Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - Bush & Blair Knew & Both Went on Vacation; Is the Code Red Terror Alert Legitimate?

host · 08-11-2006, 12:10 AM

IMO, the greatest threat faced by the greatest numbers of residents of the UK and the US is not from, as the political officials in those two countries want you to fear it is......the threat of attacks by "terrorists" (in response to the announced Aug. 9, "foiling" of the "terror plot" US president Bush called them <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamofascism">"Islamic facists"</a> ), but from the agenda of the politcal officials themselves.

The greatest threat that my research causes me to suspect that we face, is an "officially" sanctioned, propaganda campaign that is intent on diminishing the rights and authority of "the people", by scaring and intimidating them into "giving it up" to the officials who are coordinating the "fear based", propaganda campaign. Follow the track record of the "leaders"; their pronouncements, the lucky "coincidences" that surround the "timing" of terror "alerts" and announcements of "progress" in the "WoT".....coincidences that too often seem to occur at opportune times, for the benefit of the "leaders" in the areas of reversing sagging polling trends, influencing voters to favor the campaigns of the "leaders" on the eves of elections that are important to them and their political allies, and then "disappear", when there is no immediate agenda that requires reinforcing the "fear" into the public psyche.

On the very "eve" of the latest "terror alert", the message was clear: DO NOT QUESTION or CRITICIZE GOVERNMENT SECURITY OFFICIALS:
On Aug. 9, 2006, the day before the terror plot was foiled,
British Home Secretary John Reid:

Quote:

http://www.epolitix.com/EN/News/2006...3513d4b82d.htm
....In a speech to the think tank Demos, John Reid said many in Britain had failed to grasp the scale of the terrorist threat.

"I make this point about the requirement for a fundamental understanding of the nature of the struggle in which we're engaged," he said.

"It will be wide, it will be long, it will be deep and it will be difficult.

"Our adversaries in international terrorism are completely unconstrained.

"The international terrorists of today are ruthless and unconstrained in every direction, including in their attempts to misuse our freedoms to undermine our free society."

Saying that terrorists were abusing "great strengths" like the free media and ease of travel, he said: "They endeavour to drain our morale through the misuse of our freedoms by misrepresenting every mistake or over-reaction as if it is our primary or real purpose."

"We should not allow ourselves to be seduced by the terrorist who urges [us] to be the quickest to condemn our security forces and police on every occasion and the slowest to understand the problems they face in tackling a new and unconstrained enemy," Reid added.

<h3>Comment from host: Consider that the previous comment by Reid, warns that, if you question or criticize the government "security forces and police on every occasion", you are "seduced by the terrorist". IMO, Reid offers only two choices....seduction by the government, or by the terrorist, but certainly no choice for "healthy skepticism".....</h3>

Warning that Britain may have to give up some of its freedoms in the short term in order to protect them in the long term, the home secretary said the government's terrorism legislation had proved necessary despite the opposition it has met from parliament, the judiciary and the press.

"In spite of these changes we remain unable to adapt our institutions and legal orthodoxy as fast as I believe we need to," he also warned.

"The nature of organised crime, social breakdown in parts of our community, not to say the threat of global terrorism bent on mass slaughter means traditional civil liberty arguments are not so much wrong as made for another age.

"We are in some ways attempting to fight a 21st century struggle with a framework of thought, culture and international legality which was provided for the mid-20th century."

He said human rights laws were designed to protect the individual from states with "fascist inclinations", whereas the challenge today was a threat to society from "what might be called fascist individuals".

Reid also said terrorism was a challenge faced by everyone in Britain. "Our common security in this country can only be assured by a common effort from all sections of society," he said.

Rachel Briggs from Demos welcomed his comments, but said she was not convinced the government was prepared to make compromises to involve others in improving security.....

She said: "The big message was the need to move beyond this outdated idea that security is something governments do to us or impose on us.

"It needs to understand that if it talks about genuine partnership that doesn't mean dictating to people."

Briggs said Demos' research found the government had squandered goodwill in Muslim communities after July 7 by "giving them no space for their own voice".

Reid's "message", IMO was clear: We are scaring you into a state where you will stop asking any questions, and you will give up some of your freedom for the duration of a long, long war, so that "we", your government officials, can protect you from "terrorists", until "we" decide that it is "safe" to return some of the civil liberties that we convinced you to "give up"....someday.....

It is clear to me that there is a high probability that the following is an accurate assessment of what has actually happened (happening) in the US:

Quote:

http://www.time.com/time/nation/prin...211369,00.html
Friday, Jul. 07, 2006
Toying With Terror Alerts? In the Bush era, the timing and quality of "arrests" and "warnings" have a suspicious ring
By JOSHUA MICAH MARSHALL

In these perilous days, we must be ready to think the unthinkable. No, I don't mean the possibility of a catastrophic terrorist attack. After 9/11, that's all too easy to imagine. No, I'm talking about a thought that even now seldom forces its way into respectable conversation: the quite reasonable suspicion that the Bush Administration orchestrates its terror alerts and arrests to goose the GOP's poll numbers.

Now, I'm a respectable columnist. I don't want to draw rolled eyes. But think about it.

The 18 months prior to the 2004 presidential election witnessed a barrage of those ridiculous color-coded terror alerts, quashed-plot headlines and breathless press conferences from Administration officials. Warnings of terror attacks over the Christmas 2003 holidays, warnings over summer terror attacks at the 2004 political conventions, then a whole slew of warnings of terror attacks to disrupt the election itself. Even the timing of the alerts seemed to fall with odd regularity right on the heels of major political events. One of Department of Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge's terror warnings came two days after John Kerry picked John Edwards as his running mate; another came three days after the end of the Democratic convention.

So it went right through the 2004 election. And then not long after the champagne corks stopped popping at Bush campaign headquarters, terror alerts seemed to go out of style. The color codes became yesterday's news. With the exception of one warning about mass-transit facilities in response to the London bombing on July 7, 2005, that was pretty much it until this summer. I live in lower Manhattan and my wife works in a building overlooking Ground Zero. So I want to know when something's really up and not worry that I'm getting bamboozled to amp the President's approval rating.

Can I prove any of this was politically motivated? Of course not. But that's the magic of the terror-alert song and dance. There's no way to know. All the key facts are veiled in secrecy, as they must be. So it's impossible to know from the outside whether it's on the level or not. But with another election looming, it seems we're about to get a bunch of new chances to wonder.

On June 23, cable-news channels went gonzo over a raid on a homegrown terror cell in Miami that foiled an alleged plot to blow up Chicago's Sears Tower. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales held a press conference to announce the arrests. Even Vice President Dick Cheney weighed in and called the group a "very real threat." He did so at a political fundraiser.

But as often is the case in these announcements, it turned out to be a lot less than advertised, unless you were a writer for Saturday Night Live. When the FBI raided the abandoned warehouse where the group hung out in Miami's impoverished Liberty City neighborhood, they found no weapons, no money and no evidence of ties to any terrorist group anywhere. Indeed, these would-be jihadis were so early in their planning for jihad that they hadn't yet set aside time to become Muslims. The group, according to a follow-up report from Reuters, "mixes Islam, Buddhism, Christianity, Freemasonry, Gnosticism and Taoism." Their covert methods included taking turns guarding the abandoned warehouse (which served as their clubhouse) wearing black uniforms, ski masks and combat boots in the hot Florida summer. Their leader, Narseal Batiste, roamed the streets in a bathrobe with a crooked wooden staff recruiting men to join his group. The oath of allegiance to al-Qaeda they allegedly made to an FBI informant seems as likely as not to have been prompted by the informants' offer of new pairs of boots for the gang. Shoes were apparently in short supply.

You don't need to be a Muslim or even that bright a bulb to create deadly mayhem. Richard Reid, the would-be shoe bomber, was a klutz, but one who might have downed an airliner en route to the U.S. in the days after 9/11. But the Miami warehouse cult that gave Cheney the willies seemed like they'd have trouble finding a Sears let alone blowing up the Sears Tower.

Two weeks later there was another report of a foiled plot, this one a far more serious-sounding scheme to blow up the Holland Tunnel, which connects New Jersey to Manhattan. Sensing their credibility might be running thin, FBI officials as well as members of media started referring to these plotters as the "real deal" plotters, presumably to distinguish them from whack jobs in Miami. These guys too, it turned out, hadn't done much more than talk in an Internet chat room about blowing something up. And their plan to flood downtown New York City with sea water from a demolished tunnel would have been complicated a bit by the fact that, unlike New Orleans, Manhattan is well above sea level.

The "tell" in this case was the date. The FBI got wind of this plot last summer and arrests were made back in April. So why did we hear about them on July 7, the anniversary of the London bombings? I believe the question answers itself. The story was leaked to pump up the anniversary of the London subway bombings on July 7, 2005, and remind people that if it could happen in London it could happen here. The dozens if not hundreds of law enforcement folks who worked on thwarting this embryonic plot were not part of some political scheme. But whoever chose July 7 to leak the story clearly was. With the mid-term election less than four months away, for some people, that's a helpful message.

Joshua Micah Marshall is head of TPM Media and the founder of Talkingpointsmemo.com

As the recent <a href="http://www.pollingreport.com/terror.htm#USA">polling data</a> concerning public opinion about the progress and management of the war in Iraq and national security clearly indicate, (with the exception of foxnews poll results....) the declining trend in support for Bush and republican management of these issues, less than three months from a mid-term election that could result in the shift of political control of one or both branches of congress to democrats, make what is billed, "a terror alert in the aftermath of the foiling of the greatest Al Qaeda plot since the 9/11 attacks", quite a timely gift for candidates who need to scare potential voters into voting for them.....voting to "stay the course"....because you don't "switch horses" in "mid-stream".....wink....wink !!!