Steelplate
New member
And this refutes my post how?
Obama, Asleep at the Switch?
- Thread starter Dixie - In Memoriam
- Start date
And this refutes my post how?
Of course I dismiss the source....I gave you 2 links from government documents.....excellent sources and you give me 'americanprogress' bullshit.....
a far left crap site that spouts lies, cherry picks events and conveniently ignores others.....
you bet I dismiss the source.....the same as you would whine about if I sourced Glenn Beck or Breitbart...fool.
Now try again.....show me a reputable link that Ashcroft cut over 50 mill from the DOJ....especially the FBI which was the main terrorism fighting org.
and explain why he and Bush asked to an increase of over 100 million for the next budget.
Talk about revisionist history.....you and thingy ought to write a history book, comic fiction of course.....
Last edited:
Off the books ?.....lmao......neat phrase,....meaningless but clever.....
Here is your heros legacy....here is where the taxpayers money goes.....
The number of Americans living in poverty has spiked to levels not seen since the mid 1960s, classing 20 per cent of the country’s children as poor.
record long term unemployment under President Obama is at the highest level since at least the end of World War II
record -- of continuous high unemployment
record numbers getting disability
record numbers getting food stamps
record number of years Senate has not passed a budget
record high national debt
record of military suicides
record of military kia in Afghanistan
record High Gasoline at Pump Averaged in 2012
record largest monthly deficit in history in February at $223 billion...CBO ( deficit for the ENTIRE Year of 2007 year was $62 billion lower than this one month)
record 'first'....debt rating has been downgraded for the first time in our history under Obama.
record....The number of Americans designated as "not in the labor force" in February, 2013 was 89,304,000, a record high,
First pinhead to propose 2 budgets that even his own party refused to vote for....
maineman
Banned
Government links are embedded. I knew you'd never take the time to click on them and read them.
OK...so I looked over the embedded links....can't find any mention of Ashcroft cutting 50+ million dollars affecting the FBI's conterterrorism ability....for 2001 or 2002 or 2003......
The Presidents budget for 2002 holds funding levels at 2001 levels and a 6% increase for 2003 was proposed....
as a matter of fact, the OMB requested only an increase of 4% for 2003.
The budget proposes to reduce funding for counter terrorism equipment GRANTS by 65,000,000.....is this what you 're whining about ?
It goes on,.....As of June, 2001, this program was operating with an "unobligated balance of 180,000,000 which represents 2 years of appropriated funding.....
(this is excess money, unobligated balance, money not spent for its intended purpose)
That means that they already had enough unspent money to cover the next 2 years, 180,000,000 dollars FOR THE STATES preparedness plans......so the cut of 65,000,000 is no cut at all affecting the the FBI's ability for fight terrorism......it was money that would be used by the states if and when they finally submitted plans in 2002....
Nice try, but no cigar.....you lose this one.
Last edited:
Dixie - In Memoriam
New member
Wow mainey... is your ass bleeding after that?
maineman
Banned
But in his Sept. 10 submission to the budget office, Mr. Ashcroft did not endorse F.B.I. requests for $58 million for 149 new counterterrorism field agents, 200 intelligence analysts and 54 additional translators.
Mr. Ashcroft proposed cuts in 14 programs. One proposed $65 million cut was for a program that gives state and local counterterrorism grants for equipment, including radios and decontamination suits and training to localities for counterterrorism preparedness.
http://www.criminology.fsu.edu/transcrime/articles/How Sept_ 11 Changed Goals of Justice Dept.htm
The fact remains: terrorism was a higher priority for the Clinton administration than it was for the Bush administration pre-9/11. Dixie states that once Dubya declared war on terrorism, all of a sudden the deaths in America stopped. My question to him remains unanswered: why, after Khobar Towers and the African embassies, and the USS Cole, was Bush not already ON a war footing against terror? The Clinton administration had been. Why did he simply read the August 6th PDB and blithely ignore it and the growing threat that AQ posed to us until AFTER 9/11, when, all of a sudden, he and Asscroft became born again terror warriors?
Mr. Ashcroft proposed cuts in 14 programs. One proposed $65 million cut was for a program that gives state and local counterterrorism grants for equipment, including radios and decontamination suits and training to localities for counterterrorism preparedness.
http://www.criminology.fsu.edu/transcrime/articles/How Sept_ 11 Changed Goals of Justice Dept.htm
The fact remains: terrorism was a higher priority for the Clinton administration than it was for the Bush administration pre-9/11. Dixie states that once Dubya declared war on terrorism, all of a sudden the deaths in America stopped. My question to him remains unanswered: why, after Khobar Towers and the African embassies, and the USS Cole, was Bush not already ON a war footing against terror? The Clinton administration had been. Why did he simply read the August 6th PDB and blithely ignore it and the growing threat that AQ posed to us until AFTER 9/11, when, all of a sudden, he and Asscroft became born again terror warriors?
OnearmSword
New member
My hero?? That maggot is not and never has been my hero. As far as I am concerned he should be impeached ,found guilty of treason and given the max sentence allowed by law!
Here was my point in that reply, the last paragraph that in fact was putting it far too mildly. I've added in a few well placed corrections. Obama is deliberately bankrupting the nation..
Pres. Obama’s claim is indeed an optimistic one, but is it all that accurate?( NO! ) For starters, the Congressional Budget Office admits that, yes, the deficit may be slightly less in the coming months than what we’ve seen throughout the Obama administration so far, but in ten years’ time things aren’t likely to shape up all that wonderfully.(Going to be a financial disaster is more like it) The CBO projects a deficit of $845 billion — a fantastic figure when compared with the deficits exceeding $1 trillion that have occurred since Pres. Obama took office — but the size of that sum won’t be shrinking for long. (Never shrank to start with) The CBO expects the deficit to take an upward turn again as soon as 2015, with a total of $7 trillion expected to be added to the national debt during the next decade.(far greater than 7 trillion, is on course to be more like 12 trillion)
=================================================
Did not endorse and cutting 50 million are two different things......plus, the FBI's request was for the upcoming year (2002) and did not affect their present counter-terrorism
abilities one iota....and your repeating what I already said in my post don't change anything about the 65 million cut from an already bloated fund that
had an excess of 2 future years appropriations (180 million in excess)....that had nothing to do with the FBI's own spending...it was money sent aside for state use in 2002, not for the on-going needs of the FBI.....
There were reductions proposed in 14 programs (FOR THE YEAR 2002)...14 programs, NONE of which had anything to do with FBI counter-terrorism efforts....
You spinning and throwing shit on the wall hoping something will stick ain't gonna cut it.....your claims are wrong and tantamount to a lie by mis-characterizing what
the cuts were really about...the fact that the budget in question was for the following year and had nothing to do with 9/11 or the year 2001 at all....
Your conclusion that terrorism was a lower priority is the lefty spin.....everything the FBI does, whether its border protection, communications monitoring, or dozens or
other programs under dozens of other titles, can be and are a part of counter-terrorism while still being for the public safety in general....things don't have to be spelled out as if talking to 3rd graders.....the DOJ and FBI certainly have discretion in how their budget is allocated...but by all means, do keep digging.
Maineman:
Clinton on a war footing ?.....Rubbish....the draft dodger wouldn't know a war footing if one stepped on his dick.....
Clintons eyes, just like Bush, were on terrorism from overseas.....hijacking of air liners flying to the US....US ships.....embassy's....etc....
Don't ignore that the fact the the 9/11 terrorists entered the US under Clintons watch...for a full year.....and by the time of this infamous 'memo' and
the phony Ashcroft proposed cuts....ALL THE TERROISTS WERE ON US SOIL.....and the attack was days away....
Just as you grab onto the title of the PDB for your accusations is mis-leading ....
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and General Richard Myers have actually read the body of the PDB and in spite of the 'title'....testified under oath the the CIA's PDB did not warn the President of a specific new threat but "contained historical information based on old reporting"....
But of course, the title alone is enough for your narrow-minded, far left, partisan purposes....
Last edited:
Dixie - In Memoriam
New member
Yes, all of a sudden... after 3,000 innocent Americans died on US soil in the worst terrorist attack in US history. All you are doing, and have been doing all along, is trying to apply some rational cause for action and alarm, retroactively. Why didn't Obama find something to charge the Boston bomber for while he had him in custody? See, I can ask the same kind of retroactive questions. Why didn't Clinton send in SEAL Team 6 to Sudan, instead of bombing an aspirin factory? If Clinton was so diligently fighting terrorists, how did the 9/11 hijackers manage to get into the country in 2000, before Bush was elected?
This thread is not about Bush or Clinton, or what they did or didn't do. It's about Obama and how the left does not hold the man to the same standards as Bush. "Asleep at the switch" became a mantra from the left regarding Bush, it never was applied to Clinton, because 3,000 people hadn't died in a domestic terror act. When that happened, you retroactively applied emotion to what happened before. Suddenly, the 8/6 PDB became this "red flag" that Bush should have done something about, but you've never really said what he should have done with a memo. It's no different than the FBI questioning someone with ties to terrorism, and releasing them. You can't take action if there is no criminal activity, if no law has been broken. The 8/6 PDB didn't specify a name, or indicate any persons, it was nothing more than intelligence gathering... by the same intelligence agency who said it was a slam dunk that Saddam had WMDs, by the way.
We can ALWAYS go back retroactively, and apply emotional sentiment, asking why oh why wasn't something done? But presidents are not born with telepathy and they don't have crystal balls. Our Constitution doesn't allow the president to round up suspicious people on US soil, based on their religion, and hold them without charge. There was nothing Bush could have done to prevent 9/11 from happening, just like there was nothing Obama could have done to prevent the Boston bombings.
For about the past decade, we have debated what to do about radical Islamic terrorism. YOUR side has taken the position that we shouldn't combat terrorists abroad, we should be isolationists and mind our own business, or maybe try to "talk to" the terrorists, find out why they are so angry, and see if we can fix their problems. We're asked to be tolerant of their radicalized religion, and every action that has been taken to mitigate the threat, has been met with resistance and protest. What's making them mad is us being in the middle east, so we have to withdraw our presence from there... since 2008, we've steadily been doing this, so why were we attacked again? Obama gave a speech in Egypt and told them all we want to be their friends, things were supposed to all come together and he was going to resolve the issues which divide us, but that hasn't happened at all. Now, here you come, with this notion that Democrat presidents Clinton and Obama, have done MORE to combat terrorism than Bush, who was "asleep at the switch." But still... 200+ people are maimed for life and 3 are dead, because of the actions of a man who Obama once had in his custody and released. Asleep at the switch?
maineman
Banned
I can vividly recall Dixie whining that Clinton did not do enough after the AQ attacks on American installations and interests overseas.... but here, he tells us that it was only after 9/11 that George W. Bush even declared war on terrorism....
and somehow that was perfectly acceptable to Dixie THEN....
odd.
and somehow that was perfectly acceptable to Dixie THEN....
odd.
maineman
Banned
and again...Nova.... I am not suggesting that, if Asscroft had NOT submitted the budget he did the day before 9/11, somehow 9/11 would magically not have happened. I AM saying that the evidence is there that, BEFORE 9/11, the Bush administration had de-emphasized the priority of anti-terrorism and had de-emphasized the position of diligence concerning OBL and AQ that the previous administration had had. I understand that, prior to 9/11, they thought that star wars was a more important priority. I even understand that Asscroft was more worried about the insidious creep of pornography in America than he was about a bunch of ragheads half a world away. I realize that Rummy was more worried about what country was going to get the next nuke and the delivery system to launch it than he was about some arab extremist group whose apparent main target was Israel and not us. I understand all that... I just understand that it was the wrong thing to de-prioritize anti-terrorism... it was the wrong thing to not restart predator drone flights tracking OBL when the winter winds died down in the spring of 2001... it was the wrong thing to demote Clarke and to not heed his warnings... and nobody on the right has ever taken Dubya to task for those wrong moves... in fact, to this day, nearly all righties on the internet defend them as the right moves. I find that odd. As a democrat, I certainly felt that Johnson's response to the Tonkin Gulf incident was wrong and continued to hold that position until this day. In juxtaposition, I find nothing about Obama's actions concerning Boston that would indicate any inaction or misguided action in any way.
maineman
Banned
Patently ridiculous and wrong... and illustrative of the inherent continued willful ignorance of the right on this issue. A few points:
radical islamic terrorism IS indeed our enemy. There is no evidence, even today, that the Boston attack was carried out by radical islamic terrorists, and if it does come out at some point that the older brother had somehow become radicalized, it was a recent phenomenon and nothing that any rational individual can claim that the Obama administration, who interviewed the brother at the request of the Russian government and found no evidence of any such a connection, should be blamed for those actions in Boston in any way.
radical extreme islamic fundamentalists have been our sworn enemies since the late 1990's and CERTAINLY since 9/11. They should have always been the focus of our military and intelligence efforts. Secular pan-arab baathists have not been our sworn enemies... until we stupidly invaded their country, that is.
I am all for taking the fight to islamic extremists any way we can... with drones, with cruise missiles, with the insertion of trained teams of killers, with intelligence, with financial sanctions... with EVERY tool at our disposal. I firmly believe that once a muslim has been radicalized, you can't bring him back to the crowd of sane muslims with some intervention or group therapy.... the only answer for him is a bullet or a bomb or a rope.
We do know, however, what makes radical islamists mad at America... it is our continued presence in the middle east and our continued support for not only Israel but for the oppressive kingdoms in the gulf. It is NOT, as Dubya tried to tell us, because they "hate us for our freedoms". If we quit propping up the Saudi royalty for oil and quit propping up the state of Israel, we would not be seen by islamic extremists as enemies worthy of fighting - we'd be out of their hair... Of course, we're not about to do either of those things, so we need to continue to focus our attentions on our true enemies and not get distracted AGAIN and start a war with someone else who is not a radical islamic extremist.
Two goofballs who used to live in Chechnya explode a pressure cooker in Boston and kill three people. Would Dixie want our response to be an invasion of Russia?
So you finally admit the Ashcroft, so-called cuts, is a bogus issue....thanks.....that was the whole issue of the thread, not which president put
a greater emphasis on counter-terrorism before 9/11.....the is pure and utter opinion....their was no "war of terror" during the Clinton admin.
Almost all of the terror war was off US soil....its was hijacking of air lines in the UK or foreign embassy bombings or US Naval ships and the like....very limited in scope and
little the US could do in a foreign country to combat it....except in our own embassys....like Obama just experienced, but failed so miserably at....
If the Islamic terrorist had a little more skill and luck, it just might have been Clinton watching the wtc collapse in 1993....then you'd have to whine about GB 1
because you clowns have a phobia with blaming everyone else for bad events on your watch.
Before 9/11/2001, OBL was nothing.....the Democrats ranted and raved more about Saddam and WMD in those years more than anything, or have you conveniently
forgotten that too....it was a daily occurrence,....Saddam, wmd, Saddam, wmd, over and over.....not OBL....
Even after the Cloe bombing, Clinton never mentioned AQ or OBL as being responsible.....the masterminds behind the Cole bombing were caught by Bush and
sent to Gitmo in 2002-03...
Your recollections of history are selective like most lefties....only emphasizing what can be used to ridicule Bush or apologize for Clinton and Obama or shift blame
to anyone but Democrats........
christiefan915
Catalyst
Here's our legacy courtesy of your Saviour.
With two wars and an economy in shambles, it’s not hard to get the feeling that something’s gone terribly wrong here in Washington. “We’ll look back on this period as one of the most destructive in our public life,” Thomas Mann of the Brookings Institution told us in a recent interview. He’s not alone. Public opinion pollsters give this president the lowest marks for job performance of any administration since they started polling.
How bad is it? The Center for Public Integrity set out to document just how off-track things have gone. We assigned a team of 13 reporters to sift through hundreds of GAO assessments, inspectors general reports, congressional investigations, and news stories. The team also interviewed dozens of experts and sent e-mails to nearly 5,000 federal employees to solicit nominations for this project.
The results surprised even us.
From 250 suggested failures, our editors narrowed the list to half, focusing on those that attracted bipartisan criticism and had major impacts on the lives of ordinary Americans. We’re calling this our Broken Government project, and it reveals an extraordinary record of failure: eight years of poor oversight, lack of accountability, and a government based on ideology not competence.
Many of the failures will be familiar to you, but the breadth and depth of them all just might surprise you, too. For more on the project, check out our Broken Government project. For now, here’s a sampling of what we found — 40 ways in which the executive branch of the U.S. government failed to perform from 2001-2008:
• 45 million Americans without health care
• 60 percent of EPA scientists report political interference with their work
• 1,273 whistleblower complaints filed from 2002-2008; 1,256 were dismissed
• 190,000 U.S.-supplied weapons missing in Iraq
• $212.3 million in overcharges by Halliburton for Iraq oil reconstruction work
• $455 billion deficit for fiscal year 2008; estimated to reach up to $1 trillion in 2009
• $9.91 billion for government secrecy in 2007 — a record
• 809 government laptops with sensitive information lost by FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives
• 30 million pounds of beef recalled in 2007
• $300 billion over budget for Department of Defense weapons acquisitions
• Less than 3 percent of U.S. electricity needs met by alternative energy
• 2,145 troops killed and 21,000 injured in Iraq from March 2003 through November 1, 2008, by IEDs (improvised explosive devices) and other explosives — many while awaiting body armor. Additionally, tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed in the conflict
• 34.8 percent of oil used in America imported during Nixon administration; 42.2 percent during first Gulf War; 59.9 percent in 2006
• $100 million for failed FBI computer network
• $100 billion in federal tax revenues lost annually to corporations using off-shore tax shelters
• 163 million airline passengers delayed 320 million hours; cost to U.S. economy: more than $41 billion in 2007
• $60 billion stolen in Medicare fraud each year
• 2.5 million toxic toys recalled in summer of 2007
• $12.5 billion for defective National Polar-Orbiting Environmental Satellite System
• $4 billion to upgrade National Security Agency computers that often crash, have trouble talking to each other, and lose key intelligence
• 60,000 flights made by 46 Southwest Airline jets in violation of FAA safety directives due to lax FAA enforcement
• 12.8 percent job turnover at Department of Homeland Security in 2006 — double that of any other cabinet-level agency
• 730,000 backlogged patent applications
• 148,000 troops not enough to secure Iraq, enabling insurgency to take root
• $1 billion, six-year “Reading First” program called ineffective by Department of Education Inspector General
• 20,000 U.S. deaths annually from lack of pollution controls on diesel vehicles and power plants
• 60,000 newborns a year at risk for neurological problems due to mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants
• Two-thirds fewer clean ups of EPA Superfund toxic waste sites during 2001-2006 than in previous six years
• 935 demonstrably false statements in lead-up to Iraq war by President Bush and seven members of his administration
• At least $500 million for FEMA trailers contaminated by formaldehyde occupied by thousands displaced after Hurricane Katrina
• 558 detainees at Guantanamo detention facility reduced to 255 after court-ordered case reviews
• 26 percent of corporations holding at least $250 million in assets audited in 2006; percent audited in 1990: more than 70 percent. IRS audit staff slashed by 30 percent
• $431.5 billion spent on Medicare in 2007, double amount in 2001
• 47 dead in mining accidents in 2006 blamed on lax oversight
• $9 billion in federal oil and gas royalties mismanaged by agency linked to drug-and-sex scandal
• 275 largest U.S. corporations pay, on average, about 17 percent in taxes in 2007, half the standard corporate tax rate
• $45 trillion in credit-default swaps, without federal oversight, in 2007
• 760,800 disability claims backlogged, awaiting hearings at Social Security Administration as of October 2008
• 806,000 Veterans Affairs disability claims in 2006, up 39 percent since 2000; backlog reached 400,000 claims by February 2007
• 2,640 days Osama bin Laden at large since September 11, 2001 (as of December 10, 2008)
http://www.publicintegrity.org/2008/12/10/2997/numbers
christiefan915
Catalyst
christiefan915
Catalyst
Hoo boy, didn't take long, did it!
Well, as long as you don't forget that I've schooled you on this issue at least.....lol....
I'll show you the Demo. rants about Saddam and WMD that went on for years, before and even after 9/11.....maybe you can
show us the Demo. rants on AQ and OBL during that period in return......
no, you can't, because there was none.....OBL was a non issue until the Demo. led commission after 9/11 put the 'cover your ass' program in high gear to
shield Clinton from any incompetence that was sure to come to light....and it worked pretty well, after all, you bought it hook, line and sinker....as did
most of the weasels on this site.....