“People have got to start connecting the dots here and maybe this is the thing that will connect the dots for the Obama administration.”Of course he has no way of knowing exactly or even generally what is known by the President, his advisers, the NSA or anyone else for that matter, but by implying that something is obvious and Obama has been oblivious, he wins another point in the fantasy touch football game of insinuational politics. Of course by some rule of the game I've never understood, it's still off-limits to insinuate that the George W. Bush administration ignored the idea that Terrorists could use airplanes and followed some imaginary, if not fraudulent dots straight to Baghdad.
Hoekstra, or Hokey, if you prefer went straight to Twitter and implied to whatever birds of that feather read his bird brained utterances, that the Obama administration had made some sort of outrageous solecism worthy only of an incompetent and coward by calling a failed attempt a failed attempt, which, of course it was.
"Administration says attempted terrorist attack. No. It was a terrorist attack! Just not as successful as they (AQ) planned." tweeted our friend Hokey.A white House spokesman had been quoted by AP as saying
"We believe this was an attempted act of terrorism."By that logic, I'd have to say that my tossing a rock in a northerly direction is an actual attack on Atlanta, the importance of which is undiminished by Atlanta being some 500 miles away and my throwing arm no longer what it was.
I'm guessing with some confidence that the correct course of action would, according to Hokey, be to run down Pennsylvania Avenue shrieking "terrorist attack -- terrorist attack" because the panic factor has proved to work in the Republicans' favor often enough to warrant another try.
Unfortunately the determination as to whether we've indeed suffered an official terrorist attack is the job of the Attorney General who may have wanted to take more than 5 minutes to look into the sketchy and ever changing reports coming in from Detroit as to who did it, what was done and with what kind of device.
Of course I continue to assert that if the Republicans can do no more than sift and comb through ever word, action or inaction of the opposition for something that can be twisted, misrepresented or edited into a scandal they can use to bash Obama, they continue to be the worst enemy we have.
Good grief, we don't even know (as you point out) exactly what happened yet -- whether this guy was religiously motivated or just a nutcase, whether he was under orders from a terrorist group or acting alone, whether his device could actually have destroyed the plane, etc.
ReplyDeleteIf Hoekstra is trying to imply that he thinks the Obama administration is unaware that our country faces an Islamic terrorist threat and needs reminding, he must have missed hearing about Obama's recent decision to escalate military efforts in Afghanistan.
I agree with your last patagraph. They are just frantically throwing everything they can find, hoping something will stick. And, of course, they continue to be outraged at any attention paid to the domestic religious terrorist threat represented by such things as the Tiller murder and the Psalm 109:8 meme.
It's clear that all the Republicans are about is trashing the president and thwarting the government in any way possible.
ReplyDeleteOh wait, there's the refusing to admit they had anything to do with screwing everything up in the first place.
I thought this was a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit ~ so wouldn't the weak link here be at the airport in Amsterdam?
ReplyDeleteKudos to the passengers who did not wait to see who was at fault, but went ahead and took the nut down.
Still in the DC area, I leave tomorrow, and when I get home, that Hokey fellow will get a real good thrashing along with the rest of those repugnicants.
ReplyDeleteOh cripes, the ultra-conservative Heritage Foundation says there have been 28 foiled terror plots against the U.S. since 9/11. That's the *Heritage Foundation* saying that.
ReplyDeleteIt's not like there weren't foiled terror plots when Bush was president. But, ya know, IOKIYAR.
NO, NO, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!
ReplyDeleteThIs teRraRISt wuZ a pErrsonell eMIsari of OsAMA been lideN!!
Damn, typing like that is a bitch, I wonder if carpal tunnel syndrome or RSI is an occupational hazard for reichwinger keyboard warriurz.
Hoekstra is, like Bachmann, Palin, Inhofe and most of the GOP congressional corps a self-serving p.o.s. who will cheerfully misquote, misrepresent or flat out lie about any Democratic legislator or official's position on any subject.
I said, during the ClintonFosterWhitewaterLewsinsky witch hunt that I would never vote for a Republican candidate for any office at any level. What I've seen from the GOP over the last 8+ years has only hardened that stance.
Me too. I feel more that way than ever. They've taking dishonesty to the point where "liar" is an inadequate word.
ReplyDeleteOh, this story has yet another "delightful" twist. Turns out Bush released two of the masterminds of the failed terrorist bombing and recommended, in a manner of speaking, art therapy for them:
ReplyDeleteTwo of the four leaders allegedly behind the al Qaeda plot to blow up a Northwest Airlines passenger jet over Detroit were released by the U.S. from the Guantanamo prison in November, 2007, according to American officials and Department of Defense documents. Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the Northwest bombing in a Monday statement that vowed more attacks on Americans.
American officials agreed to send the two terrorists from Guantanamo to Saudi Arabia where they entered into an "art therapy rehabilitation program" and were set free, according to U.S. and Saudi officials.
I must admit to a personal disappointment by this news. I love art therapy! I'm stunned and saddened to learn that it does not work for would-be terrorists. Sigh. But at least we've learned something, um, therapeutic, no?
Unless the guy considered setting his pants on fire to be an art form. Yeah, that's it! The whole thing was a piece of performance art, not a terrorist attack at all.
ReplyDeleteNot much more absurd than some of what gets funded as art these days.
Yep, it could have been a misunderstood attempt at performance art, who knows.;)
ReplyDeleteMore seriously, though, art therapy could have been useful for the young man who actually attempted the act, as it appears that he was lonely, confused and conflicted about life and his religious duties, and, more than anything, desperately sought friendship and guidance.
But not so much for those who used him to carry out the attack.
BTW, you keep people in a gulag (Guantanamo) for years without trial and any hopes for due process, then release them and expect that art therapy should fix their brewing resentment and hatred toward their oppressors? That just doesn't sound remotely reasonable. Or sane.
P.S. Capt. Fogg, what's going on with your visage? It keeps changing with an alarming (IMO) speed and has less and less resemblance to the real you (as far as I can tell).
I was forced to watch Fox in a doctor's waiting room for over an hour yesterday, and was amazed to hear them admit that it was the Bush administration who released those prisoners to Bush's second country -- Saudi Arabia. They also admitted that it was the Republicans who had held up appointing a head for the TSA. I almost swooned.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure the Saudis used more that art therapy, but yes, of course, keeping someone in a cage for years isn't going to dispose them toward acts of kindness to the US, The Republicans do have an interest in continued attacks as long as a Democrat is in office, but I'm not ready to accuse them of releasing prisoners toward that end.
No, my head isn't that pointy, but I thought the All-seeing eye was a metaphorical likeness, no? Actually if you're old enough to remember the TV show Then Came Bronson, you might recognize the symbol he had on the tank of his red 1968 Harley XLCH Sportster.
Amazing as always
ReplyDelete