In other words: A discussion of The Bush Administration
The blame game
When will the Chimper realize that accepting blame is not the worst thing in the world? In fact, it too, is a sign of the character that he supposedly has. But he thinks it is a sign of weakness, so, "Never, NEVER I SAY! Will the Chimperor accept blame! NEVER!" Of what do I speak?
Of Bush's actions on that fateful day in September. He went into a school room to read to children *after* he knew of the first plane and he *remained* in the room of 2nd graders, talking nicely about a FUCKING GOAT (to borrow a line from an Edward Albee play) *after* he heard of the second. Wasting time, time, time. Tick tock, tick tock. Until about 9:30. WHY? Because, his administration has said "'The president told us his instinct was to project calm, not to have the country see an excited reaction at a moment of crisis,' the 29-page document continues. Bush saw the phones and pagers of reporters starting to ring as they stood behind the children in the classroom and 'felt he should project strength and calm until he could better understand what was happening.'"
What's happening? Uh, excuse me, but your Chief of Staff just said "We're under attack." What, exactly, else do you need there? Besides, it wasn't live coverage. The country couldn't have seen an excited reaction at a moment of crisis. Previously, he's stated that he didn't want to frighten the children.
A NORAD general has said that if they had had a little more time, they would have been able to launch fighters that would have intercepted the flights on 9/11. If notified by the FAA at the time of the hijackings, the general did not hesitate to say "Yes, we could shoot down the airplanes."
NORAD was not notified about the first plane until just 9 minutes prior to it hitting the WTC. That would be about 8:35. But when it was, it then got planes scrambled. Flight 77 didn't hit the Pentagon until 9:43. Over an hour later. Flight 93 didn't "crash" until 10:10. (See
here for a chronology)
So I'll give Bush a break. I won't hold him accountable for the first two planes. On that fateful day, he really couldn't have done anything at all to stop the first two. But instead of wasting 30 minutes talking to school children and taking questions, couldn't he have said, something like "I have to go, there is an important event happening" and left, ordering his military to be on the lookout for more hijacked planes? OR SOMETHING? I'm no rocket surgeon, but a couple of planes leaving Langley, Va. and traveling at about 1200 miles an hour could pretty much get to the DC area in about, oh, five minutes. Giving them 30 minutes to get up in the air, that means they're over DC at about 9:10 am. If only they'd had orders from their commander in chief that day they (not my supposition here remember, but a general from NORAD) would have been able to shoot down the plane that crashed into the Pentagon. That would have saved about 100 souls. But they didn't. Bush hid behind some kids until just about 13 minutes before the Pentagon hit, giving no orders, taking no calls, providing no leadership.
So the Chimp has to come up with excuses for his behavior. He can't take any blame. There was no way to have predicted this. Couldn't connect the dots. Couldn't frighten a class of 25 2nd graders over saving about 100 lives.
Just admit George, just once, that you MADE A MISTAKE. That *YOU* were scared and didn't know what to do. It's really ok. Americans do not expect that their president be a mind reader. You didn't have to know about the attacks. We don't want someone to be perfect. You really are allowed to screw up. But we also really like presidents who can admit their failures and ask us for forgiveness when necessary. Just ask us George. It's a hell of a lot better than being viewed as a liar.
- B 6:04 PM - [PermaLink] -
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