The First Draft: mixing politics and national security?
Mixing politics with national security? Maybe under Obama, but not under Bush. Well, not exactly.
That summarizes Tom Ridge in an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America.” Former President George W. Bush’s first homeland security secretary took on the Obama administration’s controversial review of Bush-era interrogations and his own published worries about politics and the threat of terrorism.
Ridge was asked what he made of former Vice President Dick Cheney’s public assault against the decision by U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to name a special prosecutor to look deeper into harsh Bush-era interrogations of captured terrorism suspects including accused Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who was waterboarded 183 times.
“I think he’s right, pure and simple,” Ridge told ABC.
In fact, the former Republican governor of Pennsylvania suggested the Justice Department investigation should itself be outlawed.
“To go back and investigate — criminally investigate — what these men were asked to do believing at the time that they were empowered to do it and it was consistent with the law, I think it’s wrong. It’s chilling and it’s inappropriate,” he said.
“To suggest four or five years later that what they did was criminal, I think that’s criminal,” Ridge said.
Ridge says he was pushed to raise terror alert before election
The nation’s first Homeland Security secretary is airing some dirty laundry from the Bush administration: He says he was pushed to raise the terror alert level on the eve of the 2004 presidential election.
The level was never raised but Tom Ridge reveals how threats of terrorism were used to influence voters in his upcoming book ”The Test of Our Times: America Under Siege … and How We Can Be Safe Again”.
According to the promotion material released by the book’s publisher, Ridge said the DHS was pressured to connect homeland security to the international “war on terror”. He also said he effectively thwarted a plan to raise the alert level before the 2004 election, which Bush won.
Several other Bush administration officials disagree with Ridge’s characterization. Former Homeland Security adviser Frances Fragos Townsend called it “way off base”. She said there was a debate about raising the alert level at that time but politics were never discussed at that meeting.
Politico quotes former White House chief of staff Andy Card saying the Bush administration was very disciplined in its efforts to make sure politics did not influence national security decisions.
So were politics involved? What do you think?
eric h ,the impression that i have, when it comes to full disclosure,the democrats just want to cherry pick what should be disclosed. Cheney has not tried to object to any files only that the total story is revealed including the ones that justified their successes. The latest witch hunt, will cover material that has already been involved in a full investigation on a none partisan basis.Not good enough for the democrats they what to use some one who is sympathetic to them. What happened to the case against the armed black panthers stopping people being able to vote? something else you want to over look?
Specter gains chairmanship, loses potential foe
Senator Arlen Specter, who has had some rocky times since switching from the Republican to Democratic party last week, had a really good day on Thursday.
Specter gained some power — the chairmanship of a Senate subcommittee — and lost a potential and powerful reelection foe, former Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge.
“After careful consideration and many conversations with friends and family and the leadership of my party, I have decided not to seek the Republican nomination for Senate,” Ridge said in a statement.
Earlier on Thursday, Senate Democrats, who had stripped Specter of committee seniority this week, turned around and gave him the chairmanship of a Judiciary subcommittee on crime and drugs.
“I want Senator Specter to feel welcome in our caucus,” said Assistant Senate Majority Leader Dick Durbin, the Democrat who surrendered the chairmanship to make way for Specter.
“It is something I’d like to do,” Specter said.
Specter riled members of both parties last week in becoming the chamber’s newest Democrat.
Senator Arlen Specter will need to convince Democrats that he jumped ship mainly out of real conviction and not for convenience. If he does that convincingly, there is a bright future for him. More and more Republicans are disillusioned with the GOP and may jolly well decide to switch allegiance. The Democrats will have to be prudent before accepting Republicans into their rank and file: their credentials and intentions will have to be vetted very closely. President Obama has shown smart leadership and Republicans are beginning to realise that their political party is like a rudderless ship. Obama is calling all the shots as America grows from strength to strength.
