The use of vehicles disguised as official or corporate cars, vans or trucks is an old tactic among criminals and militants that still bears review. It has cropped up everywhere -- from Iraq and Saudi Arabia to Maryland and San Diego -- and is even used by U.S. law enforcement agencies during surveillance operations. Such vehicles arouse little suspicion among the public -- and from a mental awareness standpoint, the mind has a tendency to discount the obvious, such as a delivery truck parked in a fire lane.
Stratfor has long argued that observance and vigilance among citizens are the best defenses against terrorism; the difficulty -- particularly during periods of heightened alert -- is knowing what to be on watch for.
Spoofed vehicles are only one example: Sources have told Stratfor that those identified in southern California were reasonable facsimiles of company vehicles -- utility trucks, delivery vehicles or even fleet sedans with corporate markings -- that would not attract notice from casual observers (emphasis on "casual"). In the past, militants also have used taxis as cover for surveillance; this has occurred in New York City and New Orleans, where investigators disrupted a Sikh militant assassination plot against Indian diplomats.
Other tactics include:
Official uniforms that are copied or stolen: This tactic has been used in terrorist attacks in the past, including the May assaults against Westerners at the Oasis housing compound in Khobar, Saudi Arabia. In the United States, theft of official uniforms -- such as those for police, firemen or security guards -- can be difficult to prevent; the most effective countermeasure usually is speedily reporting the theft to authorities.
Theft or copying of identification cards and badges: Requiring employees to display identification badges in order to enter the workplace is an effective security measure for many government agencies and companies, but it also renders the workplace vulnerable: Employees often wear their badges outside the building -- where they inadvertently could reveal important information or be lost or stolen. That said, employers can protect themselves through measures such as proxy card/badge readers, which allow specific numeric identifiers on lost or stolen cards to be deleted in real-time from computer memory banks, keeping any impostors from accessing the facility.
Stolen utility vehicles: These could be used in car- or truck-bombing plots, a tactic al Qaeda has discussed in the past. In 1993, militants in New York City considered using stolen delivery vans to gain access to target venues in several scenarios, such as blowing up the Waldorf-Astoria or U.N. Plaza Hotel. Countermeasures that can help to prevent against such attacks include the use of global positioning systems or similar technology that allows companies to trace lost or stolen vehicles quickly. GPS systems routinely are installed in commercial tractor-trailers, where federal officials say they have been extremely effective in preventing theft of cargo-loads traveling U.S. interstates.
When Hollywood Declares Us Ignorant - O
The power for change rests within each individual, by our example, unity and actions. Yes, we have failed in certain areas and accomplished great things in other areas. I just don't appreciate being lumped into some giant group called ignorant by simplistic performers who have basic educations and who were just plain lucky to get the break which, by the way, came to them as a result of support from the Americans they constantly criticize.
Let the ones who have no sin cast the first stone, and let all the others repent and seek change.
We could all use a little more Sun Tzu in our lives.
Let the ones who have no sin cast the first stone, and let all the others repent and seek change.
We could all use a little more Sun Tzu in our lives.
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