Ridge backpedals on pressure to raise terror alert level

Link only due to copyright issues:

www.usatoday.com...

This guy cannot make up his mind.

I wonder who's threatening him...

He CLEARLY DID suggest in his book that they could be playing politics and messing with the election and the nation's security...

From his book:

"Ashcroft strongly urged an increase in the threat level, and was supported by Rumsfeld," he writes. "There was absolutely no support for that position within our department. None. I wondered, 'Is this about security or politics?' "

And now?

Security secretary Tom Ridge ... says he did not mean to suggest that other top Bush administration officials were playing politics with the nation's security before the 2004 presidential election.

But he certainly does suggest that in his book...

reply to post by mabus325

This guy cannot make up his mind.

No he probably got threats to retract his statement OR ELSE and he had every reason to be afraid, VERY afraid.

“Confessions of an Economic Hit Man”


Perkins writes, "The book was to be dedicated to the presidents of two countries, men who had been his clients whom I respected and thought of as kindred spirits – Jaime Rolds, president of Ecuador, and Omar Torrijos, president of Panama. Both had just died in fiery crashes. Their deaths were not accidental. They were assassinated because they opposed that fraternity of corporate, government, and banking heads whose goal is global empire. We Economic Hit Men failed to bring Rolds and Torrijos around, and the other type of hit men, the CIA-sanctioned jackals who were always right behind us, stepped in.”

The "fraternity of corporate, government, and banking heads whose goal is global empire” is certainly not representing the American people, but an elite intent on a worldwide empire with them at the helm. www.lewrockwell.com...

The Bush family,... the Saudi royals....—and other rich and influential Saudi families [Khashoggi ] were naturally drawn to one another as they share similar ideologies and goals: the “new world order” which is to be governed and controlled by a small ruling class elite, That is, the “Brotherhood”. In the 1960s, and certainly by the 1970s, they were all doing business together.

However, in the case of the Saudis, that new world order will be a world-wide Islamic state, governed according to Sunni Wahhabi interpretations of Islam (15). Although that goal is not shared by the Bush-Wall Street-corporate elite, the Bush team and the Saudis are nevertheless willing to work closely together, to increase their wealth and their power, and to combat and eliminate common enemies and competitors for world domination . Indeed, due in part to Saudi efforts, since the 1980s, Islam has become the fastest growing religion among Latinos in the Americas .... Bush business partner and friend, Adnan Khashoggi, a Saudi billionaire oil and arms trader, admitted in a television-interview, that he funneled $5 million dollars to help finance arms shipments to the Contras who were terrorizing Nicaragua. In addition, the Sultan of Brunei — the richest man in the world — pitched in another $10 million. Let us recall that Saudi billionaire, Adnan Khashoggi, was providing millions of dollars to support the Contras, as was the Sultan of Brunei, and the royal family of Saudi King Fahd . brainmind.com...

reply to post by Benevolent Heretic

He CLEARLY DID suggest in his book that they could be playing politics and messing with the election and the nation's security...

There is nothing clear about any of it. He suggested in his book that maybe it was about politics, but it doesn't matter because they didn't raise the threat level before the election. Not to mention there were reason to be worried, especially since it was the first election since 9/11.

Once again, the media MANUFACTURED a scandal out of this that Ridge never intended.

reply to post by Benevolent Heretic


Source: kdka.com...


here's an exchange in 2008

He writes: "I wondered, 'Is this about security or politics?'"

This new contention directly refutes what Ridge told KDKA-TV's Ken Rice in an interview in June of 2008.

Rice: "Was there ever pressure to raise the alert level for some reason that had nothing to do with the actual threats out there?"

Ridge: "Never."

Rice: "Never even a hint of that?"

Ridge: "Never. It's a great question though."

Ridge went on to point out that he didn't have authority to raise the alert level alone and that decision had to be a consensus of the president's Homeland Security Council, including the heads of the departments of State, Defense and Justice and the FBI and CIA.

But for an issue that was quickly dismissed when raised a year ago, Ridge now writes that he was so disturbed by what happened in 2004, it reinforced his decision to resign from the Bush administration.