Friday, September 11, 2009

CNN Feeds On America’s Fear Syndrome

So, yes, the Coast Guard held a training exercise in the Potomac River, and they held it on September 11th.

No one noticed until CNN reporter Elaine Quijano reported on it and asked White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs what was happening out on the river. And Gibbs came unglued.

Said Gibbs of the reporting:

“Let’s understand that best I can tell there was reporting based on listening to a police scanner that was not verified, and then it was on television and now we’ve raced back to find out that it’s a training exercise. So I think it appears as if a lot of this might have been avoided.”

I’ll say.

Yes, it is 8 years since 4 planes were hijacked and 3 of them were driven into buildings occupied by Americans and other nationalities. But I just have to say stop it now.

Apparently all the terrorists have to do is to eventually attack us on every day of the year so that we will be prevented from carrying out any training exercise at all for fear that someone is going to create a mess in their drawers.

And I put the blame for this unprecedented propensity to fear anything out of the ordinary squarely on the previous administration. They made a game of inciting fear in Americans. Former Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge so much as admitted to it in his recently released book, The Test of Our Times: America Under Siege...and How We Can Be Safe Again. Americans need to move on and stop cringing at their own shadows.

And the media needs to lead the way.

CNN is completely out of line in their complaints that the Coast Guard was wrong to schedule a training exercise on September 11th. Again, who else noticed?

But no. And now the Republicans, ironically the ones responsible for the whole fiasco beginning when they ignored a NIE that claimed that Osama bin Laden was bent on wreaking havoc on American soil, are jumping on the bandwagon shaking their fists in the air at this careless and heartless Department of Homeland Security.

“Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) is calling on Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to explain the timing of the exercise, which occurred while top officials were attending memorial services for Sept. 11. Homeland Security oversees the Coast Guard.

“‘The anxiety caused by this situation on such a solemn day is extremely disturbing,’ said Voinovich, a member of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. ‘It sounds very much like the left hand didn’t know what the right hand was doing.’”

All I can say, is this: George, none of this would have been an issue had your guys not fanned the flames of fear year after year.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

This afternoon when I got out the bread to make me a sandwich, I discovered the bread was molded.

Guess it was the Bush administration' fault.

Hal said...

No Anon, as anyone around these parts will tell you, the fault apparently lies in your own hygiene practices.

Fenway Fran said...

It's a sad day when CNN out-foxes FOX. And to think how much I loved CNN International when I was overseas. A mere dark shadow of their former selves, as I watch favorite reporters leave for Public Broadcasting and other more reputable sources. Gibbs is showing some stuff here! Back at ya, CNN.

Anonymous said...

I am becoming more and more disappointed with CNN. I prefer MSNBC and PBS whenever I want to get reliable news without the hype, gossip, concentration on distractions that are not worthy of media attention and to use Obama’s phrase as I notice some are doing, “ratcheting up” distractions of nothingness that are not worthy of media attention.

I do not enjoy Campbell Brown or Don Lemon. Campbell Brown tries to twist everything to her point of view negatively, incorrect, and gossipy—in other words, she ends up having a conversation with herself—asking and answering her own questions. Don Lemon is too timid to ask the hard qiuestions and if he manages to get a few through, he backs away and apologies for having asked them in the first place; he is such a wuss. Like last evening for instance, I was sickened by the manner in which Don Lemon boot-licked the far right winger out of Florida who started the flap about the President’s speech to school children.

Lou Dobbs claims he’s an Independent, but I cannot tell—he seems like a Right Winger to me. Wolf, well, Wolf seems to try and twist things his way also—always trying to find a way to slip in something to some sensationalism. John tries to be a Russ—and ask tough questions in a way to solicit the true response—but, he cannot because he, tries too hard and is not skilled enough to quite deliver; then, he ends up putting his own gossipy spin and dead, wrong interpretations on the answers once the guest gives the correct and/or true answer. That’s the problem; they seem to be always looking for an opportunity to sensationalize everything rather than simply seeking the truth.

That all I want. Just the true facts, please.