Administration to double troop numbers for Vietman- I mean Afghanistan

[Leif]

Case in point, the August 6th, 2001 PDB (Presidential Daily Briefing, a daily "newspaper" the President is given bringing him up to speed on all the most important intelligence issues) contained a blunt warning - Osama Bin Laden is planning a terrorist strike on U.S. soil. Airplanes might be used as weapons. Bush Administration officials maintain that the President never read that part, because unintentional ignorance is somehow better than willful ignorance.

For those who haven't learned how to read since that document was released in April 2004, I'll break it down. Again.

Based on news reports and statements Bin Ladin had publically made, we determined he wanted to strike in the US. Big shocker there.

Based on the fact that Muslim extremists have tried to blow up airports, embassies, and ships, it was then safe to conclude that they wanted us dead.

Now that everyone knows they want to kill us based on information a fifth grader could have googled, I wonder what else the report said.

Well, the report also says, that because previous al'Quada conspirators were American citizens in the past, it's in the realm of possibility! I mean, wow, who could have seen that conclusion coming?

Oh, and that Bin Laden also wants to hijack aircraft to extract terrorists in US custody. But wait, there's more! According to a "source" a cell in New York was recruiting Muslim youth in the state.

But wait! Here's the good one! The FBI thinks they're going after New York federal buildings! With explosives!



So based on all of this, 9/11 could have been prevented!!!!!.... Right?

Well, if 9/11 was committed by Muslim youth recruited by a New York cell who used explosives to attack federal buildings.... then the report would have been extremely valuable. However, since about 90% of this information could be found on the internet, it's not like there's a lot of intelligence poured into the report.

So, the report does not say that they were planning on using airplanes as weapons. Nor is it a "blunt warning". I must have missed the part where the Bush administration played stupid too.


Seriously, get it right. You don't get to see a flashy title like "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US" (like that was news) and then conclude that it is full of information that suggests anything but what the title suggests.

The report was not title "Bin Laden Plot to Destroy WTC" for a reason.

And of course, we all remember that Ambassador Joe Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, had her career ruined after Wilson wrote an op-ed piece alleging that the President misrepresented the intelligence regarding Iraq attempting to buy uranium from Niger.

Which, like all liberal sensationalist stories, was a complete hoax.

Whether or not Obama retains the policy of "tell me only what I want to hear" has not yet been established.

Unsubstantiated.

No NIE was requested by President Bush prior to the invasion of Iraq.

Which, you take, to mean he was a complete bonehead who didn't know what was going on. We'll just ignore the fact that he probably got about ten times the amount of intelligence in those puny briefs on a daily basis.

[Stee]

what does superpower even mean anymore? We have the most money? no. We are almost always morally right in our decisions? no. People fear us the most? no. Our decisions carry the most weight? arguably.

I'm honestly trying to think of one just war besides WWII that we have fought and I'm having a hard time finding any. Afghanistan can be argued for, but definitely not the length.

Umm most advanced and powerful military force the world has ever known and many many nukes, pretty sure that counts as a superpower.

And while I'm not agreeing with US foreign policy, at least when we fight for our own individualistic goals we are freeing or at least trying to free people from oppression as a byproduct.

[pohibaba]

Umm most advanced and powerful military force the world has ever known and many many nukes, pretty sure that counts as a superpower.

And while I'm not agreeing with US foreign policy, at least when we fight for our own individualistic goals we are freeing or at least trying to free people from oppression as a byproduct.

I honestly suggest that you take a look at America's involvement in other country's affairs. We fuck shit up. We're the ones who put the bad guys in power. We're the ones who give weapons to terrorists. We're the ones who quell popular uprisings using violence that threaten to topple dictators. If people truly want to be free from oppression then they'll free themselves.

[Demosthenes11]

Umm most advanced and powerful military force the world has ever known and many many nukes, pretty sure that counts as a superpower.

And while I'm not agreeing with US foreign policy, at least when we fight for our own individualistic goals we are freeing or at least trying to free people from oppression as a byproduct.

you should go to laos. oh, but don't go to several thousands of square miles of it or you will step on one of the USAs 50k+ land mines that are still there, active, and killing people

[Baelorn]

you should go to laos. oh, but don't go to several thousands of square miles of it or you will step on one of the USAs 50k+ land mines that are still there, active, and killing people

Unfortunately regulations on landmines were not strict then so the fields were unlabeled and undocumented which makes it extremely difficult to remove them. In fact, there's no credible source for the actual number of landmines still there.

I'm not trying to understate the effects of landmines but you act like the US laid landmines with the sole purpose of blowing up civilians. The US is also the largest contributor to landmine relief in Laos.

Are you interested in a job at FOX News? You'd be great.

[archibaldcrane]

you should go to laos. oh, but don't go to several thousands of square miles of it or you will step on one of the USAs 50k+ land mines that are still there, active, and killing people

Yeah but demos, you have to consider that we were fighting a war against Laos at the time - you can hardly criticize us for for landmines left over in our war effort against Laos.








Wait.

Wait what we never had a war against Laos?


Oh.

Also the poster who said this is a Fox News talking point is fucking retarded.

[Deftscythe]

Unfortunately regulations on landmines were not strict then so the fields were unlabeled and undocumented which makes it extremely difficult to remove them. In fact, there's no credible source for the actual number of landmines still there.

I'm not trying to understate the effects of landmines but you act like the US laid landmines with the sole purpose of blowing up civilians. The US is also the largest contributor to landmine relief in Laos.

Are you interested in a job at FOX News? You'd be great.

So many things wrong with this post.

[Kuya]

Did he just say Fox News in regards to demo's post? Seriously?

[Leif]

I'd like to thank Leif for skillfully providing an example of what willful ignorance looks like.

After I overview, step by step, what the report had in it, completely and totally proving you wrong, you call me willfully ignorant.

Just saying.

[ozz]

Finally, blindly playing the fox news card bites someone in the ass

[Leif]

You did absolutely nothing of the sort. There's not a syllable in anything you said that's more than baseless speculation or blatently ignoring the point because you don't like what it says.

Wait, what? I went off exactly what the report said.

It did not say that they were going to use airplanes as weapons as you claimed.

The report had the location wrong (it wasn't federal buildings), the weapon wrong (it wasn't explosives), and the perpetrators wrong (it wasn't New York Muslims or American citizens).

The ONE THING the report did have right was motive. They want us dead. As I said earlier, a fifth grader could have compiled that information off of a google search.

The report had no information that could have been utilized to prevent the attack. None. Zip. Zero.

You post based on Michael Moore, a proven liar and dropout at one of the country's worst college. Anybody with an IQ above that of a toaster should know not to post anything he says without being immediately corrected.


So how is all of this "baseless speculation"? How am I "blatantly ignoring the point"? The facts are in mister. You lose.


So for all you guys who still believe 9/11 was an inside job or that it was Bush's fault or that Zealot actually knows what's going on, read it for yourself. It's only about a page long. As you will see, it clearly proves my point.

http://www.fas.org/irp/cia/product/pdb080601.pdf

It's funny that when you post easily verifiable lies, you get your tits in a twist when someone corrects you.

[SwampdonkeyPLD]

- The August 6th Presidential Daily Briefing contained specific reference to the fact that Osama bin Laden was planning an attack on the United States and that it was likely airports or airplanes would be targets. The White House maintains President Bush did not read the brieifing. Whether he did or not, no action was taken to strengthen airport security.

This is the only thing Leif was focusing on. All the other stuff has nothing to do with what he posted. And if that link was the memo you're referring to and doesn't contain this information then you're wrong. Everything else is just irrelevant.

Edit: After reading it, there are only two relevant points. "They wanted to attack LAX." The terrorists did not. "They may want to hijack planes." Sorta kinda maybe on point.

[pohibaba]

The really sad part here is that my overall criticism was of the failure of U.S. Intelligence. There was no mention anywhere of a conspiracy or that it was explicitly the fault of the Bush administration. You're so pre-conditioned to spout ultra-conservative idiocy that you immediately took it as some 9/11 conspiracy bullshit.

Case in point, the August 6th, 2001 PDB (Presidential Daily Briefing, a daily "newspaper" the President is given bringing him up to speed on all the most important intelligence issues) contained a blunt warning - Osama Bin Laden is planning a terrorist strike on U.S. soil. Airplanes might be used as weapons. Bush Administration officials maintain that the President never read that part, because unintentional ignorance is somehow better than willful ignorance.

That sure sounds to me like you're blaming the Bush Administration. Now, I'm normally not one to agree with Leaf, as I think he's a moron, but he's right in this case. There was nothing in that Presidential briefing that could have reasonably prevented the attacks on 9/11. And although all of your points were true and important, they don't relate to the discussion you were having with Leaf at all. The two of you were clearly discussing whether President Bush's "unintentional ignorance" played a part in the attacks of 9/11, but every point that you listed could have and would have happened with whomever was in charge.

[Dimmauk]

Don't derail the thread into shit about 9/11.

Yeah?

[Byrthnoth]

As long as they don't start a draft or abuse the reserve to do their troop surge I don't see a real problem with it. As a country, we pay soldiers to do soldiering. We pay taxes so that we personally won't have to do soldiering because it's dangerous as shit. Some people get paid to do soldiering even though it's dangerous as shit. I'm sorry that we can't pay them to sit around and drill all the time, but I'm less sympathetic about this than I could be.

Personally, I don't really like the idea of soldiers running around and risking their lives and I'd rather we adopt a long-term plan to reduce active foreign involvement in general and scale down our lower ranks of the armed forces. We could use a tiny fraction of the savings from all those salaries to bolster our national guard program. The assumption would be that if there's any conflict we need an army for we can institute a draft and be up and running in under a month with people in the reserve program, then can push people through basic training quickly enough to swell our forces within a month or two.

This would provide a political disincentive for foreign commitments by requiring a draft to get a real armed force and would make people (like me) generally more interested in what we're thinking about doing with our armed forces. If bureaucracy wasn't bureaucracy, in exchange for personally accepting the chance we might be called to active duty our taxes would go down. In fact, the savings would probably go into pet projects and we'd be just as taxed as ever with the off-chance we'd be called to active duty at any time.

[Cephius]

As long as they don't start a draft or abuse the reserve to do their troop surge I don't see a real problem with it. As a country, we pay soldiers to do soldiering. We pay taxes so that we personally won't have to do soldiering because it's dangerous as shit. Some people get paid to do soldiering even though it's dangerous as shit. I'm sorry that we can't pay them to sit around and drill all the time, but I'm less sympathetic about this than I could be.

Personally, I don't really like the idea of soldiers running around and risking their lives and I'd rather we adopt a long-term plan to reduce active foreign involvement in general and scale down our lower ranks of the armed forces. We could use a tiny fraction of the savings from all those salaries to bolster our national guard program. The assumption would be that if there's any conflict we need an army for we can institute a draft and be up and running in under a month with people in the reserve program, then can push people through basic training quickly enough to swell our forces within a month or two.

This would provide a political disincentive for foreign commitments by requiring a draft to get a real armed force and would make people (like me) generally more interested in what we're thinking about doing with our armed forces. If bureaucracy wasn't bureaucracy, in exchange for personally accepting the chance we might be called to active duty our taxes would go down. In fact, the savings would probably go into pet projects and we'd be just as taxed as ever with the off-chance we'd be called to active duty at any time.

This is really confusing to me. We can't pay soldiers to sit around and drill all day? Why not? Isn't that, ideally, what every country strives to do? War is expensive, but you need some sort of armed forces to defend your country, so yes, I think I'd prefer my taxes went so our soldiers could sit around and drill without any threat to themselves as opposed to the alternatives.

And are you really suggesting to shift funds from the armed forces to the national guard, and only have minimal forces on active duty? And then institute a draft if we need more? Umm... okay.

[archibaldcrane]

I'm not so terribly opposed to a smaller military and a draft if needed. If a draft was needed to invade Iraq, there would've been a lot more people stepping back and saying "are we -sure- this is what we want to be doing right now?"

And that's a good thing.

[Plow]

ok, I'm gonna do it.

guartz posted this video like 2 years ago and I've reposted it like 5 times since


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3xlb6_0OEs


not saying I fully support all this guy's ideas, but he has some extremely valid points about things we're doing wildly wrong, imo

[Leif]

- The August 6th Presidential Daily Briefing contained specific reference to the fact that Osama bin Laden was planning an attack on the United States and that it was likely airports or airplanes would be targets. The White House maintains President Bush did not read the brieifing. Whether he did or not, no action was taken to strengthen airport security.

Well, I'm just going to ignore the rest of your coulda shoulda woulda crap, and worry about the issue at hand: You lying about what the brief contained. And you just did it again.

The PDB did not contain "specific reference" to the idea that Bin Laden was planning an attack as you just claimed again. It did contain specific reference to evidence that suggests he would be more than willing to plan an attack. There was no information about any pending plot.

The PDB did not say that airports or airplanes would be targets as you just claimed again. It said that airplanes might be hijacked to extract Bin Laden's friends from US custody. It did not say they would be used as 500mph missiles aimed at the nearest landmark building.

Stop lying.

*overly emotional "you're the worst person ever" crap*

Yeah, I feel real terrible being called names by someone who keeps lying to a degree of Holocaust-denying proportions.

[Cephius]

I just wanna say that I'm as anti-Bush as you can be, but the idea that 9/11 was an inside job or that "obvious signs were ignored" is an utter joke. Nothing anyone could have done would have prevented it even if you went back in time and told people what was going to happen.