Tuesday, October 26, 2004

Re: FW: Incompetence

yeah - i dont have a clear picture... however, the metanarrative that ive been running is that there might not be an election, and there might be a terrorist attack. or a major terror threat. and everyones been waiting for the october surprise. thisjust released news that there are 400 tonnes of explosives is at least consistent with all that. (the news is a year or more old)

as for the pr damage, these guys have survived everything so far, incredibly. and the campaign has been based on '43 is the best man on terror' - somehow more evidence of terror seems to outweigh 'more evidence of incompetence'. astonishingly. sadly. if incompetence was an issue he would have been disqualified a long time ago...

im surprised that the repugs didnt have a good message response - theyve been all over the shop. and weak at every attempt. you'd generally think that fact would point to the idea that it hasnt been orchestrated by them - but then on the flipside, theyve been trying to cover up this story for a year anyways, and theyve known that the story was coming out for at least 2 weeks. and they still had a bumbling response. they could have easily come out with the 'fog of war' thing which would sufficiently explain it to most people in a soundbite.

'jonk on the economy, 43 on terror.'

if it is rovian, its a masterpiece - cos no-one could have predicted it, he had very few options that wouldnt have brought howls of derision. bringing obl outta the closet was (prolly) too much. in some ways, its not dissimilar to the rathergate leak. this way, noone suspects him. except for me. but i dont trust hardly anything!

the media doesnt really seem to be turning it into a 'be scared' story - but rather incompetence.

i dont really know what to make of it all. but i dont necessarily trust it.

one things for sure - if an am building blows up this week - friday perhaps - using rdx, we'll know where the explosives came from...

and if theres no rove involvement, then the incompetence in iraq is truly mindblowing. (ive always mostly believed that the incompetence was intentional - but thats another story)


----- Original Message -----
From: "Adam
To:
Subject: FW: Incompetence
Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2004 14:37:23 -0400

>
> Here is the Democratic spin (I mean take) on the missing arms
> story..does sort of make you wonder how the Rove/Cheney team could have
> thought this was a good idea/how they will spin it."You need us to keep
> you safer, because the world is dangerous.because these arms have been
> stolen.because we are fighting to keep you safer".
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Joe Lockhart, Kerry-Edwards 2004 [mailto:info@johnkerry.com]
> Sent: Monday, October 25, 2004 1:39 PM
> To: a
> Subject: Incompetence
>
>

> This morning, The New York Times published a story that offers further
> proof of how the Bush administration's incompetence and arrogance has
> endangered the lives of our troops and the American people.
> Even before invading Iraq, the Bush administration knew that a huge
> facility, called Al Qaqaa, contained nearly 380 tons of deadly
> explosives. Despite the fact that they knew exactly where this facility
> was and what was there, they took no action to secure or protect the
> site. Due to the stunning incompetence of the Bush administration and
> their incomprehensible failure to plan, these explosives have
> disappeared.
> Let me put this in perspective -- the bomb that took down Pan Am Flight
> 103 over Scotland used less than one pound of this same explosive. There
> were 760,000 pounds at Al Qaqaa.
> You can read the article by visiting:
>
> http://www.johnkerry.com/pressroom/news/news_2004_1025.html
> Our troops are the best-trained and best-led forces in the world, and
> they have been doing their job honorably and bravely. The problem is the
> commander in chief has not being doing his. George Bush refuses to
> recognize his failures in Iraq, so he can't fix them and is doomed to
> repeat them.
> Thank you,
> Joe Lockhart
> Senior Advisor
>
> P.S.
> Use our online volunteer center to talk to your local media outlets
> about this story:
>
>
> http://volunteer.johnkerry.com/speakout/
>
> After being warned about the danger of major stockpiles of explosives in
> Iraq, this administration failed to guard those stockpiles. This is one
> of the great blunders of the Bush policy in Iraq. The administration has
> several key questions to answer:
> 1. Why did the administration ignore warnings from the IAEA to
> secure the nearly 380 tons of explosives in Iraq?
>
> 2. Did President Bush's failure to listen to General Shinseki and
> others about the troop levels that would be needed to secure Iraq after
> the initial military operations contribute to the military's inability
> to secure the site?
>
> 3. How many terrorist bombings in Iraq, Egypt or elsewhere have
> been carried out using HMX, RDX or PETN explosives since 2002?
>
> 4. Who knew what, when? When was the civilian leadership at the
> Pentagon told about the missing explosives? When did Secretary Rumsfeld
> learn that the explosives had gone missing? When was the president's
> National Security Council informed? When was national security advisor
> Condoleezza Rice briefed on this? When was the president told?
>
> 5. What is the chronology of action taken by the Bush
> administration after being informed that the explosives had gone
> missing?
>
> 6. Has the site been inspected recently?
>
> 7. Why did the Bush administration deny the IAEA's request to go
> back into Iraq to verify the status of the stockpile?
>
> 8. What action did Paul Bremer take after reportedly being warned
> in May 2004 that the explosives had gone missing?
>
> 9. In addition to the missing explosives and reports of machine
> tools that can be used for nuclear and non nuclear purposes, what other
> sites in Iraq with dangerous material were not adequately protected and
> subsequently looted?
>
> 10. Is there an estimate for the total amount of munitions, weapons
> and explosives that have gone missing in Iraq?
>
________________________________________________________________________________
Four More of the Same. Four More of the Same.
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