Blair Blue Blog

Imagine, if you will, an administration using fear to defend our country from terror.  It sounds like something that might have been written by the late, great, Rod Serling.  Of course Serling, would have had a more interesting cast, than the likes of George Bush Donald Rumsfeld, Rick Santorum and Bill Shuster.  The plot, however; is still thick with kind of twists and ironies that would have made the smoking host of the proto-type Sci-Fi anthology show, feel right at home.

Consider this latest British Airline plot; NBC is reporting that there were “significant disagreements” between US and UK officials as to when to move in on the suspects.  It was the US officials, according to NBC sources, who insisted that Scotland Yard move in when they did.

My question is “Why”?  It’s not like the British haven’t been a reliable ally in the Global War on Terror, often, they have been our only ally.  It’s not as if the Brits don’t know a thing or two about terrorists, they’ve only been dealing with the IRA for about 300 years.  Why push them to move sooner then they thought prudent?  Could it be Politics?

The First Secretary of Homeland Security, Former Pennsylvania Governor, Tom Ridge, has recently been critical of the Bush Admistration for politicizing terror.  MSNBC’s Keith Olberman recently counted down the “Top Ten” instances when changes in political circumstances that would have been bad for the administration, have been followed by “Upgrades in the Terror Alert Level”, the most egregious of these are the “Alert Upgrades” that came conveniently on the heels of the Democratic National Convention that formally nominated John Kerry for President.

Olberman’s piece on “Countdown” lists 8 other instances where politics was going bad for the GOP and then two or three days later a new terror threat is announced.

So what happens this past week? Ned Lamont, an avowed anti-war Democrat wins the Connecticut Primary defeating Bush ally Joe Lieberman and a couple of days later, a terror plot is discovered. 

The truth is that Scotland Yard had been watching these alleged plotters for months and had the situation well in hand.  The British wanted to wait until they had undeniable proof of wrong doing but pressure from the US forced their hand. 

As a results of the insistence by the Bush administration that these alleged plotters be rounded up now, may very well be the reason that British courts may be forced to charge them with only minor crimes or let them go all together.

In what can only be described as a Serlingesque twist of fate, it seems that the very people screaming about National Security are the ones making Americans unsafe.  Rod Serling would feel right at home.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 16th, 2006 at 11:10 am and is filed under Issues. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.