Jump to content

I've made US safer, says Bush..


KiwiCoromandel

Recommended Posts

THE US President, George Bush, has accelerated an election-year debate over his leadership in the "war on terror", saying he has made his country safer and the US may be fighting terrorists for years to come.

But the former president Bill Clinton has accused him of using the reported plot to blow up planes flying between Britain and the US for political purposes and questioned Mr Bush's national security priorities.

In Britain another man was arrested over last week's foiled plot. The arrest in the Thames Valley, London, on Tuesday takes the number of people held to 24, all of them British born.

Pakistani authorities said that early this month they detained a man "apparently related" to a British suspect in the alleged plot. They said his arrest led to the arrest a few days later of Rashid Rauf, a British national.

Also in Pakistan, an intelligence official claimed an al-Qaeda leader based in Afghanistan was the mastermind of the plot. The official told reporters that the man was comparable in importance with Abu Faraj al-Libbi, a Libyan said to have been a high-ranking al-Qaeda official, arrested in Pakistan in May 2005.

As the bomb plot investigation continues, US politicians are beginning campaigns with control of Congress at stake.

At the last two elections Republicans persuaded voters they do a better job fighting terrorism, but polls now show a sharp turnaround in this perception.

The White House believes the London plot allegations are a chance to remind voters of the continuing danger from terrorism, while Democrats see an opportunity to argue that the Iraq war has distracted from the hunt for al-Qaeda.

"America is safer than it has been. But it's not yet safe," Mr Bush said, while trumpeting his accomplishments at America's National Counterterrorism Centre. "The enemy has got an advantage when it comes to attacking our homeland. They've got to be right one time, and we've got to be right 100 per cent of the time."

Mr Clinton, who generally refrains from criticising Mr Bush by name, said Republicans have been "trying to play politics" with the London arrests. "They seem to be anxious to tie it to al-Qaeda," he told America's ABC News. "If that's true, how come we've got seven times as many troops in Iraq as in Afghanistan?"

The Senate Democratic leader, Harry Reid, said Mr Bush had not done enough to keep the US safe. "Five years after 9/11, al-Qaeda has morphed into a global franchise operation, terror attacks have increased sharply across the world and the President has shut down the program designed to catch Osama bin Laden," he said.

The Vice-President, Dick Cheney, accused Democrats of "defeatism", citing the victory of the anti-war candidate Ned Lamont over Joseph Lieberman in a Senate primary last week.

While the President insists the country is safer, the public remains split. A Newsweek poll found 50 per cent of Americans believed they were safer from terrorism today than before September 11, 2001, while 47 per cent said they were no safer.

source:The Washington Post, Associated Press

image:teppismo.org/..America are we safe Yet?..

post-193-1155774287_thumb.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Bush strongly defends policy in Iraq.....

LANCASTER, Pennsylvania - President George W. Bush has strongly defended his Iraq war policy against Democratic demands to bring US troops home and warned that if America leaves Iraq could become a country controlled by terrorists willing to use oil as a weapon.

"Leaving before we complete our mission would create a terrorist state in the heart of the Middle East, a country with HUGE OIL RESERVES that the terrorist network would be willing to use to extract economic pain from those of us who believe in freedom," Bush said.

In a campaign speech for former National Football League star Lynn Swann, the Republican candidate for governor of Pennsylvania, Bush appeared to be addressing those Democrats who are trying to turn the November congressional elections into a referendum on his handling of the Iraq war.

He did not specifically mention Democrats. But Democratic congressional leaders last month urged Bush to start pulling out US troops from Iraq this year while not specifying a time frame for completing the withdrawal.

Bush's popularity ratings are near the lowest of his presidency due largely to dissatisfaction over Iraq.

It was his first stump speech of the fall congressional election, Bush showed how he plans to reject Democrats who consider the Iraq war a failed policy.

"They want us to cut and run and there are some good people in our country who believe we should cut and run. They are not bad people when they say that, they are decent people, I just happen to believe they are wrong," Bush said. "This would be a defeat for the United States in a key battleground in the global war on terror."

His voice rising with emotion, Bush added: "If we were to leave before the mission is complete, it would hurt US credibility. Who would want to stand with the United States of America if we didn't complete the mission in a mission that can be completed, and will be completed?"

"If we leave before the mission is complete, if we withdraw, the enemy will follow us home," he said.

The Bush administration has reacted to the Democrats' election of Ned Lamont, an anti-war candidate who defeated incumbent Democratic Sen. Joe Lieberman in the Connecticut primary a week ago, by portraying Democrats as soft on terrorism.

Bush also said the terror plot in Britain that led to arrests a week ago was similar to al Qaeda activities in the past but he was reluctant to blame it on the extremist group, saying only that "it's the kind of activities that al Qaeda has done in the past."

"And so we've got to use new tactics, new efforts, new assets to protect ourselves against an enemy that will strike us at any moment. This war on terror is more than just chasing down people hiding in caves or preventing people from getting on airplanes to blow them up," he said.

In Pennsylvania for Swann's uphill campaign to unseat Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell, Bush first toured a Harley-Davidson plant where he admired the craftsmanship of the quintessential American motorcycles.

source:REUTERS

post-193-1155850174.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Judge orders Bush to halt wiretapping surveillance.....

A federal judge has ordered the Bush administration to halt the National Security Agency's program of domestic eavesdropping, saying it violated the US Constitution.

The ruling marked a setback for the Bush administration, which has defended the program as an essential tool in its war on terrorism.

US District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor said the warrantless wiretapping under the "Terrorist Surveillance Program" violated free speech rights, protections against unreasonable searches and the constitutional check on the power of the presidency.

"There are no hereditary kings in America and no powers not created by the Constitution," Taylor said in a 44-page ruling.

The NSA program has been widely criticized by civil rights activists and raised concern among lawmakers, including some in President George W. Bush's own Republican Party, who say the president may have overstepped his powers by authorizing it.

The government had asked for the lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union to be thrown out, arguing that any court action on the case would jeopardize secrets in the war on terrorism.

The Justice Department had no immediate comment. The ACLU said it expected the Bush administration to seek an immediate stay on the federal court order pending an appeal before the 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals.

"We think the program is unconstitutional and we are hopeful and confident that any district or appellate court who looks at it seriously will agree with that," said ACLU attorney Jameel Jaffer.

Bush authorized the NSA program after the September 11 attacks on the United States, and it became public last year.

The program allows the government to eavesdrop on the international phone calls and emails of US citizens without obtaining a warrant, if those wiretaps are made to track suspected al Qaeda operatives.

But Taylor ruled that by skirting the process of obtaining warrants, the Bush administration had violated the terms of a 1978 surveillance law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA.

FISA requires warrants for individual eavesdropping on suspects inside the United States.

Taylor said the government's arguments in support of the program appeared to imply that Bush's role as commander in chief of the US armed forces gave him "the inherent power to violate not only the laws of the Congress but the First and Fourth Amendments of the Constitution itself."

Civil rights activists welcomed the decision.

"The ruling of the judge is not only a victory for the American Muslim community but a victory for the entire American population," said Dawud Walid, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations for Michigan, which joined the ACLU as a plaintiff in the lawsuit.

"America is built on the principles of civil liberty and equal protection for all American citizens, regardless of ethnicity and race," he said.

The ACLU lawsuit was filed on behalf of scholars, attorneys, journalists and non-profit groups that regularly communicate with people in the Middle East and believe that their phone calls and email had been intercepted by the US government.

A similar suit brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights is pending in federal court in New York. The judge in that case is set to hear arguments on September 5.

source:REUTERS

post-193-1155850279.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

ANOTHER AMAZING DISGRACE

Bush to dead soldier's mom: "How do you know his life would have been good?"

Dolores Kesterson meets the president.

By Jeff Norman

August 11, 2005

Cindy Sheehan is not the only Gold Star mom who felt disrespected after a visit with George W. Bush. Dolores Kesterson, whose son Erik was killed in Iraq in November of 2003, was among several military families who last year were invited to meet with Bush as a group. Each family was allotted ten minutes with the president, but because she is divorced from her husband, Dolores asked to speak with Bush one-on-one.

Dolores reports exclusively for U.S. Tour of Duty that she waited alone in a small partitioned area, wondering if her request would be granted, before a Bush aide suddenly announced, "The president will now see you." As the commander in chief strode briskly toward her, it seemed to Dolores that he was trying to intimidate her. "He came marching in and got right in my face...eyeball to eyeball, and said, 'I'm George Bush, the president of the United States, and I understand you have something to say to me in private.'"

Dolores tried to give Bush a sense of what type of person Erik had been. She described her son as a "comedian" whose favorite saying was, "Life is good." The president replied, "How do you know his life would have been good?"

Dolores was shocked by Bush's eagerness to question the value of her son's life. She told the president, "Nobody wants to die."

Before he concluded their meeting, Bush proclaimed to Dolores, "We won't know in our lifetime whether or not Iraq was a success."

Source

But we already know that Bush is a failure as a President in this lifetime

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Our picks

    • Wait, Burning Man is going online-only? What does that even look like?
      You could have been forgiven for missing the announcement that actual physical Burning Man has been canceled for this year, if not next. Firstly, the nonprofit Burning Man organization, known affectionately to insiders as the Borg, posted it after 5 p.m. PT Friday. That, even in the COVID-19 era, is the traditional time to push out news when you don't want much media attention. 
      But secondly, you may have missed its cancellation because the Borg is being careful not to use the C-word. The announcement was neutrally titled "The Burning Man Multiverse in 2020." Even as it offers refunds to early ticket buyers, considers layoffs and other belt-tightening measures, and can't even commit to a physical event in 2021, the Borg is making lemonade by focusing on an online-only version of Black Rock City this coming August.    Read more...
      More about Burning Man, Tech, Web Culture, and Live EventsView the full article
      • 0 replies
    • Post in What Are You Listening To?
      Post in What Are You Listening To?
    • Post in What Are You Listening To?
      Post in What Are You Listening To?
    • Post in What Are You Listening To?
      Post in What Are You Listening To?
    • Post in What Are You Listening To?
      Post in What Are You Listening To?
×
×
  • Create New...