I've been at some pains to say in the last few days, it's not a political speech, it's not trying to draw political distinctions or issue calls to action.However, if you have a look at the president's speech, I think it was. What say you?
Now have a look at how Tony tries to defend himself and his president:
Q Was the President's speech last night political?Where the disagreement lies is how to win the war on terror, not if the Dems are hard or soft on terrorists? Moreover, it is not helpful when one person who suggests it is healthy to debate but then goes ahead and bends the truth, how can there be a good faith discussion about anything?
MR. SNOW: No.
Q How can you say that?
MR. SNOW: Because, I'll tell you -- how can I not?
Q Because -- Tony, you were here Friday.
MR. SNOW: What was the political statement? Tell me what the political sentence was. Give me the sentence.
Q I'll tell you exactly what it was. It was a crystallized greatest hits of the eight-day period in which he made four speeches where he laid out his philosophical underpinnings about the war on terror heading into the election. And he boiled it down, crystallized it and laid it out last night on network TV for 17 minutes. And it was in direct contrast to what you came in here and told us Friday.
MR. SNOW: No, that's not in direct contrast.
Q Yes, it was. You said Friday that there would be no drawing of lines, distinctions between Democrats and Republicans --
MR. SNOW: And there wasn't.
Q -- it would focus on unity.
MR. SNOW: There wasn't.
Q Was it a speech about unity, or was it a speech about a proposal about Iraq?
MR. SNOW: It was speech about -- let me -- out of the entire speech -- well, let's take a look at the Iraq section.
Q Let's do that.
MR. SNOW: Let's have some fun. (Laughter.) If you look at the Iraq statement -- let's back up. We're in a war on terror right now -- I'm going to start at the back and move forward, because the back end is something very important, which is Osama bin Laden, mastermind of September 11th, the person that many people talk about and still have concerns about, calls this fight, the fight in Iraq, "the third world war." And he says that, "Victory for the terrorists in Iraq will mean America's defeat and disgrace forever."
We are in Iraq. It is now seen as the central focal point of the war on terror by the very people who mounted September 11th. If the President of the United States, in talking about September 11th, did not make reference to the plans and the strategy and the beliefs of the very people who mounted September 11th on the anniversary of that date, it would have seen as dereliction. And you guys would have been out here just clubbing me like a baby seal, saying, why didn't --
Q No, I think it would have --
MR. SNOW: -- let me finish and then you can come back -- saying, why on earth did you -- why didn't you talk about Iraq; I know why it is, because the President is being political and he understands that Iraq is unpopular.
Last week the question was: Isn't it true that he wants to talk about the war on terror instead of Iraq. If this is supposed to be political, according to the calculus that is constantly presented to me, it's kind of a weird way to do it.
Instead, what the President was making reference to after September 11th -- the war on terror didn't end on September 11th, it began. It lifted the veil to us on a world that we didn't know existed, that we have to respond to. And it is also a real fact that the war in Iraq is clearly part of that war on terror, and where we proceed with it.
Q You've got to stop right there, because that --
MR. SNOW: Why do I have to stop right there?
Q Because that is the central point that will be debated in the next eight weeks between Democrats and Republicans. That will be in large part what the midterm elections are decided on.
MR. SNOW: I agree.
Q Okay, So if the President takes time in a speech that was advertised by you at this podium on Friday as being non-political and no drawing of distinctions --
MR. SNOW: I said it was no drawing of partisan lines.
Q -- and he gets up last night and lays out his case, and essentially it is an advertisement for the next eight weeks --
MR. SNOW: What you're saying is he shouldn't have talked about Iraq. Is that what you're saying?
Q I'm saying that it wasn't consistent with what it was billed.
MR. SNOW: No, I disagree, and I'll tell you why. Throughout the day, by the way, you're getting an interesting contrast.
You had Congressman Moran going at a memorial service in Arlington and bashing the President. The President never once talked about a Democrat by name yesterday, never once said, my policy is this, their policy is that, they're wrong, I'm right.
What I told you was there would be no drawing of partisan distinctions, and there wasn't. And furthermore, if you look at the section, what part of this -- this controversy -- "Al Qaeda and other extremists from across the world have come to Iraq to stop the rise of a free society in the heart of the Middle East." That's not offensive. How about, "We're training Iraqi troops so that they can defend their nation." Both parties support that. "We will not leave until this work is done." Quick show of hands for everybody who wants to leave until the work is done.
The point is that the use of the term "partisan" I think is being now tossed around as a way to fend off the debate or say, how dare the President talk about it. I guarantee --
Q No, because it was. This was supposed to a pause in all that, for 24 hours.
MR. SNOW: And it was. But if you look at it, what the President is explaining -- and everybody in vast majorities of both Houses of Congress agree, it was important to go ahead and address the issue of Saddam Hussein. And you have wide support in both Houses of Congress. Both Houses of Congress agreed to going into this war. We're there. We have to deal with it. For the President to ignore it -- let me -- I'll give you anecdotal evidence. Yesterday morning, we're in a firehouse in New York, talking with a lot of people who lost friends and buddies. Later in the day we went to Shanksville, and the President worked a long semi-circle of grieving family members. At the Pentagon there is -- as you saw, it was a very emotional meeting with family members. Not one said, don't fight, give up, quit, get out.
But the President did not want to try to turn this into a Democrats versus the Republicans thing, but you cannot talk about the war on terror without talking about Iraq. And furthermore, you can't talk about September 11th, especially when Osama bin Laden, himself, says, Iraq is at the center of all this -- without mentioning it.
What he tried to do was to lay it out in as neutral a way as possible and explain why he did it. And furthermore the question was, why are you there? This was the question that he answered.
This was not an attempt to stir the hornet's nest. Meanwhile, Senator Levine, before the speech, on Lou Dobbs hammering the President. You had people, as you all know, had their talking points out, accusing the President of being partisan the instant the speech was over. There was no talk out of the White House yesterday of Democrat versus Republican.
And, furthermore, a good 90 percent of the speech has to deal with the things that draw us together, including many of the sections -- many of the sentences on Iraq were expressions of things that are utterly uncontroversial with both political parties.
Q But, Tony, when the President said yesterday that the worst mistake -- talking about Iraq, that the worst mistake would be to think that if we pulled out, the terrorist would leave us alone. Who is he referring to, though? Isn't he suggesting implicitly that --
MR. SNOW: No, he's not --
Q -- that's what his critics believe?
MR. SNOW: No, he's making a statement. Look, here's the question that people will ask, should we leave right now or not? Under what conditions should we leave? The President says he wants to get out, everybody wants to get out. The question is, under what conditions?
No, what he was actually doing was summarizing testimony that General Abizaid had given, and what General Abizaid has told him directly, which is, if we leave they will follow us. That's what he was trying to do. He was repeating what he's heard from the key General in the war.
Q But he said the worst mistake would be to think that if we pulled out the terrorists would leave us alone. Has someone suggested that they feel the terrorists would leave us alone if we left Iraq?
MR. SNOW: No, what he's trying to do is to repeat to you exactly what the terrorists think. That sentence is not an attempt -- look, I have a feeling that some people may feel pain because they think it's pointing to them. It's not pointing to them, it's pointing at the terrorists. It's pointing at the terrorists who, again, want to engage in the fantasy -- they've learned the hard way once, and let's pray they don't learn the hard way twice -- they don't realize that we love our liberty and we love our country. And if they strike, we're going to strike back. That's what that's all about. That's as much a warning to terrorists as anything else. It's not a desire to start pointing fingers at members of Congress.
Q Tony, when he says, let's put aside our differences, what is he referring to? Is he referring to Iraq or something else?
MR. SNOW: Look, I think it is perfectly possible and laudable -- getting back to David's question -- people can disagree about Iraq, they can disagree. But let's do it in a way where we keep our eye on the ball, which is to win the war on terror and do it in a constructive way to figure out how best to get the job done. If somebody wants to do it, that's fine, but don't start finger-pointing and all that kind of thing. I think the most important challenge facing the American people right now is to realize that it's a long war. And one of the key calculations of bin Laden and others is we'll run out of patience -- we won't, but that's their calculation.
And what the President -- look, it would be great if both political parties right now would start realizing that the national interest is to win the war on terror and to present a united front. It's not likely to happen in a political year. There are going to be disagreements. It's been that way in every war and in every administration, but we'll get through it.
Jim.
4 comments:
"...how can there be a good faith discussion about anything?"
There can't...and they don't want one.
One thing that struck me as odd in the days after 9/11 was Bush saying "We will not tolerate conspiracy theories [regarding 9/11]". Sure enough there have been some wacky conspiracy theories surrounding the events of that day. The most far-fetched and patently ridiculous one that I've ever heard goes like this: Nineteen hijackers who claimed to be devout Muslims but yet were so un-Muslim as to be getting drunk all the time, doing cocaine and frequenting strip clubs decided to hijack four airliners and fly them into buildings in the northeastern U.S., the area of the country that is the most thick with fighter bases. After leaving a Koran on a barstool at a strip bar after getting shitfaced drunk on the night before, then writing a suicide note/inspirational letter that sounded like it was written by someone with next to no knowledge of Islam, they went to bed and got up the next morning hung over and carried out their devious plan. Nevermind the fact that of the four "pilots" among them there was not a one that could handle a Cessna or a Piper Cub let alone fly a jumbo jet, and the one assigned the most difficult task of all, Hani Hanjour, was so laughably incompetent that he was the worst fake "pilot" of the bunch, with someone who was there when he was attempting to fly a small airplane saying that Hanjour was so clumsy that he was unsure if he had driven a car before. Nevermind the fact that they received very rudimentary flight training at Pensacola Naval Air Station, making them more likely to have been C.I.A. assets than Islamic fundamentalist terrorists. So on to the airports after Mohammed Atta supposedly leaves two rental cars at two impossibly far-removed locations. So they hijack all four airliners and at this time passengers on United 93 start making a bunch of cell phone calls from 35,000 feet in the air to tell people what was going on. Nevermind the fact that cell phones wouldn't work very well above 4,000 feet, and wouldn't work at ALL above 8,000 feet. But the conspiracy theorists won't let that fact get in the way of a good fantasy. That is one of the little things you "aren't supposed to think about". Nevermind that one of the callers called his mom and said his first and last name ("Hi mom, this is Mark Bingham"), more like he was reading from a list than calling his own mom. Anyway, when these airliners each deviated from their flight plan and didn't respond to ground control, NORAD would any other time have followed standard operating procedure (and did NOT have to be told by F.A.A. that there were hijackings because they were watching the same events unfold on their own radar) which means fighter jets would be scrambled from the nearest base where they were available on standby within a few minutes, just like every other time when airliners stray off course. But of course on 9/11 this didn't happen, not even close. Somehow these "hijackers" must have used magical powers to cause NORAD to stand down, as ridiculous as this sounds because total inaction from the most high-tech and professional Air Force in the world would be necessary to carry out their tasks. So on the most important day in its history the Air Force was totally worthless. Then they had to make one of the airliners look like a smaller plane, because unknown to them the Naudet brothers had a videocamera to capture the only known footage of the North Tower crash, and this footage shows something that doesn't look like a jumbo jet, but didn't have to bother with the South Tower jet disguising itself because that was the one we were "supposed to see". Anyway, as for the Pentagon they had to have Hani Hanjour fly his airliner like it was a fighter plane, making a high G-force corkscrew turn that no real airliner can do, in making its descent to strike the Pentagon. But these "hijackers" wanted to make sure Rumsfeld survived so they went out of their way to hit the farthest point in the building from where Rumsfeld and the top brass are located. And this worked out rather well for the military personnel in the Pentagon, since the side that was hit was the part that was under renovation at the time with few military personnel present compared to construction workers. Still more fortuitous for the Pentagon, the side that was hit had just before 9/11 been structurally reinforced to prevent a large fire there from spreading elsewhere in the building. Awful nice of them to pick that part to hit, huh? Then the airliner vaporized itself into nothing but tiny unidentifiable pieces most no bigger than a fist, unlike the crash of a real airliner when you will be able to see at least some identifiable parts, like crumpled wings, broken tail section etc. Why, Hani Hanjour the terrible pilot flew that airliner so good that even though he hit the Pentagon on the ground floor the engines didn't even drag the ground!! Imagine that!! Though the airliner vaporized itself on impact it only made a tiny 16 foot hole in the building. Amazing. Meanwhile, though the planes hitting the Twin Towers caused fires small enough for the firefighters to be heard on their radios saying "We just need 2 hoses and we can knock this fire down" attesting to the small size of it, somehow they must have used magical powers from beyond the grave to make this morph into a raging inferno capable of making the steel on all forty-seven main support columns (not to mention the over 100 smaller support columns) soften and buckle, then all fail at once. Hmmm. Then still more magic was used to make the building totally defy physics as well as common sense in having the uppermost floors pass through the remainder of the building as quickly, meaning as effortlessly, as falling through air, a feat that without magic could only be done with explosives. Then exactly 30 minutes later the North Tower collapses in precisely the same freefall physics-defying manner. Incredible. Not to mention the fact that both collapsed at a uniform rate too, not slowing down, which also defies physics because as the uppermost floors crash into and through each successive floor beneath them they would shed more and more energy each time, thus slowing itself down. Common sense tells you this is not possible without either the hijackers' magical powers or explosives. To emphasize their telekinetic prowess, later in the day they made a third building, WTC # 7, collapse also at freefall rate though no plane or any major debris hit it. Amazing guys these magical hijackers. But we know it had to be "Muslim hijackers" the conspiracy theorist will tell you because (now don't laugh) one of their passports was "found" a couple days later near Ground Zero, miraculously "surviving" the fire that we were told incinerated planes, passengers and black boxes, and also "survived" the collapse of the building it was in. When common sense tells you if that were true then they should start making buildings and airliners out of heavy paper and plastic so as to be "indestructable" like that magic passport. The hijackers even used their magical powers to bring at least seven of their number back to life, to appear at american embassies outraged at being blamed for 9/11!! BBC reported on that and it is still online. Nevertheless, they also used magical powers to make the american government look like it was covering something up in the aftermath of this, what with the hasty removal of the steel debris and having it driven to ports in trucks with GPS locators on them, to be shipped overseas to China and India to be melted down. When common sense again tells you that this is paradoxical in that if the steel was so unimportant that they didn't bother saving some for analysis but so important as to require GPS locators on the trucks with one driver losing his job because he stopped to get lunch. Hmmmm. Further making themselves look guilty, the Bush administration steadfastly refused for over a year to allow a commission to investigate 9/11 to even be formed, only agreeing to it on the conditions that they get to dictate its scope, meaning it was based on the false pretense of the "official story" being true with no other alternatives allowed to be considered, handpicked all its members making sure the ones picked had vested interests in the truth remaining buried, and with Bush and Cheney only "testifying" together, only for an hour, behind closed doors, with their attorneys present and with their "testimonies" not being recorded by tape or even written down in notes. Yes, this whole story smacks of the utmost idiocy and fantastic far-fetched lying, but it is amazingly enough what some people believe. Even now, five years later, the provably false fairy tale of the "nineteen hijackers" is heard repeated again and again, and is accepted without question by so many Americans. Which is itself a testament to the innate psychological cowardice of the American sheeple, i mean people, and their abject willingness to believe something, ANYTHING, no matter how ridiculous in order to avoid facing a scary uncomfortable truth. Time to wake up America.
Debunking Popular Mechanics lies:
http://www.lookingglassnews.org/viewstory.php?storyid=6880
someone else debunking Popular Mechanics crap:
http://www.serendipity.li/wot/pop_mech/reply_to_popular_mechanics.htm
still more debunking Popular Mechanics:
http://letsroll911.org/ipw-web/bulletin/bb/viewtopic.php?t=5505
and still more debunking of Popular Mechanics:
http://www.reopen911.org/ericreubt.htm
Popular Mechanics staff replaced just before laughable “debunking” article written:
http://www.reopen911.org/hiddenhand.htm
another neo-con 9/11 hit piece explodes, is retracted:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/august2006/180806hitpiece.htm
Professor Steven Jones debunks the N.I.S.T. “report” as well as the F.E.M.A. one and the 9/11 commission "report":
http://www.infowars.com/articles/sept11/wtc_buildings_collapse_steven_jones.htm
N.I.S.T. scientist interviewed:
http://www.teamliberty.net/id235.html
F.B.I. says no hard evidence linking Osama bin Laden to 9/11 which is why his wanted poster says nothing about 9/11:
http://forum.afghansite.com/index.php?showtopic=9349
Fire Engineering magazine says important questions about the Twin Tower “collapses” still need to be addressed:http://fe.pennnet.com/Articles/Article_Display.cfm?Section=OnlineArticles&SubSection=Display&PUBLICATION_ID=25&ARTICLE_ID
Twin Towers’ construction certifiers say they should have easily withstood it:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/november2004/121104easilywithstood.htm
USA Today interview with the last man out of the South Tower, pursued by a fireball:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/sept11/2001/12/19/usat-escape.htm
Janitor who heard explosions and escaped has testimony ignored by 9/11 whitewash commission:
http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/ignoring_9-11.html
Janitor starts speaking out about it and his apartment is burglarized, laptop stolen:
http://kurtnimmo.blogspot.com/2005/08/apartment-of-nine-eleven-hero-william_28.html
Firefighters tell of multiple explosions:
http://www.wnbc.com/news/1315651/detail.html
Eyewitnesses tell of explosions:
http://research.amnh.org/users/tyson/essays/TheHorrorTheHorror.html
Interview with another firefighter telling of explosions:
http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/nyregion/20050812_WTC_GRAPHIC/Banaciski_Richard.txt
Firefighter saw “sparkles” (strobe lights on detonators?) before “collapse”:
http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/nyregion/20050812_WTC_GRAPHIC/Fitzpatrick_Tom.txt
Other eyewitnesses talk of seeing/hearing explosions:
http://georgewashington.blogspot.com/2005/11/more-proof-911-inside-job-witnesses-to.html
Surviving eyewitnesses talk of multiple explosions there:
http://www.thememoryhole.org/911/veliz-bombs.htm
Cutter charge explosions clearly visible:
http://www.rense.com/general63/cutt.htm
The pyroclastic cloud (that dust cloud that a second before was concrete) and how it wouldn’t be possible without explosives:
http://st12.startlogic.com/~xenonpup/physics/
Detailed description of the demolition of the Twin Towers:
http://gordonssite.tripod.com/id2.html
Freefall rate of “collapses” math:
http://www.911blimp.net/prf_FreeFallPhysics.shtml
More about their freefall rate “collapses”:
http://www.serendipity.li/wot/second_wave.htm
Video footage of the controlled demolition of the Twin Towers:
http://www.plaguepuppy.net/public_html/video%20archive/
Video footage of the controlled demolition of WTC # 7 building:
http://911research.wtc7.net/talks/wtc/videos.html
More of WTC # 7 controlled demolition:
http://www.wtc7.net/
Naudet brothers' video footage of the North Tower crash:
http://www.911blimp.net/vid_Naudet.shtml
Photos of the Pentagon’s lawn (look at these and see if you can tell me with a straight face that a jumbo jet crashed there):
http://www.911blimp.net/cached/HuntTheBoeing!.htm
More photos of this amazing lawn at the Pentagon:
http://cryptogon.com/docs/Introducing%20the%20amazing%20Penta-Lawn%202000!%20(9-11).htm
Very unconvincing fake “Osama” “confession” tape:
http://welfarestate.com/wtc/faketape/
More about the fake “Osama” tape:
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/osamatape2.html
Fake “Mohammed Atta” “suicide” letter:
http://www.welfarestate.com/wtc/fake-letters.txt
Commercial pilots disagree with “official” 9/11 myth:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/september_11_us_government_accused.htm
More commercial jet pilots say “official” myth is impossible:
http://www.masternewmedia.org/2001/10/31/commercial_jet_pilots_analysis_of_the_twin_tower_attack.htm
Impossibility of cell phone calls from United 93:
http://www.physics911.net/cellphoneflight93.htm
More about the impossible cell phone calls:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO408B.html
Experiment proves cell phone calls were NOT possible from anywhere near the altitude the “official” myth has them at:
http://physics911.ca/org/modules/news/article.php?storyid=9
Fake Barbara Olson phone call:
http://www.vialls.com/lies911/lies.htm
Where the hell was the Air Force?
http://www.welfarestate.com/wtc/af-scramble.txt
More about the Air Force impotence question:
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0331-11.htm
Sept. 10th 2001, Pentagon announces it is “missing” $2.3 trillion (now why do you think they picked THAT day to announce it? So it could be buried the next day by 9/11 news):
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/01/29/eveningnews/main325985.shtml
Unocal pipeline-through-Afghanistan plan:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0513/p05s01-wosc.html
Unocal pipeline-through-Afghanistan plan mentioned:
http://thetyee.ca/Views/2006/05/19/OutOfAfghanistan
More on Unocal Afghan pipeline:
http://www.newscentralasia.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1031
The attack on Afghanistan was planned in the summer of 2001, months before 9/11:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/1550366.stm
Pentagon deliberately misled 9/11 Commission:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=EGG20060802&articleId=2887
Evidence destruction by authorities and cover-up:
http://www.flcv.com/coverup.html/
9/11 whitewash Commission and NORAD day:
http://fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/071204_final_fraud.shtml
The incredible fish tales of the 9/11 Commission examined:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=%20GR20051213&articleId=1478
Jeb Bush declares state of emergency 4 days before 9/11 for Florida, saying it will help respond to terrorism:
http://www.eionews.addr.com/psyops/news/jebknew.htm
Steel debris removal from Ground Zero, destruction of evidence:
http://911research.wtc7.net/wtc/groundzero/cleanup.html
Over two hundred incriminating bits of 9/11 evidence shown in the mainstream media:
http://thewebfairy.com/killtown/911smokingguns.html
Tracking the “hijackers”:
http://www.welfarestate.com/911/
“Hijacker” patsies:
http://911review.org/Wiki/HijackersPatsies.shtml
“Hijackers” receiving flight training at Pensacola Naval Air Station:
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0208/S00085.htm
Several accused "hijackers" still alive and well, wondering why they are accused:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/1559151.stm
Yet the F.B.I. insists that the people it claims were the "hijackers" really were the "hijackers":
http://www.prisonplanet.com/fbi_denies_mix_up_of_911_terrorists.htm
No Arabs on Flight 77:
http://www.sierratimes.com/03/07/02/article_tro.htm
Thirty experts say “official” 9/11 myth impossible:
http://911fraud.blogspot.com/2005/06/us-governments-offical-911-story-is.html
“Al Qaeda” website tracks back to Maryland:
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/alqmaryland.html
Al Qaeda videos uploaded from a U.S. government website:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/july2004/140704governmentwebsite.htm
Operation: Northwoods, a plan for a false-flag “terror” attack to be blamed on Castro to use it as a pretext for America to invade Cuba, thankfully not approved by Kennedy back in 1962 but was approved by the Joint Chiefs of Staff and sent to his desk:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/us_terror_plan_cuba_invasion_pretext.html
Enlighten...that's a hefty comment. Do you have a blog yourself? It's worthy.
blog on friends, blog on all.
Thanks Windspike. No, I don't have a blog of my own, I don't know even how to get one going. Also, I don't really have the requisite time to be able to devote to one; from what I understand having your own blog is a pretty involved thing, a lot of work. Keeping it updated etc. I hate going onto a blog that the blogmaster or whatever they're called isn't able to keep it updated, you look on it and nothing has changed since a fortnight ago. I'm afraid if I had a blog it would be like that, instead of like yours and other good blogs like Moxie's where they are daily or almost-daily updated. It's a big commitment having a blog, and I have to hand it to you Windspike, you've got a good one. Well thanks for the kind words anyway, I'll keep it in mind in case I am able to have more time at my disposal at some time in the future.
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