How 'Historic'

[desdemona]

Just How 'Historic' Can an Oval Office Interview Be if It's Not Recorded?

By ALESSANDRA STANLEY

Published: April 30, 2004

If an important meeting takes place in the Oval Office and there are no television cameras to record it, did the meeting matter?

ABC, NBC and CBS all led their evening news programs with the Sept. 11 commission's meeting with President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney yesterday. Yet no television news program had images of the encounter. A paranoid conspiracy theorist could conclude that the much-anticipated White House interview never took place.

There were no pictures of Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney sitting side by side in front of the Oval Office fireplace. There was no tape of the president or Mr. Cheney greeting or talking to commission members at the White House entrance.

read more:

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/30/politics/30WATC.html

[slum_goddess]

A paranoid conspiracy theorist could conclude that the much-anticipated White House interview never took place

like the moon landing?

*ducks*

seriously, i can't understand why people aren't protesting & demanding proof/more info...last night i watched JFK (only seen it 50+ times--you can say i'm obsessed but that's another story :P). anyway, a lot of what's talked about in the film on government secrecy holds true today. then again, i learnt people are very different depending where you are e.g., some of what's classified in some USA circles, as 'hippie protesters' is the norm over here.

[DudeAsInCool]

There were no pictures of Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney sitting side by side in front of the Oval Office fireplace.

Thank God - I've seen enuff photo ops to last me a lifetime. Seriously, a subject5 matter this important should obviously be recorded... but secrecy is the name of the game inside the Bush White House

[CTC Command]

The "historic record" is that Bush refused to have this meeting openly. Future historians will not be surprised by this.

[desdemona]

yeah but this administration just denies access to everything, they call this historic but there's no record of it, go figure. NOT that I wanted to see the president stumbling around for answers and that stupid grin on his face, but what is he so afraid of divulging?

[CTC Command]

what is he so afraid of devulging?

What you and I already strongly suspect--that this administration was so preoccupied with giving huge tax breaks to corporations, turining back progressive reform from BC to TR and trying to come up with an excuse to invade Iraq that they missed all the cues to prevent the greatest lapse of security in American history.

Either that, and more sinisterly, that by allowing some sort of terrorist attack get through it would provide both a smokescreen for their corrupt activities like the enron case, and give them cart blanche to proceed with things like the Patriot Act and the inavasion of Iraq, which without some pretext like 9/11 no one would have swallowed. The activities of Ashcroft and Cheney in the days immediately before 9/11 lend credence to the suspicion they had an idea, though they probably didn't expect the attacks to be as severe. They probably figured it would be something smaller, similar to the attack on the USS Cole.

Keep in mind that less than two weeks before the attacks, W was STILL ON VACATION, a vaction that, if had been one day longer, would have been the longest on US history. As it was he merely tied what had been his father's singular achievement...

[desdemona]

how sad, that after all the sacrifice men have made in previous wars we can allow this kind of presidency that promotes secrecy and a personal agenda. It seems watergate was a lesser offense than what has taken place behind the scenes now, and that was pursued more aggressively and without restraint. I'm not a subscriber to conspiracy theories but the president's lack of astuteness and his allocation of decision making to his likeminded cabinet is nothing less than negligence. It amazes me how polls can still show the election as being close, but then they're not counting those thousands of americans that don't vote :(

[CTC Command]

Of course, everything after "either that" falls in to the realm of conspiracy theory and unless someone were dumb enough to commit such conversations to tape recordings, it is completely unprovable.

I have to agree with you. There seems to have been a fundamental shift in this country, and how much of it is attributable to parroting the pro-conservative mass media (almost entirely under corporate control now) and how much is a genuine internalization of conservative ideals vis-a-vis economic aspirations and involvement with fundamentalist religion it is hard to say.

But you have hit the problem square on the head--apathy is the biggest problem in this country. The people who care one way or the other are registered and will vote. What needs to happen is a groundswell of voter registration much like what happened with Southern blacks 40 years ago. But it doesn't look like anyone is taking the initiative--all the money Soros and others are throwing at Kerry's campaign could be better used shifting the demographic of unregistered voters...

[slum_goddess]

There seems to have been a fundamental shift in this country...apathy is the biggest problem...all the money Soros and others are throwing at Kerry's campaign could be better used shifting the demographic of unregistered voters...

totally agree w/you there. i'm hoping something gets through to people before gwb is told his ass stays in the whitehouse in november.

[Kooperman]

Apparently Bush is still playing the "Blame Clinton" card, which is used daily by this administration for all things which go wrong.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/...-632009,00.html